Elisha's Ministry - The Miraculous Floating Axe Head 2 Kings 6:1-7 Series

Well in those verses I can’t find too much for Elijah, but it seems there are more references that could be applied to Elisha. Is this strange? No. Remember a very important thing. Right back at the beginning Elisha received a double portion - 2Kings 2 v 9 Now it came about when they had crossed over, that Elijah said to Elisha, “Ask what I shall do for you before I am taken from you,” and Elisha said, “Please, let a double portion of your spirit be upon me.”

There was one man who was felling a tree that must have been hanging over the water so they were right at the river. When I was a boy we used to have a slow combustion stove, one that also had a tank on the side of it to heat water. I loved going to get wood and used to go up the hill we were on with the man next door, carrying logs back on our shoulders. I used an axe quite frequently. It was always an accomplishment to fit a new handle to an axe head and drive that handle into the head as far as you could. At the head end of the handle there was a cut right up the middle of the wood, and when the handle was fastened as good as you could get it, you’d cut off the overhanging piece of handle flush to the head, then you would hammer in two or three wedges into that cut in the handle that expanded the wood to really lock it in. Well occasionally, that handle could work loose or the wedges fell out. In Elisha’s day they possibly fastened the handle to the head in a different way. In any case, as the man was cutting, horror or horrors, the head came away and fell into the river.

That caused the man to cry out, not for the loss of the axe head, but because the axe was not his. Because of the poverty he endured, he would not be able to procure another one. It is bad enough when something belonging to you is damaged or lost, but when it belongs to someone else, that is different, especially when the person was good enough to lend it to you. I don’t know if that has happened to you but it is not a good feeling. Some people, you know, try to repair the damage, or disguise it, hoping it won’t be noticed and give the item back. That is not too honest. “ALAS!” the man cried out. How was he going to face the owner?

It would not be a problem for some Moslems. They simply say, “It was the will of Allah.” That absolves them from a lot of responsibility. The Boxing Day tsunami in 2004 is believed to be the deadliest tsunami in history, killing more than 230,000 people across 14 countries. The aid response was unprecedented for a natural disaster, with a colossal $6.25bn donated to a central UN relief fund assisting 14 countries. The series of tsunamis on 26 December not only killed more than 230,000 people but left more than 2 million people homeless. Indonesia was hardest hit, followed by Sri Lanka and Thailand. That is why in the Aceh earthquake and tsunami in Moslem Indonesia, the western world donated the most and the rich Islamic oil countries gave next to nothing. You see, it was the will of Allah!

Well one thing I am certain of here, it was God’s will that this axe head fell off, because through it, He was going to show His power, and the glory would be unto Him. This links beautifully with en episode John recorded in his Gospel - John 9 v 1 As He passed by, He saw a man blind from birth, John 9:2 and His disciples asked Him saying, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he should be born blind?” John 9:3 Jesus answered, “It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents, but it was in order that the works of God might be displayed in him. John 9:4 We must work the works of Him who sent Me as long as it is day. Night is coming when no man can work. John 9:5 While I am in the world, I am the light of the world.”