2 Kings 6. I want to begin in
verse 18 of 2 Kings 6. A couple of men pointed out to
me after Sunday school last week that this is a real type of the
gospel and I hadn't seen it as clearly. And I started looking
at it this week and it is indeed a beautiful picture of the gospel. Verse 18, and when they came
down to him, Elisha prayed unto the Lord and said, smite this
people I pray thee. with blindness. And he smote
them with blindness according to the word of Elisha. And Elisha
said unto them, this is not the way, neither is this the city.
Follow me and I will bring you to the man whom you seek. But
he led them to Samaria. That's the place where the king
of Israel was. And it came to pass, When they were come into
Samaria, that Elisha said, Lord, open the eyes of these men that
they may see. And the Lord opened their eyes
and they saw and behold, they were in the midst of Samaria,
a place where they were totally vulnerable and could not win. Verse 21, and the king of Israel
said unto Elisha when he saw them, my father, shall I smite
them? Shall I smite them? That's what
he wanted to do. He wanted to put them all to death. And he
answered, thou shalt not smite them. Wouldst thou smite those
whom thou hast taken captive with thy sword and with thy bow?
Set bread and water before them that they may eat and drink and
go to their master. And he prepared great provision
for them. And when they had eaten and drunk,
he sent them away and they went to their master. So the bands
of Syria, the marauders that would invade the land, came no
more into the land of Israel. Let's pray. Lord, we ask in Christ's name
that you would be pleased to meet with us. Lord, we ask that you would speak
in power from your word to our hearts. We ask that your grace might
indeed reign in us. That you would make us believers. That you would make us followers
of thy son. that you would give us a greater
love to your person, a greater understanding of your gospel,
a greater love to your son, a greater love to one another. Lord, we
confess our sins and pray for forgiveness and cleansing. Lord,
how we need you. We ask that you would bless us,
those of us that are going through trials. Lord, bless them for
your glory. And Lord, give us the grace to
give thanks for all things. Be with all your people, wherever
they meet together, be with our friends that are traveling, keep
them by your grace. In Christ's name we pray, amen. Elisha means God is salvation. That's the meaning of his name.
And we're going to see his name in action in this story that
we're looking at. Now, maybe you remember from
last week, let's begin in verse 8. Then the king of Syria warred
against Israel and took counsel with his servants, saying, in
such and such a place shall be my camp. And the man of God,
Elisha, sent to the king of Israel saying, beware that thou pass
not such a place for the Syrians are come down. And the king of
Israel sent to the place which the man of God told him and warned
him of and saved himself there not once or twice. Every time
he would try to raid, he would be stopped because Elisha would
warn the king of Israel where these men were encamped in order
to ambush them. Therefore, verse 11, the heart
of the king of Syria was troubled for this thing. And he called
his servants and said unto them, will you show me which of us
is for the king of Israel, which one is ratting on us and, and,
um, letting the king of Israel know who, who is, um, where we're
at. And one of his servants said,
none, my Lord, O king, but Elisha, the prophet that's in Israel,
telleth the king of Israel, the words that thou speakest in thy
bedchamber. And he said, go and spy where he is, that I may send
him and fetch him. And it was told him, saying,
behold, he's in Dothan. Therefore send he thither horses
and chariots and a great host. And they came by night and compassed
the city about. And when the servant of the man
of God was risen up early and gone forth, behold, and host
compassed the city, both with horses and chariots and a servant,
and said unto him, alas, my master, how shall we do? And he answered,
fear not. He wasn't a bit afraid of this
army. I would to God that that would be our attitude constantly. Fear not. How come? For they that be with us are
more than they which be with them. If God be for us, who can
be against us? And Elisha prayed and said, Lord,
I pray thee, open his eyes that he may see. And the Lord opened
the eyes of the young man and he saw and behold, the mountain
was full of horses and chariots of fire round about Elisha. Child of God, it's always that
way with you, whether you see it or not. It's always that way
with you. Now let's pick up. And when they
came down to him, Elisha prayed unto the Lord and said, smite
this people, I pray thee, with blindness. And he smote them
with blindness according to the word of the Lord. Now, when the
Lord intends on saving a man, the first thing he does in their
experience is he smites them with blindness. Now, what in
the world does that mean? Well, first turn to John chapter
9. Hold your finger there. John 9, verse 39, the Lord says,
For judgment I am coming to this world that they which see not
might see, and they which see might be made blind. And some of the Pharisees which
were with him heard these words and said unto him, Are we blind
also? Jesus said unto them, if you were blind, you should have
no sin. But now you say, we see. Therefore,
your sin remaineth. Now what is this thing of being
made blind? It happens to every one of God's
people when he saves them. They're made blind. What's the
first thing that happened to Paul on the road to Damascus? He was
struck with blindness. Now what is this thing of being
blind? When you're blind, you can't see any reason why God
would have anything to do with you. That's what blindness means. You can't find one reason in
yourself as to why God would look in favor or grace or mercy
toward you. All those objections about the
fairness of God, for choosing some and passing by others, all
those objections about Christ dying only for the elect, and
God the Holy Spirit only giving life to those the father elected
and the son died for, all the arguments against that, why that's
not fair, he's not treating everybody right. Those disappear when you're
blind, because you know at least in your case, fair for you is
hell. You believe that. Now that blind
person Struck with blindness, just like
these men. And I love to think of these
blind men following Elijah. That's kind of a sight to think
of. I've tried to picture that in my mind. I can't see how they
fall. Well, I know this. All they could do is hear the
voice. Kind of sounds like faith in Christ, doesn't it? You're
in the blind. All you can do is follow his
voice. And here they go, blind, blinded,
and Elisha leads them into the camp of Samaria and they're in
a place where they're completely vulnerable, but Elisha was doing
this for purposes of mercy. Now he could have killed them
all. I mean, they're blind. They couldn't protect themselves.
He brings them right into Samaria, the place where they were most
vulnerable. They were in the midst of Samaria. All of Israel
could have just looking at him there and could have killed him.
But his purpose was purposes of mercy, as we shall see. So here they are, verse 18. And they came down to him, Elisha
prayed unto the Lord and said, smite this people, I pray thee,
with blindness. And he smote them with blindness
according to the word of Elisha. And Elisha said unto them, this
is not the way, neither is this the city, follow me. and I'll
bring you to the man whom you seek. But he led them to Samaria. And it came to pass when they
were coming to Samaria that Elisha said, Lord, open the eyes of
these men that they may see. Now they're brought into a place
where they couldn't win the battle. They were brought into a place
of complete helplessness. And then he says, open their
eyes that they may see. Now, when God saves a man, first
he blinds him, and then he opens his eyes that he may see. I see, right now while I'm talking
to you, I see how God can save me utterly for Christ's sake. I see how God has made a way
to be just and justify me. I now see, I see. There was a
time when I didn't. But I had to first be brought
to the place where I couldn't see any reason why God would
have anything to do with me. And when I'm blinded, then all
of a sudden, he gives me sight to see the gospel. Now, when
their eyes are opened, they are in the midst of Samaria, and
they see they're in this completely vulnerable position. They can't
protect themselves. Verse 21, and the king of Israel,
this is Jeroboam. Now, he wasn't a good king. He
was a bad king. Elisha didn't like him. He was nothing but
trouble. But here he is the law without the gospel. Here these
people are, shall I smite them? He wanted to kill them. He wanted
to put them to death. That was his great desire to
put these people to death. Shall I smite them? That's what
he wanted to do. And that's what the law says.
And then here is this amazing answer. Elisha answered, thou
shalt not smite them. Wouldst thou smite those whom
thou hast taken captive with thy sword and with thy bow? Set
bread and water before them that they may eat and drink and go
to their master. Give them provision and set them
free so they can go back to their master. Now these were their
enemies, but he makes them friends. He makes them friends. He provides
for them and he sets them free. Look in verse 23, and he prepared
great provision for thee. They had a feast. Here they're
brought into Samaria and they're given a feast, a banquet, great
provision, more than they imagined. And what took place? So they
went to their master, he sent them away, he set them free,
and they went to their master, they went back to Syria. So the
bands of Syria came no more into the land of Israel. First, great
provision. Jehovah Jireh, God will provide. Now all that God requires of
the sinner, he provides. Now that's the point of this
great provision. I need to be in God's presence
accepted, I need perfect righteousness. God will accept no less. God
provides that perfect righteousness in the person of his son. I need
something done about my sin and there's nothing I can do about
it. I can't make it go away. I can't stop sinning. I need
something done about my sin. He provides that with the sacrifice
of his son. All sin put away. He's, he's provided everything
I need. I need a new heart. I can't believe. I can't repent. I can't love.
I need a new heart. I need him to give me a heart
that I don't have. He provides that heart. I need
faith. I can't come up with faith. He
gives the faith. Faith is the gift of his grace.
I need repentance. I need a true change of mind.
He provides it. Everything he requires of me,
everything he requires of me, he provides. I need to persevere
in the faith. He preserves me. Now that's that
great provision, the great provision of the gospel. What a banquet
that these people, they come in totally vulnerable, expecting
probably to be put to death, and the opposite takes place.
They're given great provision. And then what do you do next?
He sets them free. Go back to your master, do what
you want. They are set free. The Lord is that spirit, and
where the spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty. There is freedom. These people
have been set free. Now, what is it to be free? It's
basically two things. Number one, it's to not owe anything. I hope some of you have experienced
paying off a debt. Isn't it liberating when you
don't owe anything? Now, that's freedom. If you have
a debt, it's over. You can't really feel free. But
if you're debt-free, oh, what a blessing. And freedom is getting
to do what you want to do. That's freedom. Not doing what
you get in trouble if you don't do it, but getting to do what
you want to do. There was a missionary, some of you remember him, Bill
Clark. And he made this statement. And I think it's a great statement.
And I've had, I've heard, I've had preachers say, no, that's
not a good statement. Yeah, it is. Trust Christ and do what
you want to. Trust Christ and do what you
want to. You're free. Do what you want
to. You see, when God saves somebody,
he changes their want to. And they still have a bad want
to, and you'd be remiss to deny that. You still have a bad want
to, but you've got another want to too. You want to be just like
Christ. You want to not sin anymore. You want to be perfectly conformed
to his image. So he sets these people free. And what took place as a result
of him setting them free? They didn't come back in bands
in Israel to raid anymore. They weren't told not to. They
didn't want to. They didn't want to. They had
been set free. You see, the strength of sin
is what? The law. In every relationship,
put somebody under law, how are they going to respond? Not good. If I put a line in
the sand and say, don't put your toe past that line, what do you
want to do? You want to put your toe past that line. I'm not going
to listen to that guy. And law with regard to God. All it does is stir up rebellion.
All it does is stir up enmity. There's nothing wrong with the
law. The law is holy and just and good. Problems with us. Paul
said, I had not known sin except the law had said thou shalt not
covet. And as soon as that came in power to my mind, thou shalt
not covet. What did I do? Coveted like crazy. That's all I, don't covet. What
happens? Don't have one impure thought. That's what the law does. The
strength of sin is the law. But look what took place. I love
this. He prepared, verse 23, he prepared great provision for
them, the provision of the gospel. When they had eaten and drunk,
he sent them away and they went to their master. So the bands
of Israel came no more, or the bands of Syria came no more into
the land of Israel. I'd like you to turn for just
a moment to 2 Corinthians 8. Now, the point I want to try
to make is the law doesn't work. Grace works. By grace are you
saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. That faith,
it's not of yourselves. It wasn't the product of something
you came up with. It's the gift of God, not of
works, lest any man should boast. Now look here in 2 Corinthians
chapter 8, verse 1. Moreover, brethren, we do you
to wit, we want you to know of the grace of God bestowed on
the churches of Macedonia. He said, I want to show you what
grace looks like with these churches. This will let you know what the
grace of God looks like when you see how it was bestowed on
the churches of Macedonia. How that in a great trial of
affliction, the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty. You know, there's he's talking about
the poverty of financial poverty, but he's also talking about spiritual
poverty, because only where there's spiritual poverty, when you're
poor in spirit, will you really know anything about joy? What
do I mean by that? When you have nothing, You have
Christ is all, and you don't want anything else. Let's go
on reading. Having a great trial of affliction,
the abundance of their joy and their deep poverty abounded unto
the riches of their liberality. That could be translated simplicity,
that could be translated generosity, and here that's what he's talking
about as we go on reading. For to their power, I bear record,
these churches of Macedonia that God bestowed his grace on, yea,
and beyond their power, they were willing, get that, willing,
of themselves, not by being pressed, not by being given law, not by
being given rules and regulations, this is what you've got to do,
they were willing of themselves, praying us with much entreaty,
that we would receive the gift and take upon us the fellowship
of the ministering to the saints. And this they did, not as we
hoped, but first gave their own selves to the Lord and to us
by the will of God. Now that's what grace did. It
made them give their own selves. May the Lord enable me to do
that. If I've never done that, may I do it right now. Give myself
to the Lord and to us by the will of God
insomuch, verse six, that we desired Titus that as he'd begun,
so he would also finish in you the same grace also. Therefore, as you abound in everything,
in faith and utterance and knowledge and in all diligence and your
love to us, see that you abound in this grace also. He's talking about giving. I
speak not by commandment, I'm not giving you a commandment,
but by occasion of the forwardness of others, and to prove the sincerity
of your love, for you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,
that though he was rich. Who can describe the riches of
the Lord Jesus Christ? It'd be impossible. Though he was rich, Yet for your
sakes, your sakes, put your name in
there, that he had you on his heart. If you're a believer,
he had you individually on his heart. For your sakes, he became
poor, that you through his poverty might be rich. Now that's what
grace looks like. These people willingly gave themselves
to the Lord. Now, what do you do when you
do that? Well, let's begin right here.
We rely completely on Him. Nowhere else. We rely completely
on Him as our everything in salvation. Now, this was the effect. Shall
I smite him? No. Beat him. Set him free. And what effect did that have?
They no longer had any desire to come in and raid Israel. That's a beautiful picture of
the gospel, isn't it?