TEXT: II Kings 13:20-21

SUBJECT: Elisha #17: Life Out of Death

There once was a prophet in Israel whose name was Elisha. Like his master, Elijah, he served the Lord for many years by preaching the Word of God and performing miracles of judgment and grace. Unlike the older man, however, Elisha wasn’t carried off to heaven in a fiery chariot, but he got there the more common way—by dying!

His body was wrapped in fine linen and laid in a tomb, not far from the border with Moab. There he would remain at rest until the Day of the Resurrection.

Which came a little sooner than he expected!

Not long after the prophet’s death, another man died. His body was also made ready for burial and carried by friends to a nearby tomb. But on their way to the cemetery they spotted a gang of Moabites who had crossed the border and were taking whatever they wanted from Israel.

Scared of the Moabite outlaws, the men ran to the nearest tomb and dumped their friend’s body into it, planning to put it where it belongs when the coast is clear.

The tomb they happened upon was the prophet’s. When the dead body rolled into his, it sprang back to life! The dead man wasn’t dead any more. For years, the Life of God had been flowing through Elisha, and it still was!

That’s the story.

The moral to the story is not hard to find: God raises the dead.

If the story is of perennial interest, it had a special message for the people who first heard it. Who were they? They were the Jews in exile, carried into captivity, first by the Assyrians, and then by the Babylonians.

These were bad times for the people of God.They had lost their land and their living, their freedom and their temple, their nation and their hope. Had they lost it all because their enemies were guilty, and they were innocent, they might have appealed to God to try their case and to vindicate them, as David and others had done in the past.

But they couldn’t do that, because they were guiltier than their enemies, and the judgment they suffered was of their own doing. From as far back as the days of Moses, God told them what He would do if they forsook Him. And, in case they had forgotten the Law, He sent them prophets to remind them—every generation had its share of them, for the Lord rose up early and sent them, but the people would not listen.

And so they perished. Physically, many thousands died in the wars and deportations, but spiritually, the whole nation died with the exile.

In the visions of God, Ezekiel sees Israel for what it is. In the first one, a squad of cherubim march into Jerusalem and halt at the east gate of the Temple. The Glory of God then rises from its seat in the Holy of Holies and takes it place above the living cherubim who carry it away from Jerusalem. The glory of the Lord has departed.

You’ve been to funerals and looked into the dead faces of ones you love. The morticians have done their best to make them look like themselves, but they never succeed in doing it. For the glory of life has left them, and no makeup can give it back. The body without the human spirit is dead. And Israel is dead, too, without the Spirit of God.

In his second vision, Ezekiel is lifted up by God’s Spirit and carried off into a desert. Down below he sees a valley full of bones, picked clean by the birds, bleached by the sun, scattered here and there, and above all, dead! What are the bones, and what does the vision mean?

Israel is dead—as dead as a body without a spirit, as dead as a battlefield a hundred years after the last shot was fired. But the story is not fully told. Later, Ezekiel sees the bones coming together, flesh forming over them again, and finally, a very great army--an army of living soldiers! At the end of his book, the first vision is reversed, the Temple is rebuilt and the Glory of the Lord returns to it—this time to stay!

If Israel is dead in Assyria and Babylonia, God will raise the dead. That’s the promise of our story. God raises the dead.

The theme does not begin in today’s story, but is woven into the whole story of Israel. The parents of Israel are Abraham and Sarah, whose reproductive powers are dead. Until God raises the dead and gives them a son. Several years later, the Lord commands Abraham to take that son and kill him on Mount Moriah. When Isaac is tied to the altar and his father’s knife is raised, the boy is as good as dead. And God raises him from the dead. When Jacob cheats his brother out of his blessing, Esau begins sharpening his knives to cut his brother’s throat. But God raises him from the dead. When the sons of Jacob massacre a whole Canaanite town, the father fears the natives will take revenge and wipe out the whole family. But God raises them from the dead. When a famine strikes the land, the clan is about to starve until they hear there’s food to be had in Egypt. God raises the dead. When Jacob is buried, the family is at the mercy of Joseph who had every right to punish them all with death. But he doesn’t. God raises the dead.

Moses is born under the death penalty—Throw him in the river is Pharoah’s command. But God raises the dead. When the people are trapped between the Red Sea and the king’s army, God raises the dead. The Wilderness would sustain a few bedouin (if they were careful), but for forty years, it feeds a nation of three million. God raises the dead.

Later, the fortunes of the nation were tied to David, and how many times was he as good as dead? God raises the dead.

The whole history of Israel can be captured in a single word: Resurrection!

Standing before Herod Agrippa, who knew the Old Testament, and believe it in his own way, Paul summed up its teaching and his own ministry,

‘You should believe in the Resurrection—King Herod—‘not because I cite find a proof text here or find a type of it there—but because it’s what the whole Bible is about’.

From Genesis 3, where man falls into sin and death, to the end of the Old Testament, it’s all about Resurrection. God raises the dead.

If this is what the story meant to Israel, it means the same to us. But we’re farther along in it than they were. To them, the Resurrection was a future event only.

For us, the Resurrection is also a future event, but not only a future event. For us, the future is now! About 30 AD, a Man was crucified under Pontius Pilate, dead, and buried. The following Sunday morning, this same Man rose from the dead. Unlike the man in our story, though, He did not rise from the dead only to regain the life He had before. He rose from all death and entered into the fullness of Life!

This Man is our Lord Jesus Christ, the Conqueror of Death and the Prince of Life. Death has done everything it could to Him, and He came out of it alive and well and victorious—I have the keys—He said—to death, hell, and the grave. ‘Keys’ stand for both authority and access. As the Master of Death, He unlocks it for us, freeing us…to live.

Because of what He has done for us, we are alive. Peter says we, who used to be dead, have been born again to a living hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. The life we now have is His life, not all of His life, but His life nonetheless.

What does ‘the life of Christ’ look like? It heaven, it looks like the sun, only far brighter. On earth, its brightness is veiled-- but not its character. Here, the Life looks like holiness. The life of the Godhead shone in the face of Jesus Christ, not only when He was transfigured or when He did signs and wonders, but especially when He did the little things in life, the same things you’re called to do, such as obeying your parents (if you’re a kid) or caring for them (if they need your help) or giving to the poor (even if you haven’t got much yourself) or loving your enemies.

This is what the Life of the Resurrection looks like for now. But because it is a Resurrection Life, it does not die with the body, in fact, it only gets fuller. When believers die, their bodies go into the ground, but their souls are still alive, and the life they have absent from the body is a better life—not a life full of worries and the fear of death, but a happy and peaceful life. If this life is better than the one we now have, there’s a life even better.

It is the Full Life of the Resurrection. When our Lord comes again, He will not un-body His people,; He will re-body us! The bodies we now have will be raised from the dust to which they have returned and be refashioned. What they’ll look like, what they’ll feel like, and what we can do with them is all speculation. But we know this much: They will be like our Lord’s body—resurrected and glorified, or to use Paul’s words, immortal and incorruptible.

At this time, the death which our Lord defeated on the cross will be annihilated. Not even the eyes of the Resurrection will be able to find a speck of death and the misery that goes with it. The former things have passed away—no tears, no sorrows, no pains among the blessed!

The Kingdom of Life has arrived, and God sincerely invites you to share in its joy. You come to life by coming to Christ, renouncing the death of sin and hoping for life in Him. This is what the Gospel is—not a set of doctrines or a set of rules. The angel calls it,

The Life Christ has in Himself and the Life He gives to everyone who wants it. So, why don’t you come to Life? Why don’t you come to Christ? You have nothing to lose but Death!

God raises the dead. He proved it long ago on a man who ‘accidentally’ bumped into Elisha’s remains. But this was only an inkling of what He was going to do in Christ, and what He has done. And what He will do for everyone who believes.

What’s the Bible about? It’s about Resurrection. What’s the Gospel about? It’s about you having a part in the Resurrection.

Take the Life God offers you in the Gospel. You can have it now, but one day, the offer will expire. You don’t know when that day is, so you’re only safe now.

Live the Life God has given you. Live an active, focussed, hopeful Christian life. God never raised a dead man so he would stay in the tomb. He raises the dead so they will live!

Don’t be afraid of death, because it has no power over Christ, and if you’re in Him, no power over you. It was John Donne who wrote,

Look forward to the Second Coming of Christ. How sad it is that unbelievers laugh when they hear about it and believers tremble. It ought to be the other way around! The lost should be shuddering at the thought of His Descent from Heaven. But we should laughing our heads off for happiness! For us, the Second Coming of Christ is a good thing, no more than that, it’s the best thing.