Burn Your Plow - Part 2

February 9th 2025

Series: Days of Elisha

Topic Tags: Holy Spirit, Elisha, Faith, Calling

Sermon Title: Burn Your Plow – Part 2

Key Passages: 1 Kings 19: 19-21, Luke 5: 1-11

Sermon Blurb: In this message, we will learn not to fear God’s calling on our life and why we should burn our plan B.

Preacher: Grace – Erik EBENEEZER – Keith S. REDWOOD – Adam Grill

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Sermon

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Welcome back to week #2 of our character study in our Holy Spirit series on a guy named Elisha.

Open your Bibles and turn with me to

1 Kings 19

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PAUSE

Let’s re-read the story we are working through and then we will dive right in!

1 Kings 19:19-21

19 So Elijah went from there and found Elisha. He was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen, and he himself was driving the twelfth pair.

Elijah went up to him and threw his cloak around him.

20 Elisha then left his oxen and ran after Elijah. “Let me kiss my father and mother goodbye,” he said, “and then I will come with you.”

“Go back,” Elijah replied. “What have I done to you?”

21 So Elisha left him and went back. He took his yoke of oxen and slaughtered them.

He burned the plowing equipment to cook the meat and gave it to the people, and they ate.

Then he set out to follow Elijah and became his servant.

For those who are new today.

Elijah was the current prophet for God’s people.

He was told by God earlier in 1 Kings 19 to go anoint Elisha to succeed him as the prophet.

And as you can see in what we read, he did exactly what God told him to do.

Last week we began to unpack how Elisha responded to this call out of nowhere on his life….

This call to STOP farming.

To LEAVE mom and dad’s business…

To LEAVE behind your training….

To LEAVE behind your family….

And GO follow Elijah and learn from him…

And last week we learned that we do NOT need all the details to follow….

Elijah….

Look in your Bibles….

He was given NO details….

He just followed….

And remember….look in your Bible….

EliSHA was that he is just a regular guy.

He wasn't the son of a pastor.

He wasn’t some great theologian.

He is just a farm kid.

He was a regular guy who was living at home with his parents, working on a farm.

Let’s write down the second way for…

How to respond to God’s call on our life. 1. Be willing to give up anything for God.

Repeat

Church….God often works through those who give up the most.

This is going to speak to somebody…

God often works through those who have sacrificed so much for Him.

Watch this come to life in Elisha’s life.

Verse 21.

21 So Elisha left him and went back. He took his yoke of oxen and slaughtered them.

He burned the plowing equipment to cook the meat and gave it to the people, and they ate.

Then he set out to follow Elijah and became his servant.

Now let’s stop for second and think about this.

Elisha went back and he took the animals that allowed him to work the earth.

The animals who made it possible to farm more land.

And he killed them.

Oh, but he didn’t stop there!

What does it say he did with his plow church?

He burned the plowing equipment!

He used the equipment needed to break up the earth to cook his oxen.

And it isn’t done there….look in your Bibles….

Then he feeds to people…..

And what does he feed them church?

HIS oxen!!!!!!

Elisha is my kind of friend!

He made a bonfire and BBQ!!!!

Anyone who wants to have me over just has to say bonfire and BBQ, Brisket, Ribs…. and I AM IN!!!!

But it does not end there.

Let me point out something else….

Elisha must have owned the plow and oxen because they were his to give up.

So, Elisha was a business owner….

Or maybe he took over the family farm…

Regardless…

He left it all behind to become a servant…..

He made the choice to destroy his ENTIRE business to follow a man of God…..

That would be CRAZY to most of us to consider….

Who leaves their livelihood to follow someone they do not know?

Even crazier…..

Who leaves a family business with NO plan!!!!

EVEN CRAZIER….

Who goes back and destroys their old life….thereby saying, “I am NEVER going back.”

I mean, who gives up all their safety net?

LONG PAUSE…..

I can tell you who….

Someone who completely trusts God.

Someone who wants God to work through them.

EliSHA burns up any chance of coming back to his farming life.

To Plan B.

There is no plan B.

There's only follow God.

There's only plan A.

PAUSE

Parents, I have to say this passage is so convincing to me.

Elisha likely lived with his parents.

At one point, those cows were probably theirs.

That plow might have been theirs passed down over the generations….

So, parents, let me point out….

Parents note what the parents did and did NOT do…

They did NOT stand in his way!

They didn’t say, “That plow used to be ours, you are not destroying so we are taking it back.”

They didn’t say, “We gave you this business and we will not let you give it away.”

I can just see them with tears in their eyes...

Tears of sadness because the son they hoped would take over the business is leaving…

Maybe tears of joy as they see their little boy taking a massive leap of faith…

Watching their little boy burn up everything he had…

To step out in FAITH…

PAUSE

They did not do what I would be most parents in the room would do…

They didn’t say, “Son, let’s keep our options open here.

We will take care of your oxen if this does not work.”

They didn’t say, “That was our plow, and it is a good plow.

You’re not burning it up.”

They didn’t say, “Well, if you are leaving, this is all going to your little brother now.”

ADD an example from your life…

That reminds of something that impacted me deeply in seminary….during a class on missions we had a guest speaker talking about his ministry in China. And at one point he started talking about his daughter.

His daughter lived on the border of a very dangerous area. His daughter was an English teacher as a front to smuggle Christians out of one area and into another.

His daughter lived in an area where women are objects…His daughter, who was helping people get away from very DANGEROUS people… would love to hurt her...

At one point, this little, pretty blond woman walks in the room. His daughter. And I can remember my eyes filling with tears as I looked at her….there was not one thing wrong with her…..she had never been hurt…..

My eyes filled with tears because when I looked at her, I saw Addie…

Who was just a little girl at that time…

And at that moment….

I knew at that moment my faith was not strong enough to let my beautiful little girl go do something like that.

And trust God.

Does anyone want to guess now….many years later, what my daughter is doing as we speak…..

She is in the Philippines working with women coming out of prostitution….

PAUSE

Family Church, as you get deeper and deeper into your faith….

You’ll see in scripture that people are often so moved by God that they do crazy things to follow him.

Elisha….left every comfort he knew…

His trade…

His everything….

He gave up everything…..

Elisha is not the only person who can do that.

You will see numerous people doing the same thing throughout the Bible.

Let me just give you one example….

Flip in your Bible to

Luke 5: 1-11 One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake, the people were crowding around him and listening to the word of God.

2 He saw at the water’s edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets.

3 He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat.

4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.”

5 Simon answered, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.”

Simon Peter listens and follows…even when it does not make sense….

Simon was the professional fisherman, NOT Jesus…

But without all the details as to WHY…he follows…

6 When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break.

7 So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink.

8 When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!”

9 For he and all his companions were astonished at the catch of fish they had taken,

10 and so were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, Simon’s partners.

God showed up!

This goes on to say something just as crazy as "Burn the plows and kill the cows!"

Then Jesus said to Simon, “Don’t be afraid; from now on you will fish for people.”

11 So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed him.

They left everything.

They gave up their job.

They gave up their way of life.

To follow and didn’t know what was coming.

We can just read right over that and not even think about it.

PAUSE

Let’s bring that to the 21st century.

That could mean leaving your job, which is what you have spent your life training to do.

That could mean leaving the family business to follow Jesus’s calling on your life!

It could mean changing your major when you’re almost done.

It could mean leaving your comfort,

family,

neighborhood,

could even mean leaving our church to plant a new one!

They left everything to follow Jesus.

Elisha left everything to follow Elijah.

PAUSE

I believe with everything in me that at some point, God is going to speak a word into you that will give you plow-burning faith.

And let me just say, make sure God is speaking to you; you don't just go into work Monday and say, "I'm sick of my job I hate you all," and then burn down the building.

That's not what I'm talking about!!!!

I'm talking about when you know that God is calling you to leave where you are and go where he wants you to go.

When you're so convinced that you just burn the bridge back…

Because you're not turning back!!

You can't go back because God is calling you forward.

There are some of you, God is going to give you a plow-burning faithwhere deep within…

You're willing to do whatever it takes to follow God to the next place.

(Add a story like this…)

That reminds me of one of my good friends Eric. As a kid he came down with cancer and was supposed to die; but God had other plans for his life. But he got REALLY mad at God because of the cancer and ran far from him.

He got into drugs, alcohol and partying. He surfed all around the world and decided he was going to live for himself. The cancer ended up not killing him and instead of praising God for that he started his own construction company.

Then one day God whispered an idea into him, “Rock Solid.” And he started building playgrounds for kids with cancer. He was still far from God but started doing these great things for families with kids that were hurting. ROCKSOLID LOGO

And all the while he had no idea what God was going to ask him to do years later….

I will never forget the first time I met him. At a fund raising event. People drinking loads of beer and I bought a raffle ticket to support him instead of beer. And I won the grand prize; a TV.

And that was the start to our friendship. Fast forward in his life and he and his wife accepted Jesus…and then shortly after that….God called Eric to burn his plows…to leave his construction business behind and work full time for his foundation that could not even support him.

It made no sense….it put stress on his life and his wife’s….but he followed God not knowing all the details….have gave up his business to follow his calling….

And fast forward 10+ years and anyone want to guess who came to MY house to build this for my son?

ADD WYATT TREEHOUSE PIC

Eric…

Eric’s foundation that now has a multi-million dollar budget….

For some of you here today….you are far from God and you might not realize it but God still speaks to you!

And like Eric, like Elijah, like Simon.

If we will just follow the calling God places on our life…

If we are not SO CAUGHT up in needs ALL the answers.

If we will just follow…

If we will step out in faith and leave behind what the world says we need, but God says we do not….

Then, God will show up in amazique ways.

PAUSE

Would you look at the person sitting next to you and say, "Maybe you need to burn a plow."

Go ahead and go right now.

Now look at the other person on the other side who was your second choice, and tell them, "Maybe you need to burn a plow."

PAUSE

I don't know what it would be in your life, but if anything is keeping you from serving God, you're going to burn that plow.

If there is sin holding you back, you burn that plow.

If there is a doubt in your life, you burn that plow.

If a relationship is holding you back, somebody will burn that plow.

You will not let anything keep you from following God because you don't have to understand fully to obey immediately.

You won’t cling to the things of this world that do not matter in eternity!

Church, it is time to stop being like our kids and clinging to our blanky.

Some of you hold onto something that keeps you secure.

Never ever forget this.

To step towards your destiny, you have to step away from your security.

Repeat

God is going to speak to somebody and give you the faith to believe that he's calling you to something new.

PAUSE

This leads us to our life application today….

If you are new, or newer, to Family Church we LOVE to end our messages with something for you to talk about with someone else.

Something to help you apply the message to your life.

So here is this week’s Life Application…

Life Application: What plow is God calling you to burn? What do you need to step away from to follow a God’s path for your life? As a result of today’s message, I will _________________________.

Let’s pray….

Prayer:

Make sure to do a salvation call!

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