Bibles today to 2nd Kings. And reading through the historical
books of the Bible, we cannot help but see the goodness and
mercy of God as it is displayed on the very dark background of
the nation of Israel's sinfulness. This book of 2 Kings, it ends
with the destruction of Jerusalem and the nation of Judah being
taken into captivity. If you look in chapter 25, the
last chapter, 2nd Kings 25 and beginning with
verse 6 we read, So they, that is the armies of Nebuchadnezzar,
the Babylonians, they took the king and brought him up to the
king of Babylon to Riblah and they gave judgment upon him and
they slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes. The last thing
this king saw in this world was his sons being slain. And then they put out the eyes
of Zedekiah, bound him with fetters of brass, and carried him to
Babylon. The city of Jerusalem was taken
captive and destroyed. And in the fifth month, on the
seventh day of the month, which is in the 19th year of King Nebuchadnezzar,
king of Babylon, came Nebuchadnezzar, captain of the guard, a servant
of the king of Babylon, unto Jerusalem. And he burnt the house
of the Lord, and the king's house, and all the houses of Jerusalem,
and every great man's house burnt he with fire. and all the army
of the Chaldeans, Chaldees, that were with the captain of the
guard break down the walls of Jerusalem round about. Again, as I said, as you read
through these historical books, what we see is the goodness and
the mercy of God as it is displayed on this very dark background
of the nation of Israel's sinfulness Jeremiah, the prophet Jeremiah,
he lived during the time that Jerusalem was burned with fire
and King Zedekiah's eyes were put out. And he said this in
his prophecy, God said this really, my people have committed two
evils. This is the reason they were
destroyed, they were taken away. My people have committed two
evils. They have forsaken me the fountain
of living waters. That's number one. They have
forsaken me the fountain of living waters. And number two, they
have hewed out cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water. And what he meant by that, of
course, is they forsook the true and the living God and they turned
to idols, broken cisterns, which can hold no water. The Lord God
Almighty is the fountain from which every blessing flows. And
when you read through these books, the first reaction that we all
have, I think, is why? Why? Why would Israel do this
time after time after time? Why did they forsake God after
seeing the mighty hand of God displayed? Why would they forsake
God and turn to idols? But I say unto all of us here
this morning, better than for us to ask why about the nation
of Israel, we should look in the mirror and we should ask
ourselves why. Why is it that we turn so many
times away from the Lord, the fountain of living waters, the
blessed, the only blessed God, and the one from whom all blessings
flow? Why is it that we so many times
turn from Him to a broken cistern? You know, we see these miracles,
especially showing God's goodness and mercy during the ministry
of Elisha in 2 Kings. The greatest miracle, or the
miracle which is the best known, of course, is found in chapter
5, 2 Kings chapter 5. And the reason this is so well
known, Naaman, the leper, was cleansed. Our Lord used this
as an example when he preached his first message after he was
baptized, after he was tempted of Satan in the wilderness for
40 days. He returned to Nazareth, the
city in which he had been raised, went into the synagogue, And
they handed him the place, the book, and he read the place where
it is written, the spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he hath
anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor. Glad tidings to
the captives. And then, people were amazed. People were marveled when the
Lord Jesus Christ took the, here we have the living word, reading
the written word. And as he read, the people there,
They were amazed. They marveled at his speech,
at the words which he spoke, but then he made application.
And all of a sudden, they tried to kill him. And his application,
one of them was Naaman, the leper. The Lord Jesus Christ said, there
were many lepers in Israel in the days of Elisha, that is,
Elisha, but none of them were cleansed. But God cleansed a
Gentile, and that was just more than that group of people could
take. The sovereignty of God's grace. A person who has eyes to see
cannot fail to see, as you read through the Word of God. God
is sovereign in dispensing of His grace. He said, I will be
gracious to whom I will be gracious. And that's just so. And we see
that all through the Word of God. I was driving through a
parking lot this past week, and I had to stop for people to pass
in front of me. And I looked at those people,
and I could not help but wonder. I wonder how many of them, if
any of them, Know the Lord. Are you overwhelmed? If you know
Christ today, are you overwhelmed with the grace of God? That God
would be gracious to you, to me? He doesn't have to be, and
He isn't to everyone. He said, I will be gracious to
whom I will be gracious, and I will show mercy upon whom I
will show mercy. So then, it is not of him that
runneth, nor of him that willeth, but of God that showeth mercy. You know, Naaman, if you look
in 2 Kings 5, I said he's, the miracle of his cleansing is probably
the best known of all of these miracles. But you read in verse
1 how it begins, Now Naaman, captain of the host of the king
of Syria, was a great man with his master and honorable. Because by him the Lord had given
deliverance unto Syria, he was also a mighty man in valor. If
the world wrote the description of this man, it would say he
had it all. He had it all. He had everything
that most men seek for. He had power. He had authority. He had wealth. He had recognition. He had fame. He had everything
that most men and women spend their lifetime seeking after. But then we read, but he was
a leper. And that just cast a shadow over
everything else. He was a leper. And men seek
the things of this world, and many of them God allows to capture
those things, to have those things, to rise in power and prominence
and recognition and wealth and everything else that the flesh
naturally craves. But he was a leper. What about the sin problem? What
about that? That's the most important thing.
And so as we look today at this miracle in chapter 4, of the
all, God's goodness and mercy is demonstrated here in the case
of this miracle. And as we look at the miracle,
I want to speak to us about the miracle of salvation. The miracle
of salvation. Salvation is a miracle. If you're
saved today, you say, show me a miracle. If you're saved, you
are a miracle. I am a miracle. If you're saved,
if you know God, if you've been quickened by the Spirit of God
and given life and you believe and trust today in Jesus Christ,
you know God, you are a miracle. It's not to be taken lightly,
my friends. Let's look through this miracle
today. First, this miracle speaks of a widow. Notice it begins,
Now there cried a certain woman of the wives of the sons of the
prophets unto Elisha, saying, Thy servant, my husband, is dead,
and thou knowest that thy servant did fear the Lord. She was a
widow. And some of the things that were
true of this widow The object of this miracle is, first of
all, we see that her need of this miracle was the result of
the death of another. How did she become a widow? Well,
her husband died. That's how she became a widow
and had need of this miracle. In the book of Lamentations,
I mentioned the prophet Jeremiah just a moment ago. You know,
he wrote the Lamentations. And it is a lamentation, him
crying, Jeremiah the crying prophet. as he looked at Jerusalem, and
he saw the destruction that had come upon that nation because
of their sin. Remember, he said, Is there any
sorrow like unto my sorrow? Is it nothing to all you that
pass by? You see this city in destruction
and ruins, you see what God has done? Is it nothing to you? And we know that's a type, that's
a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ Himself upon the cross hanging
there dying and the world passing by. Is it nothing, is it nothing
to all you that pass by and see this sight, this spectacle, the
Son of God hanging on a tree being crucified? How can you
pass by, how can you see that and not stop and wonder, who
is this? What's happening here? No wonder
Isaac Watts wrote that great hymn, when I surveyed the wondrous
cross upon which the Prince of Glory died. My richest gains
I count but loss and poor contempt on all my pride. were the whole
realm of nature mine, that were a present far too small for love
so amazing and so divine. Jeremiah said this in the book
of Lamentations about Jerusalem. He said, how doth the city sit
solitary that was full of people? Now listen, how is she become
as a widow? as a widow. Remember, this was
in the day when there was no Social Security, there was no
relief funds for widows. She was a widow. She was in destitution. And she came to this place because
of the death of her husband. And secondly, we see that her
need of a miracle was even greater. Not just that she was a widow.
That showed that she was in need, in desolation. But her need is
demonstrated here even greater because she was in debt. You
know, many women, I'm sure when they became widows, at least
their husband did not leave them in debt. But this man, he left
his wife in debt. She was a widow, she was poor,
and more than just being poor, she was in debt. And it was a
debt that she could not pay. You know, they used to have debtors'
prisons. I'm thankful that somewhere back
in our history, they did away with those things, aren't you?
But how in the world, if a person couldn't pay his debt out of
prison, how could he pay it in prison? But they had debtors'
prisons. You'd go to prison for debt,
and you'd stay there till the debt was paid. This woman, who
is the object of this miracle, she was a widow, meaning that
she was poor, but even more than that, she was in debt. Now God's miracle of salvation
comes to those of us who are like this widow. How did we become poor? Adam,
our head, just as her head, her husband died, so our head, Adam,
our federal representative, he died just as the Lord told him
If you eat that, or in the day, not if, but in the day that you
eat that fruit, you will die. He disobeyed, and he died spiritually,
and because he represented us, we too, we all died spiritually
in Adam. Now, you say, well, that's not
fair. Well, take up your argument with
God. But let me say this, I'm so thankful
that I became a sinner through a representative. I am. Why? Because that means I can
be saved through a representative. And that's the only way I may
be saved. Yes, just as this woman became
a widow through the death of her head, so we too became sinners
by the death of our head, that is Adam. And the Apostle Paul,
he wrote it so clearly in Romans chapter 5 and verse 12, ìFor
by one man, one man, sin entered into the world. And so death
passed upon all men, for that all have sinned.î We come into
this world just like this widow was, poor, and then we increase
our We're born poor and we increase our debt. How do we increase
our debt? By sin. You know that verse in
Isaiah chapter 53 and verse 6, it says it like this. All, A-L-L,
all, all men, all we like sheep have gone astray, and then it
says we have turned every one to his own way. We were lost
in our head, became sinners through Adam's sin, but then when we
come into this world, we just go deeper in debt, deeper in
debt. We go astray from the womb, speaking
lies. And every sin that we commit
is against God. We owe a debt, just like this
widow. We're poor and we have a debt
that we owe. Now the second thing that we
see, this miracle speaks of a creditor. A creditor. She had a creditor. This debt was owed to somebody.
It wasn't just flying out there in the air somewhere. Someone
was her creditor. She was in debt to someone. And
her creditor demanded what was right. It was right. Whatever, however her husband
or herself involved too, I'm not sure about that, but however
they got into debt, it was right. It was right. It was just that
this man be paid. He demanded payment. And the
only thing that she had, she had two sons. And since she had
nothing with which to pay the creditor, he was coming and legally
had the right to take her two sons and make them his servants,
his slaves, put them into slavery. Now, when I hear that story and
when I repeat that story about this man, we all naturally think,
well, that man sure was mean. He sure was cruel. You'd think
at least he'd have mercy on a poor widow. Here she is in poverty,
in need, and the only thing she has that can possibly be of any
help to her are her two sons, and now he's going to take them.
He sure is mean. He sure is cruel. Let me tell
you something. There was no word of mercy in
this man's vocabulary. And the same thing is true about
God's law. This man said, and he said rightly,
Pay me what you owe. And that's what God's law says
to every person. Pay me. Pay me what you owe. And our Lord Jesus Christ, he
said this. A man came to him one day and
he said, Master, what's the first commandment? What's the greatest
commandment? And our Lord answered him, Thou
shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart. Now let that sink
in. Don't let that just fly over
your head. That's God's law. to you, to
me, to every son of Adam, to all of his creatures, thou shalt
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul,
and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment,
and the second is like unto it, thou shalt love thy neighbor
as thyself. That's God's law. And every time
we fail to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and love
our neighbor as ourself, we are increasing our debt until we
are head over heels in debt. And the creditor, the law of
God, says, pay me! You say, well, I'm going to cast
myself on the mercy of the law. The law doesn't know anything
about mercy. The law says, do. Pay me. Pay me what you owe. These are God's commandments
for all of his creatures. And the law, you can read through
the law as it's given in the books of Moses. You can read
through it and it will not speak of mercy to a sinner. It demands obedience. And there's
a penalty. You know, a law is no good if
there is not a penalty. I mean, up here in Austin, the
state legislators, they can pass laws, but I guarantee you, every
time they pass a law, they write a penalty. You do this, or here's
the penalty. And a law without a penalty,
why would anyone obey it? There has to be a penalty. And
I'm telling you, God has a penalty, and it's death. Pay me. Pay me. That's the penalty. Well, the third thing, this miracle
speaks of neighbors who could not help. When Elisha told her, when she
went to Elisha and she told him what her predicament was, and
he said, Well, what do you have? She said, Nothing. Nothing. Got a pot with some oil. Well,
he said, I want you to do this, or you do this. You borrow all
the vessels. And the only thing about these
vessels, make sure they're empty. But you just borrow all the empty
vessels. And listen, she had no trouble
borrowing vessels. Because, you see, there was a
dearth in the land. And not only was she poor, not
only was she broke, But all of her neighbors, they had vessels
to loan, empty vessels. They had them to loan. She had
no trouble. Her sons found plenty of vessels
to bring to her house. And this pictures to us the fact
that not only can we not pay our debt, but neither can any
of our friends and neighbors. We love our children. And we would do anything for
them. And sometimes they may get in debt, and we will do our
best to pay their debt financially. But I'm telling you, the debt
of sin, I don't care how much you love your children, you can't
pay it. How much you love your neighbor,
you can't pay it. No one. Not a neighbor, not a
church, not a priest, not a church ordinance, baptism, the Lord's
table. I don't care what men come up
with. Ceremonies, and oh my, men love ceremonies, don't they?
And they come up with all kinds. And they put on special dresses
and special hats. And they go through the ceremony. And they turn at the right time
and kiss the altar, so-called, and burn the incense. And they've
got ceremonies. But listen, they're just like
the neighbors of this widow. They could not help her. They,
too, had empty vessels. You know, one of the priests,
he was a high priest. Actually, Eli was his name. He
was a man who was a priest, remember, when Samuel was born. And Eli
had two sons who were wicked. You see, salvation is not passed
down from father to son through the blood. Scripture says, it's
not of him that, not of blood rather, not of the will of the
flesh, not of man, but of God. And Eli, he was a priest, a high
priest. He had two wicked sons. And he
told them this one day. He said, if one man sinned against
another, the judge shall judge him. But if a man sin against
the Lord, who shall entreat for him? Her neighbors could not
help her. They could loan her vessels.
They were empty vessels. They had plenty of them. They
didn't have anything either. Am I getting my point over? I
hope I am. But I want to emphasize the fact
if you look anywhere, I don't care who you are and I don't
care where you look, Your sin problem, your debt of sin is
so great and there's no one in this world, there's no organization,
there's no ceremony, there's no ritual, I don't care what
you look to, there's nothing in this world that can pay your
sin debt. This debt's going to have to
be paid. by a miracle. A miracle. And that's the fourth. This miracle speaks of the need
of the law being satisfied. You know, Elisha, later on in
2nd Kings, you remember he would pass by a certain way. And there
was a great woman, the Scripture says. And she observed Elisha
coming by. And she told her husband, she
said, that's a man of God. Let's build him a little lean-to
shack up on the side of the house so when he passes by, he can
turn in there and we'll put a table and a chair and a candle in there.
And Elisha would come by and he would stay there, spend the
night or whatever. And one day he said, how can
I help you? He wanted to do something in
return. He was grateful for her liberality. How can I do something
for you? And one of the things he says,
can I speak to the king for you? Can I speak to the king for you?
Can I put in a good word to the king for you? Elijah, he had
clout, in other words. The kings, they respected him. They knew he was a man of God,
that he, under his hand, God had worked miracles. When this
woman came to Elisha and said, the creditor's coming, Elisha
didn't say, well, I'll talk to him. I'll talk to him. And if he doesn't listen to me,
I'll talk to the king. I'll take care of that. No, Elisha
recognized that the creditor had to be satisfied. He had a right to be satisfied. And so she was told by Elisha,
you go and borrow as many vessels and pour oil out of your pot
into those vessels. And she had oil and the miracle
was that as she poured oil out of her pot, it was multiplied. It was multiplied in every vessel. And I like to think of vessels,
you know, they're vessels of honor. Paul speaks of in Romans
chapter 9, vessels of mercy and vessels of dishonor. That's what
every sinner is. We're a vessel. There's all kinds of bottles,
aren't there? There's some pretty bottles. There's some bottles
that have big mouths. There's some bottles that have
long necks. I mean, if we think of this as sinners, I mean, there's
all kinds of sinners that God saves, right? I can't pass over
that. I'm so thankful. Aren't you? He saves all kind. All kind. So her sons, they didn't
have any problem getting vessels, bringing them to her and She
began to pour, and as she poured, she poured, and poured, and finally
she told one of her sons, bring me another vessel. He said, that's
it, mom. There ain't no more. There's
no more. The miracle satisfied the creditor. That's the point. The law of
God must be satisfied. She owed a legitimate debt. And so the mercy that she received
having her debt paid was not at the expense of justice. Write
that down in your memory. Mercy is never expended at the
price of justice. Justice is going to be satisfied
because God is just. The question is, the riddle is,
how can God be just and justifier of the ungodly? How can this
creditor, he's just in demanding the debt be paid, but how can
it be paid? By a miracle. And that's the
incarnation of Christ, isn't it? Him coming into this world
as a man that he might suffer, bleed, and die in satisfying
God's justice. God's justice said, pay me. Pay
me what you owe. In Romans chapter four, the apostle
Paul said, being justified freely by his grace through and never
part, never part. through the redemption which
is in Christ Jesus. Now, there are two aspects in
redemption, and they're both set forth here in this miracle. In redemption, there's price.
There's a price paid and there is power. Now, the price is seen
in her selling the oil to pay the debt. And the power is seen
in the multiplication of the oil. We see that in the greatest
picture in the Old Testament of redemption. That is the nation
of Israel redeemed out of Egyptian bondage. There was a price paid,
the blood of the Lamb. There was power. demonstrated. God opened the Red Sea and brought
them out. And when they were on the other
side, they sang the song of the redeemed. You see what I'm saying? In redemption, you always have
these two things. You have the price and the power.
And in the salvation of a sinner, the redemption of a sinner, there's
a price and there's power. Christ is the blood of the Lord
Jesus Christ and the power is the new birth. The Spirit of
God quickening a man or woman, boy or girl who is spiritually
dead and giving them life. And what we see here, this is
not, in this case, because it is a picture and type of Christ
and his work of redemption. This wasn't a general redemption. You know, that's what the world
likes to talk about, isn't it? That's what so-called Christianity,
they love to talk about what they call a general redemption,
which actually is not a redemption at all. It's not a redemption
at all. Christ redeemed his people. The debt of this widow woman,
it was paid. And don't you love the way Elisha
said, sell, sell the oil and pay your debt and then live on
what's left. We are redeemed through the blood
of Jesus Christ. We're saved by his blood, his
redemption, and we live We live upon His redemption. Every day,
we live upon Christ and His redemption. The Good Shepherd gave His life
for the sheep. Now, here's the fifth thing,
and this is the last thing. This miracle speaks of that done
in private. Elisha told her, you go home,
borrow those vessels, and shut the door. Close the door. shut the door, and she did. And this miracle of salvation
is a private matter. It's something between God and
His chosen people. It's a matter of the heart. It's
not a matter of the body moving location. That's what we've been
raised on in this country. what is called decisional regeneration. Make your decision for Christ.
Come down to the front. Repeat the sinner's prayer. Salvation
is a private thing. God Almighty working in the heart
of His people. With the heart man believeth
unto righteousness, and with the mouth, salvation, or confession
is made unto salvation. It's a private matter. The Spirit
of God, our Lord said, it bloweth where it listeth, just like the
wind. You hear the sound thereof, but
you can't tell from where it came or where it's going. It
could be, could be, oh, I would that it were. And even in this service today,
the Spirit of God, unseen to those around, but God the Holy
Spirit is speaking to someone here, granting salvation, giving
salvation. The hymn writer said it like
this, I know not how the Spirit moves, convincing men of sin,
Revealing Jesus through the Word, creating faith in Him. I just
know it so. One old hymn we used to hear
quite a bit years ago was, It took a miracle to put the stars
in place. It took a miracle to hang the
world in space. But when He saved my soul, cleansed
and made me whole. It took a miracle of love and
grace." What a miracle. What a miracle
is salvation. I pray that the Lord will bless
this word to all of us here today.