MY FAVORITES : # 1
I know you can't tell, cuz I have not been writing every day. It may seem like I have been dragging my feet about getting to this next section of the "Destroyed Cloak" series. But ~ NO! This is my favorite ... OK, with the notably exception of Jesus dying and being resurrected OF COURSE ... but other than that this is my favorite part of the WHOLE Bible. It is not my favorite for the theology. It is not my favorite for the literary excellence. It is my favorite because the miracles are so wild, and crazy and 'miracle-y'. In an earlier post I mentioned C. S. Lewis' concept that there are "miracles of the OLD creation, and miracles of the NEW creation." For example -- a miracle of the OLD creation would be when Jesus turned water into wine. Lewis notes that water is turned into wine every day : it is called fermentation. Jesus, as LORD of creation simply skipped the middle steps. A miracle of the NEW creation would be when Jesus after he had been resurrected was simply IN the room with the disciples and didn't need to use a door, or when Jesus walked on water. He says they foreshadow a new creation where there will be new laws and new ways of dealing with Creation, itself. Elisha seems to live like he has been given permission to live in that new creation. OK, all miracles are ... well ... miraculous. When someone is healed, when God in the Joshua story makes the sun stand still for about a whole day so Joshua would have time to win the battle (Joshua chapter 10), when waters of a river part so Elijah, and then Elisha (and before that Moses and the Israelites, and then Joshua and the Israelites) can walk across on dry land -- when we read those stories we are not confused: they are MIRACLE stories. They depict wonderful things that would NOT have happened without the intervention of God. For me the Elisha stories are totally different. OK read 2 Kings chapter 4 to chapter 8:6.
Chapter 4 begins a series of stories that are a vignette of the life of the company of the prophets. We are not "told" in a passage that explains with details and theology. The information about the company of the prophets must, as it were, be gleaned from the corners and scattered tidbits of other stories. 2 Kings 4 begins, "The wife of a man from the company of the prophets came to Elisha...". It seems that there was, when these books were first penned, such a common understanding that the prophets and their families all lived together in "companies" that no explanation is given.
This woman comes to Elisha to tell him that her husband has died. All she has to her name is one little pot of oil. They are in debt and her two sons are going to be made slaves to cover the debt. In that day, if you were in debt either you paid the debt or you became slave to the creditor to pay off the debt. This woman is in a desperate situation. I love that there is no chastising : Elisha DOESN'T say, "If your husband were a really godly man, he would have known better than to get into debt...." or anything preachy like that. He gives her this crazy instruction: Go borrow some empty vessels from your neighbors ~ as many as you can get. Go into your home and shut the doors behind you and your sons, . .that is, do this in secret. Pour oil from your little pot of oil into all the vessels. When all the vessels they could get were full, Elisha tells her to go sell the oil, pay off the debts and live off the profit that is left over. I wonder how she felt -- can't you see them? She starts with a small bowl, one, perhaps a bit bigger than her pot of oil. She pour gingerly -- it gets fuller, and fuller, and as her eyes widen, it is filled to the very brim. Checking inside her little pot, she sees that her pot of oil is still full. She looks at her sons. Smiles spread across their faces. Her oldest grabs a huge pitcher and she starts pouring. Bubbling laughter fills the room as they --'glug glug'-- fill pot after pitcher after bowl after cup until they are all full. Problem solved. I LOVE IT! Such a joyful answer -- such a picture for me of God's mercy.
Chapter 4 begins a series of stories that are a vignette of the life of the company of the prophets. We are not "told" in a passage that explains with details and theology. The information about the company of the prophets must, as it were, be gleaned from the corners and scattered tidbits of other stories. 2 Kings 4 begins, "The wife of a man from the company of the prophets came to Elisha...". It seems that there was, when these books were first penned, such a common understanding that the prophets and their families all lived together in "companies" that no explanation is given.
This woman comes to Elisha to tell him that her husband has died. All she has to her name is one little pot of oil. They are in debt and her two sons are going to be made slaves to cover the debt. In that day, if you were in debt either you paid the debt or you became slave to the creditor to pay off the debt. This woman is in a desperate situation. I love that there is no chastising : Elisha DOESN'T say, "If your husband were a really godly man, he would have known better than to get into debt...." or anything preachy like that. He gives her this crazy instruction: Go borrow some empty vessels from your neighbors ~ as many as you can get. Go into your home and shut the doors behind you and your sons, . .that is, do this in secret. Pour oil from your little pot of oil into all the vessels. When all the vessels they could get were full, Elisha tells her to go sell the oil, pay off the debts and live off the profit that is left over. I wonder how she felt -- can't you see them? She starts with a small bowl, one, perhaps a bit bigger than her pot of oil. She pour gingerly -- it gets fuller, and fuller, and as her eyes widen, it is filled to the very brim. Checking inside her little pot, she sees that her pot of oil is still full. She looks at her sons. Smiles spread across their faces. Her oldest grabs a huge pitcher and she starts pouring. Bubbling laughter fills the room as they --'glug glug'-- fill pot after pitcher after bowl after cup until they are all full. Problem solved. I LOVE IT! Such a joyful answer -- such a picture for me of God's mercy.
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