Grace for Beggars

Title: Grace for Beggars

Context: The relief from the famine at Jerusalem

Text: 2 Kings 6:24- 2 Kings : 7-20

@ Nelson Road on 16th March 2008

Introduction

A couple of weeks ago I sat watching the news….and saw the bombing on Palestine by the Israelis….bodies where everywhere….it was hard for me to take it in….it was desperate situation …words failed me!

Sadly lots of things within our world cause us to feel the same thing….hopeless and desperate and longing a solution

Weather it is the state of the planet, the lack of NHS dentists, the rising price of petrol, the fact the young people today just can’t afford to leave home these days, something’s just leave you with a feeling of desperation   

What are we face with in these verses is another disparate situation….really disparate….with no hope in sight ….lets see what happens    

A) Desperate situation

We might be inclined to explain the Syrian siege as some­thing that just happened, but it was much more than that.

Cen­turies earlier Moses had warned the people of Israel of certain calamities that would most surely follow disobedience to the commandments of God.

One of these calamities was that for­eign armies would lay siege to their cities (Deut. 28:53-57).

The people of Elisha's day had been anything but obedient

They had flaunted God laws and had gone after idols, and now they were reaping the consequences.

The God who is always faithful to his word had allowed the Syrians to surround Samaria. The Syrian presence there was, then, the message of God's judgement.

The cost of food reflects part of this desperation…. the famine was so severe that food profiteers were asking scandalous black market prices for the most disgusting dishes.

The most revolting garbage was worth its weight in gold.

Even though a donkey was considered unclean for human consumption and the animals head the most disgusting cut of meat for eating, a donkey’s head was still being sold for approximately £80

Although various explanations have been given for the “dove droppings” in verse 25 whatever it was, it was another very unappetizing food, and a quarter of gallon of it cost £5.

And as the average wage was about £10 a month you can see how desperate they where

How hopeless there situation was

But the human cost eclipses even the panic for food, mothers were ready to eat there own children.

Cannibalism is not unknown in the Old Testament, but the horror of the situation in Samaria reaches its deepest level here.

Here we have a depiction of those who appear to be utterly oblivious to God's judgement and who with a self-reliant atti­tude resort to desperate measures just to sustain life upon this earth.

Ethics are right out of the window here!

How many even today are happy to go down this route

When they are so taken up are they with the here and now, and the maintaining of it at all costs, that they never allow their thoughts to rise above those basics needs to God and the hereafter.

The king himself depicts for us yet another response to God's judgement. His was that of defiance.

The statement that he was wearing sackcloth under his royal robe might at first encourage us to believe that he carried a soft and tender heart towards God and a genuine sorrow for the idolatry of his nation.

The author soon strips this hope from us. The king's pledge to behead the prophet Elisha shows that he was anything but repentant

He knew the city was under siege because Elisha's God had decreed it, and he would now show his defiance of God by killing the prophet.

The response of Israel's king, Jehoram, is also very much with us today.

It is the response of all those who essentially hate God and take that hatred out on God's people.

Let a preacher declare the holiness and justice of God against sin­ners and the certain calamity that awaits them if they do not repent, and the Jehorams of our day become angry.

They may be content to ridicule him or merely to stay away from him. They may seek to have him fired. Or they may even threaten him with physical harm as the king did Elisha.

We see this today don’t we in some the laws that the government are trying to pass, to stop us proclaiming the absolute truth of the Gospel of Jesus….that mankind is in a mess and needs to change ….and we can’t do this in are own strength ….the world does not want to here this message…and tries to stop it being heard

The king hearing the message of the women was driven over the edge….and his response was to do away with Elisha….not repentance…not looking within….but a desire to hurt someone….for the situation he and his nation found themselves in

Proving one again the truth that hurt people hurt people!      

I see this again with our world…we lament the situation with many of our young people…but don’t ask why….what have we done to get to this situation…how our liberal views on marriage and sex  have open up the doors for what we see today!

We just want to blame someone else!

B) An Amazing answer to the problem!

But those who ignore God's judgement it as the women did, or defy it as the king did, will eventually find themselves facing it in its full force

Once more, Elisha’s supernatural knowledge allowed him to predict the coming of the king’s executioner

I love the line here but Elisha was sitting in his house….God is in control….its ok!

We don’t see Him jumping up and running around….he was sitting…he was at peace he knew what happening and he knew the solution…because he was in constant contact with his God….if you like he knew Gods word….he knew what was up too and therefore he responded in a control thoughtful way

Shut the door….lets be sensible know!

We see the same in the life of Jesus he knew who was he knew what his Father was up too… and was willing to walk the path his father had chosen for him in a thoughtful sensible, controlled way…not panicking…but setting his heart on the things of God and allowing them to dictate his reactions         

He didn’t let the circumstance dictate the his reactions but his knowledge of the word of God

Surely the major impression we receive from this section is that of political helplessness.

As James Mead says, 'This narrative makes an argument about the ineffectiveness of royal power in a situation that only Yahweh can reverse.

The government simply can't find a solution. And yet aren't many of us in the West sucked into thinking that our governments are somehow a big chunk of our hope?

Or as James Kirk puts it….we can only hope for a degree of justice and civil order, and if graft and dishonesty are not totally rampant in it, that is probably as much as we can rightly expect.

We must drop anchor in Psalm 146:3-6. The first words in Calvin's Sunday morning liturgy are the constant corrective we need: 'Our help is in the name of the lord, who made heaven and earth' (Ps. 124:8).

Surely the bottom line here is this world is in a desperate situation because of our rebellion against God and his will for our lives …..In the same way Israel’s rebellion against God had brought about this desperate situation.

We sacrifice our children on the altar of pride and worldliness

We try to find answers to our situation without the least reference to God

And we tell those who question our views to be quite and leave us alone in our rebellion

There is an answer but not the one most people are looking for!  

It seems clear that the statement in verse 33 came from the king although the kings servant may well of repeated it , “Surely this calamity is from the Lord; why should I wait for the Lord any longer?

That although these are words of despair, that they may also contain a flickering glimmer of hope.

Is there any reason to wait on the Lord before I surrender the city to the enemy, I really hope there is but….but ….how is it going to happen….I just can’t see it!

And this cry of anguish is answered by the message of hope delivered by Elisha in the next chapter.

The king’s question reminds us again of the words of another prophet, “Those who wait on the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint” (Is. 40:31).

It is sometime tough but sometimes the only way we learn the lessons we need to is as we go through hard times!

Israel needed to learn about grace as well as judgement but it had to be in God’s time and in Gods way!

Elisha brought the blustering questions of the king up short with a wonderful message of hope and grace. The Syrian-induced famine would abruptly end, and the very next day

Elisha was not promising cheap food but relief from the siege; he was saying that things would begin to return to normal. Eight litres of fine flour would still costs approximately one month's wages.

According to Babylonian sources, a shekel of silver would ordinarily buy about 50 litres of barley, but here it buys 4 litres. So Elisha was not predicting cut-rate groceries but relative relief, which would seem substantial when compared to the current situation

Simply the fact that there was barley instead of dove's dung is a vast improvement.

This is all about mercy….there are no obvious signs here from the people or from the king of real repentance….but God loves his people and still reaches out to them with deliverance

He still is willing to move mightily in the lives of his people even when they don’t show any real desire to change there life style

That’s the gracious God we serve

But Gods promise was still too much for the royal aide to believe.

And because he refused to believe the word of God he was given a word of judgment that excluded him from the enjoyment of the promise.

But this is the essence of Christian faith…we need to believe the promises of God 

We are not called to have some general faith that God will do unheard of, bizarre, or unlikely things as though if we only squeeze our eyes shut, clasp our hands tight, and pump up enough faith to believe, then God will do whatever we want.

Sometimes sadly I admit I  have done that! 

You may want to believe that God will drop twelve-feet long, four-foot wide pickle on your church barbecue along with a twenty-gallon pot of ketchup.

But I doubt he'll do it, not because God couldn’t but because he hasn't promised to supply strange condiments for your church picnic.

But if God promises deliverance, however wild it may seem, we are required to believe it. We must believe what Yahweh says no matter how unlikely.

We have many unlikely words of our Lord. For example 'Because I live, you also will live' (John 14:19; cf. 6:40).

Or Philippians 2:10-11 (every knee bows at the name of Jesus). Doesn't it seem like a wild pipe-dream when history seems to consist of terror, coup, and oppression?

Or we hear Romans 6:14:  For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace.

But we need to trust Gods word in spite of it all how unlikely they may seem because he always keeps his word! He is God who always keeps his promises

But this man scoffed at the message of grace.

And his rejection led to his ruin.

He would see the abundance but would not share in it (7:2).

God's message of grace had become a message of judgment for this hard-hearted, sour man, and in the same way God's message of grace in the gospel will finally turn to eternal judgment for all those who reject it.

We have in the gospel a message of grace that makes Elisha’s pale in comparison.

The gospel comes to us in our spiritual poverty and tells us that God has provided spiritual abundance for all who believe.

It tells us that God has, as it were, made windows in heaven. Through the redeeming work of his Son, Jesus Christ, God now pours out of those windows forgiveness of sins, adoption into his family, the hope of eternal glory and every spiritual blessing.

But there are many who scoff at God's plan of salvation and refuse to accept it and will therefore sadly face Gods judgment

What a warning this is for all such a judgment

C)The Unlikely Instruments of Deliverance

Who would I have sent to deliver these people….Superman, a Fleet of Tesco’s Vans?  

I would certainly not have chosen the people God choose

Four leapers…on the point of death…

These four guys, on the brink of starvation, formulated a last-ditch plan to save themselves. There was no food in the city. There was no food in their lepers' camp.

But there was food in the Syrian camp. Perhaps the Syrians could be persuaded to be merciful and share their food with them.

If not, a quick death at their hands would be immensely better than slow starvation.

So they were off to the Syrian lines. They were in for an incredible surprise.

We might say these men were surprised by grace.

God had caused the Syrians to hear 'the noise of a great army' (7:6). Thinking they were about to be attacked, they fled. In their panic, they did not even take time turn of the gas or pack. They left their tents, their horses, their clothing — and their food! (7:7-8).

This is the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes (cf. Ps. 118:23).

The praise is his and the writer underscores this by placing Yahweh's role at the heart of the story.

The lepers wasted no time enjoying the bounty. They ate and drank and hid silver, gold and clothing.

Then it occurred to them that their city was starving. They said to one another, 'We are not doing right. This is a day of good news, and we remain silent' (7:9).

The four men soon shared their news with those in the city; deliverance needs evangelists to proclaim it

The instruments of deliverance are unclean lepers….now that’s amazing grace!

These guys just stumbled into salvation…and where meet the grace of God!

And these beggars’ just told others about the bread they had found and that is all we need to do!

Christians cannot help but see themselves in these men sufferings from leprosy.

We too have been surprised by grace. We were walking down life's pathway in our sin and condemnation when the grace of God intervened, showed us the desperateness of our condition and pointed us to the Lord Jesus Christ as our sufficient Saviour.

How we rejoice in the saving grace of God that rescued us from our sin and gave us spiritual abundance!

And how much we need to share this good news with others

But the king still didn’t believe it 

He was not that not naive; he's studied military tactics; he knew what's happening.

This was a Syrian wooded horse…this was trap

The king has it figured out. Of course the camp is deserted—the Syrians are hiding, for crying out loud. It's called strategy. Only a fool would fall for it.

The king doesn't seem to consider the possibility of an alternative scenario, in spite of Elisha's previous promise and in spite the report of good news via the lepers that God could still do miracles

But praise the Lord for another servant of the king …who is simple realistic just like the leapers ….hey we are in deep mess here….doing nothing is not going to makes things better …maybe doing something will be just as bad but it can’t be any worse…lets go for it!....let go out and see!

And it was true….God had kept his word...As he always does!

He brought deliverance from the famine just as he said he would…and he brought judgement on the unbeliever as he said he would!

And this is still the truth God still saves by grace those who are willing admit they have no hope in themselves ….and he judges those who do not believe his word!

Conclusion

We all have to admit this world is in desperate situation…it is lost and going no where but down!

It is facing the judgement of God  

And no politician has the answer

We are trying of starvation….and there is no hope to be found!

Yet into this despite situation….God has brought about an amazing solution

A baby born …in a stable who would die on a cross…who brings salvation into the world!    

And we beggars have been given this bread …and we need to tell others about it

And as we do all the glory and the praise and the honour, goes to God!