Miracles of Elisha, Message 2 — Ed Miller

How we should praise the Lord. There's another one? Not use notes, just speak from my heart. We need to really praise the Lord for what He does in the hearts of our young people. We need to support them and hold them before the Lord.

It's awesome. It's awesome. As we come to the study of God's Word, there's a principle of Bible study that is absolutely indispensable. And the word indispensable means that we cannot do without it. We can't take it for granted.

We can't overlook it. We can't forget it. It's indispensable. And that is total reliance upon God's Holy Spirit. We have a miracle book. It's given by the breath of God. It's God-breathed. It's inspired.

It's from heaven. It's the Word of God. It's the Word of the Lord. And only the Lord can interpret this to our heart. Only He can show Himself through this precious, precious book. Let me share one Bible verse with you, and then we'll look into the Word back to Elisha.

God's Self-Revelation and the Danger of Superficial Belief

Recently, my heart was moved in John chapter 2 and verse 23 and 24. It says, Now when he was in Jerusalem at the Passover, during the feast, many believed in his name, observing the signs which he was doing.

If the passage ended there, it would mean one thing. But it didn't end there. Listen to the next verse. I'm going to back up again. Many believed in his name, observing the signs which he was doing. But Jesus, on His part, was not entrusting Himself to them, for He knew all men.

What a terrible thing to come to a weekend like Ashur and believe on His name and observe the signs He's doing with the possibility that though we entrust ourselves to Him, He won't entrust Himself to us because He knows our hearts.

Because He did not need anyone to testify concerning man, He Himself knew what was in man. Any place but in the presence of God, we can fake it. Any place, we can get away with it. But don't play with the Lord, brothers and sisters.

We're going to call out and ask God to reveal Himself. We want self-disclosure. We want God to make Himself known. And it's possible that He won't disclose Himself to us because He knows what's in us.

He knows our heart. What a shame if He doesn't disclose Himself to us. He doesn't disclose Himself to everybody. May God reveal Himself. Let's pray and ask the Lord to deliver us from the kind of belief that would not allow Jesus to commit Himself to us.

Father, we thank You for Your precious Word and Your many, many promises that You would meet those who would come trusting the Holy Spirit to open the eyes and to illumine the heart and to unveil the Savior.

Lord, we call upon You now and we ask You to disclose Yourself. We pray that we might be able to believe in such a way that You would commit Yourself to us. Oh, work it in us, we pray, in Jesus' name.

Amen. I'll ask you to open your Bibles, please, to 2 Kings, if you would, and chapter, well, for now, chapter 1. This weekend at this marvelous servant of the Lord, Elisha, the man who looked like Jesus, the one who was a friend to the helpless, the one who cleansed the leper, the one who multiplied loaves, the one who raised the dead, the one who communicated life after he himself was dead, the one that reached out to the Gentiles, the one that came unto His own and His own received Him not, the one who knew what was in man, this man that looks like Jesus.

Elisha as an Old Testament Picture of Christlike Character

And we're looking at Him because God has called you to look like Jesus and He's called me to look like Jesus. And so it's possible if we study in seed form this Old Testament illustration of a man who looked like Jesus, maybe we can pick up a secret or two on how God creates a person like that.

Now, you're not in the dark, and so I'll be very candid and tell you, there are not many Elishas in the church. There are not many Elishas, people, men and women, who look like Jesus. This morning we looked at some of the principles that we call sort of preparation or the preliminary thing.

The man who looks like Jesus. This is not optional. The man who looks like Jesus must be prepared as God prepared Elisha. The way we've divided this up is we're going to look two lessons at the man and then two lessons at the message that that man held.

The man that looks like Jesus is the Christian, and the message is the gospel. And so nothing could be simpler. What we're going to look at this weekend is our Lord Jesus Christ and the grace of God. That's what it's all about.

That's what we do every HaShua. We just yell in different places. It's the same message. It's always the same message. Let me just review the principles. I won't develop them, that we looked at this morning.

Responding to Grace, Desiring God, and Maintaining Spiritual Focus

If God is going to bring a man to look like the Lord Jesus, a woman, the first truth is this. It's the first thing recorded in Elisha's life. The first record we have. And that is that God visits us by His grace unsolicited.

He was not expecting it. God just showed up. And when God shows up, man must respond to that. And that's the very first principle. The grace of God came to Elisha. And through the instrumentality of Elijah, laid the mantle on his shoulders, called him.

And he responded in an unquestioning surrender. A willful, total, joyful laying down of everything so that he could respond to the grace of God. That was the first principle. The second principle that God worked in his heart, and is indispensable in anybody who's in any degree serious about being like the Lord Jesus, we just summarize it in one word.

Well, we use many words, but any one of these words. He has to have desire. He has to have thirst. He's got to want it. God's not going to force anything on anybody. They've got to desire it. And Elisha had a passion for what was called the double portion, or the double blessing.

I was talking to Jake just before we came up here, and I was moved by one of the things he said. And he said, I fear that one of the greatest things missing among God's people is desire. God has so much more to give than we want to receive.

I don't know if you're familiar with the author Frederick Faber. He's real good. He's real bad. It depends on what you pick up. Anyway, in his poetry, he's real good. The lack of desire is the ill of all ills.

Many thousands through it the dark pathway have trod. The honey, the wine of predestinate wills, is a jubilant pining and longing for God. Well, Elisha had that jubilant pining and longing for God. And without that, there can be no person who is like the Lord Jesus.

And then finally, we looked at the last principle illustrated in chapter 2, verse 10. Elijah said, If you see me when I'm taken, it shall be so for you. And it has to do with focus. It has to do with vision.

It has to do with seeing. Not with these eyes, but with these eyes. And he had a desire to be alert to the spiritual world, to the invisible world. And he was called to a tremendous task in the midst of amazing distractions, to keep focused.

You want to be like the Lord Jesus? That's how Elisha started. You have to respond to the grace of God, and you have to want it. And you have to determine purpose in your heart, that I will be focused on the spiritual reality.

That's how it all began. And you see how those principles are fundamental and foundational principles. You can see why God starts there. Responding to His grace. Having a desire in your heart for God's best to be poured out in your life.

Being willing to look beyond this world and see, focus on the Lord. Those are fundamental things. When we closed this morning, I called attention to the fact that that was the starting point of Elisha's experience.

It wasn't the goal. It wasn't something that they were moving toward. There are many, many wiles of the devil. And I think two of his tricks that he pulls on those who have some earnestness to really know the Lord, and go forward with the Lord, the devil loves to make a goal out of a starting point.

He just delights to do that, because if he can make a goal out of a starting point, you'll never begin. It's always out there. Someday I'll be surrendered. Someday I'll be filled with the Spirit. Someday I'll trust the Lord fully.

Someday I'll be sold out. Someday I'll desire God's best. And it never comes. That's why it's a starting point. You say, well, I hope at the end of Hashuah to have those three characteristics. Totally surrender to the Lord.

A great desire for God's best in my life. Focused on the spiritual world. Well, if you desire that at the end of Hashuah, you better have it at the beginning of Hashuah. Because it's a starting point.

And then just in passing, the other clever trick of the devil, if he doesn't make a goal out of a starting point, he makes by-products to become goals. And a by-product is not a goal. Christ is the goal.

The knowledge of the Lord is the goal. Rest is not the goal. That's the by-product. Joy is not the goal. That's the by-product. Peace is not a goal. That's a by-product. Spiritual gifts are not a goal.

That's the by-product. Holiness is not a goal. That's a by-product. Don't run after those things. You run after the Lord and those things come. You run after those things, you miss the goal and the by-product together.

Oh, may God deliver us from those terrible wiles. But in the connection with Elisha, we're talking about this idea that the goal is, don't make a starting point a goal. When we left off in our discussion, I was pointing out the difference, and this is where we'll begin tonight, the difference between having the mantle of God on your shoulder and having the mantle of God in your hand appropriated, claimed by faith, that the mantle was on Elisha's shoulders before he surrendered to the Lord.

The mantle was on his shoulders before he expressed any desire for a double portion. The mantle was on his shoulders before he ever was called to be tested with his spiritual vision. But when he picked up the mantle, he had already surrendered to the Lord.

You can't have the mantle in your hand until you've totally surrendered to the Lord and responded to His grace. Until God has put in you a passion just to know Him, to have His best in your heart, and that God has worked in you that determination to be focused.

No matter what the distraction, no matter how great the whirlwind, no matter what's breaking all around me, I'm just going to keep looking to Jesus. Then you pick it up, and now life begins. Now, I know some of you, this is all review, because you have already picked up the mantle and your life has begun.

Four Miracles in Elisha's Ministry

Well now, this evening, what I'd like to do, this is our next look at the man. Now, let's just look at the life and ministry. If it's in fact true that I have embraced it, I've been through those other principles, what will my life and ministry look like?

And in the first chapters, He lays down four stories, four miracles, and in those miracles, He just lays out, if you've really done it, this is what you can expect in your life. So we're just going to sort of look at the overview.

Then, Lord willing, tomorrow we'll begin and break it down and look at the details of that. In chapter 2 and verse 14, we have the first of four miracles. Let me just sort of lay them out before you. We have that first miracle of crossing the Jordan.

And then we have the second miracle where He heals the waters of Jerusalem. The third miracle where He curses the children of Bethel and the bears come out of the woods. And then the fourth miracle in the wilderness where the trenches were dug and God gave a supernatural supply of streams in the desert.

Those are the first four miracles that take place in Elisha's life. Now that's a lot of ground to cover in one evening, so once again, I'll just tell you, I'm going to try just to touch the revelation of the Lord.

I regret that we must leave so many wonderful things behind. But again, we're not doing 2 Kings. We're looking at God's heart in the life of this wonderful servant. Now when I call the crossing of the Jordan the first miracle after He picked up the mantle, you understand how I'm using the word miracle.

What we talk about when we talk about miracles, when God does some supernatural thing and for a moment suspends the laws of nature and that kind of thing. I told you this morning that He had a complete surrender.

Well, you know that's a miracle. That's a miracle. And you know He desired the fullness of the Lord. That's a miracle to desire that. And He was focused without distraction. That's a mighty miracle. So when I say this is the first miracle, I know there were other miracles, but I'm talking about the kind of miracle that you can see with these eyes where God does something very wonderful.

The Jordan Crossing and God's Supernatural Opening of the Way

Chapter 2, verse 8. If you'll look there please. The last miracle that Elijah did was the first miracle that Elisha did. Elijah took his mantle, folded it together, struck the waters, and they were divided here and there so that the two of them crossed over on dry land.

And it was right after this that when Elijah was caught up that the mantle came down and Elisha picked up the mantle. Verse 13. And he also took up the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and returned and stood by the bank of the Jordan.

He took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and struck the waters and said, Where is the Lord, the God of Elijah? And when he also had struck the waters, they were divided here and there and Elisha crossed over.

Now what truth is illustrated? What summary truth is illustrated by the opening of the Jordan there? And the answer is this, what can I expect in my life if God makes me an Elijah? If I pick up the mantle?

And I think the first answer illustrated by the first miracle is this, I can expect God to open the way before me. I can expect a life of faith. And what you see at the beginning is what was true in his whole life in ministry.

God began right away, as soon as he took that mantle, now God began to supernaturally open up the way before him and remove hindrances that were otherwise in his way. No obstacle can stand in the way of someone who has learned to pick up the mantle.

Who has appropriated the Lord by simple faith. Then God begins to open up His way. Now where is Elisha going? And the answer is, he's going to minister to God's people. That's where he's going. Oh, it took a mighty miracle of God to bring him to the place where he could minister to God's people.

It's always a mighty miracle when God calls you to minister to His people. God has to open the way. He has to dry up the hindrances and remove all the obstacles. If I'm prepared by God as Elisha was, I can expect what happened at the beginning to be characteristic of my whole Christian experience.

Not just at the beginning. You may say when Elijah was alive, Elijah opened the Jordan River by his faith. And now he's gone, and so Elisha is going to open up the river by his faith. Look at verse 14.

And he took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and he struck the waters, and he said, where's the Lord, the God of Elijah? Elisha's not trusting Elijah or Elijah's faith. Where's the God of Elijah?

See, we might have the idea that faith will dry up the river. Faith won't dry up any river. God will dry up a river, but faith won't. Some people have faith in their faith. And they just trust their trust.

God hasn't called you to trust your trust. He's called you to trust the Lord. He's called you to trust in Jesus. Call me to trust in Jesus. And that's what Elisha did. As you know, this is not the first time God opened the Jordan River.

About 500 years before this, God had already opened up the Jordan River in the days of Joshua. Five hundred years before when God opened up the Jordan River in the days of Joshua, He didn't use a mantle.

What did He use that day? He used the ark of God. And it wasn't to bring one man over. It was to bring a whole nation over. You see, the ark was God's picture of Christ for the group. The mantle is God's picture of Christ for the individual.

By this miracle, God was saying, Elisha, you've chosen to follow Me and you've embraced Me. And now I'm going to open the way before you. And I want you to know that the God of the distant past is your God.

I'm the same God that opened the river for the group 500 years ago. And now I'm going to open the river for you. Elisha could have thought, because God called him to minister to the northern tribes, He could have reasoned this way.

Well, now how in the world am I ever going to get across the river? Because the southern tribes, they have the ark. And I don't have the ark, so I can't get across the river. Elisha, that's no excuse.

Because when you don't have the ark, you have the mantle. The ark is for the group and the mantle is for the individual. Someone here might say, well, you don't know what I go through. My family is not trusting the Lord.

I'm not from a Christian family. That's no excuse. You have the mantle. It doesn't matter what the group is doing. You say, well, you don't understand. My church is not following the Lord. That's no excuse.

You have the mantle. You say, well, America's turned from the Lord. What can we expect? I'll tell you what you can expect. Pick up the mantle. God will open the way for the individual, even when the group doesn't follow.

And right away, Elisha is learning that God is going to open the way that God can be trusted and that the path will be a supernatural path. I'm not going to take the time to do it, but I have an idea, if I did it, it would be successful.

I have an idea that I could start right in the front row, and I could go row by row and person after person could testify it's true. When I embraced the Lord in His fullness, He began to open the way.

He began to open doors and remove obstacles that I could not believe. And probably it would be very profitable to just do that and not even finish the message. It would be such a rich testimony time. And that's the first...

What will my life look like? Testimony after testimony after testimony. God did impossible things. And when He did it, don't forget, I said there's not many Elishas around. When He did it, the 50 sons of the prophets were standing on the banks with their mouths opened wide in amazement, and their eyes opened wide in amazement.

Elisha is remnant. They're rare. Somebody that is serious about just wanting the Lord. And when somebody just wants the Lord, the other Christians stand around. They can't believe what God does for you.

And the doors got opened and the rivers. God dries it up for you. And they can't understand it. And that's the beginning of such a life. As the first miracle summarized, the kind of life you can expect.

Healing Barren Waters and Bringing Spiritual Blessing

The next miracle summarized, the kind of ministry you can expect. Elisha had a supernatural life now. A miracle life. And he also had a miracle ministry. If I'm serious and I've picked up the mantle, what will my ministry look like?

If you're serious with the Lord and you've picked up the mantle, what can you expect? God gives us three stories. Three miracles. These are the first four miracles that happened in his life. And they tell the story.

Where are you going to find Elisha? What's he going to be doing? Who's he going to be ministering unto? What's his ministry going to look like? And so God gives us these stories. Let me give three characteristics of what you can expect illustrated by these miracles.

Number 1, chapter 2, verse 19, And the men of the city said to Elisha, Behold now, the situation of the city is pleasant as my Lord sees, but the water is bad and the land is unfruitful. And he said, Bring me a new jar and put salt in it.

And so they brought it to him. And he went out to the spring of water and he threw salt in it. And he said, Thus says the Lord, I have purified these waters. There shall not be from their death or unfruitfulness any longer.

And so the waters have been purified to this day according to the word of Elisha which he spoke. Let me sort of just give you the truth and then break it apart. What will the man of God, what will his ministry look like?

Well, I think the principle illustrated here is that God is going to use him to bring spiritual blessing. He's going to remove the curse and bring the blessing of the Lord. It's a very positive story.

Now let me retell the story and fill in some of the background. The place we're talking about is Jericho. And it's the same Jericho that Joshua marched around. And at the end of the war, that seven-year war, a curse was put on Jericho by Joshua.

Do you remember that? A curse was put on Jericho 500 years before. It's recorded in chapter 6, verse 26 of Joshua. Joshua made them take an oath at that time saying, Cursed before the Lord is any man who rises up and builds the city of Jericho.

With the loss of his firstborn, he'll lay the foundation. And with the loss of his youngest, he'll set up the gates. Well, people were afraid of that curse for many years. A hundred years went by. Someone says, Let's build Jericho.

They said, Oh no, don't build Jericho. There's a curse on that. You're going to lose your firstborn as soon as you start and you're going to lose your youngest child at the time you finish. And so hundreds of years went by and Jericho was not rebuilt.

But in the days of Elijah when Ahab was king and Jezebel was queen and idolatry was rampant and God was put aside, they scoffed at the curse of God. And someone came up with the bright idea, Let's rebuild Jericho.

The record of that is in 1 Kings 16. And I'll just read verse 34. In his days, the Bethelite built Jericho and he laid its foundation with the loss of Abiram, his firstborn. And he set up his gates with the loss of his youngest son, Segab, according to the word of the Lord.

That word was 500 years old. God remembered His word. And the man who tried to rebuild it, he lost two of his sons in the building of Jericho. But now it's rebuilt, and so let's move in. And so they moved in.

And they started to live there. And it was wonderful. Except the curse went beyond the death of two children. Evidently, the curse was on the city itself and on the water supply. Chapter 2 of 2 Kings 19.

The men of the city said to Elisha, Behold, the situation of the city is pleasant, as my Lord sees, but the water is bad. The land is unfruitful. Now that word translated unfruitful, it can be a little bit misleading.

Don't get the idea that the water is bad, the land is unfruitful. That if you went to Jericho, it would be a desert. It would be a desolation. That's not how it was at all. Depends on what time you'd go there.

That word translated unfruitful literally means the ground casts forth its fruit. The fruit didn't come to fruition. It's the Hebrew word for miscarry. It miscarried. If you went to Jericho in the spring, you would be very deceived.

Your eyes would be deceived. If you went to Jericho in the spring, you would find green grass and green leaves and buds on the trees and blossoms on the trees. But as the fruit came closer and closer to the harvest, it would suddenly miscarry.

It would begin to wither. It would begin to rot. And it would fall rotten to the ground. Year after year this happened. It looked so good on the outside, but everything miscarried. That sad story kept repeating itself every season.

Barrenness. Miscarriage. Abortion. Death. There are some people like Jericho. Like the city of Jericho. They look pretty good to these eyes and all around people who observe them. But they get so tired from miscarrying.

They get so weary. They want to do it and they seek the Lord and it's going to work and then it doesn't work. And there's no fruit in their life. So they come to the altar and they sign another card and they raise their hand and they cry and they go in the counseling room and then they go back.

And then it's death again. And it doesn't work and they sin and they go out and they have no victory in their life. And it's barren over and over and over again. Those people will seek out Elisha. That's His ministry.

That's one of the first characteristics of His ministry. Those kind of people that look so good that desire fruit but don't know what to do. They're going to hunt out Elisha. And that's what happens in the record.

They won't go to the 7 ,000 who have not bowed the knee to Baal. It's interesting to read that the sons of the prophet had set up a Bible school right here in Jericho. They didn't go to them. They didn't go to the Bible school because when you have that in your life, that's the big secret.

I don't want anybody to know about that. I want them to see my buds and see my leaves and see my blossoms and think I'm doing pretty well in the Lord. And then I'll go backstage and I'll cry. And I'll weep because I know there's something awfully wrong.

And then one day, I'll hear about Elisha, the man who looks like Jesus, and I'll seek him out. And so they go to the man of God. And the man of God will always do what the man of God did here. Let's talk about it.

The cause of their barrenness, the cause of their constant miscarriage, their cause of not being able to produce fruit to fruition, it was way down deep in the spring, in the source, on the inside. Now, the man of God has a ministry to those who look like Jericho.

Verse 19, when the men of the city said to Elisha, Behold, now the situation of the city is pleasant as my Lord sees, but the water is bad and the land is unfruitful. The situation was perfect. Jericho wasn't situated in some desert.

It wasn't on some mountaintop. It was a perfect situation. It had a perfect climate. It had a great water supply. But the spring, the essence of it, was messed up. How many people like Jericho have a great situation?

Great church. Great church background. They're situated wonderful. It shouldn't be happening. And yet, in their lives... And so, the ministry of the man of God, it's going to be blessing. It's going to be removing the curse.

But watch God's method, because God's method here is everlastingly the same. First of all, the man of God always goes to the polluted spring. He doesn't chop off weeds at the surface. He doesn't deal with some symptom.

Somebody comes to him and says, I'm having a real struggle over this immorality in my life. The man that looks like Jesus goes right to the spring. He knows what's wrong. You see, if they had gone to the sons of the prophets, I don't think they would have gone right to the spring.

The man of God always goes right to the spring, to the heart of it. And then the man of God always throws salt in the spring. Now, I know there's some evidence to believe that salt is a picture in the Old Testament of God's Holy Spirit.

And perhaps it is. Leviticus 2 and 13 says you couldn't offer a sacrifice to the Lord unless you offered that sacrifice with salt. And there are passages that talk about a covenant of salt. And maybe others see more than I see.

But I'm inclined to think more in the line of we're identifying with a rejected Savior King when we identify with Christ. Did you ever hear the expression put salt in the wound? And how that's used. When someone says, ah, you're just putting salt in the wound.

That means you're doing more harm than good. It's an amazing picture here that God would cure impure water with salt. Let me give an illustration so you know exactly what I'm saying. A woman is being badly treated by her life partner.

Maybe she's being terribly abused. Brutalized. She needs help. So let's say she goes to the sons of the prophets for help. I wonder what they would say. They would say, your husband needs help. I suggest, and then they would set up a counseling session because that guy needs help.

He's messed up and he's doing bad things and he needs some help. And then I also suggest perhaps that you read these books. These are wonderful how-to books. And perhaps they would help you. And then maybe in the counseling session, he would be asked some heart-searching questions about his childhood.

Were you ever nursed as a child? Was there asbestos in your kindergarten bucket? I don't want to play with this, but that's not the spring. That's not the source. And he throws salt in the spring. And so the same woman comes.

Man of God, you've got to help me. My husband is abusing me terribly. What should I do? Look to Jesus. Don't tell me that. Give me something practical. Just look to Jesus. That's the only answer the man of God has.

And it's salt in the spring. And the drug addict comes and says, what should I do? And he says, look to Jesus. And he goes right to the spring and he gives the real answer, salt. Look to Christ in reality.

The guy says, you've got to give me more than that. I want to be practical. You're not helping me. Don't keep saying, look to Jesus. The man of God says, all I've got is salt. That's all I have. And to make it worse, you're not going to put salt in it and it tells you to look to the Lord and then he says, now wait and see.

And some people just throw their hands up and despair. That's no answer. I need something better than that. Stop giving me that. What can I expect if I really lay hold of the mantle? I can expect God to be opening supernatural doors.

I'm going to start a miracle walk. What can I expect in my ministry? I can expect those who have been embarrassed by their barren life to seek me out and to say, look, I can't find help. There's a problem.

It looks great. I've fooled everybody. They all look at it and think I'm doing great. I'm not doing great. I keep aborting. I can't bear fruit. What's wrong? And he'll go right to the spring and he'll put salt in the spring and he'll say, now wait.

And blessing will come. That's the blessing of the Lord. That's the first miracle and that's what the man of God can expect in his life. I'm going to ask you to look at the second miracle please because this is a little different.

Judgment at Bethel and the Dividing Work of the Word

23. He went up from there to Bethel as he was going up by the way. Young lads came out from the city, mocked him and said, go up you bald head. Go up you bald head. My son Daniel. You know him? Some of you do.

He shaved his head. Bald. He's bald as bald could be. And he's got that verse on his wall. He called that his favorite Bible verse. Go up you bald head. He absolutely militated against the text on that.

And when he looked behind him, he saw them. He cursed them in the name of the Lord. Two female bears came out of the woods and they tore up 42 lads of their number. What can I expect if I'm serious about the Lord?

You say, a ministry of blessing. That's part of it. Here's the other side. A ministry of cursing. A ministry of cursing. Negative. In Jericho, he removed the curse, but here at Bethel, he brings the curse.

Now if you have a King James Version, you might be confused at the wording of verse 24 there. There came forth two she-bears out of the woods and tore 42 children of them. The word children might make you think of little kids.

Little children. What happened here was not playground teasing. It wasn't somebody calling names, making fun of the prophet. Maybe they were little children in the midst. Maybe they weren't. I don't know.

I know the word that's used. Solomon was 20 years old when he applied it to himself. And remember when Samuel gathered the sons of Jesse? And they all stood there. He's going to anoint the king. There, the same word is used.

And he gathered all the lads, all the children of those sons. And so probably they were teenagers or better. Probably they were maybe in their young 20s. And it wasn't just boys calling names, saying, you know, go up you bald head, go up you bald head.

Actually in the Septuagint, you familiar with that? That's the Greek Old Testament. They have an added verse in there, in the Septuagint, and it says, and they pelted him with stone. See, we don't have that in our translation.

We just say, oh you bald head, you bald head. They weren't 42. It says out of their number, 42 were tore up. There were more than 42. We don't know how many. This was not just a little band of kids making fun of a prophet.

This was a gang. And if you believe the Septuagint, they were stoning him. And probably this whole incident rescued him, saved his life. I don't know that for a fact, but I know that it was more than little brats.