Elisha’s Call and its Lessons

General Principle of God’s Call (1 Kings 19:19-21)

  “So he departed thence, and found Elisha the son of Shaphat, who was ploughing with twelve yoke of oven before him, and he with the twelfth: and Elijah passed by him, and cast his mantle upon him. And he left the oxen, and ran after Elijah, and said, Let me, I pray thee, kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow thee. And he said to him, Go back again: for what have I done to thee? And he returned back from him, and took a yoke of oxen, and slew them, and boiled their flesh with the instruments of the oxen, and gave to the people, and they did eat. Then he arose and went after Elijah, and ministered to him.

God’s chosen servants are ever trained in secret before they are called to public service. The barrack square before the open field—the discipline of training before the din of battle—is ever the order. The future teacher must be taught. The future leader must learn to follow. The future commander must know first how to obey.

Joseph, in prison, learned to rule in obscurity before he governed in public, next to the mighty Pharaoh. Moses was forty years at the backside of the desert before he led God’s people for a like period of years across its howling stretches. David smote the lion and the bear in secret before he slew the giant in public. He cared for his father’s sheep in the wilderness before he was called upon to care for God’s people. From the sheep-cote to the throne is the moral order of exaltation.

Elisha’s Call

Though nothing is predicated of a direct nature of this kind in connection with Elisha’s call, one can read between the lines that he, too, had been secretly prepared for the call of God. For instance, he showed no surprise when the prophetic mantle was cast upon him.

They were troublous times. The prophetic office was no bed of roses. It was no sinecure. If it earned God’s approbation, it received men’s hate. It involved carrying one’s life in one’s hand. If the strenuous and bold spirit of Elijah had failed under the strain of it, it was no light task for his successor.

Yet Elisha promptly expressed his readiness to follow Elijah. Filial duty and affection, exalted, and rightly so, to a religious regard, led him to ask permission to kiss his father and mother before plunging into his new career. At a word from Elijah he said farewell to the home, for God’s claims are paramount. Discipline is a narrow gate, but it leads into a blessed path. “If any man come to Me, and hate not his father, and mother, and wife, and children, and brethren, and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple.” “No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God.”

Elisha by his actions proved himself. He took the oxen, wherewith he was ploughing, slew them, and boiled their flesh with the instruments of the oxen, and gave to the people. His oxen and plough were indispensable to his former life. He dispensed with them, saying unmistakably in the act, that he answered to the call of God, wholly and absolutely. Henceforth there was no turning back for him.

The Call of the Christian Today

What a lesson for us! For every Christian is called—called to an extraordinary path, a path of faith, a path needing courage, a path from which there should be no turning back.

None of us is called to be a prophet, nevertheless the call to be a Christian is a wonderful one. How few rise to the heights of it! How few put Christ’s interests first and their own interests second. Indeed, if a Christian puts Christ’s interests first, then his interests are the Lord’s special care. Never was there a time when devotedness was more called for. Never was a night so dark as now, and so much need, therefore, for our light to be burning. “Men of God” is the crying need of the moment.

It takes no character to go with the crowd. No spiritual strength is needed to float with the stream. But to stand alone, to swim against the stream, to stem the evil influence of the hour, needs spiritual grit and fibre. We shall see the secret of Elisha’s power and constancy. May we learn that secret each one of us for ourselves.

Elisha’s Constancy in the Path

We hear no more of Elisha till we read of the last journey master and disciple took together. Each stage of that journey—from Gilgal to Bethel, from Bethel to Jericho, from Jericho to Jordan—tested Elisha, as three times over Elijah said to him, “Tarry here, I pray thee.” He clung to his master, refusing to be separated, till separation was inevitable (2 Kings 2).

What thoughts must have filled their hearts as they walked that last journey, each step deepening in solemnity. If Elijah had prevision as to his translation, how he must have contrasted his dread of dying a violent death at the hands of Jezebel’s servants with the tender gracious rebuke of the Lord sending heaven’s horsemen and chariot to take him without dying at all. We, too, may faint beneath the pressure and quail before the storm, and wonder how we are to get on at all. We see already very plainly the characteristics of the day when no man shall be allowed to buy or sell unless he has the mark of the beast upon his forehead or in his hand. But before that awful day comes—impossible for the Christian—believers shall be taken out of the world, caught up to heaven without dying at all (cf. 1 Thess. 4). What a blessed prospect!

And what was filling the heart of Elisha? Elijah’s request reveals the secret of his soul. He said, “Ask what I shall do for thee, before l be taken away from thee.”

The solemnity of the moment, the relationship the two men bore to each other, the needs of Elisha’s path when left to tread it alone—all calculated to make his answer the unveiling of himself, the revealing of his heart of hearts.

Elijah a Figure of Christ

And just at this point I must crave the indulgence of the reader. Elijah, wonderful prophet as he was, was only a man, and as such was “subject to like passions as we are.” But at this stage in our meditations I would ask the reader to look at him as a figure of Christ in whom was no failure at all. His translation is a type of our Lord’s ascension to glory, and Elisha left behind, a type of the church, and, as the church is made up of individuals, of the individual believer.

Elisha reveals the Secret of his Heart

In response to Elijah’s invitation to ask what he would, Elisha answered, “I pray thee, let a double portion of thy spirit be upon me.” Here, then, Elisha reveals himself, discloses all his soul’s history, expresses the secret of his heart.

  “A double portion!” What can that mean? Deuteronomy 21:15-17 explains the expression. Suppose a man had three sons. He would divide his possessions into four portions, giving single portions to the younger sons, and a double portion to the eldest, as the right of the firstborn.”

Why should this be? It is because the eldest son was to become representative of his father. This principle obtains to a large extent in this country today. The eldest son of a peer succeeds, on the death of his father, to the family title, estates, seats, etc., because he is called upon to be head of the family and represent his Father, whilst the younger sons have younger sons’ portions.

And Scripture confirms this. For instance, 1 Chronicles 5:2 tells us, concerning Israel, “the birthright was Joseph’s,” and verse 1 tells us Reuben’s (the eldest son) birthright “was given to the sons of Joseph the son of Israel.” We can see why Joseph had two sons and only two, viz, that he might have the double portion of the firstborn. So that in the apportioning of territory, whilst each of Israel’s sons (Levi excluded for obvious reasons) had single portions, that is one tribe each, Joseph had the double portion, two tribes, viz. Ephraim and Manasseh.

Thus we learn that the one consuming desire of Elisha’s heart was to stand in the place in which Elijah had stood. This showed how his heart was won. The interests of the God whom Elijah had represented were paramount. To represent him the one thing above all else he desired.

What is your Dearest Wish?

If you had but one wish offered you, by one who was powerful enough to gratify any wish you formed, what would be your dearest wish? Sit down and think thoughtfully. For you will think what is uppermost and undermost. You will think yourself. If you are called to be a Christian your dearest wish should be to represent Christ, the Rejected of earth, your Lord and Master. All else will perish. Anything short of this can only disappoint. This only can carry us on in the path of God’s appointing. Every other wish in its consummation will be only like the teeth breaking into an apple of the Dead Sea, and the mouth filled with dust.

And here let me make a remark that may surprise the reader. The Christian alone is called upon to represent an absent Lord. A moment’s reflection will convince. The Old Testament saint could not represent Christ, for Christ was not then revealed. True, individuals were types of Christ, but this was unconsciously to themselves, so far as Scripture testifies. Doubtless the spirit of Christ manifested itself often in the stirrings of divine life in the Old Testament believer, but he was not called upon, nor could he be, to represent an absent Christ. Nor will the Jew in the day to come be called upon to represent an absent Lord. On the contrary Christ will be present to take up His rights as Messiah.

No, it is only the Christian in this dispensation who is called upon to represent Christ. This is borne out by Hebrews 12:22-23, “Ye are come to the general assembly and church of the firstborn” (firstborn ones, NT.). Israel of old, and Israel and the nations in the day to come, occupy the place of younger sons. The church, that of the firstborn, is thus called upon to represent an absent Lord. [We use the word “sons” here as illustrative of position and not as denoting the peculiar and unique place sonship has in Christianity. Similarly Ephesians 3:15 speaks of “Every family in [the] heavens and on earth” (N.Tr.). What an honour! What a privilege! Who would miss it, if once they knew their portion and privilege?

The Condition Necessary

Elijah in answering Elisha’s request used words pregnant with meaning, not in their actual historical fulfilment, but in their interpretation for our times. “Thou hast asked a hard thing; nevertheless, if thou see me when I am taken from thee, it shall be so to thee; but if not, it shall not be so.”

The two men continued their walk and talk, when suddenly “there appeared a chariot of fire, and horses of fire, and parted them both asunder; and Elijah went up by a whirlwind into heaven.” And Elisha, in seeing the wondrous sight, knew that his request was granted, the desire of his heart given; and he cried out, “My father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof.”

Now there was power to have rapt both up into glory, but Elisha was left behind to maintain those interests for which Elijah had stood. True, as far as their actual ministry was concerned, one was the prophet of judgment, the other of grace; but we are now viewing the one as a type of Christ ascending, the other of the Christian left behind to carry on His interests.

The condition necessary, then, was the beholding the translation. And what is the condition necessary for our representing an absent Lord? Surely His taking His present place on high. This altogether determines our place, as belonging to the spot where He is glorified, and our place in this world, rejected because He has been rejected.

In John 17 the Lord is in spirit in ascension glory, and He puts His saints in His own place before the Father, and then in His own place, as rejected by the world. What a privilege to have both the one and the other! And it is the entering into the one that fits us for the other. Approach and reproach work one with the other as the blades of a pair of scissors. The more the believer knows of approach the more be will gladly suffer reproach. So the Lord could say of His own, “They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.” “As Thou hast sent Me into the world, even so have I also sent them into the world.”

Of course all believers receive the historical truth of the ascension of the Lord Jesus to God’s right band. It is one thing to receive the truth historically, it is another to understand its moral import, and this can only be through the affections. And this, I believe, is the spiritual import for us of Elijah’s condition as to granting Elisha’s wish.

Beloved, have we grasped the truth of the Lord’s position, how it settles every question as to His place on high for us, associating us with Himself, how it determines our place of rejection because He is rejected, how it answers in the emphatic negative the question as to whether this world’s politics and honours are for the Christian, how it evidences unmistakably that every attempt at friendship with the world is enmity to God? Have we grasped this? If not, we cannot be to any degree truly representative.

The Power Necessary

As Elijah was being translated he dropped his mantle. Elisha’s action was thorough and reminiscent of the first occasion he met Elijah. “He took hold of his own clothes and rent them in two pieces.” Then he took up Elijah’s mantle.

I believe Elijah’s casting his mantle to earth was typical of the Lord sending down the Holy Ghost upon the believers at Pentecost.

In this twofold action of Elisha we have typified the secret of power for the representative of an absent Master.

In tearing his own garments he typifies the believer judging himself, his own powers in themselves his natural character, as worthless for God. In picking up Elijah’s mantle he typifies the believer who sees in the gift of the Spirit the only power for representation and service.

Elisha had the choice between two mantles—Elijah’s and his own. Wisely he chose his master’s, and was done with his own. So if the Lord gives His Spirit we must choose between Himself and ourselves, His and our own power. Can there be any choice? It needs but to be presented to instantly settle the matter once and for ever.

  “Higher than the highest heaven,
  Deeper than the deepest sea,
  Lord, thy love at last has conquered;
  ‘None of self, and all of Thee.’”

If this be the case then the eye will be fixed on Christ in glory, and the heart, freed from self and selfish interests, will be ready to respond to the Lord.

It is worthy of note that the last thing Elijah did with his mantle before he was translated—viz, part the waters of Jordan, type of access into heavenly blessings through death (in the Lord’s case not for Himself surely, but for us as Man)—is the first thing Elisha did with the same mantle.

And so it shall be that we shall be enabled to reproduce in our little measure the life of Christ upon this earth, to represent Him the little while until He comes. He comes quickly. May we not miss the wonderful opportunity that is ours, an opportunity eternity itself will not afford.