Don't mess with Godly man

March 2nd 2025

Series: Days of Elisha

Topic Tags: Holy Spirit, Elisha, ADD

Sermon Title: Dream BIG

Key Passages: 2 Kings 1: 1-17

Sermon Blurb: In this message, we will learn when why you don’t want to mess with a Godly man and why it is essential to learn from the mistakes of others. Preacher: Grace – Erik EBENEEZER – Keith S. REDWOOD – Derek Carpenter

***1st week ODD months add communion & target message at 15 pages.

***1st week EVEN months add space for dedication, baptism, or ministry highlight & target message at 15 pages.

***Green in sermons means illustration, something we are looking for a response from, and/or a picture that goes on the screens.

***Yellow means what is yellow will be on the screens and in the handout.

Dedication, Baptism, or Ministry Highlight (1st Sunday, even months):

Sermon

Hello Family Church!!!

Welcome to Family Church… whether you are in person or watching online…

Family Moment (Share something personal to help people get to know you and your family)

Celebrate salvations / re-dedications / baptisms last week.

Welcome back to week #5 of our character study in our Holy Spirit series on a guy named Elisha.

Elisha was a regular kid who grew up on a farm.

In 1 Kings 19, Elijah called Elisha to follow him.

What was Elisha’s response?

Anyone remember?

What did he do?

Right, he left everything to follow.

He didn’t ask for the details.

He followed.

He left behind his life to follow the call of God.

But even more than that….

He killed his oxen.

Chopped up his plow and used it to cook his oxen!

Then gave everyone in the community some good oxen steaks!

Then he left everything to follow Elijah and became his servant.

PAUSE

Our first image of Elisha is as a regular farm kid….

Who destroyed any chance of a plan B.

Elisha took a massive step of faith and left everything he knew in life to follow the calling on his life.

And last week, we saw Elisha following Elijah and NOT even mentioned in the story…

And today….

Well…

It will start out much the same!

Open your Bibles and turn with me to

2 Kings 1

(New Person Bible Connection)

If you do not have a Bible, that is ok!

After service, we will give you an AMAZING leather-bound study Bible!

Or if you have a Bible stop by there anyway and we will give you a gift card to a local restaurant because we LOVE that you came today and we want to bless you!!!

Just go to (ADD YOUR CAMPUS PLACE) and get one for FREE!!!

PAUSE

I titled the message today…

Don’t mess with a Man of God.

You will see that come to life shortly!

Let’s read what God has for us today…

Verse 1...

2 Kings 1: 1- 17 After Ahab’s death, Moab rebelled against Israel.

Stop there for a second…

If you remember, last weekend, God told Elijah to go tell King Ahab he was going to die because he was such evil king.

Elijah went and did…

Then they got into a little verbal sparing match…

But it ended with the King… repenting and apparently changing his ways enough that God did NOT kill the king.

BUT….

If you kept reading in 1 Kings, you would see that at the end of 1 Kings, Ahab did die…

YEARS later, what God told Elijah to say happened.

Which is why last weekend we talked about God’s timing…

And how sometimes our timing and God’s is not the same…

And how we need to accept when God gives people a second chance…

Just like he did with King Ahab.

And yes…

Ahab went back to his old sinful ways.

And so God did take him out.

But we should ALWAYS be willing to give people a second, third, fourth chance.

Our goal should ALWAYS be reconciliation with God and not judgment and separation from God….

PAUSE

Let’s keep reading…

2 Now Ahaziah had fallen through the lattice of his upper room in Samaria and injured himself.

So he sent messengers, saying to them, “Go and consult Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron, to see if I will recover from this injury.”

Pause there…

So, the NEW king fell in his home.

He hits the Life Alert button…

Does anyone remember those commercials?

Remember, “I have fallen and cannot get up!”

The King fell…

The King hurt himself…

And he wants to know if he will get better.

So he says, look in your Bibles…

He says… “Go ask the idol of the Philippines 40 miles away if I will get better.”

That is who Baal is…

He is an idol worshiped back in this day and age.

The new King in GOD’S land…

He wants to ask an IDOL, not GOD, if he will get better…

Probably a bad idea…

PAUSE

Let’s keep reading.

3 But the angel of the Lord said to Elijah the Tishbite, “Go up and meet the messengers of the king of Samaria and ask them,

‘Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are going off to consult Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron?’

4 Therefore this is what the Lord says: ‘You will not leave the bed you are lying on. You will certainly die!’”

Let me point out two things here.

1st…. just like last week…

We are in a series on Elisha who is following Elijah.

And he is NOT even mentioned here!

Sometimes, it is SO hard to be the #2 person.

Sometimes, it is SO hard when only your boss gets the credit.

Sometimes, it is SO hard when only the star on the team is interviewed.

Sometimes, it is SO hard when you are overlooked.

And if you struggle with that….

I want to encourage you to keep coming back because you are going to see something AMAZING in Elisha’s life in the future!

Don’t give up!

Keep following!

Just because you are not the #1 person today…does not mean you will not be one day….

And if you FOLLOW well…

Well one day you might do things even your boss, coach, teacher, or whomever would NEVER think you could…

PAUSE

2nd… Elijah has a choice here..

He can do what God calls him to do…or not.

Just like every one of us.

We all can do what God calls us to do in life or not.

We can choose to learn the Bible and live as it calls us to or not.

It is OUR choice…

And the Bible says….

So Elijah went.

Elijah…

This man of God goes.

This man of God continues to show Elisha…who is following him…to do what God says to do.

Elijah goes and meets with the messengers on their way to talk to this idol…

And tells them what God said.

And they apparently turn around and go back to the king because verse 5 says…

5 When the messengers returned to the king, he asked them, “Why have you come back?”

6 “A man came to meet us,” they replied. “And he said to us, ‘Go back to the king who sent you and tell him,

“This is what the Lord says: Is it because there is no God in Israel that you are sending messengers to consult Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron?

Therefore you will not leave the bed you are lying on. You will certainly die!”’”

Wow, Elijah tells another king God is going to take you out!

Elijah has some rough messages to send to people!

Let’s keep reading…

7 The king asked them, “What kind of man was it who came to meet you and told you this?”

8 They replied, “He had a garment of hair and had a leather belt around his waist.”

Stop there…

Let’s see who knows their Bible well!

Look at the verse on the screen…

Who does that sound like?

I figured some of you would say John the Baptist…

And that is close…

The guys are describing this person on the screens!

They ran into Chewbacca!

Just kidding…

Yes…it sounds like John the Baptist must have learned his fashion cues from Elijah!

And the king knows exactly who it is…it says…

The king said, “That was Elijah the Tishbite.” 9 Then he sent to Elijah a captain with his company of fifty men.

Here is where it is going to get CRAZY!!!!

The captain went up to Elijah, who was sitting on the top of a hill, and said to him, “Man of God, the king says, ‘Come down!’”

10 Elijah answered the captain, “If I am a man of God, may fire come down from heaven and consume you and your fifty men!”

Then fire fell from heaven and consumed the captain and his men.

Remember our sermon title…

Don’t mess with a man of God!

Does anyone know if this is the first time Elijah has called down fire from heaven????

NOPE!!!

He did the SAME thing with the last king!

Elijah has a pretty epic connection to God to do stuff like this!

And remember…

Elisha is somewhere…

Watching….

Learning…

Being blown away at the way Elijah and God work together.

DON’T forget that as we keep walking through Elisha’s story….

PAUSE

Verse 11

11 At this the king sent to Elijah another captain with his fifty men. The captain said to him, “Man of God, this is what the king says, ‘Come down at once!’”

If I were the captain…

I might not have been so hostile knowing what happened to the last guy….

And Elijah says…

12 “If I am a man of God,” Elijah replied, “may fire come down from heaven and consume you and your fifty men!”

Then the fire of God fell from heaven and consumed him and his fifty men.

Remember our sermon title…

Don’t mess with a man of God!

Same fate for two groups of people….

I wonder what Elisha was thinking as this happened! I wonder what the king thought when he heard?

I wonder what other people who worked for the king thought when they heard…

Verse 13….

13 So the king sent a third captain with his fifty men. This third captain went up and fell on his knees before Elijah.

“Man of God,” he begged, “please have respect for my life and the lives of these fifty men, your servants!

14 See, fire has fallen from heaven and consumed the first two captains and all their men. But now have respect for my life!”

So, this captain takes a different approach…

Probably a good life choice…

This captain CHOSE humility.

This captain CHOSE to learn from what happened to the prior two captains.

This captain realized you DON’T mess with a man of God!

PAUSE

This reminds me of a prior point we have learned, but I want you to write it down here…

Learn from the mistakes of others.

Repeat

Now you could write down instead of mistakes…

Poor life choices.

Sins.

Church, this captain learned from the poor life choices of the prior two captains.

Just like you and I can learn from the mistakes of:

Our parents.

Our teachers.

History books.

Politicians.

We can learn from ANYONE's mistakes if we CHOOSE to do so.

But it is your choice to learn or not.

This captain chose to learn from the mistakes of others…

So, let’s see if that was good or not.

PAUSE

Verse 15

15 The angel of the Lord said to Elijah, “Go down with him; do not be afraid of him.”

So Elijah got up and went down with him to the king. 16 He told the king, “This is what the Lord says:

Is it because there is no God in Israel for you to consult that you have sent messengers to consult Baal-Zebub, the god of Ekron?

Because you have done this, you will never leave the bed you are lying on. You will certainly die!”

17 So he died, according to the word of the Lord that Elijah had spoken.

Elijah was a BOLD guy….

He was not afraid of anyone.

He simply did what God called him to do.

He simply said what God said to say.

He did NOT worry about his safety.

He did NOT worry about getting thrown in prison.

He did NOT worry about losing his career.

He did NOT worry about all the things we do…

He was a man of God who cared more about what God wanted than what man wanted…

Let me say that again…

Elijah was a man of God…

Who care MORE about what GOD WANTED…

Then what MAN wanted…

And Elisha is in the background learning ALL this…

Again…nothing about him in this whole passage!

He is just a follower of Elijah.

PAUSE

Let’s pause here….

Think about your life.

Think about the choices you make.

You will see a question in your notes that says:

What is the primary driver of your life choices?

Repeat

I want you all to think about that for a second…

Is it God?

Is it money?

Is it your happiness?

Is it your future desired place in life?

Are you driven by what your coach says?

A parent?

A teacher?

A boss?

What really drives your choices in life?

Elisha was learning from Elijah that it should be God.

I encourage my kids ALL the time to follow God’s call for their life.

NOT to chase money.

Or success…

Or possessions…

And they will all grow up one day, and they will get to choose what to go after….

Just like Elisha is growing up and one day will be able to choose as well.

PAUSE

And let me invite you all back next week…

Next week Elijah passes the torch to Elisha in a really cool way that you are NOT going to want to miss!!!!

So, church, here is our life application for this week.

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.

It says this…

Life Application: Spend some time this week as you make decisions and dig into the driver behind them. Think about how you could place God more in the driver's seat. As a result of today’s message, I will _________________________.

Communion Flow #2 – March, September

Communion, or the Lord’s Supper, is when followers of Jesus take a moment to remember what Jesus did for us.

At Family Church, we believe the Table of the Lord is open to ALL followers of Jesus.

So, we practice “open communion”, which means you do NOT have to be a member of this church or attend a special class… in order to take communion.

Also, if you have kids with you who have made Jesus their Lord and Savior, they too are welcome to participate if you as a parent think they are ready.

In Romans, we read about God’s goodness to us. The Apostle Paul writes this in Romans 3:

Romans 3: 23-25 For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.

God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood—to be received by faith.

Paul continues his thoughts in chapter 6...

Romans 6:23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

God loves us so much, that He left His perfect heaven to provide the ONLY way for you and me to be forgiven of our sins and made right with God.

Jesus left Heaven to come to earth, and to give His life for us.

Jesus became the bridge for our sins and the substitution for our punishment.

Jesus took on our sins and He offers His righteousness to anyone who would believe.

And Jesus did this so that we can be forgiven our sins and enter His perfect heaven.

In His love and mercy, God has already established a means for you to be forgiven of your sins.

Jesus has already done the deed…

Jesus made the ONLY way for anyone to be saved from their sins.

When someone places their faith in Jesus, God performs a Divine Exchange...

In exchange for our sin, God clothes the believer in Jesus’ righteousness.

And what activates this, is faith.

Faith in Jesus.

Faith in Jesus’ perfect, sinless life,

Faith in Jesus’ willingness to die on their behalf.

And faith to invite God to forgive them of their sins and exchange Jesus’ righteousness.

PAUSE

And that is why we take communion…. to remember Jesus and what He did for us!

We believe and confess that our Savior Jesus Christ has ordained and instituted the sacrament of the Holy Supper to nourish and sustain those who are already grafted into his family, into his church...

That God gave the act of Communion as a means of grace for nourishing and strengthening disciples of Christ.

Jesus instituted Communion on the evening He was betrayed.

In Mathew 26:26-28 we read,

Mathew 26:26-28, “While they were eating, Jesus took bread, gave thanks and broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying, ‘Take and eat; this is my body.’

Then He took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, ‘Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.’”

PAUSE

Now we are going to listen to a song and as you listen I want to encourage you to take a moment and reflect on what it means that Jesus was willing to sacrifice His body for you and shed his blood for the forgiveness of your sins….

Take a moment and thank Jesus for his sacrifice for you.

Take a moment to ask Jesus to forgive you of any hidden sin in your life.

If you have not given your life to Jesus…take a moment now and ask Jesus to forgive you of your sins and tell him you now submit your life to him…

And then after this song, I will explain how we will take communion…. together….

AFTER THE SONG ENDS…..

In the seat in front of you there is a cup the looks like this……

EXPLAIN HOW TO OPEN based on style….

Just so you all know, the bread is gluten-free…

Let’s first take and eat the bread of life and give Jesus thanks for sacrificing his body for us.

Scripture tells us then Jesus took the cup, gave thanks and offered it to them, saying, ‘Drink from it, all of you. This is my blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many for the forgiveness of sins.’”

Drinking this cup symbolizes Jesus shedding his blood for our sins….

AND us asking Jesus to give you an increased portion of his Spirit to keep us away from sinning in the future!

Take and drink the cup in remembrance of Jesus shedding his blood for your sins.

Let’s pray….

Prayer:

Make sure to do a salvation call!

Offering:

Thank you all for being here today!

If you would like to continue your worship through giving, there are offering boxes by the doors as you exit, or behind me on the screens. You can also see other ways to give here at Family Church.

You can also place any connection cards you filled out in there.

***Each week we want to highlight a different way to give.