UNCOMMON Series: Uncommon Pace

Uncommon Pace

Mal 4:5-6. 5 Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. 6 And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.” NKJ

Matt 11:13-15  13 For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John.  14 And if you are willing to receive it, he is Elijah who is to come.  15 He who has ears to hear, let him hear! NKJV

Matt 17:11-13 11 Jesus answered and said to them, “Indeed, Elijah is coming first and will restore all things.  12 But I say to you that Elijah has come already, and they did not know him but did to him whatever they wished. Likewise the Son of Man is also about to suffer at their hands.”  13 Then the disciples understood that He spoke to them of John the Baptist. NKJV

Rev 1:8 8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End,” says the Lord, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” NKJV

Introduction:  At times as a speaker, communicator, and preacher…I get a word that I cannot contain…even if that word is to be a series for everyone to be able to apply it…but often in those times, the Word or Message needs to be released into the atmosphere, like an arrow shot out of a window…

Today is one of those days…I really wrestled with it…because I knew it’d be spring break and many would be out and others would be guest…

Now another disclaimer…this Word requires you to think…requires you to know the Word of God…though I will fill in the gaps…

1. GPS
   1. I have a love, hate relationship with the GPS system in my car…
      1. I have mine set to a British Lady who gives me instructions…
   2. I love it…because I don’t have to remember certain things, places, addresses and landmarks…
   3. I hate it because I have become accustom to relying on that thing…
   4. But here is my greatest dislike of my GPS system…
      1. I can be going…even in the direction I know is correct and right…and I get no encouragement…
      2. The thing is silent…

• The thing doesn’t talk to me until it is time to adjust my course…and then it speaks to me so I can reposition myself to follow the instructions…
  1. 2 Miles ahead, exit Holcomb

1. I want it to talk to me…and keep me company along the way…
2. A “way to go…keep going on the current road” would be a welcomed sound…
3. But it never does that…it only speaks when it is time to reposition myself…so I can make the necessary adjustments to follow the course set for me…

1. We get nervous…even though we are the correct road of life, following the last instructions given…but because we are use to chatter…we deviate from the course at times…

1. Typology
   1. Revelation says, “Rev 1:8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End,” says the Lord, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.” (NKJV)
   2. The statement: “Who is and who was and who is to come…” is both a revelation of who Jesus is…but also how he operates throughout history…
   3. Jesus said…we had an Elijah, if you are able to understand…Elijah or the spirit of Elijah was also upon John the Baptist…and if we read the book of Revelation further…we’d discover…during the tribulations Elijah will return again….
      1. Yet also, before the end…the spirit of Elijah will come and turn the hearts of the Fathers, to the sons and the daughters….
      2. You may ask, “Pastor how is this possible…” the answer is in the same verse I read to you…”The Almighty.”
   4. So if John the Baptist was a typology of Elijah…could it be Jesus was a typology…of Elisha.
   5. Similarities to Elisha and Jesus’ ministry….

Here are ten of them:

1. Their names have similar meanings
   1. Elisha means ‘God is salvation.’ Jesus means ‘Yahweh will save.’
2. Their ministries both start at the River Jordan
   1. Elisha takes up the mantle of Elijah at the River Jordan and starts his ministry. Jesus is baptized by John at the River Jordan and starts his ministry. Elisha sees the heavens open and Elijah being taken up in a whirlwind and then receives a ‘double portion’ of the Holy Spirit. At Jesus’ baptism John sees the heavens open and the Holy Spirit descends on Jesus like a dove.

• They both raise a woman’s adult son from the dead
  1. Elisha raises the son of the ‘Shunammite woman’ from the dead. Jesus raises the son of the ‘widow of Nain’ from the dead.

1. They both feed large numbers with a small quantity of food
   1. Elisha feeds 100 men with a few barley loaves and there is food left over. Jesus, on two occasions, feeds 5000 and then 4000 with a few loaves and fishes and there is food left over.
2. They both turn a small quantity of liquid into an abundance.
   1. Elisha turns a small amount of oil into enough oil to fill every vessel in the community. Jesus turns water into huge quantities of wine.
3. They both heal lepers.
   1. Elisha heals Naaman, the Syrian commander, of leprosy. Jesus heals many lepers.

• They both make things that should sink, float.
  1. Elisha makes an iron axe head float. Jesus walks on water and enables his disciple Peter to walk on water.
• They are both betrayed for love of money
  1. Elisha is betrayed by his servant Gehazi because Gehazi sees an opportunity to make money from betrayal. Jesus is betrayed by his disciple Judas because Judas sees an opportunity to make money from betrayal.

1. They both give sight to the blind.
   1. Elisha first blinds his enemies and then restores their sight. Jesus often restores sight to the blind.
2. Their deaths bring new life
   1. Elisha’s tomb was a place of resurrection. Raiders interrupted a burial, and the body was thrown hastily into Elisha’s tomb. On touching Elisha’s bones, the dead person came back to life. Jesus’ tomb was a place of resurrection. He himself was raised to life and brought the promise of new life to all.

Transition:  Now here me very clearly…I am not saying Jesus is Elisha…I’m looking at trends and typology…because Jesus can be compared to many in the Old Testament…this isn’t even where I’m going…I want to know who we are in the story of these great men…

• The Journey

1 Kings 19:19-20 19 So he departed from there, and found Elisha the son of Shaphat, who was plowing with twelve yoke of oxen before him, and he was with the twelfth. Then Elijah passed by him and threw his mantle on him. 20 And he left the oxen and ran after Elijah, and said, “Please let me kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow you.” And he said to him, “Go back again, for what have I done to you?” NKJV

1. Passed by Him (Repeat it)
2. When opportunity passes by potential there is a powerful possibility that can happen.
3. All the pain of carrying unrealized passions and expectations cry out for this moment….
4. But Elisha is stuck in the familiar
   1. We / I / many have said that fear is the anithesis of faith…
   2. But I’d submit familiar is the antithis of faith
      1. You don’’t need faith for the familiar, the comfortable, the historical….
      2. But when Eljah passes by there will a need for faith to break-free from the familiar
   3. “He left the oxen and ran after Elijah”
      1. I wish opportunity would come along and take a seat and wait for me to catch up to it…or to even recognize it is there…
      2. But opportunity is busy, it keeps walking and looking
         1. Revival will pass by…but it’ll also keep moving
         2. Breakthrough

• Miracles

1. “Cast his mantle upon Him…”
   1. Elijah exposed Elisha to the greater…what could be
   2. Thought I was stuck until I was exposed to greater….
   3. We will define our lives based on what we have been exposed to…
   4. Personally, I owe you two things as a People, as a Church:
      1. I owe you the exposer to what and who I have been exposed to…
      2. Secondly, I owe you an apology…because once you have been exposed to greater…you won’t be able to go back following stupid Ox…
   5. Elijah asks “ what have I done to you…”
      1. Elisha was doing what he had always seen done before him…
         1. Then he was exposed…
         2. For a moment when that mantle hit him…he was a Prophet….it was a preview of coming attractions…

• Exposer, tells you like a GPS system…reposition yourself…because a few miles up the road there is a turn coming or a new road your about to drive down…

1. Paul put it this way…”Oh that I may apprehend him, who has apprehended me….”

1. Exposure pushes back the barriers of what has held you back….
   1. From this point forward Elisha is radically changed…
   2. Hear me…when you have encountered the Destiny of God on your life…you will never go back to status quo…
   3. But your change will disappoint people who like you where you are and the way you are…
2. 21 “then he arose and went after Elijah”
   1. Implies picking up the pace….to run after.
   2. Elisha had to move at he pace of Elijah…not vice versa…
   3. We have to move at the pace of Jesus…he doesn’t slow down or speed up…just cause you and I are anxious or nervous….
   4. He doesn’t chatter over the GPS system of life…when he gave you instructions and we are going the right way….

Transition:  now if you know the story…Elisha follows and serves alongside Elijah for 19 years…and when Elijah is taken, Elisha received Double of what was on the life of Elijah…

1. Gehazi
   1. In the 4^th Chapter of Second Kings we have the introduction of another servant…his name is Gehazi…and he is the servant of Elisha…
   2. Gehazi’s name means: “one who diminishes or “one whose vision is in a valley”
      1. Gehazi is given Exposure…
         1. To the man of God, Elisha…
         2. To the Mantle upon his life…
         3. Gehazi is exposed to the miraculous…
         4. Elisha even lets Gehazi perform miracles on Elisha’s and God’s behalf…
         5. So Gehazi is exposed…to the Power, the Presence and the Purpose of God…
      2. But Expose doesn’t always have the impact it should…
   3. In 2Kings 5…Naaman the General of the Syrian army is found to have Leprosy…and he inquires of the prophet Elisha to pray for him, that he may be healed…
      1. Elisha doesn’t go and see him…instead Elisha send his representative…Gehazi…
         1. What do you do when your representative stops representing you and begins representing themselves through you….OH GOD…I’ll get back to that….
      2. Gehazi goes out to meet the General and tells him…
         1. Elisha say, “Go dip in the Jordan 7 times and you’ll be cured…”

Transition:  Let’s pick up this story here…in the scriptures…

2 Kings 5:15-21 15 And he returned to the man of God, he and all his aides, and came and stood before him; and he said, “Indeed, now I know that there is no God in all the earth, except in Israel; now therefore, please take a gift from your servant.” 16 But he said, “As the Lord lives, before whom I stand, I will receive nothing.” And he urged him to take it, but he refused. 17 So Naaman said, “Then, if not, please let your servant be given two mule-loads of earth; for your servant will no longer offer either burnt offering or sacrifice to other gods, but to the Lord.

• This 17^th verse is a great teaching on “Sacred Space” and territory belonging to the Lord…”

18 Yet in this thing may the Lord pardon your servant: when my master goes into the temple of Rimmon to worship there, and he leans on my hand, and I bow down in the temple of Rimmon — when I bow down in the temple of Rimmon, may the Lord please pardon your servant in this thing.”

19 Then he said to him, “Go in peace.” So he departed from him a short distance.

20 But Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the man of God, said, “Look, my master has spared Naaman this Syrian, while not receiving from his hands what he brought; but as the Lord lives, I will run after him and take something from him.”  NKJV

1. He was Running
   1. Now if I could teach this thing….
      1. Elisha ran after Elijah…
      2. But Gehazi…after all he had been exposed to…still ran after Stuff the general Naaman could offer…

• What are you running after…?

1. You’ll spend your life running…and that is okay…but what are you running after….
2. The scripture tells us…that when Gehazi returns to Elisha, Elisha asked him, where did you go…and Gehazi lied…so the prophet said, “the Leprosy that was on Naaman will now rest upon you…” and the bible says, “Gehazi was stricken white as snow…” with leprosy….

1. Here is the tragedy…
   1. Elijah passed down to Elisha a double portion…
   2. But Elisha could have passed down quadruple to Gehazi…but Gehazi decided to run after the wrong things…
   3. Back to my typology…
      1. If John the Baptist was a type and shadow of Elijah
      2. Jesus a type and shadow of Elisha…

• Could it be…we are Gehazi…destined for “Greater things than these will you do because I do to the Father…” but we chose to chase the wrong things…?

• Redemption
  1. In 2Kings 7 Samaria is stricken by Famine…they are bargaining over eating each other’s children to survive…and outside the gates are 4 men with Leprosy…
  2. These 4 Lepers have a conversation
     1. If we go into the city…we die
     2. If we stay here…we die

• If we go to the enemies camp…we possibly may die…

1. But doing nothing isn’t an option…so they arise and go toward the enemies camp…and the Lord had caused the enemies to hear the sound of chariots and soldiers…so they ran away…
2. The lepers find themselves…with food, clothes, silver, gold, treasures…all manner of blessing…and they say…today is a day of celebration for everyone, not just us…so they run and tell the entire city…and the city is saved….

1. In the 8^th Chapter Gehazi is standing before the King…
   1. Now the interesting thing is…if you have leprosy you are forbidden to stand before anyone much less a King…
2. According to Jewish Historians…
   1. The 4 men with Leprosy were Gehazi and his 3 sons…and when they shared what they had gotten from the Lord…
   2. There leprosy was cured and Gehazi was raised back to a place of Prominence…

• Now he never walked in a Quadruple anointing of Elisha…but he was redeemed and recovered….

1. I came to tell you no matter what you have been chasing up to this point…and where it may have left you…Jesus offers Redemption…
2. Maybe the GPS system of your life…hasn’t been speaking to you…but his morning it is saying…to reposition yourself…