Man second Kings chapter number 13 the Bible reads in verse number one in the three and twentieth year of Joe
Ash the son of Aziah king of Judah
Jehovah has the son of Jehu began to reign over Israel in
Samaria and reigns 17 years and he did that which was evil in the side of the Lord and
Followed the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat which made Israel descend he departed not there from now
Of course
this is a massive theme in the books of the kings and chronicles the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat and
This is when the kingdom had first split into that northern kingdom of Israel and the southern kingdom of Judah if you remember
Jeroboam set up a place of worship in
Bethel and in Dan instead of Jerusalem because he was afraid that if the Israelites of the northern kingdom would go down to
Jerusalem to worship at the temple where they're supposed to worship
Then he was afraid that they'd go there and their heart would kind of be connected with Judah
And they'd want to reunify the kingdom under the Davidic monarchy, right?
Because the son of David is the one that's ruling down in Judah
So he decided it's a better idea to just make sure that the people of the northern kingdom don't go down there
So he set up a place of worship in Bethel and in Dan that involves a golden calf, right?
So it's an idol of an animal and it you know
It's supposedly that they're worshiping still Jehovah God
So it has all the right words and the right names
But it's a religion based upon idolatry of worshiping a golden calf and there were two different locations
One in Dan because that was already just a hub of idolatry
Since the very founding of the nation of Israel up in the northern part of Israel and then down in the southern part
Bethel is the name literally means house of God and this place had a lot of history
That's where Jacob slept on the stone and saw the ladder with the angels ascending and descending and he said
This is like a gateway to heaven. This is the house of God
So basically because it has it in the name house of God
He figured this will be an easy sell to people. Hey, it's not Jerusalem. It's Bethel. It's right there in the name house of God
Of course, the Lord had chosen the place to put his name there and that is Jerusalem
That's where they're supposed to worship
Jesus had this conversation with the woman at the well where she said our father's worship God in this mountain
Mount Garai's him
But you say that Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship and of course Jesus explains to her
Yeah, it's Jerusalem
Salvation of the Jews
But he says the time is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem our man going to worship God because you know
God just wants people worshiping him and spirit in a truth and in the New Testament
We don't have a physical location. So Jerusalem doesn't matter. No physical location matters
It's just wherever two or three are gathered together in Christ's name. There he is in the midst
Okay, so that's a little bit of background here of what this means when it says that jihu
continued in the sons of
Excuse me in the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat and now his son is also
Continuing with that sin the sin is idolatry. Right? That is the big sin. It's idolatry
It's a twisted form of religion that is in the name of Jehovah God
But it ends up twisting things and having this gross sin of idolatry, which is a violation of God's word
So as a result of this idolatry it says in verse 3
The anger of the Lord was kindled against Israel and he delivered them into the hand of Haseel
King of Syria and into the hand of Ben-Hadad the son of Haseel all their days and
Jehovah has besought the Lord and the Lord
Harkened unto him for he saw the oppression of Israel because the king of Syria oppressed them and the Lord gave Israel a
Savior so that they went out from under the hand of the Syrians and the children of Israel dwelt in their tents as
Before time so notice here that even in the midst of sin even in the midst of idolatry
Even though they're screwing up the religion, you know
they cry out to the Lord and God is merciful anyway and God actually helps them out a little bit and
What you'll see is that there's a pattern in scripture
Where people will just kind of take one step toward God, you know
and he'll kind of help them out and throw them a bone and
Hopefully the idea is that maybe when they see God deliver them a little bit
That maybe they'll decide to go all the way and serve God and get right with God
But unfortunately, that's not what ends up happening here. So he cries out to God and God helps him out
But yet in spite of that it doesn't fix it because in verse 6 it says
Nevertheless, they departed not from the sins of Jeroboam who made Israel sin
But walked there in and they remained the grove also in Samaria
and then it just goes on to talk about how much of
Failure and how weak the kingdom is as a result of not going all the way and getting the sin out of their lives and
Actually serving God the right way
So there are a whole bunch of lessons just to take from these first several verses that I think are so critical
For us as Christians today and one of those lessons is that a lot of people when they feel like they're not right with God
Because they're involved in serious sin. Obviously, they're right. They're not right with God
But they sometimes will get this attitude up. Well, I'm not right with God anyway
So what's the use of even trying? You know, I might as well just go all the way off the cliff
And just in for a penny in for a pound and this is such a stupid attitude
And I feel like I spend my entire life and my entire ministry
Trying to explain to people how stupid this is and how many sermons I've gone through this over and over again
Because it seems like so many people think this way
They think like oh, I screwed up. I might as well just go all the way
It's so dumb because here's the thing even if you've screwed up. Don't throw good money after bad
You know, you can always course-correct
Repent get right and yeah, there's gonna be some damage that's already done
But at least you can mitigate the damage and not just go all the way off the cliff, right?
And of course the classic example of this is the girl who goes out and commits fornication and lose their virginity
And then just says ah there there goes my virginity. My as well just become a total whore
That doesn't make any sense
If you committed that sin
Affornication then you just confess it and forsake it get right with God move on and be pure from here on out
Be clean from here on out. Don't just have this attitude of oh, it's too late. I already screwed up
It's over for me. Same thing with people who are drunkards. Okay, you know, they will be sober for X amount of time
They'll take one drink up screwed it up. There goes my sobriety
There goes six months of sobriety there goes two years of sobriety and then they just go on a bender
Just go absolutely crazy folks. That doesn't make any sense
You know, and I think that we all deal with this in a smaller scale on just dumb little things in our life
Like you screw up your diet, you know, it's like you eat one little ice cream cone. Oh, there goes the diet
All right, let's go whole pizza
You know, you don't have to go all the way off the cliff
Because even if you just screwed up your diet on that one thing, you know
Confess it and forsake it and move on and keep going and it's not even that many calories
It's not even a big deal. It's not even going to change things except for the mentality of all I screwed up
It's over for me now
Now look, these people are involved in grievous sin of idolatry
These people are messed up. These people quote are doing evil in the sight of the Lord
I mean when God just gives an overview. He's like these people are doing evil in the sight of the Lord yet when they cry out to God
He still does something for them, you know, it shows you the mercy of God
It shows you that even when you are screwed up
It makes sense to at least try to seek after God
Try to get things right try to do something good try to get back on track and don't just completely
Despair and give up because you know who knows maybe God will help you out and then you keep going now at the same time
We don't want to be like Jehovah has here where we just cry out to God get a little help and then just keep on living that
Life of sin obviously the smart thing to do is to go all the way and get right with God all the way
Take a little step toward God. He throws you a bone
You take another little step toward God and you just keep going keep growing keep getting better
Keep getting closer to God keep getting more sin out of your life. Keep getting better on track with your walk with God
Okay, obviously you want to keep going and not stop short
Because he stopped short and he ends up still being a failure
But the good lesson also to draw from this is even if you're involved in serious sin, you can still get right with God
You know, I don't care if you've been a drunk. You've been a fornicator. You've been an idolater
You've been involved in whatever, you know what just
Confess and forsake it and look as long as you are breathing air as a saved Christian
You can always get right with God
Right anybody who's saved it's never too late for anybody who's saved to get right with God
And here's the thing if you're just like no God's through with me. I'm trash
Well, here's the thing about that if God were through with you
He'd just bring you home to be with him in heaven because guess what people that he through Lee truly throws in the trash can they die
It's like when he was just totally done with King Saul. He just says alright, Saul
You're so screwed up tomorrow. You and your sons are gonna come be with me. You guys are toast
Right, but here's the thing as long as you're saved and God has left you on this earth
You could still do something for God. You could still be used by God
You could still get right with God. You could still win a soul to Christ and do something and have value, okay?
So I feel like I'm constantly preaching this constantly explain to people do not despair
Don't give up. Don't throw in the towel
Just because your back's letting just because you've quit the church out of church screwed up
Hey start taking steps to get back on track spiritually
And you no matter how screwed up you've been you can come back and fix it
You know, that's just the way life is and so God gives example this over and over and here's the thing
Even when God is just flat out telling Nineveh yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown
He's not even telling them. Hey, here's how you can get right with God and fix us
He just gives them a message of pure doom and
We know it was pure doom because we know Jonah
He wasn't preaching anything merciful to the Nevites
We know how Jonah was. He's just like you guys are screwed. You guys are toast God's gonna smoke you in 40 days
I'm gonna go watch it happen. I'm gonna go get a good seat so I can watch God destroy you. Okay, and yet what they do
They got right with God and you know what they said?
Maybe
Per adventure
God will turn away from the fierceness of his wrath
You know, and that's always a maybe and so therefore if you're smart
You'll always go for that maybe and say, you know what?
I'm gonna throw myself on the mercies of God because his mercies are new every morning. He's compassionate
He's loving and so you've got to
Keep trying to get right with God and don't give up and quit
It's so stupid to just say I'm just gonna go all the way into drugs all the way into fornication
Just all the way into Hormongering and and all this stuff. It's like no
You screwed up
dust yourself off and get back on the horse and try it again
Another interesting thing here is that when when Jehovah has besought the Lord and prayed unto him
It says the Lord gave Israel a
Savior so that they went out from under the hand of the Syrians notice that it is often one
Person that ends up making a huge difference in this world
Or a huge difference in the course of history all throughout the Bible if we study the Bible from Genesis to Revelation
Isn't it typically like one person?
That's the focus of each story as we go through the stories, you know
You're reading the book of Genesis and it's like it's Noah. It's Abraham. It's Isaac. It's Jacob
It's Joseph and then we get into Exodus. Who is it? It's
Yeah, it's Moses, you know or two people Moses and Aaron, you know
But it's mainly Moses
But it's it's like one or two or three people can be so greatly used by God to make a difference
And then I'm not gonna ask you who it is in the book of Joshua because I know you're not stupid
Okay, and then we get to the book of judges and it's just one person after another God sends them a
Savior God sends them a
Deliverer God sends them a judge, right?
Whether it's Othniel, Ehud, Barak, Gideon, right?
And all these other guys that are just kind of no-name guys that you don't really think that much
Tola or something, you know or you know
Was that Shamgar, you know, you know Shamgar of course, you know, it's a popular baby name in
2026 that's burning up all the charts
But the point is that God will often use one person to do something dramatic
So here there's some unnamed
Savior that God sends them that basically helps them defeat sort of like back in the days of the judges
Sends them a savior
You know another thing that's interesting about this besides the fact that God can often use one person because the Savior is singular
That God can often use one person to do something great and to change the course of things is that often that person
Doesn't necessarily get the credit and doesn't necessarily get remembered or get properly honored because it's like whoever's writing this
Chronicle doesn't even know the guy's name and God has chosen not to reveal the name and so this guy's name is
Lost to history
It's just like yeah, what was that guy's name that saved everybody's butts. Oh, we don't know we don't remember, but he sent a Savior
You know what? A lot of times we don't know and that's what's so stupid about these people that base their faith on
Church history
Instead of the Bible instead of the word of God
You're basing it on church history
Well, guess what the greatest man of God over the last 2,000 years are probably totally forgotten to history
But in their time they probably won tons of people to Christ preach to
Thousands or even millions of people, but nobody's gonna remember them
Okay, because the Roman Catholics are the ones writing the book in most cases
So it's like everybody was Catholic until the Protestant Reformation. Yeah, right. Sure
Everybody's Catholic and it's funny how everybody hasn't been Catholic for the last 500 years
There's just all these tons of other beliefs and denominations and things and it's always been that way
There's nothing new under the Sun
It's not like oh, we just have this yay the happy little dark ages. Everybody's Catholic yay dark ages
Stupid there was never such a time when everyone was Catholic. It's dumb
But that's what of course that's what their history book is gonna tell you because they're gonna erase everybody else and
Look even these people that are trying to memorialize their own guy
Don't even know the guy's name and she's a there was a savior. That's the way life is
So here's the thing if you're searching for earthly glory sir serving the Lord, you know what?
That's not the way it works because a lot of times the Lord's not gonna let you get the glory on this earth
Because if you're doing it for the glory on this earth the Bible says well
You already have your reward if you want to get the big rewards in heaven you'd be like this guy and nobody necessarily knows your name
And at the end of the day if you're gonna be super popular and have
Alkalades and have everybody speak well of you on this earth. Well, then you have your reward right now
Whereas the ones who are serving God for the right reasons doing it from the heart for the Lord
Forgot all they care is that the people got saved. They don't care if they get the credit for it
You know, we can't be doing it for fame or money or accolades
You got to be doing it for the sake of saving the people and if you save the people and nobody remembers your name
The people are still saved and so that's what we get here from this unnamed
Unknown savior of the children of Israel at this time
But of course even though God sends them a man of God a savior
Fill with the spirit to go out and fight the Lord's battles and defeat the enemy and deliver them from Syria
yet
They still persist in their sinful lifestyle unfortunately of idolatry
And I want to just point out the parentheses at the beginning of chapter or excuse me beginning of verse 5 and the end of verse 6
because the
King James has put these parentheses here to help you understand and so the way
parentheses work in the King James Bible is that the parentheses
Typically represents something that is deviating from the normal grammar of the sentence. Okay, so this way
You can understand the grammar of the sentence by basically just skipping that which is in parentheses
And then the grammar will connect and make sense and then the parenthetical is just some like extra bonus information
Now why did they put parentheses here because otherwise when you look at verse 7?
It says neither did he leave of the people of Jehovah has you know
It's kind of like okay. Who's the he there? It could be confusing who the he is
Whereas if you don't look at the parentheses, it says at the end of verse 4 because the king of Syria oppressed them
Neither did he leave of the people of Jehovah has but 50 horsemen and 10 charities everybody see that
so the purpose of the parentheses is
Just one thing it's so that you know that verse 7 is picking up
Grammatically where verse 4 left off so that you know that is the king of Syria
That did only leave of the people to Jehovah has but
50 horsemen is that sound like a lot to you like in ancient warfare
You know, they're fighting with tens of thousands of troops hundreds of thousands of troops
So he's saying like okay, you guys can only have 50 horsemen and
10 chariots so he's basically leaving them with like a super small
military when it comes to the technology of the horses and the chariots and that level of fighting and
10,000 footmen which might sound like a lot but again only
10,000 footmen and
Just a couple chariots couple horsemen. It's it's a it's kind of a skeleton crew
As far as Israel so he's really just decimated them and he says the king of Syria
Had destroyed them and again this goes to support what I just told you that verse 7 is
Grammatically picking up from verse 4 because it's still the king of Syria had destroyed them and had made them like the dust
By threshing so the king of Syria has just absolutely chewed them up and spat them out
So God is allowing them to hang by a thread
God is allowing the nation of Israel to continue to exist
But they're just absolutely hanging by a thread
Okay, God listen their prayers and he saved them from total destruction
But because they're persisting in idolatry
He's just letting them barely hang on and be very weak and anemic
But hey, it's better to be weak and anemic than to be dead. It's better to have 10,000
Footmen and 10 chariots and 50 horsemen rather than to just stop being a nation and just become part of Syria and be enslaved completely
And so again don't go all the way off the cliff spiritually because half a loaf is better than none
but
We as Christians we want to go all the way get right with God get all the way in
Serious about serving God get the grievous sin out of our life so that we can actually be blessed by God and not live this kind of like
10 chariot 50 horsemen
10,000 troops kind of Christian life, you know, we want to live the full blown Christian life and not be weak about it
So it says in verse 8 now the rest of the acts of Jehovah has and all that he did and his might are they not written in the book of the
Chronicles of the kings of Israel and Jehovah has slept with his fathers and they buried him in Samaria and
Joe ash his son reigned in his stead
So we have Jihu then we have Jehovah has now we have Joe ash right and God had promised Jihu
that his sons would reign for the next four generations because of his
Wrath that was executed upon Ahab. He's gonna bless Jihu with four generations
But unfortunately all four generations persists in idolatry and so that's what we see here
So after Joe as we have King Joe ash. This is not the same Joe ash from Judah
It's a different Joe ash popular baby name in the 30 and seventh year of
Joe ash King of Judah
Began Jehovah ash the son of Jehovah has to reign so they both have the same name to spell a little different from time to time
Over Israel and Samaria and reigns 16 years and he did that which was evil in the side of the Lord
He departed not from all the sins of Jeroboam the son of Nebat who made Israel sin
But he walked there in and the rest of the acts of Joe ash and all that he did and his might were with
He fought against Amaziah King of Judah
Are they not written in the book of the Chronicles of the kings of Israel and Joe ash slept with his fathers and Jeroboam
Sat upon his throne and Joe ash was buried in Samaria with the kings of Israel
So that's just kind of giving us like a quick little overview of saying like okay
After Jihu is Jehovah has here's Jehovah has his reign
Here's Joe ashes rain yada yada yada blah blah blah
But then we're gonna get into now the death of Elisha and you're gonna notice that Joe ash is still alive
Okay, so we are deviating from chronological order here because the Bible was just giving us like an overview
Just kind of showing us how Jihu's descendants keep reigning and they keep on
Continuing in the same sin yada yada. Okay, but now we're gonna back up because it says now Elisha
Was fallen sick of his sickness wherever he died and Joe ash the king of Israel came down under him
So notice this is the guy that we just talked about how he died in verse 13 and now he's alive in verse 14
Why because that was out of chronological order
It was just giving us like an overview of a chronicle and that's why this Joe ash
He's gonna die again in chapter 14 because again, we've gone back in time now
The Bible in general is in chronological order every once in a while though for the sake of the story for the sake of themes
It will deviate from chronological order, but usually it makes it obvious if you're paying attention
It's not hard to notice that in verse 13. Yeah, you'd rain this long and then he died and that's like, okay
But you know here is alive in verse 14, okay?
And again, he's gonna die again in chapter 14. I think it's like verse 12 or something somewhere around there
He dies again. I'm not verse 12, but somewhere like that. Okay
Anyway, so let's get into the death of Elisha. It says in verse 14 now Elisha was fallen sick
Of his sickness where have he died and Joe ash the king of Israel came unto him and wept over his face and said
Oh, my father my father the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof and again
This is funny to me because this guy is is doing evil in the sight of the Lord
He's not right with God, but yet he seems to be a big Elisha fan. Isn't that funny?
He loves Elisha. He thinks Elisha is super cool calls him father
But yet he's not obeying him. He's not doing what he says because Elisha is one of the greatest prophets who ever lived
Joe has did that which is evil in the sight of the Lord
Right because when God just gives an overview of him
It's like you did evil because you spent your whole life
Bowing down to an idol and that's idolatry and the Bible says that's not not make unto thee any graven image
That's not bowed down unto them nor serve them the Lord your God is a jealous God
And yet this guy for some reason, you know loves Elisha
So what you see with a lot of these northern kingdom guys is that they have some little modicum of
Spirituality that you know like if you look at even King Ahab, you know King Ab at some point gets right with God
God here's his prayers, you know, and so here's the thing that a lot of these guys are probably saved
But they're just super backslidden super worldly super sinful super and God's not blessing them
God's saying that they're doing evil
But yet they seem to at least be at least a little bit sort of kind of
Connected to worshiping the true God of the Bible and so it's kind of weird how that works
But we see Joe Ash, you know
He's just a big Elisha fan and he's crying and everything and he's sad about Elisha dying
And it's funny what he says because he says oh my father my father the chariot of Israel and the horseman there
I'm like, what does that mean? It's kind of a weird thing to say, right?
Well, if you back up to chapter two of the same book, this is what Elisha said when Elijah died, right?
so Elijah is
able to actually like pass on the torch to the next generation because remember Elisha
Wanted to have a double portion of Elijah's spirit and so you know if Elisha was there when he died
He's gonna get the double portion of Elijah's spirit
And he was able to get the mantle from Elijah and go out and have double the ministry of Elijah and do great things
But here
instead of Elisha
having
His protege that's gonna basically fall in his footsteps
He just has this kind of backslidden messed up king of Israel that's saying the same thing he said to his mentor
He's saying the the chariot of Israel and the horsemen there up because remember Elijah was taken in a fiery chariot
So when Elisha said it it made sense
It fit the context now when Joe Ash is saying it to Elisha. It's really just
He's just kind of just saying words that don't really have meaning. He's kind of going through the motions
He's not a real heir of Elisha
And you know what this shows me is that here's the thing sometimes you can pass on
to the next generation the fire of
Preaching and prophecy and doing great works for God and sometimes you can't because Elijah was a great man of God
And he's able to pass it on to someone else
He's able to train and ordain Elisha to pick it up from him
but Elisha is
A greater man than Elijah in the sense that he does more for God
But yet he's not able to pass it on to the next generation and when he's dying
He doesn't really have a good protege. Who's he supposed to be passing off to Gehazi, right?
His protege didn't pan out apparently other protege's didn't pan out. He's got the king of Israel
He tries to be a good influence on the king of Israel, but he ends up dying
Frustrated and upset with the next generation for not
Catching what they needed to catch not getting what he's trying to pass down to them
You know, it's it's kind of a sad story here that he's not able to pass it on to the next guy the next prophet
And so here's the thing, you know throughout the Bible
Sometimes there will be great men of God doing great works and then other times
It's like
Periods will go by where there's just really no standout
Prophets or really no great leaders or men of God doing anything great for 10 years 20 years at a time
There'll be these kind of dead spots, you know between great prophets
And so it's kind of a sad story here where Elisha is dying
And this is the guy that he's got to basically leave it to is the king of Israel
Who is kind of a joke spiritually and he's not right with God
and so forth
Now why is it wouldn't you think that it'd be easy? It seems like it'd be easy
Just to keep just passing on the faith to the next generation, you know what I mean?
I'm just like and just bringing people in training them teaching them
You know, you think it'd be easy for me as a pastor who have
Passed and preached and had success and have like a successful model of
What we've done and what we've accomplished, you know
You think that you'd be able to train a bunch of other young guys to kind of do the same thing and
You know, we have been able to successfully train some guys that are doing
Phenomenal works for God and great works for God and that are doing every bit is good of work
But then think about all of the bogus
People that we've tried to teach and tried to train and they ended up being idiots
They ended up screwing it up. They ended up being Gehazi. They ended up being a loser in some other way
Why is that? Well, you know
part of the problem is that
People
Often don't want to
Be humble enough to learn and follow somebody else because they they have too much ego and pride
And so I because I was thinking about this today
Like all of these like preaching protégés who've crashed and burned
Like really the big downfall for almost all of them is Envy and
Thinking that they're better than us thinking that they're better than their mentor
Then they're better than other people that they are just somehow thinking that they know better and that they can do better
And and so they get prideful they get arrogant and then they end up
Wanting to tear down their mentor and destroy their mentor as a way to lift themselves up
And of course it never works and it never makes any sense
And you know obviously every situation is a little bit different
But I feel like probably the most common thread that you could trace is like Envy and
Ego in the people that don't make it and that don't pan out
Now here's the thing is that there's no reason why
people should feel this way because
You're supposed to before you become a great leader
You're supposed to be a great follower, right?
And so like why did Elisha pan out because the Bible says that Elisha poured water on the hands of Elijah
So he's a guy who's willing to be humble and do a menial job and he's pouring the water on the hands of Elijah
He's willing to serve. He's willing to follow and here's the thing. This doesn't hold him back
This propels him to greatness because remember when Elijah dies. What is his wish?
He says I want a double portion of your spirit
So this shows it's not that Elisha is just some drone
They're just gonna just blindly do what he's told and has no zeal or no ambition or no desire to surpass his master
That is that really what's going on when he's asking for a double portion?
No, what it is is that he's smart enough to understand that you know what? Hey right now. I'm the follower
I'm gonna be humble. I'm gonna learn. I'm not gonna get out of my
Lane here or get out of place and then when the time comes
Then I will step up to that position of leadership
And I'm gonna use it for the glory of God and I want to do double and here's the thing
I would love to see man that I've trained for the ministry do double the works that I've done and
You know what? Honestly, I believe that they will I believe that some of these guys are going to outperform
And out do me now here's the thing last time I check it's not a contest anyway
You know, we're all on the same team. We're all serving God and there's thing not everybody is necessarily gonna achieve
The same levels, you know, but at the end of the day, we're all on the same team
We're all doing what we can do
We're taking the talents and abilities God has given us and doing the best we can with them
It's not a contest. Some people are gonna pastor a smaller church
They're gonna be in a smaller area or more difficult area more unreceptive area
Other people are gonna pastor in bigger places bigger cities bigger opportunities
And then here's things some people are just gonna have more more of a gift more talent more ability than others
Some people are just gonna be better speakers than others, you know
Just have more energy than others more intellect than others more charisma than others
You know at the end of the day, we all just need to do the best we can with what we've got and
not be in a in a contest about
ego and pride and
whatever
But here's the thing. There's nothing wrong with having an ambition and saying hey, man pastor Anderson did this great work for God
I'd love to do double that in my lifetime like that
That's not a bad thought as long as it's coming from a right attitude a humble attitude that says you know what?
Hey, I want to be greatly used by God. I want to do more. I want to serve more, but before honor comes humility
No one will ever be a great leader without being a great follower first
first you have to be a great church member and look if you're not gonna be respectful to your pastor and
respectful to your mentor and
Actually like be a blessing to him and be a blessing to the church family when you're in a lower position lower status
Then why would God give you success in the higher status?
Right if you're not going to be a good church member
You're not going to be a good pastor and there's the thing even if we just put the ministry aside
You know you've got to learn as a child as a teenager to honor your father and mother or you're not going to succeed for the rest of
your life
You know and it's like and then you go get a job you've got to learn to be respectful to that boss at work
You got to be respectful to the authorities that are in your life to the people who are training you the people that are teaching you
teachers mentors
bosses parents
Whoever it is that's guiding you
You got to listen to those people you got to respect those people and then eventually
Someday God will give you the position of leadership and you'll be able to do a good job as a leader because you were a good job as
A follower I mean that's what the Bible says that if you're faithful in little you'll be faithful in much if you're faithful with another man's
Then you'll be entrusted with your own
Okay, and that is the way life works and unfortunately there are just so many bozos
So many idiots that just feel like oh well, you know
Pastor Anderson, you know they want it they basically want to be under my tutelage
But then they want to also think that I'm stupid or that I'm an idiot or that I'm wrong
It's like well, which one is it bro?
You know, it's like you can't just back. Well, I'm gonna train under a lot and I'm not saying that I'm Elijah
I'm saying you can't be a life shot and back. Well, I'm gonna train under Elijah
But I think Elijah's you know kind of dumb and I'm gonna I'm just gonna do way better
I'm just gonna be where no no because what does he say? I want a double portion of your spirit. He's not saying
I'm smarter. I'm better
Let me just tell you how things are done. Let me tear you down
Let me trash you and hurt you so that I can lift myself up. No, no, it's more like no no no man
I admire you. I love you. I see what you're doing and I want a double portion of your spirit
I want to be like you and then just take it to another level
That's the right way to learn, you know, it's like this in anything. This is forget church
I mean imagine going to the kung fu gym or something
And you're gonna tell the Grand Master or whatever. I don't know Grand Master Flash or whatever the guy's called
You know, you're gonna tell him how to do kung fu and oh, well, I I'm gonna be better than him
It's like shut up, bro. You need to just learn from the guru
You see what I'm saying?
And again, this doesn't mean that you don't think this doesn't mean that you don't have your own opinions
It's just that you respect
Authority and that you respect your teachers and you respect your mentors and maybe you even think to yourself
Hey, I'm not sure that they're right about this. Okay. Keep studying your Bible. Keep reading your Bible
Keep serving God and someday when it's your turn, you know, you can work on those things and prove those things and test those things and
do better
But you've got to
Go the right way and I'm telling you
Elijah passing the mantle to Elisha is a beautiful thing
Moses passing the authority to Joshua is a beautiful thing. But unfortunately the baton is usually fumbled in the Bible
Right, it's beautiful when it's passed from one generation to the other
But how many times is the baton get fumbled in kings and chronicles and in the book of judges where there's a gap
Because there's just nobody carrying the torch from the the the the previous leader. Okay
And
Again, I'm not claiming to be anything like Elijah. I'm not claiming to be perfect
I'm not claiming to be right about everything
But but here's the thing if somebody wants to be trained at Faithful Word Baptist Church and
Trained by pastor Anderson and looks to pastor Anderson as a mentor
Then it wouldn't really make sense for that person to then be acting like oh pastor Anderson's bad or an idiot
Or it's just like well, how's that gonna work?
You know and it's just and you get too many people that are too big for their britches and they're prideful and they're envious and
They're arrogant or they just don't want to wait their turn
You know Elisha had to wait his turn and when his turn came he got the double portion, but he had to wait his turn
Unfortunately, you know, you got people who want to be in the ministry for the wrong reason like Gehazi
He's just for his own self just his own gratification his own
You know greed he wants to be in the ministry and then you got other people that just have such a big ego
They just can't pour hands on the water of the mentor and learn from him and grow and wait their turn and be successful
It's really a shame, you know
Because and look I'm super happy that I've been able to train some great pastors that are out there doing great work for God
But you know honestly like I feel like it should have been a lot more by now
And it should be a lot more in the future, you know
And it's like where are where are the guys at that are going to be that next generation?
That are gonna preach and turn this world upside down with the gospel of Christ, you know
It'd be great to get them trained
But you know what it's gonna take some humble men who want to be serving God for the right reason and
Unfortunately, Elisha doesn't have that so he's stuck with Joe Ash and so
Joe Ash is crying and saying oh
My father my father the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof and Elisha said to him take bow and arrows
And he took on him bow and arrows and he said to the king of Israel put that hand upon the bow
And he put his hand upon it and Elisha put his hands upon the king's hands
And so again, you know the symbolism here is Elisha is trying to pass something on to the next generation
He's trying to teach him something. He's trying to show him something. It's like here
Look, it's like the classic teaching someone how to shoot a bow and arrow putting your hand on their hand and showing them and standing behind them
It's showing them exactly how it's done
Obviously Joe Ash knows how to shoot a bow, but it's symbolic here
Okay, he's putting his hands on his hands and he's having him and he shoot the arrow
And he says open the window eastward verse 17
He opened it then Elisha said shoot and he shot and he said the arrow of the Lord's deliverance
The arrow of deliverance from Syria for thou shalt smite the Syrians and affect till thou have consumed them
And he said take the arrows and he took them and he said to the king of Israel smite upon the ground
And he smote thrice and stayed
Meaning that he hits the ground three times and then he stops
okay
Now apparently
The instruction seems to have been clear that he's supposed to keep hitting the ground
But yet he hits the ground three times and then just kind of stops like okay now what and
The man of God was Roth with him and said thou shouldest have smitten five or six times
Then that's how smitten Syria till that's consumed it. Whereas now thou shalt smite Syria, but thrice
So, you know, he seems upset. I'm not sure how clear this instruction was or wasn't
But he basically tells him to smite the ground he hits it three times and Elisha is like what's the deal?
That's not enough. You should have done five or six because however many times you smote the ground
That's how many times you're gonna defeat Syria
Now you're only gonna defeat them three times and that's not gonna be enough to completely take them out
And Elisha died and they buried him and the bands of the Moabites invaded the land at the coming of the year
And we'll get that in a moment. So the point is that you know, I
If you were to think of a theme for this whole chapter that kind of connects the beginning to the end is that you know
Joe Ash not going all the way
Right and this is symbolized by him whole only hitting the ground five three times instead of five or six times
He's not going all the way, you know, Elisha saying hey, you should have done more you should have gone further
You didn't go all the way. You you did it halfway
and really that's the story of
The entire northern kingdom of like well, we're gonna worship Jehovah, but we're gonna keep the idols
We're gonna keep the groves. They're half in half out when it comes to the Lord and
So here he's being rebuked. He's frustrated. So Elijah
He goes up to heaven
Passing the mantle to a guy who's gonna do twice as good as he ever did
You know, that's a beautiful story here Elisha dies angry and
Frustrated with this bozo
Joe ash who is not gonna defeat Syria. He's not gonna deliver Israel all the way
He's an idolater. He's evil in the side of the Lord. And so it's frustrating for him
And so, you know, I preached a sermon on this passage in the past also called go big or go home
You know, it's like don't hit it three times hit it five or six times, right?
If three is good five or six is better
And this is the whole way that we should live our Christian lives is we should try to go big
Try to go all the way try to be all the way in and you know again
That's why I think the faithful word Baptist Church has been successful is
Part of the reason is because we're all in and we push it hard and we push for the numbers and some people are like
Oh numbers don't matter. Well, I don't know Elisha was a guy who thought that numbers mattered
Because there's there's math involved
Both when Elisha starts his ministry and when Elisha ends his ministry, right?
Because when Elisha starts his ministry, he says I want to do double and if you count
He did twice as many miracles as Elijah and pronounced twice as many prophecies
So Elisha starts his ministry by doing double
Elisha ends his ministry by saying to the guy who follows him you did half
Because three is half of six and so he's basically like started by doing double and then the next generation is like I'm gonna do half
He's like, why are you doing half man? Go all the way
Don't be halfway about your Christian life. And you know, here's the thing
There are some numbers to the Christian life, you know some 60 some 30 and some 100 those are numbers. Oh
God doesn't care about numbers. This whole book called numbers
How come in the book of Acts? It's like 3,000 added to the church 5,000 out of the church if God doesn't care about numbers
You explain that
Because numbers do matter
And so we at our church, you know, we try to put in
Hours
Out soul winning, you know, we try to do a great number of
missions trips numbers of
Trips to the Indian reservation trips to Flagstaff trips to other small towns
You know, we're putting in
hours and numbers and numbers of soul winners and numbers of
Salvation that we're trying to achieve numbers of mission strips, you know
And it ends up being more result because we crunch the numbers and we push for the numbers and we say
Hey, we don't want to do half. We want to do double
Right. Elisha is a double kind of a guy. Joe adds to the half kind of a guy
You know, we don't want to be halfway Baptist
Right. We want to be double portion Baptist church
Okay, we want to do twice as much not half as much as our potential
And so here's the thing, you know, maybe you should look at some of the numbers of your Christian life
And say, hey, maybe my Bible reading should be doubled because maybe I'm doing half what I should be doing
And look, I'm not prescribing any wild and crazy Bible reading plans
But you know what I think you should read the Bible cover to cover at least once a year
And that's not crazy. That's 20 minutes a day. So, you know what you say, well, I'm reading one chapter a day
Well, let's you know, let's double that
Right, let's get you from one chapter to two chapters. Let's get you from two chapters to four chapters
You know, let's think about your soul winning and let's think about getting those numbers up now
Look, we can't control the number of salvations
Right. I don't think that God is expecting us to control the number of salvations because we can take the horse to the water
But we can't make him drink
I could go out and work my butt off out soul winning and get zero saved
And that's going to happen from time to time
But he that goeth forth and weepeth bearing precious seeds shall doubtless come again with rejoicing bringing his sheaves with him
Eventually you're going to get people saved
If you never get people saved something's wrong with you, okay as a soul winner, but it's not always going to happen immediately
Sometimes you do have those dry spells sometimes you're going to have to put it in the long hours
But let me tell you something, you know
God doesn't expect us to make people get saved. We can't make people get saved
God just expects us to go out there and bear the precious seed and preach the gospel to every creature
And it's up to them whether they get saved or not
We can just do our best to be a spirit-filled preacher of the gospel out there
Winning souls to christ the best that we can
And so here's the thing
You know get out there and put in the time
Put in the hours
And you will get the results ultimately, you know, and and you say well, I really want to get the numbers of
Salvation's up. I want to boost my salvation numbers
Well, really the only way to do that is to either put in more time
Or to physically go to a more receptive place
Because obviously in phoenix, it's hard to get people saved
You know so we can fill up a van full of people and go soul winning for an hour and we get one salvation
Right if we took all those same people and we're magically in the Bahamas and we went soul winning for an hour
We're going to get probably more than one salvation
If we're on if we're on the Apache reservation
We're probably going to get a bunch of salvation
If we're in Guyana if we're in the Caribbean somewhere if we're you know somewhere receptive
For in a good and look there are some hot spots around here where you have some some good neighborhoods for soul winning
You you run into those spots, but at the end of the day, you know, you want to get more people saved
You got to either put in more time or go to more receptive places
Go on mission strips. I'm sure if you went to the philippines and work with pastor Stucky
You're probably going to get bocu salvations
You know preaching the gospel in receptive places in a receptive country and whatever
You know if you learn Spanish and go to Mexico, you know, you're probably going to be able to get a bunch of people saved
And so here's the thing, you know, we should want to do something big with our lives
And and so, you know, why don't we think about maybe if you're just barely half in and half out
You know think about boosting your bible reading and you know what get out a calculator or do the math in your head
But you know what it's about numbers my friend
You know, it's it's how many minutes are you spending in your bible?
How many verses are you memorizing? How many minutes are you spending praying?
How many hours are you spending out soul winning? How many people are you preaching the gospel to?
How many missions trips are you going to go on? How many weekend trips are you going to go on?
I guarantee you you do the numbers you change the math and you're going to change the outcome
You're going to change the results
You know in a lot of churches what they care about is just how many people
They could pack into their auditorium
And how much money they could put in their bank account those are the numbers that they think about
They're just thinking about attendance and money
Right, but you know what we're thinking about is more like well, how many doors can we knock
How many mission strips can we take?
How many salvations can we get how many people can we baptize right? That's what we're thinking about
Those are the kind of numbers that we're thinking about we're thinking about like spiritual
Eternal value kind of numbers, but we still care about numbers my friend
So we're going to take all the money in the bank and we're going to drain that bank account to get everybody out soul winning
And out doing missions so we can boost the number that matters, which is the salvation number
Because that's what we care about. That's our value. That's our priority around here. Okay
And so don't be halfway about anything that you do and take
A look at your life
Take inventory and say am I smiting the ground three times?
When I should be smiting at five or six
You know, am I spending this much time when I should be spending this much time?
You know, how much effort are you putting into your christian life because you know
I guarantee you that there are a lot of people who are putting a lot of effort into a lot of things that that aren't spiritual
And it's like maybe you should redirect some of that effort into something for god
Because at the end of the day only one life so soon has passed and only what's done for christ will last
And so elisha
He's already done
I mean a lot. Well, he's not quite done because he almost doubled the miracles. He's one miracle short
So here's where he gets the final miracle
It says it came to pass as they were burying a man in verse 21 that behold they spied a band of men
So here the mobites are burying somebody and all of a sudden they're under attack like while they're burying their guy
They're under attack. They're like we got to get out of here
So they don't finish burying the guy
So then they end up just casting the man into
The sepulchre of elisha
And when the man was let down and touched the bones of elisha he revived in so his feet
So basically they're like we just got to toss this body in a hole
And they happen to toss it into the sepulcher of elisha
They throw the body in and the dead body comes into contact with elisha's bones
And the body just is revived and comes back to life
So elisha is performing one final miracle from the grave
That rounds out his double portion
Because he was one miracle short and he gets it posthumously a posthumous miracle
You know what?
I like this story because it makes me think about the fact that I preach all these sermons and they've been recorded
And people get saved watching the by the way to heaven many I just met a guy
Last week who said that he got saved from the soul winning demonstration
And it's like hey, you know what that soul winning demonstration god willing is going to be online
hopefully even after i'm dead
And hopefully other corpses can come into contact with my dead bones
And be saved and so here's the thing you know what this tells me is that we leave a legacy even after we're dead
Even after you're physically dead
Even if it's not like me where it's like mp3s of sermons that i'm hoping survive
And continue somehow, but you know what even how about just the people that you've
Touched the people that you've trained people that you've won to christ
They can continue to do the work after you're gone
And so your works will continue even after you're dead hopefully
And then you know the chapter ends with you know hasale
Oppressing is real and then of course it talks about how you know they fought against them and
You know the three times and so forth. They don't get all the way there
But just you know my encouragement to you this evening is you know
Just take a look at your life and think about if you are half in and half out
Or what you can double think about some numbers
You know double your prayer time double your library and look maybe you're already reading the bible enough
Then just keep doing it because i'm not saying that you need to double everything. I don't care how much you're doing double it
I might be too much
But i'm saying if you're lean on bible reading if you're lean on prayer if you're lean on soul winning
You know let's get those numbers up. Let's double that let's boost that
Let's get all the way in because you know what life is too short
To be a joe ash
And you know what's so funny about joe ash is he's such he's such an elisha fan
Right
But he's such a loser in his own personal life
You know what it reminds me of it reminds me of these like super out of shape people who love to follow sports
I'll never understand that
Like if if i were super out of shape i'd be like
I don't want to think about sports because it's depressing
But i mean you have just like morbidly obese people that just love watching
All these like really fit athletes do sports
Which and look i'm not if that's you i'm not mad at you i'm not criticizing you i've just never been into it
Anyway, so i'm not really in a place to judge
Okay, because i just don't really follow professional sports and i never have
It's one of those things where if your dad's into it you're into it my dad wasn't into it so i'm not
But but but you know when i think about these guys
Who are just super out of shape, but they're just super into sports
You know to me i think there's some people out there like that spiritually
Who are basically they love listening to the preaching and they're downloading all the sermons and listen to the preaching
And they're doing like nothing for god
That's that's what i think of when i think of joe ash
That's what joe ash is like
Joe ash is like the biggest fan. I mean when elisa's dying. He's there. He's a huge fan
massive fan
Oh, my father my father
The chariots of israel the horseman there. He's bringing up elisa's greatest hits
Hey, i remember when you said that remember you said that when elijah went to heaven you said that
That was so cool when you said that
Right. He's a huge fan
But in his own personal life
He's
half
Of what he should be
And god looks down at him and says well you got this gross sin of idolatry. So
You know pass fail you fail
You know, i mean it's it's it's i wonder how many
Failures are listening to my preaching
And are huge pastor anderson fans, you know what i mean? It's like what get out
Why don't you get out on the field and play the game?
Instead of just being a spectator be a participant
Get in your bible yourself get out soul winning get on your knees and start praying and do something for god
And you know what here's the thing like i'm not saying you're going to be a professional football player
You know, maybe you're in your 40s 50s 60s. Yeah, you're not going to be a professional football player
But you know what can you at least go in the front yard and throw the ball around a little
Can we at least play catch with the football? Can we at least play three flies up?
Can we at least do some flag football?
Can you at least run around the block?
Can you at least do a single push-up?
And look everybody's going to be different we're all at different levels spiritually
We're all growing and we're all in the same team
But you know what let's all look at ourselves and see if some numbers need to be boosted
Let's borrow it's not word of prayer father. We thank you so much for your word lord
We thank you for the example of lisha
and and that
Passing of the torch to the next generation successfully and doing twice as much and then also thank you for the bad example of joe ash
Which is a halfway
Failed attempt at the next generation lord help us to take an inventory
And get our lives on track for you lord to the best of our ability and lord
If there's anybody here who has
Massive sin in their lives and just is ready to just quit and throw in the towel lord
I pray that they just wouldn't give up and that they would just keep pushing and try to do a little better tomorrow
And in jesus name we pray amen