Family of Prophets: Unstoppable

Family of Prophets: Unstoppable

This morning, we’re continuing our new message series entitled, “Family of Prophets.”  We’re rediscovering our identity as a church family this year and this group of individuals are an awesome example to learn from.  

Family is a group of people who genuinely love, trust, care for, and look out for each other.

Success.  Everybody wants to succeed.  A healthy family will help one another to succeed.

Nobody makes plans, invests and sacrifices to follow those plans, only to have it all wasted and to end in failure.  No, rather, we plan and invest and sacrifice to achieve success!  How do we make unstoppable plans that are sure to succeed?

Proverbs 21:29-30

29 The wicked put up a bold front,

    but the upright give thought to their ways.

30 There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan

    that can succeed against the Lord.

(repeat)

Is there any wisdom, insight, or plan that can succeed against the Lord?  Then how do we make unstoppable plans that are sure to succeed?  We make the plans of the Lord our own.  We team up and cooperate with Him.  Only in that place are we unstoppable!

Last week, we learned of how God is our restorer from when Elisha lost Elijah.  We now turn to the very next chapter and learn from an encounter had with Elisha, the new leader of the family of prophets.

2 Kings 3

1 Joram son of Ahab became king of Israel in Samaria in the eighteenth year of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, and he reigned twelve years. 2 He did evil in the eyes of the Lord, but not as his father and mother had done. He got rid of the sacred stone of Baal that his father had made. 3 Nevertheless he clung to the sins of Jeroboam son of Nebat, which he had caused Israel to commit; he did not turn away from them.

Imagine this.  There are two horses each bridled and ready to go.  From each bridle a rope is tied to each of your arms.  In 5 seconds, each horse is about to take off full tilt.  Would you rather those horses be heading opposite directions or the same direction?  You are about to either get a limb torn off or to go faster and further ahead than you ever could on your own.

Sure, Joram wasn’t as sinful as his parents, he learned form their mistakes.  However, he still clung both to some of the sins of his dad and to the Lord.  Joram was clinging to his own ways and God’s at the same time, but they are heading two different directions.  He is torn and continuing to try and cling to the both isn’t going to end well for him.  Eventually, he is going to have to let go of one or the other.

Long story short, the nation of Israel divided during Solomon’s reign as king.  Solomon wanted to serve God along with the gods of several of his wives.  Solomon was torn, so God tore his kingdom from him.  Solomon continued to reign over Judah and the other ten tribes were known as the nation of Israel ruled by Jeroboam, Joram’s father.

Jeroboam was motivated by fear.  We learned about loss last week and the purpose that God has through it.  The fear of loss can certainly be a hinderance and stopping point to our plans.  Fear is a snare that binds us and keeps us from moving forward in life.  God has not given us a spirit of fear, but a spirit that grants us a sound mind, power, and confidence in who we are.

It takes a lot of faith to have fear.  Fear can be thought of simply as misplaced faith.  Faith in the worst-case scenario, the most unlikely and unprobeable ending.  Fear is faith in something that usually proves itself wrong in the end anyways.  We must cast off fear and put our faith instead in God!  Fear, faith in tragedy, will stop us.  Faith in God will give us courage and to become unstoppable.

Jeroboam feared that if the people of Israel went to Jerusalem in Judah to worship God in the temple that they would revert to follow the king of Judah and overthrow him as king.  He feared the loss of his position and potentially the loss of his life. 

Therefore, he decided to setup his own places of worship in Bethel and created two golden calves that he setup as gods.  Fear caused him to veer away from God’s plans and to become divided and torn.  His son, Joram, unfortunately continued in this very same sin.

Fear stops and enslaves us.  The Spirit of God sets us free and empowers us to let go of our past sins and to cling to Jesus alone and His plans for our lives.

4 Now Mesha king of Moab raised sheep, and he had to pay the king of Israel a tribute of a hundred thousand lambs and the wool of a hundred thousand rams. 5 But after Ahab died, the king of Moab rebelled against the king of Israel. 6 So at that time King Joram set out from Samaria and mobilized all Israel. 7 He also sent this message to Jehoshaphat king of Judah: “The king of Moab has rebelled against me. Will you go with me to fight against Moab?”

“I will go with you,” he replied. “I am as you are, my people as your people, my horses as your horses.”

It’s always amazing how unity can come to a divided people simply by finding a common enemy!

8 “By what route shall we attack?” he asked.

“Through the Desert of Edom,” he answered.

9 So the king of Israel set out with the king of Judah and the king of Edom. After a roundabout march of seven days, the army had no more water for themselves or for the animals with them.

Have you ever found yourself in such a place?  You make plans, you gather together all of the resources you need.  You find others who will join you to agree with and help you to fulfill those plans.  However, you find yourself just going in circles, taking one step forward and two steps back and all of your resources gone.  Your hopes for success are being swallowed up by the feeling of failure.

10 “What!” exclaimed the king of Israel. “Has the Lord called us three kings together only to deliver us into the hands of Moab?”

11 But Jehoshaphat asked, “Is there no prophet of the Lord here, through whom we may inquire of the Lord?”

An officer of the king of Israel answered, “Elisha son of Shaphat is here. He used to pour water on the hands of Elijah.”

12 Jehoshaphat said, “The word of the Lord is with him.” So the king of Israel and Jehoshaphat and the king of Edom went down to him.

Why do we always seem to wait until things are going wrong to turn to God?  Why not stay in communication with Him to ensure that we stay on the right path?  We don’t enter our destination address into our GPS, know that there is a path between here and there, then turn off our GPS and start going wherever we think we should go and expect to get there, right?  Rather, we follow that GPS step-by-step.

Proverbs 3:5-6

5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart

    and lean not on your own understanding;

6 in all your ways submit to him,

    and he will make your paths straight.

If Jesus gives us a destiny, will He not also guide us on the right path to get there?  He hasn’t promised that it would be the easiest path necessarily, but He has promised that it is the straightest path and the right one for us.  Instead of just seeking after Him for a destiny, let’s seek after Him for the next step.  Let’s seek after Him for today, for the next hour. 

Let’s live life together with Him so that He can chime into our lives at anytime just like our GPS interrupts Pandora or our podcasts.  Let’s live life together with God so that we hear His voice anytime that He speaks, not just when we are seeking after Him and then muting Him the rest of the time.  Unfortunately, these three kings weren’t exactly doing that…

13 Elisha said to the king of Israel, “Why do you want to involve me? Go to the prophets of your father and the prophets of your mother.”

“No,” the king of Israel answered, “because it was the Lord who called us three kings together to deliver us into the hands of Moab.”

14 Elisha said, “As surely as the Lord Almighty lives, whom I serve, if I did not have respect for the presence of Jehoshaphat king of Judah, I would not pay any attention to you. 15 But now bring me a harpist.”

I’m annoyed, I don’t like you, you irritate me, you are running so far away from God.  However, you’re pursuing Him now.  So, I’m gonna get my worship on, lay down my irritable self, and focus on God.

While the harpist was playing, the hand of the Lord came on Elisha

You kind of get the picture here, right?  Elisha is angry, so God comes and puts His calming hand on him.  His presence and peace came before His voice.

16 and he said, “This is what the Lord says: I will fill this valley with pools of water. 17 For this is what the Lord says: You will see neither wind nor rain, yet this valley will be filled with water, and you, your cattle and your other animals will drink. 18 This is an easy thing in the eyes of the Lord;

First, God is going to take care of their immediate needs.  The resources that they wasted wandering around seven days doing their own thing before seeking after God were about to be restored.  Whatever you may feel is wasted away and gone because you were going your own way instead of God’s is not truly gone.  Turn back to the Lord and He can easily restore what has been lost and even more!  ‘

That thing that keeps you up at night, that thing that steals your peace, that thing that seems hopeless; God is able to restore!  This is an easy thing in the eyes of the Lord!  Oh yeah, and beyond your immediate, physical needs?

he will also deliver Moab into your hands. 19 You will overthrow every fortified city and every major town. You will cut down every good tree, stop up all the springs, and ruin every good field with stones.”

When we stop going our own way and put our lives back into the hands of God, there is nothing impossible for Him!  There is nothing too hard for our God!  Not only will justice be done between you and your enemy, your enemy will be completely destroyed!  Everything that they have setup against you that has been effectively stopping you until now is about to be demolished!  Why?  Because now, with God, you are unstoppable!

2 Corinthians 10:3-4

3 For though we live in the world, we do not wage war as the world does. 4 The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds.

These three kings planned to face the Moabites head on.  Their trust was in the strength and skill of their three armies.  They were about to fight differently than they ever had fought before.  God guided their war strategy and it was a strategy for certain success!

20 The next morning, about the time for offering the sacrifice, there it was—water flowing from the direction of Edom! And the land was filled with water.

21 Now all the Moabites had heard that the kings had come to fight against them; so every man, young and old, who could bear arms was called up and stationed on the border. 22 When they got up early in the morning, the sun was shining on the water. To the Moabites across the way, the water looked red—like blood. 23 “That’s blood!” they said. “Those kings must have fought and slaughtered each other. Now to the plunder, Moab!”

24 But when the Moabites came to the camp of Israel, the Israelites rose up and fought them until they fled. And the Israelites invaded the land and slaughtered the Moabites. 25 They destroyed the towns, and each man threw a stone on every good field until it was covered. They stopped up all the springs and cut down every good tree. Only Kir Hareseth was left with its stones in place, but men armed with slings surrounded it and attacked it.

26 When the king of Moab saw that the battle had gone against him, he took with him seven hundred swordsmen to break through to the king of Edom, but they failed. 27 Then he took his firstborn son, who was to succeed him as king, and offered him as a sacrifice on the city wall. The fury against Israel was great; they withdrew and returned to their own land.

We have a personal relationship with the unstoppable God.  You are His son or daughter.  It doesn’t matter what opposition you may be facing, He has a strategy for your success and for His glory!

Proverbs 21:29-30

29 The wicked put up a bold front,

    but the upright give thought to their ways.

30 There is no wisdom, no insight, no plan

    that can succeed against the Lord.

When your plans are that of God’s, your plans are sure to succeed, you are unstoppable!