Scripture Daily

Context No. 3511 of 4322 · 2 Kings

Context · Reflection

2 Kings 1:6-10: in context

6They said to him, “A man came up to meet us, and said to us, ‘Go, return to the king who sent you, and tell him, “The LORD says, ‘Is it because there is no God in Israel that you send to inquire of Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron? Therefore you will not come down from the bed where you have gone up, but you will surely die.’”’” 7He said to them, “What kind of man was he who came up to meet you and told you these words?” 8They answered him, “He was a hairy man, and wearing a leather belt around his waist.” He said, “It’s Elijah the Tishbite.” 9Then 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 to him, “Man of God, the king has said, ‘Come down!’” 10Elijah answered to the captain of fifty, “If I am a man of God, then let fire come down from the sky and consume you and your fifty!” Then fire came down from the sky, and consumed him and his fifty.

King Ahaziah, injured and sick, sends to consult a pagan god rather than the LORD, and Elijah confronts the messengers: is it because there is no God in Israel that you go to inquire of Baal-zebub? The king's real sin was turning away from the living God, who was right there among his people, to a foreign idol.

When soldiers come to seize the prophet with contempt, fire falls from heaven, a fearful sign of judgment. We read this soberly, remembering that when Jesus' own disciples later wanted to call down fire on a village that rejected him, he rebuked them: you do not know what spirit you are of; the Son of Man came not to destroy lives but to save them. The old story shows the deadly seriousness of despising God and his word; the fuller revelation in Christ shows God's heart to save rather than to consume. What abides for us is the folly of turning from the living God to lifeless substitutes when he himself is near.

When trouble comes, do I turn to the living God who is near, rather than to lifeless substitutes, and do I know the heart of Christ, who came not to destroy but to save?

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