Hazael Murders Ben-hadad

Introduction to Elisha's Ministry and the Passage

0:06 I would encourage you to turn in your own Bibles, if you will please, to 2 Kings, 2 Kings chapter 8, and I shall read beginning with verse 7 through to the end of verse 15, 2 Kings chapter 8. This is the second incident recorded in 2 Kings 8 with reference to the life and ministry of the prophet Elisha, and the final incident in this chapter for beginning with verse 16. There is again this thread of weaving together the history of the southern kingdom of Judah with the chronology of the kings of the north, and the time of God's judgment upon the northern kingdom is ripening, and in an almost disappointing way, Elisha just begins to fade out of the picture, having fulfilled his purpose. In the will of God. Now verse 7. And Elisha came to Damascus, and Ben-Hadad, the king of Syria, was sick.

1:15 And it was told him, saying, The man of God is come hither. And the king said unto Hazel, Take a present in thy hand, and go, meet the man of God, and inquire of the Lord by him, saying, Shall I recover of this sickness? So Hazel went to meet him. And took a present with him, even of every good thing of Damascus, forty camels' burden, and came and stood before him, and said, Thy son Ben-Hadad, king of Syria, hath sent me to thee, saying, Shall I recover of this sickness?

1:52 And Elisha said unto him, Go, say to him, Thou shalt surely recover. Howbeit the Lord hath showed me that he shall surely die. And he settled. And he settled his countenance steadfastly upon him, until he was ashamed.

2:11 And the man of God wept. And Hazel said, Why weepeth my Lord? And he answered, Because I know the evil that thou wilt do to the children of Israel. Their strongholds wilt thou set on fire, and their young men wilt thou slay with the sword, and wilt dash in pieces their little ones, and rip up their wings, And Hazel said, But what is thy servant, who is but a dog, that he should do this great thing?

2:47 And Elisha answered, The Lord hath showed me that thou shalt be king over Syria. Then he departed from Elisha, and came to his master, who said to him, What said Elisha to thee? And he answered, He told me that thou wouldest surely recover. And it came to pass, on the morrow, that he took the coverlet, and dipped it in water, and spread it on his face, so that he died.

3:17 And Hazel reigned in his stead.

3:23 In a very real sense, the two incidents recorded in this chapter, with reference to the life and ministry of Elisha, underscore two of the major characteristics or strands of his ministry. We have seen, we have seen him again and again, ministering to needy, humble individuals who constituted part of the 7,000 who had not bowed the knee to Baal. And then moving right from these obscure interactions with private individuals, sometimes of a very humble station in life, we find the man of God in the presence of kings and armies, standing as it were as God's representative, declaring the will of God, for entire nations. And so we move from the incident in the first six verses in which he's meeting the cry of this woman of Shunem, who has probably now become a widow, and it has to do with her individual rights with respect to her house and her land, and the fulfillment of God's promises to one individual who is holding fast to the covenant. And now we move right from that incident, into one in which, we find a heathen king seeking the counsel of the man of God.

Main Characters: Ben-Hadad, Hazael, and Elisha

4:46 And as we attempt to understand the story and then to derive from it its abiding message to our hearts, it's essential that first of all we seek to ascertain something concerning the main characters involved in this story. The first one is this man called King Ben-Hadad. Now, lest you be confused with the story, the first one is this man called King Ben-Hadad. Now, lest you be confused with the story, there are several Ben-Hadads who appear in the books of Kings and Chronicles.

5:16 I want to quote from a very helpful book, and I would encourage every Christian family to have this volume if you don't have it, the Zondervan Pictorial Bible Dictionary. You'll find it most helpful in many, many things. And under the section dealing with Ben-Hadad, just these few sentences that I think will be of great help to you in understanding his significance, in this particular portion of the Word of God. The term Ben-Hadad is a term of title as opposed to a proper name.

5:52 As the rulers in Egypt bore the title Pharaoh, so the rulers of Syria bore the designation Ben-Hadad, which literally means son of Hadad. And Hadad, of course, was one of their pagan gods. The Syrians believe their rulers were in lineal descent, and that they were the descendants of the Syrian god Hadad, the deity of the storm and the thunder, to be identified with the god Rimen, whom we encounter in 2 Kings chapter 5. There are three individuals in the Old Testament called Ben-Hadad, and so we refer to them as Ben-Hadad I, II, and III.

6:34 Ben-Hadad I was a contemporary with Asa, king of Judah, and we read of him in 1 Kings 15. But the Ben-Hadad that we have been encountering is the one who was probably the son of Ben-Hadad I, and he is the one who was a contemporary with Ahab, the Ben-Hadad who is present in the life and ministry of the latter part of Elijah, and on into the life of Elisha. And then Ben-Hadad III was the name of the man who was the son of Hazel, who succeeded Hazel upon the...

7:10 Syrian throne after the death of Hazel. Now, why should we know these facts? Well, for the simple reason that when we read in this particular incident that Ben-Hadad is sending for Elisha and calling him by his title the man of God, he is not doing that on hearsay. He lived through some amazing manifestations of the might and power of Jehovah, through the life and ministry of Elisha, the man of God.

7:45 This is the Ben-Hadad who had seen his great general go off a leper into Israel and come back a cleansed leper, and who no doubt asked for all of the details of how that cleansing was effected. And he knew from the very lips of his general Naaman that it was by virtue of the mighty power of Jehovah, that power which came to him in obedience to the word of the prophet Elisha. Furthermore, this is the Ben-Hadad who found all of his military plans frustrated in 2 Kings 6, until he thought he had someone within his ranks who was a defector to Israel and a spy who was giving all the military information. And he came to know that as a man of God, Elisha could, when God revealed it to him, know those things that only the true and the living God could know. Furthermore, this is the Ben-Hadad who came with his armies in chapter 6 and verse 24. You remember, and had encircled the city of Samaria and had hoped to bring the children of Israel into subjugation.

8:59 And then God marvelously brought this deliverance by causing the armies to hear the sound of what they thought was a coalition of many armies. And so this man, Ben-Hadad, is a man, though a pagan, who has had some first-hand dealings with the living God Jehovah, the God of the prophet Elisha. And then the second main character in this passage is this man called Haziel. Now the word or the name Haziel is a proper name and literally means God sees.

9:37 And I'm not precisely sure or sure precisely why that name was given to him, but it is significant that his name in a very real sense is bound up in this very portion of the word of God. And he was apparently a high official in the court of Ben-Hadad II. He had already been mentioned in the biblical history in 1 Kings chapter 19, when God recommissioned Elijah the prophet, bringing him out of his discouragement. He gives him a job to do, and he says to him in 1 Kings 19.15, Go return on thy way to the wilderness of Damascus, and when thou comest, thou shalt anoint Haziel to be king over Syria. And then God intimates that Haziel's position as king will be with a specific task in view, namely to become God's scourge to bring judgment upon his people, It shall come to pass that him that escapeth from the sword of Haziel shall Jehu slay, and him that escapeth from the sword of Jehu shall Elisha slay.

10:56 And so years before, God had already decreed that Haziel should be brought to the kingship of Syria, and in the hand of God would become a frightening scourge for the chastisement and punishment of his own people. And then, of course, the third main character in this passage is Elisha. Called by that distinguishing title, the man of God, on two occasions. In this passage, and surely, as we receive further insights to the character of Elisha in this passage, we are more convinced than ever that he was indeed a man of God.

Elisha's Journey to Damascus and Ben-Hadad's Inquiry

11:38 A man whose life has no explanation, but according to his own language, he stands in the presence of God. Well, so much then about those main characters, which I trust will help you, as together we seek now to grasp the main character of Elisha. The major facts of the story that is before us. And in verse 7, we have a record of Elisha's journey into Damascus.

12:05 And it's given to us in very simple terms, Elisha came to Damascus. Now, the commentators have a field day whenever God is sparse with his information. There is something about the spirit of inquiry and inquisitiveness that does not escape even the sanest of men. And so there are all kinds of conjectures as to why Elisha came at this precise time to Damascus.

12:35 Was he like the woman during the famine period, driven there by physical wants? Was he going there for this reason or that or the other? But it seems to me that when we come to a passage where God gives us scanty information and no other passages of Scripture throw light upon it, it is the part of wisdom for us to be content with the little that God has given us. One thing we know is that in the pattern of the life of this man of God, he came to Damascus either in the impulse of sanctified judgment within the framework of the generally revealed patterns of the will of God, or under the impulse of a direct revelation from God which would have been given to him as a prophet. It is my own personal conviction that this subsequent, subsequent history has such a delicate element of timing in it that he did come under the impulse of a revelation from God. But I can only offer that as my own personal conviction. Now he comes then to this great city of Damascus, which is the capital of Syria, a city with a tremendous history that has been the capital of many nations that have conquered one another.

13:56 And when he comes, he comes, of course, as no stranger to the Syrians. They've heard about this man Elisha. And when he comes to town, it doesn't take long for the news to spread around. This is the character that was causing all of their military defeats and their commando raids.

14:13 This is the man through whose instrumentality under Jehovah, their great king, I mean their great general Naaman, had been healed. This is the man through whose instrumentality strange and wonderful things happen, and amidst all the superstition, the religion of paganism, and particularly the superstition which attaches itself to the official religious men in paganism, no doubt Elisha was well known, and word spread very quickly right to the court of Ben-Hadad. The word comes that the man of God is in town. And it comes just at a time that Ben-Hadad is sick with that which is no ordinary sickness.

14:55 It's one that precludes his going to the temple. It's one that precludes his going to the temple. It's one that precludes his going directly to the man of God. It is a sickness that obviously has him bedridden.

15:03 A sickness that from the subsequent history obviously has left him in a very weakened and defenseless position. And so the word comes to the sick king that Elisha, the man of God, is come hither. So much then for Elisha's journey into Damascus, verse 7. Now we have in verse 8 the record of Ben-Hadad's orders, to Hazael.

15:30 And the king said unto Hazael, Take a present in thy hand, and go meet the man of God, and inquire of the Lord by him, saying, Shall I recover of this sickness? Ben-Hadad's orders embody two directives. Take a gift to the man of God. Make an inquiry of the man of God.

15:53 Now this matter of taking a gift to the man of God we encountered before. For you'll remember when Naaman the general was to go to seek out the prophet, the king of Syria, no doubt the same Ben-Hadad. Chapter 5 and verse 5 said, I will send a letter, and then he departs with this great mass of wealth. Now on this occasion, probably having learned the lesson, he does not order that a great measure of wealth be taken.

16:22 He says, take a gift in thy hand, and go to the man of God. And those who have studied oriental culture are all agreed on this point that it was customary then to show respect that you would take a gift that perhaps one man could carry and you divide it up amongst ten people and each one would carry a part and so you had this great entourage coming and in this way it made, as it were, a big thing out of a little thing. And so when the text says that the man of God was greeted with forty camels, forty camels worth of gifts, we are not to think of that in terms of a camel laden to the hilt with all of this wealth, but rather in oriental custom respect was being shown to the man of God. So the order of Ben-Hadad to Hazel is take a gift and then secondly make an inquiry. And the inquiry had to do with whether or not his sickness was unto death. Inquire of the man of God.

17:23 Shall I recover? Shall I recover of this sickness? So obviously Ben-Hadad knew that this was not just a common ordinary head cold. This was not the local present virus.

17:36 This was not something that was just going through the town that everyone would be over with in a few days. He is conscious that this sickness is one that is deeply grave and serious and he is solicitous to know whether or not he will ever stand upon his feet again. Well, verse 9 then gives us the record of Hazel's compliance with the orders of Ben-Hadad. Hazel went to meet him and took a present with him, even of every good thing of Damascus, forty camels burden, and came and stood before him and said, speaking in respectful language, Thy son Ben-Hadad, king of Syria, hath sent me to thee saying, Shall I recover of this sickness? And about the only virtuous thing we can find in this man Hazel is that he carried out his boss's orders. Ben-Hadad told him do two things. Take a gift, make an inquiry.

Elisha's Difficult Response and Prophetic Vision

18:38 He goes, finds the man of God, deposits the gift, and he makes his inquiry. Now in verses 10 to 13 we have Elisha's response to Hazel's inquiry. And when we begin to take up this portion of the text, we are involved in a very difficult matter of exposition and explanation. There are difficulties in the text.

19:05 The men who are most knowledgeable in the Hebrew text, most knowledgeable in what is called textual criticism, that is, ascertaining what is the proper rendering of the text in the original, they have problems with the passage. Then those that are most knowledgeable in the grammar, when once they've settled on what they are, what the proper text is, they have problems with the text. And then once you've ascertained what it seems to say on a good basis of solid textual evidence, there are moral problems with what is apparently said. So this is a problem passage.

19:42 And I would be less than honest if I told you otherwise. One has said that God's left enough bones in his word that those who are determined to can choke themselves if they will. And though we believe with all of our hearts in the plenary, the full verbal inspiration of the word of God, we are realistic as we face the fact there are problem passages. The problem is not an unresolvable one, but there are problems.

20:12 Now I'm not going to weary you with what all those problems are. Some of them, they're over my head. I just read about them in The Men Who Know. And I say if those poor fellows can't sort it out, who drive themselves to glass, like the bottoms of Coke bottles studying critical apparatus, then surely this poor preacher is not going to be able to sort out the difficulty.

20:35 But I will give you what appears to me to be the two most reasonable explanations. First of all, Elisha's response in terms of his answer to the specific question that was carried to him by Hazel from Ben-Hadad. Shall I recover of this sickness? Well, you will notice if you have a 1901 edition that the marginal reading is, Say, thou shalt not recover, for the Lord hath showed me he shall surely die.

21:08 Now if that were the proper rendering, that would solve all the problems, or at least it would appear to solve them until you get down into verse 14. But as best as I can ascertain, those who are most responsible in handling the text of Scripture indicate that the proper rendering is the rendering such as we have in the 1901 edition. Elisha said unto him, Go, say unto him, Thou shalt surely recover. Howbeit the Lord hath showed me he shall surely die.

21:46 And as Edersheim comments on this passage, and I find his comment convincing, what the prophet of God is doing is this. Having come at that precise time when Ben-Hadad is already upon his deathbed, the prophet knows by the revelation of the Spirit of God that Hazel has already conceived his design to murder Ben-Hadad that he might usurp his throne. And in that situation, the prophet being privy to the design of Hazel's heart, when the question is asked, Shall my master recover of his sickness or not? Elisha answers, as it were, in sarcasm, saying, Sure, go, say to him, as you have already purposed to do, Thou shalt surely recover. But, Hazel, God has revealed to me that he shall surely die. All that you have designed and all that you have planned is known to me.

22:53 He will die. And though he doesn't tell him, even at your hand, lest there would be any basis for the man to say, Well, I had to do it because the prophet revealed it would be so, the prophet is veiled in what he discloses of the revelation of God. But I find this explanation satisfying, it's true to the text, and violates to my knowledge no known principle of the Word of God. And so the response of the prophet is, Yes, go, say to him what you've already purposed to tell him.

23:27 Go ahead and tell him, as you will, that he will recover, so that he'll not in any way be suspicious that his doom is nigh. But the Lord has revealed to me that he will surely die. The only other possible explanation of the passage is that Elijah is speaking in paradoxical language which hypothetically would have been true. As far as his illness is concerned, go say to him, You will surely recover.

23:57 If left to yourself, the illness would not be unto death, but you will surely die. You will die by means of this violent act of Hazel. But not only does the Scripture record Elisha's response to Hazel in terms of his answer to the specific question, but it gives us in even greater detail his agitation, at the prophetic vision that is given to him. Verse 11, And he, that is, Elisha, settled his countenance steadfastly upon him, that is, Hazel, until he was ashamed.

24:37 Now get the picture. He's just said, All right, Hazel, go ahead, go back, tell him what you purposed to tell him that he'll recover. But the Lord has revealed to me he will surely die. And at that, the burning eye of the man of God is fixed steadfastly upon the countenance of Hazel.

24:55 And he looks upon him, and he continues to look, and continues to gaze, until Hazel begins to feel very uncomfortable. The text says he becomes ashamed, and then suddenly the man of God whose eyes have been fixed upon him begins to convulse with weeping. And from those eyes there burst forth tears, and he begins to weep in the presence of this man, Hazel, to which Hazel responds, again in this feigned courtesy. And Hazel said, Why weepest, my Lord?

25:29 And Elisha's answer, Because I know the evil that thou wilt do to the children of Israel. God has revealed to Elisha some of the details of what Hazel will do when the ancient prophecy given, not ancient, but the prophecy given some years before through Elijah will come to pass, when this man will indeed take the throne of Syria and become head of the armies of Syria. He says, Jehovah has revealed to me what you will do. And then he gives some of the details.

26:04 The strongholds of the people of Israel thou wilt set on fire, and their young men thou wilt slay with the sword, and thou wilt dash in pieces their little ones, and rip up their women with child. In other words, the prophet burst into tears because he recognizes as God gives him in prophetic vision all of the unspeakable cruelties with which this man Hazel will administer his role as the scourge in the hand of Jehovah. And the prophet is helpless to thwart the divine purpose. Judgment is ripe for these ten northern tribes because of their attachment to Baal worship and their rejection of the God of the covenant. And as Elisha sees in prophetic vision the specifics of the cruelty, the unspeakable cruelty, whenever you have burning, whenever you have the slaughter of children and the ripping up of pregnant women, you have cruelty and war carried to its height. And the prophet is agitated as he beholds these things in prophetic vision. And then Hazel responds again in this kind of mock humility.

27:31 He asks the question, But what is thy servant who is but a dog that he should do this great thing? You notice he describes it as a great thing. He doesn't stand back in horror and say, What in the world do you think I am that I would ever indulge in such heartless, cruel things? No, no.

27:54 As a Syrian, trained in cruel warfare, all of this seems normal to him. His question is, From what position will I be able to accomplish such mighty deeds of conquest over your people? Who is thy servant who is but a dog? What am I that I should do this great thing?

Hazael's Deception and Murder of Ben-Hadad

28:16 To which the prophet answers, Jehovah, at the end of verse 13, Elisha answered, Jehovah hath showed me that thou shalt be king over Syria. And so with the revelation of the certainty of his being king firmly embedded in his mind, verse 14 then records Hazel's return to Ben-Hadad. And we have there the record of his heartless, I'm sorry, his deceptive reply to Ben-Hadad. He departed from Elisha, came to his master who said unto him, What said Elisha to thee?

29:00 And he didn't give the whole story. He answered, He told me thou wouldst surely recover. And he stopped. He stopped.

29:11 You see, he told that part which suited his own designs. He told me thou wouldst surely recover. And if my understanding is proper and I hide behind Edersheim in this matter that Elisha spoke sarcastically, then you see, speaking it in another way was bearing false witness. We can lie even when we use the form of the words of truth by the very way we say something.

29:35 And if Elisha's response was go, tell him, surely he'll recover, you've already purposed to do so. If his tone intimated that, for Ben-Hadad, I'm sorry, for Hazel to speak as though the prophet had made a divine prediction of his recovery was to misrepresent the word of God. But whether that's true or not, he does not tell him what else was told him by the prophet that Jehovah hath showed me he will surely die. And if it was merely a paradoxical statement, then surely he was under obligation to give the whole of that statement.

30:10 But he doesn't do this. He returns and gives a deceptive reply to Ben-Hadad. And then the next verse records his heartless murder of Ben-Hadad. It came to pass on the morrow that he took the coverlet and put it on his head.

30:28 It would be like a comforter. That's the closest thing or a quilt that we could come to in our current usage. A heavy blanket. And he dips it in water and spreads it upon the face of the king so that he died, leaving no sign of violence.

30:46 The king in his weakened condition is either suffocated or suffocated and drowned. And there'd be no sign, no marks upon him. And then the text says that Hazel ascends to the throne of Syria. Well, that's the story.

Abiding Message 1: God's Absolute Sovereignty

31:03 Those are the facts as God the Holy Ghost has given them to us. Now, having considered briefly the main characters in the story, the main events of the story, what is the abiding message of this portion of the Word of God? Believing that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God and is profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. What doctrine is here contained?

31:32 What reproof? What correction? What instruction? There are those in our day who are telling us continually that the fundamental and almost stating the exclusive purpose of the Old Testament is simply its function to point forward to Christ.

31:50 Thank God that it points forward to Christ. And surely coming through a passage such as this, when we see as it were sin in all of its ugliness, the human heart cries out, will the Deliverer who is promised to come out of Israel and out of the line of Judah, will He never come? There is something in this that causes our hearts to yearn and long for God's great Deliverer. And in that sense, it does point to Christ.

32:21 And surely, if we see anything gracious and beautiful in the man of God, Elisha, it points to the Lord Jesus of whose fullness in that sense even Elisha received long before Christ was incarnate as He was the medium of God's revelation to men. There is much more than that in the passage, and I would like to suggest tonight that the abiding message of this story is first of all that it constitutes a vivid demonstration of the absolute, absolute sovereignty of God in controlling human history. It is a vivid demonstration of the absolute sovereignty of God in controlling human nature. A prediction was made by God through Elijah way back in 1 Kings chapter 19. Thou shalt anoint Hazael to be king over Syria. And there is nothing in the record to indicate that Elijah in his person ever anointed Hazael.

33:32 But the significance of that verse is that with respect to your office, as that office is passed on to your successor Elisha, he will be the instrument for the formal recognition of this man Hazael as king over Syria. There is no record whatsoever that he was ever anointed by anyone, Elijah, Elisha, or anyone else, but that he usurped the throne. But he did so by divine decree. Hazael does not come to this position because he is a clever man.

34:15 Hazael does not come to this position because the circumstances simply happen to fall into place like the tumblers in a lock. He comes to this position by divine decree. And God allows sickness to take hold of the legitimate king, Ben-Hadad II. God, as it were, takes away the restraints from around the wicked heart of Hazael until seeing the declining health of the king.

34:45 This thought of taking the throne by his own power and by his own cunning becomes an obsession to him that ultimately leads to murder. And yet, in spite of all of that, and all of the problems that it raises in our minds, if this passage teaches anything, it teaches that God is an absolute sovereign in controlling the events of human history. He is raising up Hazael to punish the nation with which he holds a distinctive covenant relationship. But in the administration of his rule as the God of the covenant, he makes it evident that he is king over the heathen nations. He puts up one and sets down another so that in Syria no one becomes king but the one whom God purposes to be king. With regard to Israel, nothing happens in its history but what is an outworking of the divine purpose. You say, but Pastor Martin, you mean God is sovereign in the midst of all of that murder and the ripping up of women with child and all of the heartlessness?

36:02 My friend, listen to me. You have problems with that. There is a greater problem. The greatest crime that was ever perpetrated upon the face of the earth was the vicious, unjust trial and crucifixion of the Son of God.

36:22 Involved in that was the treachery of a Judas, the blind unbelief and prejudice of the religious leaders, the unprincipled, man-pleasing spirit of a Pilate and a Herod. And yet the Scripture is not at all embarrassed to say of all those things and I read now from the book of Acts chapter 2 these very simple words and they are brought forward in the midst of a sermon in the presence of multitudes. These were not things whispered in the privacy of a lecture hall when students were discussing the decrees of God. This was Peter preaching before the thousands assembled on the day of Pentecost. And he says in Acts 2 and verse 22, Ye men of Israel, hear these words. Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by mighty words and wonders and signs which God did by him in the midst of you, even as ye yourselves know. Him being delivered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, you by the hand of lawless men did crucify and slay.

37:44 And here Peter says his deliverance was an outworking of divine determination, but it was by the hands of wicked men. And it doesn't bother Peter at all to bring those two things into the closest relationship. Shortly thereafter, the church enters a period of opposition. And they go to God in prayer and notice, as they pray in Acts 4, 27, of a truth in this city against thy holy servant Jesus, whom thou didst anoint, notice, both Herod and Pontius Pilate with the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel were gathered together to do what?

38:28 To do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel hath foreordained to come to pass. The treachery of Judas foreordained to come to pass. The principled injustices of the court of Pilate and Herod foreordained to come to pass yet. Not so as to charge God as being the author of sin, for that very God will charge those very men in the day of judgment with those very sins.

39:05 My friend, there's only one alternative to a world that's ruled by God. And that's a world that's under the impulse of pure chance. And if God is ruled out of one atom in His universe, it won't be long before you've ruled Him out of every atom. He rules over all, or He rules all.

39:32 And oh, what consolation should come to us as we sit here tonight. You say, consolation? Yes, my friend. Because there are the Ben-Hadads and the Hazels of our own day.

39:47 Rulers who had some semblance of stability die. Wicked men driven by avarice and greed and ambition come to places of power and authority and we tremble. Do I need to mention names? All you need to do is read your newspaper.

40:08 All you need to do is look at the news once a week and have some sensitivity to what is going on in our own country, in the international scene. We find the Hazels speaking all of their political platitudes. Men simply trying to climb upon the gullibility of the populace, to bring themselves to a place of influence. Some of us at times wonder if we shouldn't take a leave of absence from the ministry and try to go into politics for three years just to see if it's possible for anyone who's honest and has right motives to exist in that arena.

40:46 Not seriously, just a passing thought once in a while. But oh what a comfort to know that in the midst of all of this no Hazel comes to a throne of influence to perpetrate his cruel deeds. But what the hand of Jehovah is in it. And when Jehovah sees fit to put down a Hazel he can put him down in a moment of time.

41:15 The scripture tells us that God has put all things beneath the feet of Christ and given him to be head over all things to his church which is his body. The fullness of him that filleth all in all. And so in that period of Israel's history God was in absolute control and right now it was his purpose while preserving a remnant to bring punishment upon the majority of the nation of Israel because of its sins. And so he raises up a Hazel and allows him to come to that place of influence to be the scourge in his hands while all the while he's carrying on another great work preserving that remnant bringing the whole history of redemption nearer to that moment described in Galatians 4 when in the fullness of the time God would send for his son. And that's precisely what's happening now. The only difference is everything then was being ordered and governed leading to the first advent. Now everything's being ordered and governed leading to the second advent.

42:37 And as surely as God was committed then to preserve Israel until the promised seed should come the Lord Jesus said I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And if in that process God must punish the nations of the West who've had gospel light and have rejected it and raise up the Hazels of international communism to humble us and bring us to our knees one thing we know the church will triumph America lies in the dust. I do not long to see our beloved nation lie in the dust. My prayer increasingly is oh God magnify your name by humbling our nation bringing it to its knees purging it of its Baal worship. But my friend if God does not visit us in mercy he most certainly will continue to visit us with judgments. And in all of this he's the Lord of history. Doesn't that give you comfort?

43:48 You see the poor disciples got nervous. One of those fierce storms was coming down upon the Sea of Galilee and the Lord Jesus is sound asleep and they go and they shake him Lord we're going to perish! How ridiculous. If they perished he would have perished with them.

44:09 My friends Christ is in the vessel with us. He cannot perish the church shall never perish. For dear Lord to defend, protect, and cherish is with her to the end. And so the great lesson of this passage as we see it in this setting of the history of redemption is that it's a vivid demonstration of the absolute sovereignty of God in controlling human destiny.

Abiding Message 2: Depths of Human Depravity

44:41 But then secondly the abiding message is this it constitutes a frightening revelation of the depths of human depravity a frightening revelation of the depths of human depravity. Hazel is a mirror of the human heart let loose to be true to its own capacity for wickedness. May I repeat that? Hazel is a mirror of the human heart let loose to be true to its own capacity for wickedness.

45:22 There is an absence of the fear of God in Hazel that is frightening. You see at least Ben-Hadad who was in the previous context not at all fastidious about protecting let alone consulting the man of God we find him back in chapter 6 after his neck but in his sickness he's sobered and he sees through the emptiness of the gods of his own pagan religious system. This man Hazel no fear of God whatsoever. He can look a man of God right in the eye until he feels a bit embarrassed and then go on with mock and feigned humility and to go back and give a partial response of the very word of a prophet that he knew would know about his deeds if Jehovah was pleased to reveal them. And then with heartless cold calculating icy light determination he murders Ben-Hadad and then his subsequent cruelty is at least alluded to in several subsequent passages in Kings and then in several of the prophets in which no doubt there was literally fulfilled the prediction of the prophet that he would burn up the strongholds slay the young men dash the little ones in pieces

46:51 and rip up the women with child. Now you ask the question from what source did all that wickedness come? And the answer is from within the heart of Hazel. For the scripture says the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked.

47:11 And Jesus said in Mark 7 21 in following for from within out of the heart of man proceed and then he describes some of these very sins that characterize the history of Hazel. Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts these thoughts you see of avarice and greed and ambition fornication thefts murders where did that thought of murder come from? It sprang up from within the depths of the heart of Hazel. Covetings coveting the throne not waiting to be brought to that position in God's way but taking his own way.

47:56 Wickedness deceit oh what a deceitful man he was trying to practice deceit in the presence of the prophet and then deceiving his master in the message he conveyed. I say that Hazel is a frightening revelation of the depths of human depravity. But my dear friend boys and girls men and women he that is without sin amongst you let him cast the first stone at Hazel. There is nothing in Hazel's heart that is not in your heart and my heart by nature.

48:30 Not a thing. Not a thing. Left to itself your heart would produce every foul form of wickedness manifested in Hazel and much more. Do you believe that?

48:48 Or are you offended when I say that? Do you really believe that there is nothing Hazel did that you could not do given the proper circumstances without anything coming in from without that there is enough wickedness innately within your own breast to produce everything that was produced in Hazel? My friend if you cannot answer that question without hesitation in the affirmative I doubt you have ever had a sight of your heart. And though grace has come to many of us or God has come in grace and dethroned sin in its mastery over us never forget this that remaining sin in principle not in power not in quantitative influence but in principle is capable of everything that remaining sin is capable of. That's why the Bible records of men who are in grace foul sins all the way from drunkenness incest adultery murder blasphemy these sins of the saints are recorded in the word of God not to imitate them but let him that thinketh he standeth

Abiding Message 3: Frailty and Brevity of Life

50:12 take heed lest he fall. But then in the third place the abiding message of this passage is to be understood not only in that it constitutes a vivid demonstration of the sovereignty of God a frightening revelation of the depths of human depravity but oh hear me on this point it constitutes a sobering manifestation of the frailty and the brevity of life. The same man Ben-Hadad who led forth the armies of Syria in conquest time and time again now look at him so helpless that he cannot even call his courtiers and say saddle up the royal horse I want to go have a chat with the prophet he's lying helpless upon a bed and though he has the power to have a man of great influence like Haziel beneath him and though he has the influence to give him commands and though he has the wealth to send off his gifts with tokens of the wealth of Damascus upon the back of forty camels he is so weak and helpless that when Haziel comes with his soaked comforter and places it upon his face

51:38 and puts a little gentle pressure with his hands he succumbs and he dies. My friend from a mighty warrior with all the vigor and the strength of his manhood pouring through his veins coursing through every nerve and fiber of bone and muscle there he is lying upon a bed and the blueness of death is in his face and the news is whispered through the courts of the palace and my friend listen to me sitting here as a teenager or a sub-teen sitting here in your young early twenties and thirties with all the vigor and all the virility of manhood and womanhood coursing through you a day is coming when the blueness of death will be upon you and it will be whispered through that hospital ward where you lay your last days or weeks or through the house in which loved ones are gathered

53:00 and so is death it is appointed unto men once to die and oh my dear young people I speak to you especially because everything in you rejects the death you don't want to think about it you better think about it because it's the only thing certain in life that is that you will die and it's very interesting is it not that in the hour of death when Ben-Hadad knows or has at least the premonition that this is no ordinary sickness that death is approaching all his attachment to his heathen gods goes he doesn't say send for a priest of Rimon he says send to the man of God and my friend listen to me you may be able to get along with your false gods when all is well your gods of pleasure your gods of materialism and your gods of friends and your gods of fun and your gods whatever they be when you face death what comfort can you find in them

54:27 no comfort whatsoever because those gods cannot bring you pardon for sin they cannot bring you cleansing from your sin they cannot impart a new nature and prepare you to stand in the presence of God in a few short years all of us will be in heaven or in hell every one of us every one of us Haziel is in heaven or in hell Ben-Hadad is in heaven or in hell and bless God we know Elisha is in heaven in the presence of God like Haziel you may oppose God's word I'm sorry like Ben-Hadad but oh my friend I trust I trust that the warning will come home to your heart with power you must die and there is only one way to prepare for death and that's to flee to him who tasted death for sinners who swallowed up the wrath of God in his own death in his own dying agony and who presents himself to you in the gospel and pleads with you to come to him and to embrace him as your savior and your sovereign but then finally

Abiding Message 4: Grace of God in a Fallen Sinner (Elisha)

55:57 and this will be but a brief note and I hope an encouraging one on which to close this passage constitutes a beautiful manifestation of the grace of God in a fallen sinner a beautiful manifestation of the grace of God in a fallen sinner never forget that whatever Elisha was by virtue of his peculiar prophetic office was overlaid upon what he was in his standing in grace that's why the New Testament can tell us in a passage like James 5.10 take the prophets for an example and then when James delineates the specific areas in which we are to take them as an example he does not use the things that are peculiar to their office he doesn't say take them as an example of how to receive the word of God no no that would be invalid they have the word of God come to them by dream by vision by voice no no but he says take the prophets for an example of patience and of suffering that is in the area in which the grace of God worked in them those graces common to all believers and in that sense you see

57:23 Elisha is a beautiful manifestation of the grace of God you say in what way can you imagine what this must have been like to him he knows he's going to Damascus formally to acknowledge this wretched grace he's a butcher who's going to rip up women with child who are his own fellow Israelites how do you like a job like that but there's not a shred of evidence that Elisha bought not a shred he wept he didn't just do his job his heart bled it broke it was bound to the word of God though broken it was bound what makes a man like that we could understand if he was a hard insensitive man who came just to dump his load of truth and go his way I've seen preachers like that God have mercy on anyone of us who aspires to the office of the ministry who has that disposition but we see him all the way through the record a sensitive man and in this passage as his eyes are fixed upon Hazel and in prophetic vision he sees what he will do

58:52 he burst into weeping why? because I said I see what you're going to do to my fellow Israelites and yet he didn't step aside and quarrel with God and say God that's not fair that's not right why should this wretched wicked book no no no no he says Jehovah has revealed to me thou shalt be king over Syria we gave some hints of this this morning the Lord Jesus manifested this supremely in the garden in the wilderness temptation and in that sense you see Elisha is manifesting that element of the grace of Christ submission to the will of God though it hurts though it breaks us though it brings us to tears and Elisha is also a manifestation of the grace of God in this whole situation he doesn't usurp a place that does not belong to him he doesn't run back to spill the beans on Ben-Hadad there's so many things in the passage I'd like to know but again the silences of God at times are eloquent the prophet is willing to stay when God bids him stay as well as go when God bids him go to speak when he's bidden to speak and to be silent

60:20 when God has no word for him to speak well you say that's so far beyond me I can't be that way my friends of his fullness have we all received him? in grace for grace and in the light of the richer light and privileges that are ours now that Christ is come and the age of the spirit is dawned upon us and we have the full revelation of God in scripture no no there is no reason why every one of us cannot exemplify those graces that are seen in the life of Elisha for the spirit of Christ is come to form Christ in us and tying together tonight's meditation and this morning's oh may we feed upon Christ as is revealed to us in the gospel records yes but whenever we see a Christ-like character in any fallen son of Adam though he even be a prophet remember this was no grace inherent in him by nature but implanted by the sovereign grace and mercy of God and we go to the same source from which they received it and we ask in Christ's name that God would work it in us well I submit then that this is at least in part the message of this passage may God help us to lay it to heart to derive comfort

61:47 oh tempest-tossed child of God for every look at your newspaper and every look at your TV may I urge you to stop and take ten looks to the immovable throne of Jehovah Jehovah reigns in the midst of all the campaign rhetoric Jehovah reigns and nobody's going to come to any national office in November contrary to the sovereign will of God I don't care how much money he's got I don't care what his name is I don't care who his relatives have been and does not there come a point child of God when you and I have got to be Elisha's I don't like to hang on the throne you better bow your head and shut up

62:43 if God put them there you better not be found fighting against God hmm I'm sure Elisha didn't dance a jig going back home after he delivered that message God he showed me you're going to be king in Syria when he's going to rip up women with child and dash little kids to pieces that's not a pleasant thing but my friend looking from Elisha's perspective now do you think he has any regrets that he submitted unquestionably to the will of God he sees as you and I will one day see we see now through a glass darkly but then face to face and we'll look back through all the tangled mess through which we've lived in our generation the sins of our own nation against which we've cried and over which we've mourned and I trust over which we weep and we will stand amazed to see how a sovereign God with the wheels within the wheels of divine purpose driven armed by infinite wisdom and sovereign power was accomplishing all that he designed to bring glory to his name to build up the kingdom of his son you know you say that's pie in the sky by and by well if it is friend I want to be satiated with that kind of pie

Conclusion and Prayer

64:08 because that is the sheet anchor of the child of God that's the rock on which we stand that's the refuge in which we hide Peter says we according to his promise look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwells no more Hesiods no more Ben-Hadads I'm tempted to say some more names but I won't wherein dwells righteousness and King Jesus will reign and in that day we shall reign with him may our hearts be filled with hope with joy and with confidence as we wait and as we pray even so come Lord Jesus let us pray our Father what thanks can we render to you this night that you do reign that Daniel's ancient words are as fresh today as the day he penned them we thank you for those words that were brought from the very lips of a heathen king that Jehovah reigns

65:35 among the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth and none can stay your hand or say unto you what are you doing we thank you with the psalmist we may exclaim our God is in the heavens he hath done whatsoever he hath pleased O Lord give us a practical working comforting knowledge of your unshakable and universal sovereignty give us we pray a deep spirit of submission to that sovereignty we pray that you will give us an experimental knowledge of our own depravity that fearing the potential of our hearts we may run to you and ask you to infuse them with grace that we may not be slain by the venom pouring forth from our own hearts and then we plead with you our Father that by your grace we may be like the man Elisha we do not ask for his greatness of gift we do not ask for the prophetic office which we know has ceased but O we ask for those graces available to everyone who is in union with your Son O our heavenly Father write the message of this passage of your word upon our hearts

67:04 and then Lord we plead for those who have not been honest about the certainty of death and of judgment O God may the word concerning the certainty of death the brevity of life may it fasten itself upon the conscience of every careless and impenitent man woman boy or girl in this place may they go home haunted with that sight of the bluing face of death of Ben-Hadad all of his greatness now swallowed up in death O Lord may their hearts be troubled until they find rest in him who conquered death and the grave for every sinner who will trust him write then your word upon our hearts and to your name be praise receive our thanks for this day for your presence with us in these hours together in this place help us now so to live and walk before you as to be useful in the advancement of the kingdom of your Son we ask with praise and thanksgiving in his own worthy name Amen