Elijah leaves Elisha

2nd Kings chapter 2 and verse 1. And it came to pass that the Lord would take up Elijah into heaven by a whirlwind that Elijah went with Elisha from Gilgal. Now notice the places, the four places that he visits with the senior prophet and the four places that he returns to visit after, after Elijah's got up. Very significant, there's much teaching in it.

I'm sure you're gonna pick up lots and I haven't. From Gilgal, verse 2. And Elijah said unto Elisha, tarry here I pray thee for the Lord has sent me to Bethel. And Elisha said unto him, as the Lord liveth and as thy soul liveth I will not leave thee.

So they went down to Bethel. And the sons of the prophets that were at Bethel came forth to Elisha and said unto him, knowest thou that the Lord will take away, and notice what they say, thy master from my head today. And he said, yea I know it, hold ye your peace.

And Elijah said unto him, Elisha, tarry here I pray thee for the Lord has sent me to Jericho. And he said as the Lord liveth, as thy soul liveth I will not leave thee. So they came to Jericho.

And the sons of the prophets that were at Jericho came to Elisha and said unto him, knowest thou that the Lord will take away the master from my head today. And he said, yea I know it, hold ye your peace. Elijah said unto him, again he says to him, tarry I pray thee for the Lord has sent me to Jordan.

And he said as the Lord liveth and as thy soul liveth I will not leave thee. And I think that's lovely. And they too went on.

We're reminded of that a little this morning with Abraham and Isaac from Brothers Shud after the breaking of bread. Verse 7, and fifty men of the sons of the prophets went and stood to view afar off. Notice, they don't get too close.

They just want to, you know, just watch it afar off. You know, falling mantles really weren't for them, not at this time. And they too stood by Jordan.

There we have the expression again, the two went on, and the two are standing. Elijah took his mantle and wrapped it together and smote the waters and they were divided hither and thither so that they too went over on dry ground. So three times you have that expression that came to pass when they were gone over that Elijah said to Elisha, ask what I shall do for thee before I be taken away from thee.

And Elisha said, I pray thee, let a double portion of thy spirit be upon me. And he said thou hast asked a hard thing. Nevertheless, if thou see me when I am taken from thee, it shall be so unto thee.

But if not, it shall not be so. And it came to pass as they still went on and talked that behold there appeared a chariot of fire and horses of fire and parted them both asunder. Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven and Elisha saw it and he cried, my father, my father.

Now that's significant what he cries, my father, my father, the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof. And he saw him no more and he took hold of his clothes and rent them in two pieces, took up the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and he went back and stood by the bank of Jordan. He took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and smote the waters and said, where is the Lord God of Elijah? And when he had also smitten the waters, they parted hither thither and Elisha went over.

Okay, now come down a little just for the sake of time, down please to verse number 18. And when they came again to him, he tarried at Jericho. Now this is Elisha, did I not say unto you, go not? The men of the city said to Elisha, behold, I pray thee, the situation of this city is pleasant as my Lord seeth, but the water is not.

The ground is barren. Something has happened. Now if you notice your margin, same likelihood as in mine, it says where it says the ground is barren, causing to miscarry.

Now up please to, well, reading verse 21, they went forth into the spring of waters and cast the salt in there and said, the Lord, I have healed these waters. There shall not be from thence anymore death or barren land. So the waters were healed unto this day, according to the saying of Elisha, which he spake.

And he went up from thence unto Bethel. And as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city. Now it's hard to believe that this is happening in Bethel of all places.

And they mocked him and they said unto him, go up thou bald head, go up thou bald head. Now I believe he was shaven. I don't believe that he'd lost his hair, but anyhow, verse 24, and he turned back and looked on them and cursed them and the name of the Lord.

And there came forth two she bears out of the wood and tear 40 of the two children of them. And he went from thence to Mount Carmel. And from thence he returned to Samaria.

And of course, Samaria is back where we were reading yesterday. When you're reading this chapter, there's something that comes before you and it's this, is why is it that Elijah seems so insistent that Elisha just doesn't need to follow him, just doesn't have to be with him? Is it a test? And maybe it was. And maybe it was something to test just the determination of this young man.

How quick would he really leave the older man? How quick would he flee? How quick would he come to an understanding? Hey, I understand it. You know how the young guys are today. You know, you try to tell them something and they say, what? Oh, they've already been there and done that.

They're way ahead of you. And that might be, but not this man. Now there's going to come a moment when they are going to part.

Now, the sons of the prophets start to play more and more in here. And really, they're not too much of a help. But it's interesting that when God is looking for his man, why didn't he go to the sons of the prophets? Wouldn't they have known things? Wouldn't they have been learned? Why not go to the sons of the prophets? Why pick out junior farmer, if you like? Plowing with twelve, yoke of oxen, and he with the least, he with the last.

You know what he was doing? He was following. What does God say concerning Jacob? Excuse me, concerning David? That I took thee from following the sheep go. In other words, a man that has learned to follow is a man that can learn to lead.

So on they go. So here's the sons of the prophets now. Something's going to take place and they know it.

But they're not going to get too close to it. You know, sometimes as they're like that, you know, okay, we just don't want to get involved. Count me out here.

You're going to have children's meetings. You're going to do this. You're going to just, no, no, no, not me.

Okay. You don't have your first conference. Well, that makes me nervous.

Well, it makes us all nervous. But they're going to stand up far off and they're going to watch. And you know what they'll do? They'll tell him everything that went wrong.

Notice what they say to the prophet. They say, knowest thou not that thy master shall be taken from thy head today? But when he is ascending and when he's going up, Elisha is not saying, my master, my master. What is he saying? My father, my father.

If you go back to first Kings chapter 19, the first time that he has met with the prophet and when the mantle is really tossed to him and brethren have been discussing this with me since speaking on it and they agree he must have taken it back because here it is again, it's going to now be passed to him. But notice what Elisha says. I must go home and kiss my father.

Now notice Elijah doesn't rebuke him for that. This is not Luke chapter nine, where somebody wants to follow the Lord Jesus and says, let me go bid farewell to them that are at my house and then I'll follow thee. This is not Luke chapter nine.

You know what happens, those of us that do gospel work, we know what happens when they go home. Home changes their mind. Too many times people concerned about salvation and being saved have gone home to talk it over and you didn't see them again.

Home talked them out of it. Here is a man that respected his home and he said to the prophet, let me go home and kiss my father. But notice that when the man, when now Elijah is ascending, what's he say? My father, my father.

I would suggest to you that someone that is going to serve God does not serve him as a legal guardian, does not serve him as a master. I know the teaching of the Lord Jesus, one is your master in heaven, but he's my father. Would I not do things for my father that I may not do for a master? So this man learns that there's a natural relationship that must be not abandoned, but it has to be superseded by a better relationship as the ascending man.

Now I've suggested to you these four places that it's significant that he goes with the senior man to these four places. Because when he visits them, you know what's going to happen? This prepared him for something he wasn't maybe been prepared for otherwise. These places had changed.

These places had changed. Now you can call me what you like. But brethren, there are changes around the country that I'm not happy with.

I'm sorry. There's likely changes in my own life that maybe you're not happy with. I know.

I hear the arguments. I hear it coming loud and clear. Oh, listen, we can't work the way we did this yesterday.

We can't do this and we can't do that. Says who? Just recently, not... I know I am very partial to the Maritimes, but we have proven that God does his work when the old ways of preaching the gospel, genuine repentance and faith in Christ, conviction of sin still works. Don't touch it.

Don't mess with it, brethren. We don't need better methods. We need just better men.

He goes back and I'm just going to go over these very quickly with you to stick to the time. These were tests in the life of this prophet as he had to get to know these places. And the only way that he would survive the changes that he would see was this, to live in the power of an ascended man.

No other way. No way that he could get home and discuss this. Who's going to discuss it with? Who is going to be his mentor now? The prophets are, sons of the prophets are basically saying, you're done.

Oh, is that so? A man that is going to see twice done what Elijah saw done? Oh, he's a totally different man than Elijah was. Well, they were contemporaries. They were totally different from each other.

But there's something he learned and it was this. It was the value and the fellowship of an older man. And I think those expressions are significant that I tried to emphasize as we read together that they went down, then they went on, then they went on.

You know, he never lost sight, never lost sight of an ascended man till even after he is dead. Remember what happens at his grave when the bones of this prophet are touched? Brings life. He'd be undead yet speaketh.

Reminds me I've got to, should be doing it while I'm here. He's got a rebuke to me because his widow was at our conference. And we're just having gospel meetings at home right now, three nights a week in a former church building.

I stepped off the bridge and left it with younger hands. They're doing all right. Pray for them.

But there's a young lady, an outsider coming to those meetings. And I'll tell you, it's a long time since I saw someone like that go through the soul trouble this dear soul went through. Poor Char.

Char Babineau is her name from Moncton. Going with a young man raised in the assembly. And we'd go and visit her.

She'd ask us to come to home. She'd sit there and cry. And you know, I'd give her every track I could find, what I'd written, what everybody else had written.

She'd read them. She's a receptionist at the hospital. She'd go there, put her screen up with the Bible, read her tracks when she wasn't working.

She came home. She put Peter Orszag's CD in and it broke her. And she, I still have her text.

She says, you know something, you've been preaching night after night. She said, Mr. Orszag, Mr. Ramsey was speaking to him before he got saved and says, Peter, it's a finished work. If you can't rest the night, you'll just have to go to hell.

That hit her. So it means that we're getting saved. I'm only too glad to write Mrs. Orszag's magazine and tell her that really God used the testimony of her departed husband, very good friend of mine, likely a man I've had more series with than anybody, in her salvation.

And this young woman's salvation. Wonderful when someone leaves and still their life is such a blessing that it reaches even into a coming generation. That is how this man died.

How do you want to die, brother? Not beat too hard on the sisters, brother. How do you want to die? Remember what it says of that king in the Old Testament? He died without being desired. Nobody cared.

Whether he was so miserable or so cantankerous, they were almost glad to see him go. Yeah, let me tell you, Mr. Hull could tell better than I could. He had left for meetings out here with Mr. Hunt, and I went to a funeral down in his former part of the country.

I'm sorry to tell you that I'll be careful what I'm saying because I know this is being recorded. She was a friend of mine. Her family are very good friends of mine.

And she had not been in the assembly, I'm sorry to say, for likely 40 years. It was a personal issue, a personal issue, nothing doctrinal. Her husband carried on.

However, even though she was not an assembly fellowship, people can say, you know, well, her brother made a mistake. And whether they did or whether they didn't, okay, let me tell you something. At her funeral, here's a woman that up till this year, still mailed out her calendar, still sent her tracts, still give cookies to everybody that came near.

You know that, Albert will tell you that. And I thought, why have they got this great big building for this funeral? My wife and I both went to it. If my figures are right, and I do not count ears, there are 390 people at that funeral.

I've been at funeral preachers that haven't been that big. 390 people at a funeral. Neighbors there coming to salute the testimony of a woman that hadn't been in the assembly fellowship for that many years.

Now, I'm not suggesting the way to find honor is to go that route. I sat there, I thought, what would it have been like if she stayed in the assembly? Such was the respect of a community, of an area. And she wasn't going out with these people and mixing with them.

She just showed them kindness. She spoke to them about Christ. She gave them her testimony.

And the family, for the most part, they're very, very commendable. This is big stuff, brethren and sisters. Anyhow, as we get on a little further here, the first place that he starts, you know where he starts? He starts with the old man left off.

Here's a man that finds himself, you know where he finds himself? On the wrong side of a Jordan. You'll never be much for God. I mean, I know I've heard those trying to defend the two-and-a-half tribes that would not settle on the western side of the Jordan, but that is Reuben, Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh.

God allowed them what they wanted. But they're the first to go into captivity. There's some commendable things about them, okay? But if you're going to be something for God to your brother today, to your sister, you've got to be on the right side of the Jordan.

Now, here he is, and he's on the wrong side of it, so he will take now this mantle, and the first time he's going to smite the waters, he says, where is the Lord God of Elijah? The Lord God of Elijah that took home his mentor, if you like, Elijah, whose mantle he had, and that power divided the waters. Let him go back. You know why? Well, how's he going to visit those four cities? He's going to come to a place called Gilgal.

Let me just give them to you, because I see some are taking notes down, and I somehow get speaking a little too fast. Gilgal, it was the place of virtue. We'll come back to it.

Bethel was the place of vision. Then they would go on, and they would visit Jericho, the place of victory. And Jordan, of course, was the place of values.

But we will come back to those, because I want to take them in a little different order. Gilgal, the place of virtue. Gilgal was the place, and I would write over Gilgal this, the place of short-term pain for long-term gain.

The place of the cutting off of the flesh. Whenever Israel was in difficulty, when she was in difficulty, where did God take her? Back to Gilgal. Back to Gilgal.

And so this is where we find this man going, the man that had received a double portion. So I asked myself the question, how far am I willing to go to get that? But when he gets back there, Gilgal has changed. Amos chapter 5, we read, tells us that Israel's transgressions were multiplied.

Verse 5, they were heading into captivity. It was a great place in history, where the reproach of Egypt was rolled away. But now Gilgal has changed, and Egypt is starting to come back in.

Not that Gilgal that it was, my man. Things have changed. Now where would this man be without the vision that he had seen? And keeping the eye on an ascended man.

In their history from Gilgal, they will march to conquer Canaan. Hosea chapter 9, speaking of Gilgal, things have changed. All their wickedness is in Gilgal.

What? What? You look around places today, we're thankful for testimonies that have been consistent powerhouse for God. Boy, it's not that way today. No, no.

No, we break bread in the morning. Now listen, I'm not putting down small assemblies that have changed the order of things, but come on, there's some of us can make an excuse. We break bread and then we have the children, then we speak a little in the gospel, then we go home, we have lunch, and then we go anywhere.

Anywhere. We don't give the Lord his day. I'll tell you this much, hope that never happens in stout.

I'm speaking that way only because I'm here. Hope it doesn't happen anywhere. Give him his day.

Gilgal has changed. What does he say, the prophets say? All their wickedness is in Gilgal. Think of earlier days when they had emerged from Gilgal, an unstoppable force.

When those people come forth from the cutting off of the flesh, nobody can stop them. Anybody can take them down. Notice how they weaken when the flesh is allowed to come in.

When it isn't cut off, notice how it weakened them. Next, the Bethel. Sons of the prophet, they come right to Bethel and they say, hey, he's going to leave you.

This happens right at Bethel. But Bethel had changed. Ah, Bethel, house of God.

It had changed. And what happens? Well, there's another generation now. Now the word children there, unfortunately, even though you know I'm a very, very strong authorized version, King James version if you want to know, uses the term children, Israeli young men.

What do they do? They come out to mock them. They say, go up, go up, go up. I'm not sure just about how he handled that situation and looking up at them and beginning to curse them.

But notice how Bethel, you'd go to them and say, where do you come from? Oh, we come from Bethel. Bethel? And you're acting like that? How do you act when you're away from home? Do they look at you and say, oh, you come from Stout? You come from Cedar Falls? Really? Waterloo? And the rest of the assemblies around? But it had changed. No longer is it the place of vision.

No longer is Gilgal a place of virtue. The flesh can come in, one way or the other. No longer is it a place of vision.

Bethel has lost its vision. Remember, the level to which you take the house down to will be the level to which it will remain until it goes further down. Very clear.

Because when you go to Genesis chapter 35, it's house of God. Bethel is house of God. But you only have to go a little further to Hosea, further in time.

And what do we read of it there? House of Bethhaven. House of Bethhaven. House of merchandise becomes a house of thieves in the days of the Lord Jesus.

Got the golden calf. Bethel has changed. They would never have had the calf years ago.

Imagine Jacob putting up a golden calf in Bethel, house of God. High places aren't taken away. Bethel eventually had the golden calf.

You'd have gone there earlier and told them that would happen. But here, we're Bethel. Does not that remind us of the warnings of the Lord as he searched amongst those lampstands and the revelation reminded them of a glory that had departed, of a day that was past? You can't live in those past days.

Whether it is Stout or anywhere else, you cannot live in those past days. We thank God for them. Those past days were not doing this man any help at all.

Here's a man raised for the occasion. If God wanted Elijah in this chapter, in this book, he would have had him here. But that day's past, it's Elisha now.

There's a new generation and it takes more than its rich history to preserve it. No wonder, again, John addresses them, the Lord does his little children. Here it says, young men.

All right, go to Jericho. Jericho is not only a place of virtue, Bethel is a place of vision. What are we going to say about Jericho? It's a place of victory.

Why, what a victory, Jericho. Tremendous victory, Jericho. But it has changed.

The ground is barren. The ground is starting to miscarry. You know what that means? Nobody's been saved for a long time.

But they were still going on. It wasn't bothering them. They were carrying on.

Yeah. Never asked themselves the question, well, you know, how come nobody's been saved here? The ground was miscarrying. Isn't that the language of the Psalmist? This is the 144th Psalm, where he longs that our sheep would bring forth in our streets, that there would be multiplicity, that there would be increase, and that there would be blessing, that there would be fruitfulness.

Not here in Jericho. The ground is beginning to miscarriage. Rachel said, give me children or I die.

God gave her a child. She died. I wonder sometimes, brothers and sisters, have we got to a point where we can just live without people getting saved? No, I know it's, understand, I work in the gospel.

I've worked here in this stout many times. God has been good to us here. I know we want to see blessing, and you want to see more blessing in these recent meetings.

But it is possible that we can live without it, that we're not to a point where we're that desperate that we'll cry out, give me children or I die. But what's the answer? The answer to this was salt. Salt.

What does the Lord Jesus say about salt? What does Paul write when he speaks of salt in the Colossian Epistle? Be at peace among yourselves. You cannot expect to see. I'm not saying that you don't.

God is sovereign. But if there isn't peace in that company, you can't expect God's blessing. I know, I know cases where, wow, it's taken me backward.

God has come in in spite of whatever, and he's blessed in salvation because he's sovereign. But I can't expect it. And Jericho is a changed place.

The salt. Remember, the salt brings out the flavor, not the faults. And so that's the 144th Psalm.

That our garners may be full, affording all manner of store. That our sheep may bring forth. There are thousands, there are ten thousands in our streets.

That our oxen may be strong to labor, that there be no breaking in or going out from amongst us. Nobody leave in the assembly. Wouldn't that be wonderful? Everybody gets saved.

They're in the assembly. Mr. Robert McElwain said a thing years ago, I never forgot it. I thought it was good.

He says that from one series, one salt was saved. And in the assembly until they died, our assemblies would be twice the size they are. Well, you do your math.

There might be some truth in that. But Jericho is changed. Why the ambition to destroy the traditional? Paul says, him will God destroy.

Hyle. Remember a man by the name of Hyle? Hyle was a Bethelite, which makes it even sadder. What's he do? He starts to rebuild something that was under the curse of God, a place called Jericho.

He starts to rebuild this city. What did God told him? That your sons will you bury if anybody rebuilds this city. Hyle flew right in the face of all that.

He says, I'll rebuild the city. And when he laid the foundation, he buried his first one. And when it was finished, he buried his second one.

Place of victory? Changed places in Jericho. Not a place of victory now. The Jordan.

Ah, Jordan was the place of values. That's where they learned values. A name and learned the truth of the Jordan.

But here's a man that discovered this when he got to the Jordan. That's possible to be on the wrong side of it. You know why God, I would suggest to you, my time is up.

Why God allowed those two and a half tribes to settle over there on the other side, Jordan, where he never wanted them to be. Let me suggest something to you. It'd be pretty hard to live on one side and your heart's on the other side.

Their heart. That's Deborah's song. What was wrong, she says with Reuben? It was the bleeding of the sheep.

There's something beckoning to him. And as a result of that, they'll just settle. Oh, wait a minute now.

Oh, yeah, they're God's people. They're God's people. You can't say a lot about them.

And don't be too judgmental. It'd be some of them over there that were better than you are and better than I am. But still, it did not make it right.

That was the place of Jordan. But they'd lost all that. Brethren, when I think of the two periods of times, the epochs of these two men, I would think of ourselves more in the days of an Elisha than the days of an Elijah.

But with this, we can be assured. With this, we can be assured. You keep your eye on an ascended man.

Let me quote what I quoted yesterday from the book of the Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1, they're looking steadfastly. They watched them go up, their eyes on an ascended man. Get to chapter 2, the people look steadfastly in chapter 1, live steadfastly in chapter 2. They continued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine, the breaking of bread, the prayers and the fellowship.

May God help us as we realize the days in which we live that we're not going around looking for things that are wrong and that this place isn't up to par and this place and we're suddenly the judge, not that at all. But let us maintain the character of a Bethel, house of God. Let us maintain the character of a Gilgal.

Let us maintain the character of a Jordan and what it was intended to be for his name's sake.