There are MANY lessons that we can learn from the prophet Elisha. This is the seventh in a series, appearing in the next few Saturday editions of The Nugget, focusing on the life of this great prophet.
“What can be done for her?” Elisha asked. Gehazi said, “Well, she has no son and her husband is old.” Then Elisha said, “Call her.” So he called her, and she stood in the doorway. “About this time next year,” Elisha said, “you will hold a son in your arms.” “No, my lord,” she objected. “Don’t mislead your servant, O man of God!” (2 Kings 4:14-16)
This story takes place in the land of Shunem where there lives a well-to-do woman and her husband. The woman recognizes that Elisha is a man of God, and she urges her husband to build a small room for him on their room. Elisha, overcome with gratitude, says to his servant, “What can be done for her?” Elisha’s servant observes that the woman has no child. Now to be childless in Elisha’s day was a great disgrace. Many are the stories in the Bible of barren women crying out to the Lord to become pregnant. So, when Elisha proceeds to tell her that in a year’s time she will hold a son in her arms, he is giving to her the highest reward possible.
But instead of tears of thankfulness and joy, the Shunamite’s response is simply: “No, my lord . . . Don’t mislead your servant, O man of God!”
Why would she respond in this manner?
Only because she has more than likely been often disappointed! It was considered a disgrace in her day to be without child, and the Bible records many stories of childless mothers begging for babies (Hanna/Samuel, Rachel/Joseph, Rebecca/Jacob, Sarah/Isaac, etc.). How the Shunamite must have prayed for a baby! But her prayers had only been met with more disappointment! So, in order to cope with her bitter disappointment and shame, she simply gives up hope!
But now, here stands the man of God telling her that in a year she will have a baby! Should she believe him? She desperately wants to. But what if? Will she only be opening the door to more disappointment? More pain? More shame? And so she cries out in unbelief: “No my lord, Don’t mislead your servant, oh man of God!”
But Elisha spoke the truth, and one year later, the woman of Shunem did, indeed, hold a baby boy in her arms!
Is there something that continues to disappoint you? Some prayer that as yet remains unanswered? Have you, like the woman of Shunem, given up hope? If you have, than how would YOU respond if God told you that you would, indeed, receive your heart’s desire? Would you believe? Or would you, like the woman of Shunem, cry out: “Lord, do not mislead Your servant!”
God’s Word is Truth, my friends. No matter what it is, if God promises it to you, you will get it. Never stop believing, for God will NEVER mislead His servants! Instead, claim the promise as yours, and sit back to receive the fullness of His blessings for you!
See next Saturday’s edition of The Nugget for Lessons From Elisha, Part 8.
Love in Christ,
Lyn
Lyn Chaffart, Moderator, The Nugget, Scriptural Nuggets ( www.scripturalnuggets.org ), Answers2Prayer Ministries, www.Answers2Prayer.org , ]]>
(To access the entire “Lessons From Elisha” mini-series, please click here.)