After This . . .

The city was in survivalists mode. They were desperate. Desperate people do desperate things.

As the king is going through the city he hears two mothers speaking. This defines the plight of the city.

2Kings 6:28-29 Then the king said to her, "What is troubling you?" And she answered, "This woman said to me, 'Give your son, that we may eat him today, and we will eat my son tomorrow.' (29) So we boiled my son, and ate him. And I said to her on the next day, 'Give your son, that we may eat him'; but she has hidden her son."

The king gets angry and sends for Elisha’s head. As they approach Elisha he prophesies

2Kings 7:1 Then Elisha said, "Hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord: 'Tomorrow about this time a seah of fine flour shall be sold for a shekel, and two seahs of barley for a shekel, at the gate of Samaria.' "

This is what turns around the moment. That one phrase it what makes the biggest difference, “the word of the Lord”. It is that one word from God that can give hope in desperate circumstances.

In chapter 7 we are introduced to the rest of the story. The city of seiged. There is no food. It has gone from bad to worse or as Jentzen Frankin calls it “From Bad to Unbearable”. Have you ever been there? Are you there now? Well I have good news for you.

In the unlikest people, four lepers, God sends deliverance. As they are sitting at the gate. They are lepers, they are outcast. They have a conversation.

2Ki 7:3-4 Now there were four leprous men at the entrance of the gate; and they said to one another, "Why are we sitting here until we die? (4) If we say, 'We will enter the city,' the famine is in the city, and we shall die there. And if we sit here, we die also. Now therefore, come, let us surrender to the army of the Syrians. If they keep us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall only die."

Why sit here?

We might as well do something different because what we are doing now is not working. They reasoned with in themselves to do something different than what they were doing. To think differently than what they are thinking.

Often quoted is the phrase, “ Insanity is doing the same thing over and and over and expecting different results”.

The Walk of faith

Let move ahead. Lets just start walking. Not only was their the thought but there was the action. Walk. Move. Get up and start doing something about it.

There is good reason in scripture that in Jesus miracles he required action. He told the man with the withered hand in Matthew 12:13 to, “Stretch forth thine hand.” To the man at the pool of Bethesda, He said, “Rise, take up your bed and walk.” John 5:8. To the blind man he said, “Go, wash in the pool of Siloam. Peter had to walk in Matthew 14:29 to get to Jesus.

The Sound of Faith

Here is the coolest thing. As they begin to walk the earth began to rumble.

2Ki 7:5-7 And they rose at twilight to go to the camp of the Syrians; and when they had come to the outskirts of the Syrian camp, to their surprise no one was there. (6) For the Lord had caused the army of the Syrians to hear the noise of chariots and the noise of horses--the noise of a great army; so they said to one another, "Look, the king of Israel has hired against us the kings of the Hittites and the kings of the Egyptians to attack us!" (7) Therefore they arose and fled at twilight, and left the camp intact--their tents, their horses, and their donkeys--and they fled for their lives.