15Elisha said to him, “Take bow and arrows;” and he took bow and arrows for himself.16He said to the king of Israel, “Put your hand on the bow;” and he put his hand on it. Elisha laid his hands on the king’s hands.17He said, “Open the window eastward;” and he opened it. Then Elisha said, “Shoot!” and he shot. He said, “Yahweh’s arrow of victory, even the arrow of victory over Syria; for you will strike the Syrians in Aphek, until you have consumed them.”
18He said, “Take the arrows;” and he took them. He said to the king of Israel, “Strike the ground;” and he struck three times, and stopped.19The man of God was angry with him, and said, “You should have struck five or six times. Then you would have struck Syria until you had consumed it; whereas now you will strike Syria just three times.”
15 Elisha said to him, “Take bow and arrows;” and he took bow and arrows for himself.
16 He said to the king of Israel, “Put your hand on the bow;” and he put his hand on it. Elisha laid his hands on the king’s hands.
17 He said, “Open the window eastward;” and he opened it. Then Elisha said, “Shoot!” and he shot. He said, “Yahweh’s arrow of victory, even the arrow of victory over Syria; for you will strike the Syrians in Aphek, until you have consumed them.”
18 He said, “Take the arrows;” and he took them. He said to the king of Israel, “Strike the ground;” and he struck three times, and stopped.
19 The man of God was angry with him, and said, “You should have struck five or six times. Then you would have struck Syria until you had consumed it; whereas now you will strike Syria just three times.”
KJVKing James Version
15 And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows. And he took unto him bow and arrows.
16 And he said to the king of Israel, Put thine hand upon the bow. And he put his hand upon it: and Elisha put his hands upon the king’s hands.
17 And he said, Open the window eastward. And he opened it. Then Elisha said, Shoot. And he shot. And he said, The arrow of the LORD’s deliverance, and the arrow of deliverance from Syria: for thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek, till thou have consumed them.
18 And he said, Take the arrows. And he took them. And he said unto the king of Israel, Smite upon the ground. And he smote thrice, and stayed.
19 And the man of God was wroth with him, and said, Thou shouldest have smitten five or six times; then hadst thou smitten Syria till thou hadst consumed it: whereas now thou shalt smite Syria but thrice.
Show all 3 translations
JPSJPS Tanakh (1917)
15 And Elisha said unto him: 'Take bow and arrows'; and he took unto him bow and arrows.
16 And he said to the king of Israel: 'Put thy hand upon the bow'; and he put his hand upon it. And Elisha laid his hands upon the king's hands.
17 And he said: 'Open the window eastward'; and he opened it. Then Elisha said: 'Shoot'; and he shot. And he said: 'The LORD'S arrow of victory, even the arrow of victory against Aram; for thou shalt smite the Arameans in Aphek, till thou have consumed them.'
18 And he said: 'Take the arrows'; and he took them. And he said unto the king of Israel: 'Smite upon the ground'; and he smote thrice, and stayed.
19 And the man of God was wroth with him, and said: 'Thou shouldest have smitten five or six times; then hadst thou smitten Aram till thou hadst consumed it; whereas now thou shalt smite Aram but thrice.'
2 Kings 13:25(v19)Jehoash the son of Jehoahaz took again out of the hand of Benhadad the son of Hazael the cities which he had taken out of the hand of…
1 Kings 20:26(v17)At the return of the year, Ben Hadad mustered the Syrians, and went up to Aphek, to fight against Israel.
2 Kings 5:10-14(v17)Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, “Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall come again to you, and you shall be…
John 11:39-41(v17)Jesus said, “Take away the stone.” Martha, the sister of him who was dead, said to him, “Lord, by this time there is a stench, for he has…
1 Corinthians 1:18(v17)For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are dying, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
Show all 29 cross-references
Genesis 49:24(v16)But his bow remained strong. The arms of his hands were made strong, by the hands of the Mighty One of Jacob, (from there is the shepherd,…
Exodus 4:2(v17)Yahweh said to him, “What is that in your hand?” He said, “A rod.”
Exodus 4:17(v17)You shall take this rod in your hand, with which you shall do the signs.”
Leviticus 10:16(v19)Moses diligently inquired about the goat of the sin offering, and, behold, it was burned. He was angry with Eleazar and with Ithamar, the…
Numbers 16:15(v19)Moses was very angry, and said to Yahweh, “Don’t respect their offering. I have not taken one donkey from them, neither have I hurt one of…
Judges 7:9-20(v17)That same night, Yahweh said to him, “Arise, go down into the camp, for I have delivered it into your hand. But if you are afraid to go…
1 Samuel 4:1(v17)The word of Samuel came to all Israel. Now Israel went out against the Philistines to battle, and encamped beside Ebenezer; and the…
2 Samuel 5:24(v17)When you hear the sound of marching in the tops of the mulberry trees, then stir yourself up; for then Yahweh has gone out before you to…
2 Kings 1:9-15(v19)Then the king sent a captain of fifty with his fifty to him. He went up to him; and behold, he was sitting on the top of the hill. He said…
2 Kings 4:6(v18)When the containers were full, she said to her son, “Bring me another container.” He said to her, “There isn’t another container.” Then the…
2 Kings 4:16(v19)He said, “At this season, when the time comes around, you will embrace a son.” She said, “No, my lord, you man of God, do not lie to your…
2 Kings 4:34(v16)He went up, and lay on the child, and put his mouth on his mouth, and his eyes on his eyes, and his hands on his hands. He stretched…
2 Kings 4:40(v19)So they poured out for the men to eat. As they were eating some of the stew, they cried out, and said, “Man of God, there is death in the…
2 Kings 6:9(v19)The man of God sent to the king of Israel, saying, “Beware that you not pass this place; for the Syrians are coming down there.”
Psalms 144:1(v16)Blessed be Yahweh, my rock, who teaches my hands to war, and my fingers to battle:
Mark 3:5(v19)When he had looked around at them with anger, being grieved at the hardening of their hearts, he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.”…
Mark 6:5(v19)He could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people, and healed them.
Mark 10:14(v19)But when Jesus saw it, he was moved with indignation, and said to them, “Allow the little children to come to me! Don’t forbid them, for…
John 2:5-8(v17)His mother said to the servants, “Whatever he says to you, do it.” Now there were six water pots of stone set there after the Jews’ way of…
Exodus 17:11(v18)When Moses held up his hand, Israel prevailed. When he let down his hand, Amalek prevailed.
Isaiah 20:2-4(v18)at that time Yahweh spoke by Isaiah the son of Amoz, saying, “Go, and loosen the sackcloth from off your waist, and take your sandals from…
Ezekiel 4:1-10(v18)“You also, son of man, take a tile, and lay it before yourself, and portray on it a city, even Jerusalem. Lay siege against it, build forts…
Ezekiel 5:1-4(v18)“You, son of man, take a sharp sword. You shall take it as a barber’s razor to yourself, and shall cause it to pass over your head and over…
Ezekiel 12:1-7(v18)Yahweh’s word also came to me, saying, “Son of man, you dwell in the middle of the rebellious house, who have eyes to see, and don’t see,…
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this passage (18 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Geneva Bible translators1599 · Public DomainOn vv17, 19That is, toward Syria: so that he did not…
That is, toward Syria: so that he did not only prophesy with words, but also confirmed him by these signs that he should have the victory.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp1656 · Public DomainOn vv15–192Ki 13:15 And Elisha said unto him, Take bow…
2Ki 13:15 And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows. And he took unto him bow and arrows.
Ver. 15. And Elisha said, Take bow and arrows.] Chria quadam tanquam signo externo victoriam praedicit: The prophet, moved by the king’s tears and profession, foretelleth victory by this outward sign:
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole1685 · Public DomainOn vv17–19Eastward; either towards Syria, which lay north-eastward from the…
Eastward; either towards Syria, which lay north-eastward from the land of Israel; or towards the Israelites’ land beyond Jordan, which lay eastward from Canaan, and which was now possessed by the Syrians. Either way this arrow is shot against the Syrians, as a token what God intended to do against them.
In Aphek; not in the city, but in the territory of it, where it seems there was a great battle to be fought between the Israelites and Syrians. Of Aphek, see 1Sa 4:1; 29:1; 1Ki 20:30, though it is possible there might be several cities of that name. Or, as in Aphek, i.e. thou shalt smite them as they were smitten in the city and territory of Aphek, i.e. utterly destroy them; see 1Ki 20:26,29,30; the particle as being oft understood, as hath been formerly and frequently proved.
Read full note →
Till thou have consumed them, i.e. the Syrians; not all that people, but their armies, or at least that which was to be at Aphek, where a dreadful battle was to be fought. Or if this be meant of all the Syrian armies, this is to be understood conditionally, if he did not hinder it by his unbelief or neglect, signified in the following verses.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill1763 · Public DomainOn vv15–19And he said, open the window eastward,.... Syria lying…
And he said, open the window eastward,.... Syria lying east of the land of Israel, as the Jewish commentators in general observe, and for which they quote Isa 9:12, but it lay northeast, or rather more to the north; wherefore this may respect the eastward part of the land of Israel, which the Syrians had got possession of, and should be recovered, as this sign showed, see Kg2 10:33,
and he opened it: then Elisha said, shoot, and he shot; the arrow, out of the window, being opened:
Read full note →
and he said, the arrow of the Lord's deliverance, and the arrow of deliverance from Syria; meaning, that that arrow was a sign of the Lord's deliverance of Israel from the Syrians, by whom they had been sadly oppressed, and reduced very low:
for thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek till thou hast consumed them; not the whole nation, but that army they should bring thither; which was a city in the land of Israel, where the Syrians were routed in Ahab's time; 100,000 were slain near it on one day, and 27,000 by the fall of the wall of it, Kg1 20:26 hence some read the words here, "as in Aphek."
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley1765 · Public DomainOn vv17–18Eastward - Toward Syria, which lay northeastward, from the…
Eastward - Toward Syria, which lay northeastward, from the land of Israel: this arrow is shot against the Syrians, as a token what God intended to do against them.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke1810 · Public DomainOn vv15, 17, 18Verse 15. Take bow and arrows.] The bow, the…
Verse 15. Take bow and arrows.] The bow, the arrows, and the smiting on the ground, were all emblematical things, indicative of the deliverance of Israel from Syria.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson1811 · Public DomainOn vv15, 182Ki 13:15-17. Take bow and arrows — This was…
2Ki 13:15-17. Take bow and arrows — This was to represent the wars he was to have with the Syrians. Elisha put his hands upon the king’s hands — To signify to him, that in all his expeditions against the Syrians, he must look up to God for direction and strength; must reckon his own hands insufficient for him, and must go on in dependance on the divine aid. Open the window eastward — Toward Syria, which lay north-eastward from the land of Israel: the Syrians had also possessed themselves of the land of the Israelites beyond Jordan, which lay eastward from Canaan: this arrow is shot toward these parts, as a token of what God intended to do against the Syrians. The arrow of the Lord’s deliverance — It is God that commands deliverance, and when he will effect it, who can hinder? Thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek — Where they were now encamped, or where they were to have a general rendezvous of their forces. Till thou have consumed them — Those of them that are vexatious and oppressive to thee and thy kingdom.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes1834 · Public DomainOn vv16–19Elisha put his hands upon the king’s hands -…
Elisha put his hands upon the king’s hands - A symbolic act, indicating that the successes, which the shooting typified, were to come, not from human skill, or strength, or daring, but from the presence and the power of God.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary1859 · Public DomainOn vv17–19East, looking towards Galgaad, (Hadock) which the Syrians occupied.…
East, looking towards Galgaad, (Hadock) which the Syrians occupied. (Menochius) --- These actions were all significative and prophetical. The throwing of a dart was formerly the mode of declaring war. (Virgil, Æneid ix.) Justin (ii.) says, "Alexander first threw a javelin, as against a hostile country." Thus also the ancients took possession. (Varro) (V. Max. iii., &c.) The people of Andros and Chalicis, sent each a deputy to seize Acanthos, when it had been abandoned by its inhabitants. The man from Andros, perceiving the other before him, threw his dart at the gate, and it was decided that he had thus lawfully obtained possession. (Plutarch, q. Græc.; Selden, Mare. Claus. iv.) --- The action of Joas may be considered in both lights. --- Them. We do not read the particulars of this battle: but it must have been very bloody. One of the three victories (ver. 25.) of Joas was probably obtained at Aphec, (Calmet) a place memorable for the victory of Achab, over the same Syrians, 3 Kings xx. 26. (Menochius)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown1871 · Public DomainOn v15Take bow and arrows--Hostilities were usually proclaimed by a…
Take bow and arrows--Hostilities were usually proclaimed by a herald, sometimes by a king or general making a public and formal discharge of an arrow into the enemy's country. Elisha directed Joash to do this, as a symbolical act, designed to intimate more fully and significantly the victories promised to the king of Israel over the Syrians. His laying his hands upon the king's hands was to represent the power imparted to the bow shot as coming from the Lord through the medium of the prophet. His shooting the first arrow eastward--to that part of his kingdom which the Syrians had taken and which was east of Samaria--was a declaration of war against them for the invasion. His shooting the other arrows into the ground was in token of the number of victories he was taken to gain; but his stopping at the third betrayed the weakness of his faith; for, as the discharged arrow signified a victory over the Syrians, it is evident that the more arrows he shot the more victories he would gain. As he stopped so soon, his conquests would be incomplete.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon1874 · Public DomainOn vv15, 16, 17, 1915. Take bow and arrows — To make his…
15. Take bow and arrows — To make his last oracle more impressive, the prophet uses a memorable symbol.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges1878 · Public DomainOn vv15–1915. Take bow and arrows] It is as if…
15. Take bow and arrows] It is as if the prophet by this significant action directed and encouraged the king to enter on the war against Syria.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers1878 · Public DomainOn vv15–19(15) Take bow and arrows.—From one of the royal…
(15) Take bow and arrows.—From one of the royal attendants.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary1880 · Public DomainOn vv15–19And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows.…
And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows. The prophet was moved, no doubt, by a sudden inspiration tie was bidden to assure the weeping king of victory speedy victory-over Syria. The defense of Israel would not fail because he a mere weak instrument by whom God had been pleased to work was taken from the earth. God would bless the king"s own efforts. "Take bow and arrows," he exclaims under the prophetic afflatus. "Take them at once into thine hands, and do my bidding." Words would not have been enough; greater assurance and conviction was produced when prophecy took the shape of a symbolical action. (comp. 1Sa_15:27; 1Ki_11:30; Isa_20:3; Jer_13:1-11 Jer_18:3, Jer_18:4, etc.) So the Spirit of the Lord moved the prophet to the performance of a symbolical act, or set of acts, which the historian now proceeds to describe. And he took unto him how and arrows. Joash would take these from the hands of his attendants, who might be carrying his own special weapons after him, as was the practice in Persia ("Ancient Monarchies," vol. 4. p. 161), or who would at any rate have arms of their own, since they would wait upon him not merely as attendants, but as guards.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator1887 · Public DomainOn vv15–16And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows.
2Ki_13:15-19
And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows.
Read full note →
The kings arrows
Elisha was lying ill on his deathbed. His long career of usefulness and blessing was drawing to a close. He was held in great honour, not only by the people but by the king, and when it was known that he was coming to the end of his career King Joash came to see him, and when he came into the room, and saw the prophet lying there, looking so frail and weak, the young king was greatly affected. He burst into tears, and cried aloud, O my father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof. Now Joash was neither a good nor a great man, but he was still young and not yet hardened, and he had no doubt a sudden vision of something of the meaning of the great value of Elisha to the kingdom. Elisha was a man of deeds, and he called the young man to his composure by saying to him, Take bow and arrows. For a moment Elisha is king, and the king is his servant, and the king turns and takes up a bow and arrows.
1. Gods hand on ours is our only guarantee of success. When Elisha had young King Joash take up the bow and arrows and place the arrow on the string and make ready to shoot, he put his own hands over the hands of the king to illustrate and impress upon the mind of this young ruler that if he gave himself to earnest, resolute attack upon the enemies of God and of His people the hand of God should be with him as a guarantee of victory. The lesson is as important for us as it was for Joash. God calls every one of us to fight His enemies and the enemies of mankind. And there is that other warfare in our own hearts, that campaign against our personal besetting sins. Gods hand must be on our hand if the arrow shall find its mark and do its execution.
2. We are to smite sin utterly. God seeks to deliver us entirely from sin, but we may limit the deliverance of God by our own conduct. When the prophet told the young king to shoot his arrow eastward towards his Syrian enemy, he exclaimed, The arrow of the Lords deliverance. But when, to test the young king, he told him to take up the arrows and smite on the ground with them, his heart was heavy and his soul indignant as he noticed that he struck half-heartedly and that after only three strokes he turned about in a lifeless sort of way as if looking for further directions. Let us not fail of this great lesson, God seeks our complete deliverance from sin. He desires that every enemy which troubles us and hinders us from working out the great purposes to which we are called of Jesus Christ shall be consumed and destroyed. But let us never forget that whether or not this is accomplished depends at the last upon us. It is a solemn thing that we, by our nerveless will, by our flabby lack of purpose, by our mushy indecision may thwart the purpose of Almighty God and continue to live lives far beneath our privilege. Let us smite, and smite, and smite, and yet again, smite, until every wicked passion, until every evil appetite, until every besetting sin shall be smitten to the death in our hearts and Jesus shall be crowned Lord over all.
3. There is no greater danger to the Christian than lack of persistence. Over and over again is this urged upon us in the Bible. Joash failed for lack of persistence. Many a Christian in these later centuries has failed because he gave up in despair by the way.
4. We are in great danger of being too easily satisfied. It may be that King Joash thought that three victories over Syria would be enough. It was not in him to rise up to a high ideal of his mission or to grasp the fulness of Gods willingness to make him not only the great King of Israel but the great king of all the world. Because he was easily satisfied his career was short and disgraceful. (L. A. Banks, D. D.)
Poverty of faith ensures but partial success
We may take this closing incident in the life of Elisha, as an illustration of the warfare between the soul and its enemies, and the conditions upon which complete victory is achieved.
1. Israel. Redeemed out of Egypt, in Canaan, where they might have lived in the enjoyment of triumph over all foes. Not in absolute exemption from conflict, but trusting in God and obeying Him, they would never have known defeat. They disbelieved, disobeyed, and as a consequence, there was failure and defeat. Type of a soul which has passed out of death (Egypt) into life (Canaan). But it has left its first love, in which it might have abode in the joys of continuous victory.
2. Israels enemies. Syria in particular. We find ourselves attacked from different quarters at the same time.
3. Promised deliverance.
(a) A definite deliverance--from Syria.
(b) A Divine deliverance--The Lords deliverance.
Spiritual deliverance is promised us. Definite promises of deliverance from the dominion, love and pollution of sin.
4. The kings error. He erred in not resolving on, and expecting, complete success. He smote thrice, and stayed. He, as it were, limited the Holy One of Israel. He certainly manifested a lack of faith and of courage. In the spiritual life we should aim at, and expect, complete success. Be satisfied with nothing short of this. Not to rest while a single foe has a footing in the territory which belongs to God. We are to be more than conquerors.
5. The kings partial success. Elisha would not have been wrath had there not been good cause. Elisha was Gods messenger. As when he declared that there should be plenty in Samaria within a given time, and the lord of the court was held guilty for not believing the message, so here. On account of weak faith, we are often only partially successful against our spiritual enemies. Would Naaman have been cured of his leprosy had he dipped in Jordan but thrice, and then stayed?
6. The kings loss through unbelief. He was not aware, possibly, of the grandeur of the opportunity. Perhaps he treated the prophets simple message with contempt--obeying him merely to indulge the whim of an old and dying man--failing to look beyond the prophet to God who sent him. Perhaps we stumble sometimes at the message because we look no farther or higher than the messenger. He is not talented, famous, but coarse, etc. The king suffered. So do we when this spirit is indulged. (J. E. Robinson.)
Spiritual archery
There are two acts in this wonderful event. The first concerns the shooting of the arrow of deliverance, a symbolic and prophetic act; the second concerns the smiting on the ground with arrows, also symbolical, but providing as well a test of the character, of the zeal, and of the faith of the King of Israel. Now concerning these two acts and the several scenes in them let us speak as God may guide us.
I. Shooting the arrow of deliverance. Notice,
1. A call to action. Take bow and arrows, said the dying prophet. There is a deal of meaning wrapped up in this apparently simple suggestion. Elisha had come to a full end, and like a shock of corn that was fully ripe he was now bending towards the sharpened sickle. The king, who was not remarkable all the years of his life for his devotion to God or to His prophets, is now found trembling and weeping by the side of the sick servant of Jehovah. Then it is that the dying prophet, with more faith and hope and vigour in him even at the last article than the sinful king in his prime and power, exclaims as it were, Weep not, tremble not, faint not, fear not; I am going, but God is with you. God buries His workmen, but He carries on His work. I die, but God will surely visit you. Do not let this sad event unduly depress you. I must die, for my time has come; but so long as you live, live to purpose, take bow and arrows, let not your hands hang down. Go forth to the battle yet again, and believe in the God to whom I have so long, though vainly, pointed you; for He is the Lord God of Hosts, the God of battles still. Dry up your tears; forsake your grief; take bow and arrows; arm yourself; go forth into the fight, and the Lord my God shall be with you.
2. I notice next that Elisha gives to the king several strict injunctions; indeed, the detail to which he condescends is most remarkable. All through these verses we find a long list of instructions and commands. Take bow and arrows. Put thine hand upon the bow. Open the window eastward. Shoot. Take the arrows. Smite upon the ground. The dying prophet instructs the king in all the minutiae of his immediate duty. The wisest of us need to be divinely directed.
3. Then followed on the kings part implicit obedience. Take, said the prophet; and he took. So it is throughout. Put thine hand upon the bow; and he put his hand upon it. Open the window; and he opened it. Shoot; and he shot. Smite; and he smote. All through there is a corresponding obedience on the kings part to the arrangement and suggestion of the prophet. So should it ever be with us and God. Let His imperative be answered by obedient indicative on our part.
4. There follows a hint as to the necessity for personal interest and effort. Read the 16th verse.
5. There was Divine co-operation, for we read Elisha put his hands upon the kings hands:
6. Notice next that the window had to be opened. He said, Open the window eastward. And he opened it. In other words, every obstruction and possible hindrance has to be got rid of. You see the importance of this.
7. Then at last they come to the decisive action. All the rest has been preliminary and preparatory.
II. The second act, the smiting with the other arrows. This was a symbolical act, as was the first. The flight of the single arrow through the open lattice must have been readily understood by the king, for it was the custom there and then, as in other lands and times, to throw down the gage of battle, or to hurl a dart, the signal of the war. God has shot out of every window of this Tabernacle arrows of deliverance, if I may so speak; but with this purpose, that we ourselves shall follow up those tokens, and hope and believe that they were prophecies and promises with meaning which must meet with further fulfilment. It remains for us to shoot the other arrows, for we have a quiver full of them. The command was to smite with them on the ground. You see the meaning of that. It is as though Elisha said, The arrow of Gods deliverance has gone forth; it has already found its mark and done its work. You have now, if you will but believe it, these Syrians crouching at your very feet. God has already humbled them, and they are now at your mercy. Smite upon the ground. They are already at your feet. God has delivered them into your hands. Smite! Smite! The king obeys, but with too little zeal. (T. Spurgeon.)
The arrow of the Lords deliverance
How the spiritual drama repeats itself year after year! Again and again we see young people come up full of enthusiasm, full of the memory of the great things that noble lives have done, lamenting the glory that has departed from the earth, feeling a sudden impulse, which like an arrow is shot forth from the soul, essaying to do some great and noble work; and in that moment the prophetic voice is heard saying, The arrow of the Lords deliverance; there lies the work of your life. This sudden impulse that takes possession of you in your youth, and causes you to shoot forth the arrows of the aspirations of your soul,--these are the things, that show you the way of the Lord. It is Gods purpose that you should be the deliverer of His people in the particular path that He has opened before you. How that is going on every day! How every day at college men are lifting up their hearts, and setting open the windows of their souls, and looking out, shooting forth the thoughts and hopes and desires of their soul into this great unknown world! And then what? Then says the prophetic voice again, Smite upon the ground, Take these arrows and bind them together, and in a Divine frenzy devote yourself, soul and body, to the work that God has revealed to you to do. Then comes the critical moment in a mans life. He smites thrice, and stays. He says to himself, I need not do my best; I can do about as well as other men and not be wearied by my work; I have gifts that will enable me to live, and enable me to attain, perchance, a fortune, and yet I need not give up the things that make life pleasant; I need not turn aside from my self-indulgence; I will smite thrice, and stay. So it comes to pass that this great multitude, surging out into the life of the world year after year, equipped, crowned as kings for the work of life, smite the Syrians but thrice. The work of life is but half done. They remain failures, when they might have triumphed gloriously. Or take another illustration of the same thing. Here is a woman who has given herself up to a life of frivolity and vanity. Perhaps she is not to blame for that; perhaps she has had no ideal of noble things set before her. But some day the casement is thrown open, and she sees a new life before her,--a life which shall be devoted to husband and Children and home, a life which shall for the first time remember the great forgotten who dwell among us. The hand of the prophet is on that woman, and her soul shoots forth the arrow of a new desire. And the voice says, It is the arrow of the Lords deliverance; there lie the glory, and splendour, and nobility of your life; there is the path on which God would have you walk, and you may deliver yourself and deliver those who live about you from the slavery and misery of the false ideals that thus far have dominated them. Smite, says the voice of the prophet. Devote yourself, soul and body, instantly, to the new work that has been revealed to you. And she smites thrice. She goes to see some poor stricken soul, and she finds it tiresome; she turns aside from some gathering of frivolity, and her soul is parched. She undertakes some noble work of self-denial, and she is tired. She smites thrice, and stays, and goes down with the great multitude, worthless, useless, bringing no fruit to perfection Listen to one more example of the same thing. Here is a man or woman who has come on through life, and suddenly awakes to the consciousness of his ignorance of the Divine revelation in Jesus Christ. It smites upon him. Sometimes for one cause, and sometimes for another, it comes to pass that men and women living here in this city suddenly for the first time have a revelation of the glory and beauty and power of the life of Jesus Christ. And they say to themselves, Is the thing a myth? How has it come to pass that people have dreamed of such a life? How is it that men and women gather week after week, and day after day, to hear of the Lord Jesus Christ, and desire to serve Him? That man shoots forth the arrow of his desire for knowledge, and the voice says, It is the arrow of the Lords deliverance. There lies the path by which you shall walk into the kingdom of truth and be saved from your enemies. And he begins to read. He reads a little, and he talks a little, and he thinks a little. But he learns before long that there is opening up before him a great and tremendous work, and the scepticism of the time finds voice, and whispers, Why waste your energies to learn that which cannot be known? Devote the energy of life to something that is practical; turn aside from vain dreams. So he, like the others, smites thrice and stays, and enters the great company of sceptics,--or, as they like to be called to-day, agnostics,--ignorant of Gods eternal truth. (Leighton Parks.)
The Lords arrow of victory
You see then the full measure of victory which God wants us to enjoy. Thou shalt smite the Syrians till thou have consumed them. You see, too, the limited measure of victory which most Christians experience. He smote thrice and stayed. Three big blessings and we think we have had all. Three successes over the enemy and we think we have done wonders. But the Saviour marvels that after all He went through for us, we should be content with such half measures. We glean from it four rules for complete victory in the Christian life.
1. Declare war against sin. Elisha breaks in upon the kings lamentations with the emphatic words, Take bow and arrows. It is time not for weeping but for warring. The genius of the gospel is not peace at any price, but truth at all costs.
2. Union is strength. This is the meaning of the second act in this significant drama. The prophet laid his hands upon the kings hands. Like the officer who sallied forth to capture one of the enemys forts, after two unsuccessful attempts had been made, asking first of all from his general a grasp of his conquering right hand, so we must know what it is for our weakness to be encompassed in Christs strength.
3. Claim a complete deliverance. This is the meaning of the next step. The window was opened eastward and through the open window was shot forth the Lords arrow of victory, even the arrow of victory over Syria.
4. Then came the fourth act with its momentous lesson, Fulfil the obedience of faith, and the king failed at this point so that the man of God was angry with him. How slow we are to learn this lesson. It is what we are in secret before God that fixes the amount of victory and blessing we enjoy in our walk and service amongst men. If only Joash had emptied the quiver he would have consumed the Syrians. If only we will he whole-hearted before God, yielding our will wholly and trusting Gods promises absolutely, we too shall be completely victorious against the world, the flesh, and the devil. (F. S. Webster, M. A.)
The challenge arrow
History gives us the explanation of this symbolic narrative. It appears that in former times war was often proclaimed or renewed by the despatch of an arrow into the enemys lines. Elisha meant to teach the king that, although he was weak and dying, yet Israels cause was not going to die with him; and that the same power that made Israel strong in the past would follow the king in his new campaign against the Syrian oppressor. Let us learn the following lessons from the laying of those old emaciated hands of the prophet upon the young strong hands of the king. We see there a picture of--
I. The past directing the present. When we crossed the threshold of the year we did not get rid of the old; for the past is always stretching out its vanishing hands to direct and influence the present. The white-bearded face of Elisha well represents the past, which is over behind us, overlooking our work. The actions, associations, and habits of the past are still with us. We may turn over a new leaf, but we cannot unlearn at once the irregularities of the defective writing on the previous page. We may point the arrow afresh, but the old hands are inevitably influencing the sweep it takes from the bow. This influence is exerted by the past, whether it is good or evil. Virtue and piety reap their immediate, as well as ultimate, harvests. The good deeds of the past are ever stretching forth their gentle hands to guide and bless not only ourselves, but others as well. Who can tell the influence of a mothers prayers uttered by lips long since sealed in death? In the critical moment of her boys career, it would seem as if a straw would have turned the scale of destiny this way or that. The young impulsive nature is guided and restrained by the mothers prayers answered, the mothers words remembered, the mothers influence exerted; and these have saved him in the hour of danger
II. The Divine controlling the Human. The arrow of the Lords deliverance had power in it, not because of the strong hand of Joash who pulled the bow, but mainly because of the prophetic hands that were laid upon him as he did so. Mere human effort is fruitless unless a higher power directs and controls the course and goal of the arrows flight. We may spread the sails, but they must be filled with heaven-sent breezes. We may sow the seed, but God gives the increase. Man proposes, but God disposes. We form plans and projects, we bend the bow, and throw all our power into the work lying before us, but unless a higher power is with us, all the determination and foresight we may command are valueless. Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it. If this is true in regard to temporal concerns, how much more should we recognise its truth in the spiritual sphere. Too long has the enemy oppressed and held dominion over our hearts and our lives. Let us look to the ground we would reconquer and reclaim for the King of kings. Let us resolve that this slavery of our souls to sin shall cease. And as we do so, let us pray for the presence and power of the hands of the mighty God of Jacob to strengthen our weakness and give us the victory. But while thus trusting in Divine help, notice that it was the young king who drew the bow. Human effort is as essential as Divine direction. Gods promise to help does not warrant idleness. The sense of Gods helping us should not paralyse, but should rather stimulate to doing and daring greater things than we have ever hitherto attempted. The narrative suggests that effort must be sustained to be successful. One blow never won a battle. The king stayed his hand after he had discharged three arrows, and the man of God was wrath, and said he should have smitten the ground oftener, and then he would have utterly consumed the foe. So long as God bids us fight the good fight, we must not cease our warring. So long as His hand is urging us we must smite again and again. Let us not desist, as Joash may have done, from a feeling of tenderness towards me enemy, nor from unbelief in the efficacy of the means ordained of God for our deliverance. Both motives have hindered and crippled the efforts of many a hopeful life. Finally, let us ask ourselves, has the arrow of the Lords deliverance been discharged from our bow at all? Have we declared war against sin and Satan? If not, let us do so before another day closes. Look up and see Gods hands held out, waiting, and able to help and to save you, and to rid from the guilt and bondage and pollution of sin. Fight for your life, and the lives of those around you, and all your arrows shall bring help and joy and peace to you and yours. (David A. Taylor.)
Three arrows, or six
It is a very difficult task to show the meeting-place of the purpose of God and the free agency of man. One thing is quite clear, we ought not to deny either of them, for they are both facts. It is a fact that God has purposed all things both great and little; neither will anything happen but according to His eternal purpose and decree. It is also a sure and certain fact that, oftentimes, events hang upon the choice of men. Their will has a singular potency. In the ease before us, the arrows are in the hands of the King of Israel; and according to whether he shall shoot once, twice, thrice, or five or six times, so will the nations history be affected. Now, how these two things can both be true, I cannot tell you; neither, probably, after long debate, could the wisest men in heaven tell you, not even with the assistance of cherubim and seraphim. If they could tell you, what would you know, and in what way would you be benefited if you could find out this secret? But sometimes a practical question about these two points does arise. It is correct to say, speaking after the manner of men, If men are earnest, if men are believing, if men are prayerful, such and such a blessing will come; and that the blessing does not come, may be rightly traced to the fact that they were not as prayerful and as believing as they ought to have been. Next, reflect what great things may lie in a mans hand There stood Joash an unworthy king; and yet m his hands lay, measurably, the destiny of his people. If he will take those arrows, and will shoot five or six times, their great enemy will be broken in pieces. If he will be dilatory, and will only shoot three times, he will get only a measure of victory; and poor Israel will ultimately have to suffer again from this enemy, who has been only scotched, and not killed. You do not know, dear friends, what responsibility lies upon you. You are the father of a family; what blessings may come to your household, or may be missed by your children, through your conduct! Once more, notice what great results may come from very little acts. It was a very trifling thing, was it not, to shoot an arrow from a bow? Your child has done it many times in his holidays. He has taken his bow, and shot his little home-made shaft into the air. This is what the King of Israel is required to do, to perform this very slight and common feat of archery, to shoot from an open window, and to drive his arrows into the ground beneath; and yet upon the shooting of these arrows will hang victory or defeat for Israel so there be some who think that hearing the Gospel is a little thing. Life, death, and hell, and worlds unknown, may hang upon the preaching and hearing of a sermon.
I. Let me speak of some matters in which many men too soon pause. There are some who, having great opportunities,--and we all have them more or less,--shoot only three times when they ought to shoot five or six times.
1. One of these matters is in the warfare with the evil within. Some, as soon as they begin their Christian life, fit an arrow to the string, and shoot down big sins, such as swearing., or drunkenness, or open uncleanness. When they have shot these three times, they seem to think that the other enemies within them may be tolerated. My brother, thou shouldest have shot five or six times.
2. There are some who shoot three times, and then leave off, with regard to Christian knowledge. They know the simple truth of justification by faith; but they do not want to know much about sanctification by the Spirit of God. Why not, my brother? Canst thou be saved unless thou art sanctified? Some are perfectly satisfied with laying again the first principles, always going over those; but they want to know no more. I beseech you, strive to be educated in the things of God.
3. Some, again, sin in this way with regard to Christian attainments. They have little faith, and they say, Faith like a grain of mustard-seed will save you. That is true. But are you always to be a little one? A grain of mustard-seed is not worth anything if it does not grow; it is meant to grow till it comes to be a tree, and birds lodge in its boughs. Come, my dear friend, if thou hast little faith, do not rest till thou hast great faith, till thou hast full assurance, till thou hast the full assurance of understanding.
4. Others, again, seem satisfied with little usefulness. You brought a soul to Christ, did you? Oh, that you would long to bring another! Do you not remember what the general said, in the war, when one rode up to him, and cried out, We have taken a gun from the enemy? Take another, said the general. If you have brought one soul to Christ, it should make you hunger and thirst to bring another.
5. And this spirit comes out very vividly in prayer. You do pray; else were you not the living children of God at all; but oh, for more power in prayer! You have asked for a blessing; why not ask for a far greater one?
6. The Church of God, as a whole, is guilty here, as to her plans for Gods glory. She is doing much more now than she used to do; but even now, though she smites three times, we may say to her, Thou shouldest have smitten five or six times. Oh, that the Church of Christ had a boundless ambition to conquer the world for her Lord!
II. But now, secondly, let me speak of the reasons for this pausing, Why do men come to a dead hall so soon?
1. Some of them say that they are afraid of being presumptuous. You are afraid of being too holy, are you? Dismiss your fear. You are afraid of asking for too much grace; be afraid of having too little. You are afraid of conquering sin; tremble for fear of an unconquered sin. There is no presumption in taking the largest promise of God, and pleading it, and expecting to have it fulfilled.
2. Perhaps one says, I have not the natural ability to be doing more, or enjoying more. What has natural ability to do with it? When all thy natural abilities are in the grave, and thou lookest only to the spiritual strength of God, then thou shalt see greater things than these.
3. Shall I tell you the real reasons why men pause in their work? With some, it is because they are too dependent upon their fellow-men. This King Joash could shoot when Elisha put his hand on his hand; probably Elisha only did that once, and then left him to himself, and said, Now, you shoot. Then he only shot three times. There are many Christian people who are a great deal too dependent upon their ministers, or upon some elderly Christian person who has helped them onward.
4. Another reason why some pause is, that they are too soon contented. Joash thought that he had done very well when he had shot three times, and that Elisha would pat him on the back, and say, How well you have done! That kind of feeling creeps over many workers for the Lord.
5. Joash, too, I dare say, gave up shooting because he was unbelieving. He could not see how shooting the arrows could affect the Syrians; and he wanted to see.
6. I should not wonder, also, if Joash was too indolent to shoot five or six times. He did not feel in a shooting humour. Now, whenever you do not feel in a humour for prayer, then is the time when you ought to pray twice as much.
7. Joash also probably had too little zeal. He was not wide awake, he was not thoroughly aroused, he did not care for the glory of God. If he could beat the Syrians three times, that would be quite enough for him.
III. But now, thirdly, notice the lamentable result of this pausing.
1. When Joash had shot three times, he paused; and therefore the blessing paused. Three times he shot, and three times God gave him victory. Do you see what you are doing by pausing? You are stopping the conduit-pipe by which the river of blessing will flow to you. Do not do that; to impoverish yourself must certainly be a needless operation.
2. You will suffer in consequence, as this king did; for, after the three victories, the rival power came to the front again.
3. Others will also suffer with you.
4. Meanwhile, the enemy triumphed.
5. What was even worse, Jehovah Himself was dishonoured.
6. Yet again, glorious possibilities were lost.
IV. The cure for this pausing.
1. If we pause in our holy service, or in getting near to God, or in sucking the marrow out of the promises, remember that the enemy will not pause.
2. A cure for this stopping lies in the reflection that in other things we are generally eager.
3. And lastly, this question ought to prevent us from ever pausing Can we ever do enough for our Saviour? (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The small gains of the irresolute
We have here a more than commonly graphic page of Holy Scripture. A young king grieving over the death bed of an often neglected prophet; the feeble hands of the old saint laid on the vigorous hands of his sovereign, as they held the familiar arrows and bow; the swift course of one arrow shot by Divine direction towards the land of a dangerous enemy; the handful of arrows struck a scanty number of times on the ground by the unbelieving youth; and the wrath of the patriotic prophet (compare the anger of Christ, of whom Elisha may have been a type, Mar_3:5), who longed for a widespread deliverance throughout the Holy Land. It is a picturesque story, but more than picturesque. It may be reckoned a parable as well as a tale. For--
I. There was a great opportunity. Though Joash was undeserving (2Ki_13:11, he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord) God was graciously ready to grant him complete escape from impending evil (the arrow of the Lords deliverance, 2Ki_13:17); even as helpless sinners have offered to them, through Divine mercy, present pardon and holiness here, the earnest of complete salvation hereafter.
II. The improvement of that opportunity required a personal effort. And Joash was experiencing a measure of religious revival. His visit to the old prophet woke up stirring associations (tears rolled down his checks as he cried, My father, etc., 2Ki_13:14). Much as the anniversary of a confirmation vow, a return after absence to a religious home, or the voice of a forgotten counsellor once more heard, may touch affectingly the conscience of a backslider. But--
III. The inadequate effort of little faith had a correspondingly slight result. Perhaps Joash thought the striking of arrows on the ground too trivial an action for very frequent repetition; perhaps he did not wish his companions to suppose him very obedient to a religious teacher; perhaps he was languid from the mere habit of attending to all sacred duties listlessly; perhaps he was in a hurry to be gone to some other occupation. But want of trust in the Divine revelation must have been the main cause of his curtailed exertion. And the measure of his receiving was proportioned to the small measure of his seeking. God faithfully gave him three victories, after his three strokes, but only three (2Ki_13:25). Too many have in like manner lessened the measure of their peace, holiness, and hope, by not perseveringly using means of grace which might be vastly profitable. (D. D. Stewart, M. A.)
The story of a bad stopping
Is not the lesson evident? Smiting but thrice and staying--only half-doing, not pushing to the finishing in grand faith and unrelaxing purpose--is not that the trouble with multitudes of men? Here, then, is our story of a bad stopping.
1. In the direction of success in the daily life men often make a bad stopping. They smite but thrice and stay. Success is duty. The difference between men as to making the most of themselves is due, oftener than we are apt to think, to this simply, whether they smite but thrice and stay, or whether they not only smite thrice but,--go on smiting. But it is hard, men say. Yes; but everything that gets up in this world must struggle up. One relates how Arago, the Trench astronomer, tells, in his autobiography, that in his youth he one day became puzzled and discouraged over his mathematics, and almost resolved to give up the study. He held his paper-bound text-book in his hand. Impelled by an indefinable curiosity, he damped the cover of the book, and carefully unrolled the leaf to see what was on the other side. It turned out to be a brief letter from DAlembert to a young man like himself, disheartened by the difficulties of mathematical study, who had written to him for counsel. This was the letter: Go on, sin, go on. The difficulties you meet will resolve themselves as you advance. Proceed, and light will dawn and shine with increasing clearness upon your path. Arago went on, and became the first astronomical mathematician of his time, But I am too old, men say. But use is the law of growth; and the quickest way to bring upon ones self the worst sort of senility is to withdraw from life and the interests and duties of it. But I would be humble, men say. Yes; but if you do not amount to much, there is all the mere reason you should make the most of yourself. And a true humility is never a withdrawing from service, but is always a readiness to set ones self to even the lowliest service for the love of God and fellow-men.
2. In the direction of overcoming evil habits men often make a bad stopping. They smite but thrice and stay. As some one says, such men are like a man who, attempting to jump a ditch, will never really jump, but will for ever stop and return for a fresh run.
3. In the direction of resisting temptation men often make this bad stopping. They resist thrice, but at the fourth assault they yield.
4. In the direction of advance in the Christian life men often make this bad stopping. Plenty of Christians through a long life do not get much beyond the initial stage of justification.
5. In the direction of becoming Christian, men often make this bad stopping. They smite in the way of at least a partial and outward change of life, etc., but when it comes to a total and irreversible surrender of the self to the Lord Jesus, they stay. (W. Hoyt, D. D.)
Gods purpose and mans response
A beautiful verse higher up the chapter tells us that the Lord gave Israel a saviour in answer to a repentant kings prayer. A study of the history reveals the fact that the deliverer was the grandson of the praying man. The text explains why the Divine mercy skipped a generation. The son of the royal penitent was tried and found wanting; therefore deliverance had to wait until his son, in turn, sat on the throne.
I. The Divine purpose symbolised. The shooting of an arrow, or the flinging of a dart into an enemys country was anciently a declaration of war. It signified that the archer and those he represented claimed the territory into which the missile was flung, and unless their challenge was successfully resisted would occupy it. Now eastwards from Samaria, the scene of this interview, was the district which the Syrians had taken from Israel. It was the direction from which their predatory bands came. To the north-east lay Syria itself. The shooting, of the arrow was plainly a declaration of war against Syria. That the prophets hands were upon the monarchs when it was discharged, signified that it was God who flung down the challenge. Now a challenge to combat by the Almighty is, of course, a prophecy of victory for Him. Here then, by vivid symbolism, we have the Divine purpose to deliver Israel from Syrian oppression declared. Gods purposes in the spiritual realm are revealed with equal clearness to us. It is His will that the world shall be evangelised and every Christian perfected. He has shot His arrow over the world. The incubus of devilry that now oppresses it is to be annihilated. The shadow of the Cross is upon every land. Every Christian, too, is to be perfected. We are saved rom hell: we are to be saved from sin. Our spirits are the Lords: our bodies arid minds are to become His also. All our spiritual enemies are to be conquered, and each wandering thought brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. Over the entire life of the believer the Saviours arrow has been discharged. But these glorious purposes are to be accomplished through human instrumentality. Although the prophets hands were upon his, it was King Joash who shot the arrow. God intends to conquer the world and our own bad hearts by our agency. In His might, we are to take possession of the world for our Redeemer. Further, as Gods agents we should use the wisest means to fulfil His purposes. Joash had to take and use bow and arrow. One might say that only a bow and arrow were used that all the glory might be given to God! But that would be a wrong inference. Bows and arrows in the hands of Chinese troops to-day excite the derision of Europeans. But in the days of Joash, they comprised the most formidable artillery that could be employed in warfare. The symbolic lesson was that Joash was to use the wisest means--to employ all his military might--to effect the deliverance God had planned. We, also, are to do our best for God. We are to plan wisely: we are to labour diligently. We are to make the most of ourselves. Our powers should be trained to their utmost degree of efficiency. Not only for winning others, but also for saving our own souls we should use the best means.
II. A human response invited. The King of Israel has been, as it were, in the council-chamber of the Eternal. He has been shown, figuratively but clearly, the Divine will. He is now taken back to the region of practical, everyday life. That is Gods purpose, says his mentor. Now show your acceptance of it and responsiveness to it. Take the remaining arrows. And he took them. Smite upon the ground--that is, Smite the ground with the arrows; in other words, Shoot them into the earth. And he smote--or shot--thrice, and stayed. Now here is a mystery. In the seventeenth verse we read, Thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek, till thou have consumed them: here, Thou shalt smite Syria but thrice. In the one place we have the Divine purpose; in the other, that purpose as limited by the degree of human responsiveness to it. We are surely taught that Gods plans depend for their fulfilment upon our acceptance of them and co-operation in them. This I say, is a mystery. Nothing happens apart from God. His will is surely done. That is most certain. Yet we may refuse to co-operate with Him, and so hinder, if not frustrate, His purpose. That also is undeniable. Gods elect will be saved, yet the blood of souls may cling to the skirts of a faithless watchman. Gods will shall be done, but we may be condemned for hindering it. Gods sovereignty does not lessen our responsibility. How to harmonise these apparently incongruous truths, we do not know. Let us be content to accept them both, although for the present we do not see the relation between them. Joash is an example of low content. He had no ambition to be a David or a Solomon. A comfortable, easy-going life was all he desired. He wanted to be free from the yoke of Syria, but did not aspire to play the role of national hero. We are all too like him in his ignoble satisfaction. In the world we are ambitions. We long for wealth; we thirst for fame. The higher we can climb, and the sooner we can attain, the better we are pleased. But we have no sacred ambition to dare and to do greatly for God. How few pant after holiness or burn with desire to see the world won for Christ! And therefore we shoot but three arrows, when we ought to shoot five or six times. God forgive us our low content, and inspire us with loftier ideals! Let us not be satisfied with what may reasonably be considered all that could be expected--with the formal discharge of recognised duties. Let us form a high conception of what God expects from us, and dare greatly in the attempt to achieve it, Perhaps Joash was indolent. He lacked energy and perseverance. He had no tenacity of purpose, nor measure of continuance in well-doing. Certainly that is the fault of most of us. We serve God by fits and starts. There are times when we live near Him, and give the devil trouble. We grow rapidly in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Oh, if we could only keep on that level, we should soon become holy! But we do not. Lassitude creeps over us. Reaction sets in. We relapse into indifference. But the real secret of Joashs remissness was, in all probability, unbelief. The Syrians were a powerful nation. Israel was weak through long oppression. And whether we acknowledge it or not, it is unbelief that stays our hands also. The cold fingers of unbelief, laid upon the arm that draws the bowstring, cause it to fall paralysed to the side. The world, the flesh, and thy devil are so real and powerful. There they were, rioting and ravaging, in the days of our fathers. There they are, ruining souls to-day. And there, surely, they will be to the end of the chapter! Is it conceivable that sin can lose its fascination for us, that all our inclinations towards it can be stamped out, and we, old sinners, be changed into the radiant image of the Christ of God? Is it credible that in the outside world drunkenness will be abolished, impurity exterminated, wars ended, and the world, hoary in wickedness, bound by gold chains about the feet of God? Hardly! So the arms that are stretched to shoot are palsied. We smite only two or three times. According to our faith is our effort,--and our success. All possibilities are in God. To convert them into actualities, we must believe and endeavour and persevere. We have the objective promise. There must now be the subjective appropriation of it. These two things together spell success. Man without God is impotent. God without man does not choose to work. God and one man are a majority against the world.
III. A human failure deplored. He smote thrice, and stayed. And the man of God was wroth with him. For Joash, by his want of faith and energy, had lost for ever the honour that might have been his. Gods will will undoubtedly be done, but if we fail to rise to it and work for it, it will fling us from its triumphant path, and summon others to its side, while we are left to suffer incalculable and eternal loss. No doubt we shall become perfect in heaven, but eternity itself will not compensate for the lack of holy culture here. Christ will win, but we may be denied a place beside Him when, in His chariot of victory, He passes through the eternal gates and the everlasting doors. Erasmus might have been the leader of the reformation of the sixteenth century. He published the Greek New Testament, and also a Latin translation of it. He taught the importance of knowledge of the Scriptures. He gave the initial impulse to the mighty movement which resulted in Protestantism. But when he saw how great a matter a little fire was kindling, Erasmus, timid and fearful, shrank back. Luther and others stepped forward and covered themselves with immortal glory, while Erasmus left a name which is pronounced half with honour and ball with contempt, as that of a learned man who proved a moral weakling, one who saw the light but feared to walk in it. Let us have a holy ambition to excel in the kingdom of God. Let us patiently continue in well-doing, shooting not three arrows, hut five or six. Through Joashs failure, too, Israel suffered. The bondage to Syria continued. Oppression by the foreign invader went drearily on. How far the Christian Church is responsible for the fact that on the eve of the twentieth century the world is so far from God, we cannot tell. It is a question which one shudders to face. Still, it is undoubtedly true that the poverty of our response hinders the completion of Gods gracious purposes. God was dishonoured by the monarchs laxity. The Syrians, who blasphemed His name, continued to rule in His land. And by our unspiritual lives and lax efforts God is dishonoured to-day. If we only rose to His purposes and became holy men and women and earnest and successful workers, how greatly He would be glorified! As it is, we dont remain at concert-pitch long enough for the music to rise to His praise. We so soon give in that we bring contempt on the power we profess to work by. Let us rouse ourselves from spiritual sluggishness. Let us shoot, not three arrows, but five or six, or a dozen. (B. J. Gibbon.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren1905 · Public DomainOn v162 Kings
2 Kings
THE SPIRIT OF POWER
Read full note →
2Ki 13:16.
This is part of one of the strangest narratives in the Old Testament. Elisha is on his deathbed, ‘sick of the sickness’ wherewith he ‘should die.’ A very different scene, that close sick-chamber, from the open plain beyond Jordan from which Elijah had gone up; a very different way of passing from life by wasting sickness than by fiery chariot! But God is as near His servant in the one place as in the other, and the slow wasting away is as much His messenger as the sudden apocalypse of the horsemen of fire. The king of Israel comes to the old prophet, and very significantly repeats over him his own exclamation over Elijah, ‘My father! My father! the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof.’ Elisha takes no notice of the grief and reverence expressed by the exclamation, but goes straight to his work, and what follows is remarkable indeed.
Here is a prophet dying; and his last words are not edifying moral and religious reflections, nor does he seem to be much concerned to leave with the king his final protest against Israel’s sin, but his thoughts are all of warfare, and his last effort is to stir up the sluggish young monarch to some of his own enthusiasm in the conflict with the enemy. It does not sound like an edifying deathbed. People might have said, ‘Ah! secular and political affairs should be all out of a man’s mind when he comes to his last moments.’ But Elisha thought that to stick to his life’s work till the last breath was out of him, and to devote the last breath to stimulating successors who might catch up the torch that dropped from his failing hands, was no unworthy end of a prophet’s life.
So there followed what perhaps is not very familiar to some of us, that strange scene in which the dying man is far fuller of energy and vigour than the young king, and takes the upper hand of him, giving him a series of curt, authoritative commands, each of which he punctiliously obeys. ‘Take bow and arrow,’ and he took them. Then the prophet lays his wasted hand for a moment on the strong, young hand, and having thus either in symbol or reality-never mind which-communicated power, he says to him, ‘Fling open the casement towards the quarter where the enemy’s territory lies,’ and he flings it open. ‘Now, shoot,’ and he shoots. Then the old man gathers himself up on his bed, and with a triumphant shout exclaims, ‘The Lord’s arrow of victory! . . . Thou shalt smite the Syrians till they be consumed.’
That is not all. There is a second stage. The promise is given; the possibility is opened before the king, and now all depends on the question whether he will rise to the height of the occasion. So the prophet says to him, ‘Take the sheaf of arrows in your hand’; and he takes them. And then he says, ‘Now smite upon the ground.’ It is a test. If he had been roused and stirred by what had gone before; if he had any earnestness of belief in the power that was communicated, and any eagerness of desire to realise the promises that had been given of complete victory, what would he have done? What would Elisha have done if he had had the quiver in his hand? This king smites three perfunctory taps on the floor, and having done what will satisfy the old man’s whim, and what in decency he had to do, he stops, as if weary of the whole performance. So the prophet bursts out in indignation on his dying bed-’Thou shouldst have smitten five or six times; then hadst thou conquered utterly. Now thou shalt conquer but thrice.’ A strange story; very far away from our atmosphere and latitude! Yet are there not obviously in it great principles which may be disentangled from their singular setting, and fully applied to us? I think so. Let us try and draw them from it.
I. Here we have the power communicated.
Now the story seems to indicate that it was only for a moment that the prophet’s hands were laid on the king’s hands, because, after they had been so laid, he is bidden to go to the window and fling it open, and the bedridden man could not go there with him; then he is bidden to draw the bow, and another hand upon his would have been a hindrance rather than a help. So it was but a momentary touch, a communication of power in reality or in symbol that the muscular young hand needed, and the wasted old one could give. And is that not a parable for us? We, too, if we are Christian men and women, have a gospel of which the very kernel is that there is to us a communication of power, and the very name of that divine Spirit whom it is Christ’s greatest work to send flashing and flaming through the world, is the ‘Spirit of Power.’ And so the old promise that ye shall be clothed with strength from on high is the standing prerogative of the Christian Church. There is not merely some partial communication, as when hand touched hand, but every organ is vitalised and quickened; as in the case of the other miracle of this prophet, when he stretched himself on the dead child eye to eye, and mouth to mouth, and hand to hand; and each part received the vitalising influence. We have, if we are Christian people, a Spirit given to us, and are ‘strengthened with might by the Spirit in the inner man.’
That gift, that strength comes to us by contact, not with Elisha, but with Elisha’s Lord and Master. Christ’s touch, when He was on earth, brought sight to the blind, healing to the sick, vigour to the limbs of the lame, life to the dead. And you and I can have that touch, far more truly, and far more mightily operative upon us than they had, who only felt the contact of His finger, and only derived corporeal blessing. For we can draw near to Him, and in union with Him by faith and love and obedience, can have His Spirit in close contact with our spirits, and strengthening us for all service, and for every task. Brethren! that touch which gives strength is a real thing. It is no mere piece of mystical exaggeration when we speak of our spirits being in actual contact with Christ’s Spirit. Many of us have no clear conception, and still less a firm realisation, of that closer than corporeal contact, more real than bodily presence, and more intimate than any possible physical union, which is the great gift of God in Jesus Christ, and brings to us, if we will, life and strength according to our need. I would that the popular Christianity of this day had a far larger infusion of the sound, mystical element that lies in the New Testament Christianity, and did not talk so exclusively about a Christ that is for us as to have all but lost sight of the second stage of our relation to Christ, and lost a faith in a Christ that is in us Brethren! He can lay His hand upon your spirit’s hand. He can flash light into your spirit’s eye from His eye. He can put breath and eloquence into your spirit’s lips from His lips, and His heart beating against yours can transfuse-if I may so say-into you His own life-blood, which cleanses from all sin, and fits for all conflict.
Then, further, let me remind you that this power, which is bestowed on condition of contact, is given before duties are commanded. This king, in our acted parable, first had the touch of Elisha’s fingers, and then received the command from Elisha’s lips, ‘Shoot!’ So Jesus Christ gives before He commands, and commands nothing which He has not fitted us to perform. He is not ‘an austere man, reaping where He did not sow, and gathering where He did not straw’; but He comes first to us saying, ‘I give thee Myself,’ and then He looks us in the eyes and says, ‘Wilt thou not give Me thyself?’ He bestows the strength first, and He commands the consequent duty afterwards.
Further, this strength communicated is realised in the effort to obey Christ’s great commands. Joash felt nothing when the prophet’s hand was laid upon his but, perhaps, some tingling. But when he got the bow in his hand and drew the arrow to its head, the infused power stiffened his muscles and strengthened him to pull; and though he could not distinguish between his own natural corporeal ability and that which had been thus imparted to him, the two co-operated in the one act, and it was when he drew his bow that he felt his strength. ‘Stretch forth thine hand,’ said Christ to the lame man. But the very infirmity to be dealt with was his inability to stretch it forth. At the command he tried, and, to his wonder, the stiffened sinews relaxed, and the joint that had been immovable had free play, and he stretched out his hand, and it was restored whole as the other. So He gives what He commands, and in obeying the command we realise and are conscious of the power. Elisha and Joash but act an illustration of the great word of Paul: ‘Work out your own salvation . . . for it is God that worketh in you.’
II. And now, secondly, look at the perfected victory that is possible.
When the arrows, by God’s strength operating through Joash’s arm, had been shot, the prophet says, ‘The arrow of the Lord’s victory! . . . thou shalt smite . . . till thou have consumed.’ Yes, of course; if the arrow is the Lord’s arrow, and the strength is His strength, then the only issue corresponding to the power is perfect victory. I would that Christian people realised more than they do practically in their lives that while men’s ideals and aims may be all unaccomplished, or but partially approximated to, since God is God, His nature is perfection, and nothing that He does can fall beneath His ideal and purpose in doing it. All that comes from Him must correspond to Him from whom it comes. He never leaves off till He has completed, nor can any one say about any of His work, ‘He began to build, and was not able to finish.’ So, Christian people! I would that we should rise to the height of our prerogatives, and realise the fact that perfect victory is possible, regard being had to the power which ‘teaches our hands to war and our fingers to fight.’ A great deal of not altogether profitable jangling goes on at present in reference to the question of whether absolute sinlessness is possible for a Christian man on earth. Whatever view we take upon that question, it ought not to hide from us the fact which should loom very much more largely in our daily operative belief than it does with most of us, that in so far as the power which is given to us is concerned, perfect victory is within our grasp, and is the only worthy and correspondent result to the perfect power which worketh in us. So there is no reason, as from any defect of the divine gift to the weakest of us, why our Christian lives should have ups and downs, why there should be interruptions in our devotion, fallings short in our consecration, contradictions in our conduct, slidings backward in our progress. There is no reason why, in our Christian year, there should be summer and winter; but according to the symbolical saying of one of the old prophets, ‘The ploughman may overtake the reaper, and he that treadeth out the grapes him that soweth the seed.’ In so far as our Christian life is concerned, the perfection of the power that is granted to us involves the possibility of perfection in the recipient.
And the same thing is true in reference to a Christian man’s work in the world. God’s Church has ample resources to overcome the evil of the world. The fire is tremendous, but the Christian Church has possession of the floods that can extinguish the fire. If we utilised all that we have, we might ‘smite till we had consumed,’ and turned the world into the Church of God. That is the ideal, the possibility, when we look at the Christian man as possessor of the communicated power of God. And then we turn to the reality, to our own consciences, to the state of our religious communities everywhere, and we see what seems to be blank contradiction of the possibility. Where is the explanation?
III. That brings me to my last point, the partial victory that is actually won.
‘Thou shouldst have smitten five or six times; then hadst thou smitten the Syrians till they were consumed. But now thou shalt conquer but thrice.’ All God’s promises and prophecies are conditional. There is no such thing as an unconditional promise of victory or of defeat; there is always an ‘if.’ There is always man’s freedom as a factor. It is strange. I suppose no thinking, metaphysical or theological, ever has solved or ever will, that great paradox of the power of a finite will to lift itself up in the face of, and antagonism to, an Infinite Will backed by infinite power, and to thwart its purposes. ‘How often would I have gathered . . . and ye would not.’ Here is all the power for a perfect victory, and yet the man that has it has to be contented with a very partial one.
It is a solemn thought that the Church’s unbelief can limit and hinder Christ’s work in the world, and we have here another illustration of that truth. You will find now and then in the newspapers, stories-they may be true or false-about caterpillars stopping a train. There is an old legend of that fabulous creature the remora, a tiny thing that fastened itself to the keel of a ship, and arrested it in mid-ocean. That is what we do with God and His purposes, and with His power granted to us.
A low expectation limits the power. This king did not believe, did not expect, that he would conquer utterly, and so he did not. You believe that you can do a thing, and in nine cases out of ten that goes nine-tenths of the way towards doing it. If we cast ourselves into our fight expecting victory, the expectation will realise itself in nine cases out of ten. And the man who in faith refuses to say ‘that beast of a word-impossible!’ will find that ‘all things are possible to him that believeth.’ ‘Expect great things of God,’ and you will feel His power tingling to your very fingertips, and will be able to draw the arrow to its head, and send it whizzing home to its mark.
Small desires block the power. Where there is an iron-bound coast running in one straight line, the whole ocean may dash itself on the cliffs at the base, but it enters not into the land; but where the shore opens itself out into some deep gulf far inland, and broad across at the entrance, then the glad water rushes in and fills it all. Make room for God in your lives by your desires and you will get Him in the fullness of His power.
The use of our power increases our power. Joash had an unused quiver full of arrows, and he only smote thrice. ‘To him that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not shall be taken.’ The reason why many of us professing Christians have so little of the strength of God in our lives is because we have made so little use of the strength that we have. Stow away your seed-corn in a granary and do not let the air into it, and weevils and rats will consume it. Sow it broadcast on the fields with liberal hand, and it will spring up, ‘some thirty, some sixty, some an hundredfold.’ Use increases strength in all regions, and unused organs atrophy and wither.
So, dear friends! if we will keep ourselves in contact with Christ, and tremulously sensitive to His touch, if we will expect power according to our tasks and our needs, if we will desire more of His grace, and if we will honestly and manfully use the strength that we have, then He will ‘teach our hands to war and our fingers to fight,’ and will give us strength, ‘so that a bow of brass is bent by’ our arms, and we shall be ‘more than conquerors through Him that loved us.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0On v17General Information:
General Information:
Elisha continues to talk to Joash, king of Israel.
Read full note →
Open the window eastward
"open the window that faces east" or "open that window towards the east"
so he opened it
Since this happens after Joash takes the bow and arrows, he may have had a servant open the window. AT: "So a servant opened it" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
he shot
"Joash shot the arrow"
This is Yahweh's arrow of victory, the arrow of victory over Aram
The relationship between the arrow and victory can be stated explicitly. AT: "This arrow is a sign from Yahweh that he will give you victory over Aram" or "This arrow symbolizes the victory Yahweh will give you over Aram" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
Aphek
This was a city in the land of Israel. (See: How to Translate Names)
But the man of God was angry with him
"But Elisha was angry with King Joash"
until you annihilated it
"until you completely destroyed it" or "until they were completely wiped out"
Tyndale Open Study Notes2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0On vv15, 1813:15-17 Elisha laid his own hands on the king’s…
13:15-17 Elisha laid his own hands on the king’s hands: This act conveyed spiritual empowerment for the upcoming battle with the Arameans at Aphek. • Aphek was situated east of the Sea of Galilee (1 Kgs 20:26), thus the eastern window faced the place where the battle would take place.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv17, 19 That is, toward Syria: so that he did not…
That is, toward Syria: so that he did not only prophesy with words, but also confirmed him by these signs that he should have the victory.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv15–19 2Ki 13:15 And Elisha said unto him, Take bow…
2Ki 13:15 And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows. And he took unto him bow and arrows.
Ver. 15. And Elisha said, Take bow and arrows.] Chria quadam tanquam signo externo victoriam praedicit: The prophet, moved by the king’s tears and profession, foretelleth victory by this outward sign:
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv17–19 Eastward; either towards Syria, which lay north-eastward from the…
Eastward; either towards Syria, which lay north-eastward from the land of Israel; or towards the Israelites’ land beyond Jordan, which lay eastward from Canaan, and which was now possessed by the Syrians. Either way this arrow is shot against the Syrians, as a token what God intended to do against them.
In Aphek; not in the city, but in the territory of it, where it seems there was a great battle to be fought between the Israelites and Syrians. Of Aphek, see 1Sa 4:1; 29:1; 1Ki 20:30, though it is possible there might be several cities of that name. Or, as in Aphek, i.e. thou shalt smite them as they were smitten in the city and territory of Aphek, i.e. utterly destroy them; see 1Ki 20:26,29,30; the particle as being oft understood, as hath been formerly and frequently proved.
Read full note →
Till thou have consumed them, i.e. the Syrians; not all that people, but their armies, or at least that which was to be at Aphek, where a dreadful battle was to be fought. Or if this be meant of all the Syrian armies, this is to be understood conditionally, if he did not hinder it by his unbelief or neglect, signified in the following verses.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv15–19 And he said, open the window eastward,.... Syria lying…
And he said, open the window eastward,.... Syria lying east of the land of Israel, as the Jewish commentators in general observe, and for which they quote Isa 9:12, but it lay northeast, or rather more to the north; wherefore this may respect the eastward part of the land of Israel, which the Syrians had got possession of, and should be recovered, as this sign showed, see Kg2 10:33,
and he opened it: then Elisha said, shoot, and he shot; the arrow, out of the window, being opened:
Read full note →
and he said, the arrow of the Lord's deliverance, and the arrow of deliverance from Syria; meaning, that that arrow was a sign of the Lord's deliverance of Israel from the Syrians, by whom they had been sadly oppressed, and reduced very low:
for thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek till thou hast consumed them; not the whole nation, but that army they should bring thither; which was a city in the land of Israel, where the Syrians were routed in Ahab's time; 100,000 were slain near it on one day, and 27,000 by the fall of the wall of it, Kg1 20:26 hence some read the words here, "as in Aphek."
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv17–18 Eastward - Toward Syria, which lay northeastward, from the…
Eastward - Toward Syria, which lay northeastward, from the land of Israel: this arrow is shot against the Syrians, as a token what God intended to do against them.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv15, 17, 18 Verse 15. Take bow and arrows.] The bow, the…
Verse 15. Take bow and arrows.] The bow, the arrows, and the smiting on the ground, were all emblematical things, indicative of the deliverance of Israel from Syria.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv15, 18 2Ki 13:15-17. Take bow and arrows — This was…
2Ki 13:15-17. Take bow and arrows — This was to represent the wars he was to have with the Syrians. Elisha put his hands upon the king’s hands — To signify to him, that in all his expeditions against the Syrians, he must look up to God for direction and strength; must reckon his own hands insufficient for him, and must go on in dependance on the divine aid. Open the window eastward — Toward Syria, which lay north-eastward from the land of Israel: the Syrians had also possessed themselves of the land of the Israelites beyond Jordan, which lay eastward from Canaan: this arrow is shot toward these parts, as a token of what God intended to do against the Syrians. The arrow of the Lord’s deliverance — It is God that commands deliverance, and when he will effect it, who can hinder? Thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek — Where they were now encamped, or where they were to have a general rendezvous of their forces. Till thou have consumed them — Those of them that are vexatious and oppressive to thee and thy kingdom.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv16–19 Elisha put his hands upon the king’s hands -…
Elisha put his hands upon the king’s hands - A symbolic act, indicating that the successes, which the shooting typified, were to come, not from human skill, or strength, or daring, but from the presence and the power of God.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv17–19 East, looking towards Galgaad, (Hadock) which the Syrians occupied.…
East, looking towards Galgaad, (Hadock) which the Syrians occupied. (Menochius) --- These actions were all significative and prophetical. The throwing of a dart was formerly the mode of declaring war. (Virgil, Æneid ix.) Justin (ii.) says, "Alexander first threw a javelin, as against a hostile country." Thus also the ancients took possession. (Varro) (V. Max. iii., &c.) The people of Andros and Chalicis, sent each a deputy to seize Acanthos, when it had been abandoned by its inhabitants. The man from Andros, perceiving the other before him, threw his dart at the gate, and it was decided that he had thus lawfully obtained possession. (Plutarch, q. Græc.; Selden, Mare. Claus. iv.) --- The action of Joas may be considered in both lights. --- Them. We do not read the particulars of this battle: but it must have been very bloody. One of the three victories (ver. 25.) of Joas was probably obtained at Aphec, (Calmet) a place memorable for the victory of Achab, over the same Syrians, 3 Kings xx. 26. (Menochius)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On v15 Take bow and arrows--Hostilities were usually proclaimed by a…
Take bow and arrows--Hostilities were usually proclaimed by a herald, sometimes by a king or general making a public and formal discharge of an arrow into the enemy's country. Elisha directed Joash to do this, as a symbolical act, designed to intimate more fully and significantly the victories promised to the king of Israel over the Syrians. His laying his hands upon the king's hands was to represent the power imparted to the bow shot as coming from the Lord through the medium of the prophet. His shooting the first arrow eastward--to that part of his kingdom which the Syrians had taken and which was east of Samaria--was a declaration of war against them for the invasion. His shooting the other arrows into the ground was in token of the number of victories he was taken to gain; but his stopping at the third betrayed the weakness of his faith; for, as the discharged arrow signified a victory over the Syrians, it is evident that the more arrows he shot the more victories he would gain. As he stopped so soon, his conquests would be incomplete.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv15, 16, 17, 19 15. Take bow and arrows — To make his…
15. Take bow and arrows — To make his last oracle more impressive, the prophet uses a memorable symbol.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv15–19 15. Take bow and arrows] It is as if…
15. Take bow and arrows] It is as if the prophet by this significant action directed and encouraged the king to enter on the war against Syria.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv15–19 (15) Take bow and arrows.—From one of the royal…
(15) Take bow and arrows.—From one of the royal attendants.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv15–19 And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows.…
And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows. The prophet was moved, no doubt, by a sudden inspiration tie was bidden to assure the weeping king of victory speedy victory-over Syria. The defense of Israel would not fail because he a mere weak instrument by whom God had been pleased to work was taken from the earth. God would bless the king"s own efforts. "Take bow and arrows," he exclaims under the prophetic afflatus. "Take them at once into thine hands, and do my bidding." Words would not have been enough; greater assurance and conviction was produced when prophecy took the shape of a symbolical action. (comp. 1Sa_15:27; 1Ki_11:30; Isa_20:3; Jer_13:1-11 Jer_18:3, Jer_18:4, etc.) So the Spirit of the Lord moved the prophet to the performance of a symbolical act, or set of acts, which the historian now proceeds to describe. And he took unto him how and arrows. Joash would take these from the hands of his attendants, who might be carrying his own special weapons after him, as was the practice in Persia ("Ancient Monarchies," vol. 4. p. 161), or who would at any rate have arms of their own, since they would wait upon him not merely as attendants, but as guards.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv15–16 And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows.
2Ki_13:15-19
And Elisha said unto him, Take bow and arrows.
Read full note →
The kings arrows
Elisha was lying ill on his deathbed. His long career of usefulness and blessing was drawing to a close. He was held in great honour, not only by the people but by the king, and when it was known that he was coming to the end of his career King Joash came to see him, and when he came into the room, and saw the prophet lying there, looking so frail and weak, the young king was greatly affected. He burst into tears, and cried aloud, O my father, my father, the chariot of Israel, and the horsemen thereof. Now Joash was neither a good nor a great man, but he was still young and not yet hardened, and he had no doubt a sudden vision of something of the meaning of the great value of Elisha to the kingdom. Elisha was a man of deeds, and he called the young man to his composure by saying to him, Take bow and arrows. For a moment Elisha is king, and the king is his servant, and the king turns and takes up a bow and arrows.
1. Gods hand on ours is our only guarantee of success. When Elisha had young King Joash take up the bow and arrows and place the arrow on the string and make ready to shoot, he put his own hands over the hands of the king to illustrate and impress upon the mind of this young ruler that if he gave himself to earnest, resolute attack upon the enemies of God and of His people the hand of God should be with him as a guarantee of victory. The lesson is as important for us as it was for Joash. God calls every one of us to fight His enemies and the enemies of mankind. And there is that other warfare in our own hearts, that campaign against our personal besetting sins. Gods hand must be on our hand if the arrow shall find its mark and do its execution.
2. We are to smite sin utterly. God seeks to deliver us entirely from sin, but we may limit the deliverance of God by our own conduct. When the prophet told the young king to shoot his arrow eastward towards his Syrian enemy, he exclaimed, The arrow of the Lords deliverance. But when, to test the young king, he told him to take up the arrows and smite on the ground with them, his heart was heavy and his soul indignant as he noticed that he struck half-heartedly and that after only three strokes he turned about in a lifeless sort of way as if looking for further directions. Let us not fail of this great lesson, God seeks our complete deliverance from sin. He desires that every enemy which troubles us and hinders us from working out the great purposes to which we are called of Jesus Christ shall be consumed and destroyed. But let us never forget that whether or not this is accomplished depends at the last upon us. It is a solemn thing that we, by our nerveless will, by our flabby lack of purpose, by our mushy indecision may thwart the purpose of Almighty God and continue to live lives far beneath our privilege. Let us smite, and smite, and smite, and yet again, smite, until every wicked passion, until every evil appetite, until every besetting sin shall be smitten to the death in our hearts and Jesus shall be crowned Lord over all.
3. There is no greater danger to the Christian than lack of persistence. Over and over again is this urged upon us in the Bible. Joash failed for lack of persistence. Many a Christian in these later centuries has failed because he gave up in despair by the way.
4. We are in great danger of being too easily satisfied. It may be that King Joash thought that three victories over Syria would be enough. It was not in him to rise up to a high ideal of his mission or to grasp the fulness of Gods willingness to make him not only the great King of Israel but the great king of all the world. Because he was easily satisfied his career was short and disgraceful. (L. A. Banks, D. D.)
Poverty of faith ensures but partial success
We may take this closing incident in the life of Elisha, as an illustration of the warfare between the soul and its enemies, and the conditions upon which complete victory is achieved.
1. Israel. Redeemed out of Egypt, in Canaan, where they might have lived in the enjoyment of triumph over all foes. Not in absolute exemption from conflict, but trusting in God and obeying Him, they would never have known defeat. They disbelieved, disobeyed, and as a consequence, there was failure and defeat. Type of a soul which has passed out of death (Egypt) into life (Canaan). But it has left its first love, in which it might have abode in the joys of continuous victory.
2. Israels enemies. Syria in particular. We find ourselves attacked from different quarters at the same time.
3. Promised deliverance.
(a) A definite deliverance--from Syria.
(b) A Divine deliverance--The Lords deliverance.
Spiritual deliverance is promised us. Definite promises of deliverance from the dominion, love and pollution of sin.
4. The kings error. He erred in not resolving on, and expecting, complete success. He smote thrice, and stayed. He, as it were, limited the Holy One of Israel. He certainly manifested a lack of faith and of courage. In the spiritual life we should aim at, and expect, complete success. Be satisfied with nothing short of this. Not to rest while a single foe has a footing in the territory which belongs to God. We are to be more than conquerors.
5. The kings partial success. Elisha would not have been wrath had there not been good cause. Elisha was Gods messenger. As when he declared that there should be plenty in Samaria within a given time, and the lord of the court was held guilty for not believing the message, so here. On account of weak faith, we are often only partially successful against our spiritual enemies. Would Naaman have been cured of his leprosy had he dipped in Jordan but thrice, and then stayed?
6. The kings loss through unbelief. He was not aware, possibly, of the grandeur of the opportunity. Perhaps he treated the prophets simple message with contempt--obeying him merely to indulge the whim of an old and dying man--failing to look beyond the prophet to God who sent him. Perhaps we stumble sometimes at the message because we look no farther or higher than the messenger. He is not talented, famous, but coarse, etc. The king suffered. So do we when this spirit is indulged. (J. E. Robinson.)
Spiritual archery
There are two acts in this wonderful event. The first concerns the shooting of the arrow of deliverance, a symbolic and prophetic act; the second concerns the smiting on the ground with arrows, also symbolical, but providing as well a test of the character, of the zeal, and of the faith of the King of Israel. Now concerning these two acts and the several scenes in them let us speak as God may guide us.
I. Shooting the arrow of deliverance. Notice,
1. A call to action. Take bow and arrows, said the dying prophet. There is a deal of meaning wrapped up in this apparently simple suggestion. Elisha had come to a full end, and like a shock of corn that was fully ripe he was now bending towards the sharpened sickle. The king, who was not remarkable all the years of his life for his devotion to God or to His prophets, is now found trembling and weeping by the side of the sick servant of Jehovah. Then it is that the dying prophet, with more faith and hope and vigour in him even at the last article than the sinful king in his prime and power, exclaims as it were, Weep not, tremble not, faint not, fear not; I am going, but God is with you. God buries His workmen, but He carries on His work. I die, but God will surely visit you. Do not let this sad event unduly depress you. I must die, for my time has come; but so long as you live, live to purpose, take bow and arrows, let not your hands hang down. Go forth to the battle yet again, and believe in the God to whom I have so long, though vainly, pointed you; for He is the Lord God of Hosts, the God of battles still. Dry up your tears; forsake your grief; take bow and arrows; arm yourself; go forth into the fight, and the Lord my God shall be with you.
2. I notice next that Elisha gives to the king several strict injunctions; indeed, the detail to which he condescends is most remarkable. All through these verses we find a long list of instructions and commands. Take bow and arrows. Put thine hand upon the bow. Open the window eastward. Shoot. Take the arrows. Smite upon the ground. The dying prophet instructs the king in all the minutiae of his immediate duty. The wisest of us need to be divinely directed.
3. Then followed on the kings part implicit obedience. Take, said the prophet; and he took. So it is throughout. Put thine hand upon the bow; and he put his hand upon it. Open the window; and he opened it. Shoot; and he shot. Smite; and he smote. All through there is a corresponding obedience on the kings part to the arrangement and suggestion of the prophet. So should it ever be with us and God. Let His imperative be answered by obedient indicative on our part.
4. There follows a hint as to the necessity for personal interest and effort. Read the 16th verse.
5. There was Divine co-operation, for we read Elisha put his hands upon the kings hands:
6. Notice next that the window had to be opened. He said, Open the window eastward. And he opened it. In other words, every obstruction and possible hindrance has to be got rid of. You see the importance of this.
7. Then at last they come to the decisive action. All the rest has been preliminary and preparatory.
II. The second act, the smiting with the other arrows. This was a symbolical act, as was the first. The flight of the single arrow through the open lattice must have been readily understood by the king, for it was the custom there and then, as in other lands and times, to throw down the gage of battle, or to hurl a dart, the signal of the war. God has shot out of every window of this Tabernacle arrows of deliverance, if I may so speak; but with this purpose, that we ourselves shall follow up those tokens, and hope and believe that they were prophecies and promises with meaning which must meet with further fulfilment. It remains for us to shoot the other arrows, for we have a quiver full of them. The command was to smite with them on the ground. You see the meaning of that. It is as though Elisha said, The arrow of Gods deliverance has gone forth; it has already found its mark and done its work. You have now, if you will but believe it, these Syrians crouching at your very feet. God has already humbled them, and they are now at your mercy. Smite upon the ground. They are already at your feet. God has delivered them into your hands. Smite! Smite! The king obeys, but with too little zeal. (T. Spurgeon.)
The arrow of the Lords deliverance
How the spiritual drama repeats itself year after year! Again and again we see young people come up full of enthusiasm, full of the memory of the great things that noble lives have done, lamenting the glory that has departed from the earth, feeling a sudden impulse, which like an arrow is shot forth from the soul, essaying to do some great and noble work; and in that moment the prophetic voice is heard saying, The arrow of the Lords deliverance; there lies the work of your life. This sudden impulse that takes possession of you in your youth, and causes you to shoot forth the arrows of the aspirations of your soul,--these are the things, that show you the way of the Lord. It is Gods purpose that you should be the deliverer of His people in the particular path that He has opened before you. How that is going on every day! How every day at college men are lifting up their hearts, and setting open the windows of their souls, and looking out, shooting forth the thoughts and hopes and desires of their soul into this great unknown world! And then what? Then says the prophetic voice again, Smite upon the ground, Take these arrows and bind them together, and in a Divine frenzy devote yourself, soul and body, to the work that God has revealed to you to do. Then comes the critical moment in a mans life. He smites thrice, and stays. He says to himself, I need not do my best; I can do about as well as other men and not be wearied by my work; I have gifts that will enable me to live, and enable me to attain, perchance, a fortune, and yet I need not give up the things that make life pleasant; I need not turn aside from my self-indulgence; I will smite thrice, and stay. So it comes to pass that this great multitude, surging out into the life of the world year after year, equipped, crowned as kings for the work of life, smite the Syrians but thrice. The work of life is but half done. They remain failures, when they might have triumphed gloriously. Or take another illustration of the same thing. Here is a woman who has given herself up to a life of frivolity and vanity. Perhaps she is not to blame for that; perhaps she has had no ideal of noble things set before her. But some day the casement is thrown open, and she sees a new life before her,--a life which shall be devoted to husband and Children and home, a life which shall for the first time remember the great forgotten who dwell among us. The hand of the prophet is on that woman, and her soul shoots forth the arrow of a new desire. And the voice says, It is the arrow of the Lords deliverance; there lie the glory, and splendour, and nobility of your life; there is the path on which God would have you walk, and you may deliver yourself and deliver those who live about you from the slavery and misery of the false ideals that thus far have dominated them. Smite, says the voice of the prophet. Devote yourself, soul and body, instantly, to the new work that has been revealed to you. And she smites thrice. She goes to see some poor stricken soul, and she finds it tiresome; she turns aside from some gathering of frivolity, and her soul is parched. She undertakes some noble work of self-denial, and she is tired. She smites thrice, and stays, and goes down with the great multitude, worthless, useless, bringing no fruit to perfection Listen to one more example of the same thing. Here is a man or woman who has come on through life, and suddenly awakes to the consciousness of his ignorance of the Divine revelation in Jesus Christ. It smites upon him. Sometimes for one cause, and sometimes for another, it comes to pass that men and women living here in this city suddenly for the first time have a revelation of the glory and beauty and power of the life of Jesus Christ. And they say to themselves, Is the thing a myth? How has it come to pass that people have dreamed of such a life? How is it that men and women gather week after week, and day after day, to hear of the Lord Jesus Christ, and desire to serve Him? That man shoots forth the arrow of his desire for knowledge, and the voice says, It is the arrow of the Lords deliverance. There lies the path by which you shall walk into the kingdom of truth and be saved from your enemies. And he begins to read. He reads a little, and he talks a little, and he thinks a little. But he learns before long that there is opening up before him a great and tremendous work, and the scepticism of the time finds voice, and whispers, Why waste your energies to learn that which cannot be known? Devote the energy of life to something that is practical; turn aside from vain dreams. So he, like the others, smites thrice and stays, and enters the great company of sceptics,--or, as they like to be called to-day, agnostics,--ignorant of Gods eternal truth. (Leighton Parks.)
The Lords arrow of victory
You see then the full measure of victory which God wants us to enjoy. Thou shalt smite the Syrians till thou have consumed them. You see, too, the limited measure of victory which most Christians experience. He smote thrice and stayed. Three big blessings and we think we have had all. Three successes over the enemy and we think we have done wonders. But the Saviour marvels that after all He went through for us, we should be content with such half measures. We glean from it four rules for complete victory in the Christian life.
1. Declare war against sin. Elisha breaks in upon the kings lamentations with the emphatic words, Take bow and arrows. It is time not for weeping but for warring. The genius of the gospel is not peace at any price, but truth at all costs.
2. Union is strength. This is the meaning of the second act in this significant drama. The prophet laid his hands upon the kings hands. Like the officer who sallied forth to capture one of the enemys forts, after two unsuccessful attempts had been made, asking first of all from his general a grasp of his conquering right hand, so we must know what it is for our weakness to be encompassed in Christs strength.
3. Claim a complete deliverance. This is the meaning of the next step. The window was opened eastward and through the open window was shot forth the Lords arrow of victory, even the arrow of victory over Syria.
4. Then came the fourth act with its momentous lesson, Fulfil the obedience of faith, and the king failed at this point so that the man of God was angry with him. How slow we are to learn this lesson. It is what we are in secret before God that fixes the amount of victory and blessing we enjoy in our walk and service amongst men. If only Joash had emptied the quiver he would have consumed the Syrians. If only we will he whole-hearted before God, yielding our will wholly and trusting Gods promises absolutely, we too shall be completely victorious against the world, the flesh, and the devil. (F. S. Webster, M. A.)
The challenge arrow
History gives us the explanation of this symbolic narrative. It appears that in former times war was often proclaimed or renewed by the despatch of an arrow into the enemys lines. Elisha meant to teach the king that, although he was weak and dying, yet Israels cause was not going to die with him; and that the same power that made Israel strong in the past would follow the king in his new campaign against the Syrian oppressor. Let us learn the following lessons from the laying of those old emaciated hands of the prophet upon the young strong hands of the king. We see there a picture of--
I. The past directing the present. When we crossed the threshold of the year we did not get rid of the old; for the past is always stretching out its vanishing hands to direct and influence the present. The white-bearded face of Elisha well represents the past, which is over behind us, overlooking our work. The actions, associations, and habits of the past are still with us. We may turn over a new leaf, but we cannot unlearn at once the irregularities of the defective writing on the previous page. We may point the arrow afresh, but the old hands are inevitably influencing the sweep it takes from the bow. This influence is exerted by the past, whether it is good or evil. Virtue and piety reap their immediate, as well as ultimate, harvests. The good deeds of the past are ever stretching forth their gentle hands to guide and bless not only ourselves, but others as well. Who can tell the influence of a mothers prayers uttered by lips long since sealed in death? In the critical moment of her boys career, it would seem as if a straw would have turned the scale of destiny this way or that. The young impulsive nature is guided and restrained by the mothers prayers answered, the mothers words remembered, the mothers influence exerted; and these have saved him in the hour of danger
II. The Divine controlling the Human. The arrow of the Lords deliverance had power in it, not because of the strong hand of Joash who pulled the bow, but mainly because of the prophetic hands that were laid upon him as he did so. Mere human effort is fruitless unless a higher power directs and controls the course and goal of the arrows flight. We may spread the sails, but they must be filled with heaven-sent breezes. We may sow the seed, but God gives the increase. Man proposes, but God disposes. We form plans and projects, we bend the bow, and throw all our power into the work lying before us, but unless a higher power is with us, all the determination and foresight we may command are valueless. Except the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it. If this is true in regard to temporal concerns, how much more should we recognise its truth in the spiritual sphere. Too long has the enemy oppressed and held dominion over our hearts and our lives. Let us look to the ground we would reconquer and reclaim for the King of kings. Let us resolve that this slavery of our souls to sin shall cease. And as we do so, let us pray for the presence and power of the hands of the mighty God of Jacob to strengthen our weakness and give us the victory. But while thus trusting in Divine help, notice that it was the young king who drew the bow. Human effort is as essential as Divine direction. Gods promise to help does not warrant idleness. The sense of Gods helping us should not paralyse, but should rather stimulate to doing and daring greater things than we have ever hitherto attempted. The narrative suggests that effort must be sustained to be successful. One blow never won a battle. The king stayed his hand after he had discharged three arrows, and the man of God was wrath, and said he should have smitten the ground oftener, and then he would have utterly consumed the foe. So long as God bids us fight the good fight, we must not cease our warring. So long as His hand is urging us we must smite again and again. Let us not desist, as Joash may have done, from a feeling of tenderness towards me enemy, nor from unbelief in the efficacy of the means ordained of God for our deliverance. Both motives have hindered and crippled the efforts of many a hopeful life. Finally, let us ask ourselves, has the arrow of the Lords deliverance been discharged from our bow at all? Have we declared war against sin and Satan? If not, let us do so before another day closes. Look up and see Gods hands held out, waiting, and able to help and to save you, and to rid from the guilt and bondage and pollution of sin. Fight for your life, and the lives of those around you, and all your arrows shall bring help and joy and peace to you and yours. (David A. Taylor.)
Three arrows, or six
It is a very difficult task to show the meeting-place of the purpose of God and the free agency of man. One thing is quite clear, we ought not to deny either of them, for they are both facts. It is a fact that God has purposed all things both great and little; neither will anything happen but according to His eternal purpose and decree. It is also a sure and certain fact that, oftentimes, events hang upon the choice of men. Their will has a singular potency. In the ease before us, the arrows are in the hands of the King of Israel; and according to whether he shall shoot once, twice, thrice, or five or six times, so will the nations history be affected. Now, how these two things can both be true, I cannot tell you; neither, probably, after long debate, could the wisest men in heaven tell you, not even with the assistance of cherubim and seraphim. If they could tell you, what would you know, and in what way would you be benefited if you could find out this secret? But sometimes a practical question about these two points does arise. It is correct to say, speaking after the manner of men, If men are earnest, if men are believing, if men are prayerful, such and such a blessing will come; and that the blessing does not come, may be rightly traced to the fact that they were not as prayerful and as believing as they ought to have been. Next, reflect what great things may lie in a mans hand There stood Joash an unworthy king; and yet m his hands lay, measurably, the destiny of his people. If he will take those arrows, and will shoot five or six times, their great enemy will be broken in pieces. If he will be dilatory, and will only shoot three times, he will get only a measure of victory; and poor Israel will ultimately have to suffer again from this enemy, who has been only scotched, and not killed. You do not know, dear friends, what responsibility lies upon you. You are the father of a family; what blessings may come to your household, or may be missed by your children, through your conduct! Once more, notice what great results may come from very little acts. It was a very trifling thing, was it not, to shoot an arrow from a bow? Your child has done it many times in his holidays. He has taken his bow, and shot his little home-made shaft into the air. This is what the King of Israel is required to do, to perform this very slight and common feat of archery, to shoot from an open window, and to drive his arrows into the ground beneath; and yet upon the shooting of these arrows will hang victory or defeat for Israel so there be some who think that hearing the Gospel is a little thing. Life, death, and hell, and worlds unknown, may hang upon the preaching and hearing of a sermon.
I. Let me speak of some matters in which many men too soon pause. There are some who, having great opportunities,--and we all have them more or less,--shoot only three times when they ought to shoot five or six times.
1. One of these matters is in the warfare with the evil within. Some, as soon as they begin their Christian life, fit an arrow to the string, and shoot down big sins, such as swearing., or drunkenness, or open uncleanness. When they have shot these three times, they seem to think that the other enemies within them may be tolerated. My brother, thou shouldest have shot five or six times.
2. There are some who shoot three times, and then leave off, with regard to Christian knowledge. They know the simple truth of justification by faith; but they do not want to know much about sanctification by the Spirit of God. Why not, my brother? Canst thou be saved unless thou art sanctified? Some are perfectly satisfied with laying again the first principles, always going over those; but they want to know no more. I beseech you, strive to be educated in the things of God.
3. Some, again, sin in this way with regard to Christian attainments. They have little faith, and they say, Faith like a grain of mustard-seed will save you. That is true. But are you always to be a little one? A grain of mustard-seed is not worth anything if it does not grow; it is meant to grow till it comes to be a tree, and birds lodge in its boughs. Come, my dear friend, if thou hast little faith, do not rest till thou hast great faith, till thou hast full assurance, till thou hast the full assurance of understanding.
4. Others, again, seem satisfied with little usefulness. You brought a soul to Christ, did you? Oh, that you would long to bring another! Do you not remember what the general said, in the war, when one rode up to him, and cried out, We have taken a gun from the enemy? Take another, said the general. If you have brought one soul to Christ, it should make you hunger and thirst to bring another.
5. And this spirit comes out very vividly in prayer. You do pray; else were you not the living children of God at all; but oh, for more power in prayer! You have asked for a blessing; why not ask for a far greater one?
6. The Church of God, as a whole, is guilty here, as to her plans for Gods glory. She is doing much more now than she used to do; but even now, though she smites three times, we may say to her, Thou shouldest have smitten five or six times. Oh, that the Church of Christ had a boundless ambition to conquer the world for her Lord!
II. But now, secondly, let me speak of the reasons for this pausing, Why do men come to a dead hall so soon?
1. Some of them say that they are afraid of being presumptuous. You are afraid of being too holy, are you? Dismiss your fear. You are afraid of asking for too much grace; be afraid of having too little. You are afraid of conquering sin; tremble for fear of an unconquered sin. There is no presumption in taking the largest promise of God, and pleading it, and expecting to have it fulfilled.
2. Perhaps one says, I have not the natural ability to be doing more, or enjoying more. What has natural ability to do with it? When all thy natural abilities are in the grave, and thou lookest only to the spiritual strength of God, then thou shalt see greater things than these.
3. Shall I tell you the real reasons why men pause in their work? With some, it is because they are too dependent upon their fellow-men. This King Joash could shoot when Elisha put his hand on his hand; probably Elisha only did that once, and then left him to himself, and said, Now, you shoot. Then he only shot three times. There are many Christian people who are a great deal too dependent upon their ministers, or upon some elderly Christian person who has helped them onward.
4. Another reason why some pause is, that they are too soon contented. Joash thought that he had done very well when he had shot three times, and that Elisha would pat him on the back, and say, How well you have done! That kind of feeling creeps over many workers for the Lord.
5. Joash, too, I dare say, gave up shooting because he was unbelieving. He could not see how shooting the arrows could affect the Syrians; and he wanted to see.
6. I should not wonder, also, if Joash was too indolent to shoot five or six times. He did not feel in a shooting humour. Now, whenever you do not feel in a humour for prayer, then is the time when you ought to pray twice as much.
7. Joash also probably had too little zeal. He was not wide awake, he was not thoroughly aroused, he did not care for the glory of God. If he could beat the Syrians three times, that would be quite enough for him.
III. But now, thirdly, notice the lamentable result of this pausing.
1. When Joash had shot three times, he paused; and therefore the blessing paused. Three times he shot, and three times God gave him victory. Do you see what you are doing by pausing? You are stopping the conduit-pipe by which the river of blessing will flow to you. Do not do that; to impoverish yourself must certainly be a needless operation.
2. You will suffer in consequence, as this king did; for, after the three victories, the rival power came to the front again.
3. Others will also suffer with you.
4. Meanwhile, the enemy triumphed.
5. What was even worse, Jehovah Himself was dishonoured.
6. Yet again, glorious possibilities were lost.
IV. The cure for this pausing.
1. If we pause in our holy service, or in getting near to God, or in sucking the marrow out of the promises, remember that the enemy will not pause.
2. A cure for this stopping lies in the reflection that in other things we are generally eager.
3. And lastly, this question ought to prevent us from ever pausing Can we ever do enough for our Saviour? (C. H. Spurgeon.)
The small gains of the irresolute
We have here a more than commonly graphic page of Holy Scripture. A young king grieving over the death bed of an often neglected prophet; the feeble hands of the old saint laid on the vigorous hands of his sovereign, as they held the familiar arrows and bow; the swift course of one arrow shot by Divine direction towards the land of a dangerous enemy; the handful of arrows struck a scanty number of times on the ground by the unbelieving youth; and the wrath of the patriotic prophet (compare the anger of Christ, of whom Elisha may have been a type, Mar_3:5), who longed for a widespread deliverance throughout the Holy Land. It is a picturesque story, but more than picturesque. It may be reckoned a parable as well as a tale. For--
I. There was a great opportunity. Though Joash was undeserving (2Ki_13:11, he did that which was evil in the sight of the Lord) God was graciously ready to grant him complete escape from impending evil (the arrow of the Lords deliverance, 2Ki_13:17); even as helpless sinners have offered to them, through Divine mercy, present pardon and holiness here, the earnest of complete salvation hereafter.
II. The improvement of that opportunity required a personal effort. And Joash was experiencing a measure of religious revival. His visit to the old prophet woke up stirring associations (tears rolled down his checks as he cried, My father, etc., 2Ki_13:14). Much as the anniversary of a confirmation vow, a return after absence to a religious home, or the voice of a forgotten counsellor once more heard, may touch affectingly the conscience of a backslider. But--
III. The inadequate effort of little faith had a correspondingly slight result. Perhaps Joash thought the striking of arrows on the ground too trivial an action for very frequent repetition; perhaps he did not wish his companions to suppose him very obedient to a religious teacher; perhaps he was languid from the mere habit of attending to all sacred duties listlessly; perhaps he was in a hurry to be gone to some other occupation. But want of trust in the Divine revelation must have been the main cause of his curtailed exertion. And the measure of his receiving was proportioned to the small measure of his seeking. God faithfully gave him three victories, after his three strokes, but only three (2Ki_13:25). Too many have in like manner lessened the measure of their peace, holiness, and hope, by not perseveringly using means of grace which might be vastly profitable. (D. D. Stewart, M. A.)
The story of a bad stopping
Is not the lesson evident? Smiting but thrice and staying--only half-doing, not pushing to the finishing in grand faith and unrelaxing purpose--is not that the trouble with multitudes of men? Here, then, is our story of a bad stopping.
1. In the direction of success in the daily life men often make a bad stopping. They smite but thrice and stay. Success is duty. The difference between men as to making the most of themselves is due, oftener than we are apt to think, to this simply, whether they smite but thrice and stay, or whether they not only smite thrice but,--go on smiting. But it is hard, men say. Yes; but everything that gets up in this world must struggle up. One relates how Arago, the Trench astronomer, tells, in his autobiography, that in his youth he one day became puzzled and discouraged over his mathematics, and almost resolved to give up the study. He held his paper-bound text-book in his hand. Impelled by an indefinable curiosity, he damped the cover of the book, and carefully unrolled the leaf to see what was on the other side. It turned out to be a brief letter from DAlembert to a young man like himself, disheartened by the difficulties of mathematical study, who had written to him for counsel. This was the letter: Go on, sin, go on. The difficulties you meet will resolve themselves as you advance. Proceed, and light will dawn and shine with increasing clearness upon your path. Arago went on, and became the first astronomical mathematician of his time, But I am too old, men say. But use is the law of growth; and the quickest way to bring upon ones self the worst sort of senility is to withdraw from life and the interests and duties of it. But I would be humble, men say. Yes; but if you do not amount to much, there is all the mere reason you should make the most of yourself. And a true humility is never a withdrawing from service, but is always a readiness to set ones self to even the lowliest service for the love of God and fellow-men.
2. In the direction of overcoming evil habits men often make a bad stopping. They smite but thrice and stay. As some one says, such men are like a man who, attempting to jump a ditch, will never really jump, but will for ever stop and return for a fresh run.
3. In the direction of resisting temptation men often make this bad stopping. They resist thrice, but at the fourth assault they yield.
4. In the direction of advance in the Christian life men often make this bad stopping. Plenty of Christians through a long life do not get much beyond the initial stage of justification.
5. In the direction of becoming Christian, men often make this bad stopping. They smite in the way of at least a partial and outward change of life, etc., but when it comes to a total and irreversible surrender of the self to the Lord Jesus, they stay. (W. Hoyt, D. D.)
Gods purpose and mans response
A beautiful verse higher up the chapter tells us that the Lord gave Israel a saviour in answer to a repentant kings prayer. A study of the history reveals the fact that the deliverer was the grandson of the praying man. The text explains why the Divine mercy skipped a generation. The son of the royal penitent was tried and found wanting; therefore deliverance had to wait until his son, in turn, sat on the throne.
I. The Divine purpose symbolised. The shooting of an arrow, or the flinging of a dart into an enemys country was anciently a declaration of war. It signified that the archer and those he represented claimed the territory into which the missile was flung, and unless their challenge was successfully resisted would occupy it. Now eastwards from Samaria, the scene of this interview, was the district which the Syrians had taken from Israel. It was the direction from which their predatory bands came. To the north-east lay Syria itself. The shooting, of the arrow was plainly a declaration of war against Syria. That the prophets hands were upon the monarchs when it was discharged, signified that it was God who flung down the challenge. Now a challenge to combat by the Almighty is, of course, a prophecy of victory for Him. Here then, by vivid symbolism, we have the Divine purpose to deliver Israel from Syrian oppression declared. Gods purposes in the spiritual realm are revealed with equal clearness to us. It is His will that the world shall be evangelised and every Christian perfected. He has shot His arrow over the world. The incubus of devilry that now oppresses it is to be annihilated. The shadow of the Cross is upon every land. Every Christian, too, is to be perfected. We are saved rom hell: we are to be saved from sin. Our spirits are the Lords: our bodies arid minds are to become His also. All our spiritual enemies are to be conquered, and each wandering thought brought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. Over the entire life of the believer the Saviours arrow has been discharged. But these glorious purposes are to be accomplished through human instrumentality. Although the prophets hands were upon his, it was King Joash who shot the arrow. God intends to conquer the world and our own bad hearts by our agency. In His might, we are to take possession of the world for our Redeemer. Further, as Gods agents we should use the wisest means to fulfil His purposes. Joash had to take and use bow and arrow. One might say that only a bow and arrow were used that all the glory might be given to God! But that would be a wrong inference. Bows and arrows in the hands of Chinese troops to-day excite the derision of Europeans. But in the days of Joash, they comprised the most formidable artillery that could be employed in warfare. The symbolic lesson was that Joash was to use the wisest means--to employ all his military might--to effect the deliverance God had planned. We, also, are to do our best for God. We are to plan wisely: we are to labour diligently. We are to make the most of ourselves. Our powers should be trained to their utmost degree of efficiency. Not only for winning others, but also for saving our own souls we should use the best means.
II. A human response invited. The King of Israel has been, as it were, in the council-chamber of the Eternal. He has been shown, figuratively but clearly, the Divine will. He is now taken back to the region of practical, everyday life. That is Gods purpose, says his mentor. Now show your acceptance of it and responsiveness to it. Take the remaining arrows. And he took them. Smite upon the ground--that is, Smite the ground with the arrows; in other words, Shoot them into the earth. And he smote--or shot--thrice, and stayed. Now here is a mystery. In the seventeenth verse we read, Thou shalt smite the Syrians in Aphek, till thou have consumed them: here, Thou shalt smite Syria but thrice. In the one place we have the Divine purpose; in the other, that purpose as limited by the degree of human responsiveness to it. We are surely taught that Gods plans depend for their fulfilment upon our acceptance of them and co-operation in them. This I say, is a mystery. Nothing happens apart from God. His will is surely done. That is most certain. Yet we may refuse to co-operate with Him, and so hinder, if not frustrate, His purpose. That also is undeniable. Gods elect will be saved, yet the blood of souls may cling to the skirts of a faithless watchman. Gods will shall be done, but we may be condemned for hindering it. Gods sovereignty does not lessen our responsibility. How to harmonise these apparently incongruous truths, we do not know. Let us be content to accept them both, although for the present we do not see the relation between them. Joash is an example of low content. He had no ambition to be a David or a Solomon. A comfortable, easy-going life was all he desired. He wanted to be free from the yoke of Syria, but did not aspire to play the role of national hero. We are all too like him in his ignoble satisfaction. In the world we are ambitions. We long for wealth; we thirst for fame. The higher we can climb, and the sooner we can attain, the better we are pleased. But we have no sacred ambition to dare and to do greatly for God. How few pant after holiness or burn with desire to see the world won for Christ! And therefore we shoot but three arrows, when we ought to shoot five or six times. God forgive us our low content, and inspire us with loftier ideals! Let us not be satisfied with what may reasonably be considered all that could be expected--with the formal discharge of recognised duties. Let us form a high conception of what God expects from us, and dare greatly in the attempt to achieve it, Perhaps Joash was indolent. He lacked energy and perseverance. He had no tenacity of purpose, nor measure of continuance in well-doing. Certainly that is the fault of most of us. We serve God by fits and starts. There are times when we live near Him, and give the devil trouble. We grow rapidly in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Oh, if we could only keep on that level, we should soon become holy! But we do not. Lassitude creeps over us. Reaction sets in. We relapse into indifference. But the real secret of Joashs remissness was, in all probability, unbelief. The Syrians were a powerful nation. Israel was weak through long oppression. And whether we acknowledge it or not, it is unbelief that stays our hands also. The cold fingers of unbelief, laid upon the arm that draws the bowstring, cause it to fall paralysed to the side. The world, the flesh, and thy devil are so real and powerful. There they were, rioting and ravaging, in the days of our fathers. There they are, ruining souls to-day. And there, surely, they will be to the end of the chapter! Is it conceivable that sin can lose its fascination for us, that all our inclinations towards it can be stamped out, and we, old sinners, be changed into the radiant image of the Christ of God? Is it credible that in the outside world drunkenness will be abolished, impurity exterminated, wars ended, and the world, hoary in wickedness, bound by gold chains about the feet of God? Hardly! So the arms that are stretched to shoot are palsied. We smite only two or three times. According to our faith is our effort,--and our success. All possibilities are in God. To convert them into actualities, we must believe and endeavour and persevere. We have the objective promise. There must now be the subjective appropriation of it. These two things together spell success. Man without God is impotent. God without man does not choose to work. God and one man are a majority against the world.
III. A human failure deplored. He smote thrice, and stayed. And the man of God was wroth with him. For Joash, by his want of faith and energy, had lost for ever the honour that might have been his. Gods will will undoubtedly be done, but if we fail to rise to it and work for it, it will fling us from its triumphant path, and summon others to its side, while we are left to suffer incalculable and eternal loss. No doubt we shall become perfect in heaven, but eternity itself will not compensate for the lack of holy culture here. Christ will win, but we may be denied a place beside Him when, in His chariot of victory, He passes through the eternal gates and the everlasting doors. Erasmus might have been the leader of the reformation of the sixteenth century. He published the Greek New Testament, and also a Latin translation of it. He taught the importance of knowledge of the Scriptures. He gave the initial impulse to the mighty movement which resulted in Protestantism. But when he saw how great a matter a little fire was kindling, Erasmus, timid and fearful, shrank back. Luther and others stepped forward and covered themselves with immortal glory, while Erasmus left a name which is pronounced half with honour and ball with contempt, as that of a learned man who proved a moral weakling, one who saw the light but feared to walk in it. Let us have a holy ambition to excel in the kingdom of God. Let us patiently continue in well-doing, shooting not three arrows, hut five or six. Through Joashs failure, too, Israel suffered. The bondage to Syria continued. Oppression by the foreign invader went drearily on. How far the Christian Church is responsible for the fact that on the eve of the twentieth century the world is so far from God, we cannot tell. It is a question which one shudders to face. Still, it is undoubtedly true that the poverty of our response hinders the completion of Gods gracious purposes. God was dishonoured by the monarchs laxity. The Syrians, who blasphemed His name, continued to rule in His land. And by our unspiritual lives and lax efforts God is dishonoured to-day. If we only rose to His purposes and became holy men and women and earnest and successful workers, how greatly He would be glorified! As it is, we dont remain at concert-pitch long enough for the music to rise to His praise. We so soon give in that we bring contempt on the power we profess to work by. Let us rouse ourselves from spiritual sluggishness. Let us shoot, not three arrows, but five or six, or a dozen. (B. J. Gibbon.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v16 2 Kings
2 Kings
THE SPIRIT OF POWER
Read full note →
2Ki 13:16.
This is part of one of the strangest narratives in the Old Testament. Elisha is on his deathbed, ‘sick of the sickness’ wherewith he ‘should die.’ A very different scene, that close sick-chamber, from the open plain beyond Jordan from which Elijah had gone up; a very different way of passing from life by wasting sickness than by fiery chariot! But God is as near His servant in the one place as in the other, and the slow wasting away is as much His messenger as the sudden apocalypse of the horsemen of fire. The king of Israel comes to the old prophet, and very significantly repeats over him his own exclamation over Elijah, ‘My father! My father! the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof.’ Elisha takes no notice of the grief and reverence expressed by the exclamation, but goes straight to his work, and what follows is remarkable indeed.
Here is a prophet dying; and his last words are not edifying moral and religious reflections, nor does he seem to be much concerned to leave with the king his final protest against Israel’s sin, but his thoughts are all of warfare, and his last effort is to stir up the sluggish young monarch to some of his own enthusiasm in the conflict with the enemy. It does not sound like an edifying deathbed. People might have said, ‘Ah! secular and political affairs should be all out of a man’s mind when he comes to his last moments.’ But Elisha thought that to stick to his life’s work till the last breath was out of him, and to devote the last breath to stimulating successors who might catch up the torch that dropped from his failing hands, was no unworthy end of a prophet’s life.
So there followed what perhaps is not very familiar to some of us, that strange scene in which the dying man is far fuller of energy and vigour than the young king, and takes the upper hand of him, giving him a series of curt, authoritative commands, each of which he punctiliously obeys. ‘Take bow and arrow,’ and he took them. Then the prophet lays his wasted hand for a moment on the strong, young hand, and having thus either in symbol or reality-never mind which-communicated power, he says to him, ‘Fling open the casement towards the quarter where the enemy’s territory lies,’ and he flings it open. ‘Now, shoot,’ and he shoots. Then the old man gathers himself up on his bed, and with a triumphant shout exclaims, ‘The Lord’s arrow of victory! . . . Thou shalt smite the Syrians till they be consumed.’
That is not all. There is a second stage. The promise is given; the possibility is opened before the king, and now all depends on the question whether he will rise to the height of the occasion. So the prophet says to him, ‘Take the sheaf of arrows in your hand’; and he takes them. And then he says, ‘Now smite upon the ground.’ It is a test. If he had been roused and stirred by what had gone before; if he had any earnestness of belief in the power that was communicated, and any eagerness of desire to realise the promises that had been given of complete victory, what would he have done? What would Elisha have done if he had had the quiver in his hand? This king smites three perfunctory taps on the floor, and having done what will satisfy the old man’s whim, and what in decency he had to do, he stops, as if weary of the whole performance. So the prophet bursts out in indignation on his dying bed-’Thou shouldst have smitten five or six times; then hadst thou conquered utterly. Now thou shalt conquer but thrice.’ A strange story; very far away from our atmosphere and latitude! Yet are there not obviously in it great principles which may be disentangled from their singular setting, and fully applied to us? I think so. Let us try and draw them from it.
I. Here we have the power communicated.
Now the story seems to indicate that it was only for a moment that the prophet’s hands were laid on the king’s hands, because, after they had been so laid, he is bidden to go to the window and fling it open, and the bedridden man could not go there with him; then he is bidden to draw the bow, and another hand upon his would have been a hindrance rather than a help. So it was but a momentary touch, a communication of power in reality or in symbol that the muscular young hand needed, and the wasted old one could give. And is that not a parable for us? We, too, if we are Christian men and women, have a gospel of which the very kernel is that there is to us a communication of power, and the very name of that divine Spirit whom it is Christ’s greatest work to send flashing and flaming through the world, is the ‘Spirit of Power.’ And so the old promise that ye shall be clothed with strength from on high is the standing prerogative of the Christian Church. There is not merely some partial communication, as when hand touched hand, but every organ is vitalised and quickened; as in the case of the other miracle of this prophet, when he stretched himself on the dead child eye to eye, and mouth to mouth, and hand to hand; and each part received the vitalising influence. We have, if we are Christian people, a Spirit given to us, and are ‘strengthened with might by the Spirit in the inner man.’
That gift, that strength comes to us by contact, not with Elisha, but with Elisha’s Lord and Master. Christ’s touch, when He was on earth, brought sight to the blind, healing to the sick, vigour to the limbs of the lame, life to the dead. And you and I can have that touch, far more truly, and far more mightily operative upon us than they had, who only felt the contact of His finger, and only derived corporeal blessing. For we can draw near to Him, and in union with Him by faith and love and obedience, can have His Spirit in close contact with our spirits, and strengthening us for all service, and for every task. Brethren! that touch which gives strength is a real thing. It is no mere piece of mystical exaggeration when we speak of our spirits being in actual contact with Christ’s Spirit. Many of us have no clear conception, and still less a firm realisation, of that closer than corporeal contact, more real than bodily presence, and more intimate than any possible physical union, which is the great gift of God in Jesus Christ, and brings to us, if we will, life and strength according to our need. I would that the popular Christianity of this day had a far larger infusion of the sound, mystical element that lies in the New Testament Christianity, and did not talk so exclusively about a Christ that is for us as to have all but lost sight of the second stage of our relation to Christ, and lost a faith in a Christ that is in us Brethren! He can lay His hand upon your spirit’s hand. He can flash light into your spirit’s eye from His eye. He can put breath and eloquence into your spirit’s lips from His lips, and His heart beating against yours can transfuse-if I may so say-into you His own life-blood, which cleanses from all sin, and fits for all conflict.
Then, further, let me remind you that this power, which is bestowed on condition of contact, is given before duties are commanded. This king, in our acted parable, first had the touch of Elisha’s fingers, and then received the command from Elisha’s lips, ‘Shoot!’ So Jesus Christ gives before He commands, and commands nothing which He has not fitted us to perform. He is not ‘an austere man, reaping where He did not sow, and gathering where He did not straw’; but He comes first to us saying, ‘I give thee Myself,’ and then He looks us in the eyes and says, ‘Wilt thou not give Me thyself?’ He bestows the strength first, and He commands the consequent duty afterwards.
Further, this strength communicated is realised in the effort to obey Christ’s great commands. Joash felt nothing when the prophet’s hand was laid upon his but, perhaps, some tingling. But when he got the bow in his hand and drew the arrow to its head, the infused power stiffened his muscles and strengthened him to pull; and though he could not distinguish between his own natural corporeal ability and that which had been thus imparted to him, the two co-operated in the one act, and it was when he drew his bow that he felt his strength. ‘Stretch forth thine hand,’ said Christ to the lame man. But the very infirmity to be dealt with was his inability to stretch it forth. At the command he tried, and, to his wonder, the stiffened sinews relaxed, and the joint that had been immovable had free play, and he stretched out his hand, and it was restored whole as the other. So He gives what He commands, and in obeying the command we realise and are conscious of the power. Elisha and Joash but act an illustration of the great word of Paul: ‘Work out your own salvation . . . for it is God that worketh in you.’
II. And now, secondly, look at the perfected victory that is possible.
When the arrows, by God’s strength operating through Joash’s arm, had been shot, the prophet says, ‘The arrow of the Lord’s victory! . . . thou shalt smite . . . till thou have consumed.’ Yes, of course; if the arrow is the Lord’s arrow, and the strength is His strength, then the only issue corresponding to the power is perfect victory. I would that Christian people realised more than they do practically in their lives that while men’s ideals and aims may be all unaccomplished, or but partially approximated to, since God is God, His nature is perfection, and nothing that He does can fall beneath His ideal and purpose in doing it. All that comes from Him must correspond to Him from whom it comes. He never leaves off till He has completed, nor can any one say about any of His work, ‘He began to build, and was not able to finish.’ So, Christian people! I would that we should rise to the height of our prerogatives, and realise the fact that perfect victory is possible, regard being had to the power which ‘teaches our hands to war and our fingers to fight.’ A great deal of not altogether profitable jangling goes on at present in reference to the question of whether absolute sinlessness is possible for a Christian man on earth. Whatever view we take upon that question, it ought not to hide from us the fact which should loom very much more largely in our daily operative belief than it does with most of us, that in so far as the power which is given to us is concerned, perfect victory is within our grasp, and is the only worthy and correspondent result to the perfect power which worketh in us. So there is no reason, as from any defect of the divine gift to the weakest of us, why our Christian lives should have ups and downs, why there should be interruptions in our devotion, fallings short in our consecration, contradictions in our conduct, slidings backward in our progress. There is no reason why, in our Christian year, there should be summer and winter; but according to the symbolical saying of one of the old prophets, ‘The ploughman may overtake the reaper, and he that treadeth out the grapes him that soweth the seed.’ In so far as our Christian life is concerned, the perfection of the power that is granted to us involves the possibility of perfection in the recipient.
And the same thing is true in reference to a Christian man’s work in the world. God’s Church has ample resources to overcome the evil of the world. The fire is tremendous, but the Christian Church has possession of the floods that can extinguish the fire. If we utilised all that we have, we might ‘smite till we had consumed,’ and turned the world into the Church of God. That is the ideal, the possibility, when we look at the Christian man as possessor of the communicated power of God. And then we turn to the reality, to our own consciences, to the state of our religious communities everywhere, and we see what seems to be blank contradiction of the possibility. Where is the explanation?
III. That brings me to my last point, the partial victory that is actually won.
‘Thou shouldst have smitten five or six times; then hadst thou smitten the Syrians till they were consumed. But now thou shalt conquer but thrice.’ All God’s promises and prophecies are conditional. There is no such thing as an unconditional promise of victory or of defeat; there is always an ‘if.’ There is always man’s freedom as a factor. It is strange. I suppose no thinking, metaphysical or theological, ever has solved or ever will, that great paradox of the power of a finite will to lift itself up in the face of, and antagonism to, an Infinite Will backed by infinite power, and to thwart its purposes. ‘How often would I have gathered . . . and ye would not.’ Here is all the power for a perfect victory, and yet the man that has it has to be contented with a very partial one.
It is a solemn thought that the Church’s unbelief can limit and hinder Christ’s work in the world, and we have here another illustration of that truth. You will find now and then in the newspapers, stories-they may be true or false-about caterpillars stopping a train. There is an old legend of that fabulous creature the remora, a tiny thing that fastened itself to the keel of a ship, and arrested it in mid-ocean. That is what we do with God and His purposes, and with His power granted to us.
A low expectation limits the power. This king did not believe, did not expect, that he would conquer utterly, and so he did not. You believe that you can do a thing, and in nine cases out of ten that goes nine-tenths of the way towards doing it. If we cast ourselves into our fight expecting victory, the expectation will realise itself in nine cases out of ten. And the man who in faith refuses to say ‘that beast of a word-impossible!’ will find that ‘all things are possible to him that believeth.’ ‘Expect great things of God,’ and you will feel His power tingling to your very fingertips, and will be able to draw the arrow to its head, and send it whizzing home to its mark.
Small desires block the power. Where there is an iron-bound coast running in one straight line, the whole ocean may dash itself on the cliffs at the base, but it enters not into the land; but where the shore opens itself out into some deep gulf far inland, and broad across at the entrance, then the glad water rushes in and fills it all. Make room for God in your lives by your desires and you will get Him in the fullness of His power.
The use of our power increases our power. Joash had an unused quiver full of arrows, and he only smote thrice. ‘To him that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not shall be taken.’ The reason why many of us professing Christians have so little of the strength of God in our lives is because we have made so little use of the strength that we have. Stow away your seed-corn in a granary and do not let the air into it, and weevils and rats will consume it. Sow it broadcast on the fields with liberal hand, and it will spring up, ‘some thirty, some sixty, some an hundredfold.’ Use increases strength in all regions, and unused organs atrophy and wither.
So, dear friends! if we will keep ourselves in contact with Christ, and tremulously sensitive to His touch, if we will expect power according to our tasks and our needs, if we will desire more of His grace, and if we will honestly and manfully use the strength that we have, then He will ‘teach our hands to war and our fingers to fight,’ and will give us strength, ‘so that a bow of brass is bent by’ our arms, and we shall be ‘more than conquerors through Him that loved us.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v17 General Information:
General Information:
Elisha continues to talk to Joash, king of Israel.
Read full note →
Open the window eastward
"open the window that faces east" or "open that window towards the east"
so he opened it
Since this happens after Joash takes the bow and arrows, he may have had a servant open the window. AT: "So a servant opened it" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
he shot
"Joash shot the arrow"
This is Yahweh's arrow of victory, the arrow of victory over Aram
The relationship between the arrow and victory can be stated explicitly. AT: "This arrow is a sign from Yahweh that he will give you victory over Aram" or "This arrow symbolizes the victory Yahweh will give you over Aram" (See: Assumed Knowledge and Implicit Information)
Aphek
This was a city in the land of Israel. (See: How to Translate Names)
But the man of God was angry with him
"But Elisha was angry with King Joash"
until you annihilated it
"until you completely destroyed it" or "until they were completely wiped out"
translationWords
Aram
consume
God
anger
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv15, 18 13:15-17 Elisha laid his own hands on the king’s…
13:15-17 Elisha laid his own hands on the king’s hands: This act conveyed spiritual empowerment for the upcoming battle with the Arameans at Aphek. • Aphek was situated east of the Sea of Galilee (1 Kgs 20:26), thus the eastern window faced the place where the battle would take place.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.