2 Kings 2:19-3:3

2 Kings 2:19 - 3:3 - Daily Devotion - 6 July 2026 St Barnabas Anglican Church Fairfield & Bossley Park 19 Then the men of the city said to Elisha, “Please note, our lord, that the city’s location is good, as you can see. But the water is bad and the land is unfruitful.”20 “Bring me a new bowl,” he replied, “and put some salt in it.”So they brought it to him, 21 and Elisha went out to the spring, cast the salt into it, and said, “This is what the LORD says: ‘I have healed this water. No longer will it cause death or unfruitfulness.”22 And the waters there have been healthy to this day, according to the word spoken by Elisha.23 From there, Elisha went up to Bethel, and as he was walking up the road, a group of boys came out of the city and jeered at him, chanting, “Go up, you baldhead! Go up, you baldhead!”24 Then he turned around, looked at them, and called down a curse on them in the name of the LORD.Suddenly two female bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the boys.25 And Elisha went on to Mount Carmel, and from there he returned to Samaria.Chapter three1 In the eighteenth year of Jehoshaphat’s reign over Judah, Jehoram son of Ahab became king of Israel, and he reigned in Samaria twelve years. 2 And he did evil in the sight of the LORD, but not as his father and mother had done. He removed the sacred pillar of Baal that his father had made.3 Nevertheless, he clung to the sins that Jeroboam son of Nebat had caused Israel to commit; he did not turn away from them.REFLECTIONSWritten by Stephen SheadAt first, these two episodes from Elisha’s life felt like random stories – and I’m guessing you found the second one quite disturbing.But I think there’s more going on here. Elisha has only just been granted the same prophetic Spirit that had given Elijah authority and power to call Israel back to their covenant with God. But the only people who witnessed this transfer of authority was a small company of prophets.So the Lord does these two powerful works to show that there is a true prophet of God on the scene again – one who will bring either life or death, just as God’s covenant with Israel had promised. In the first miracle, God uses Elisha to bring life to a land that was dead. In the second, he brings down the covenant curse on those who reject God’s prophet and entice others to worship idols.It’s probably helpful to say a bit more about the episode with the bears – not just because I’m with Elisha on this one (who are these kids making fun of a bald guy??). More seriously … We don’t know the details of why God chose to judge these youths so severely, but I doubt they were just messing around. Bethel was one of the two cities in the northern kingdom which was leading the Israelites in idolatry. Jeroboam, the first northern king after Israel was divided, set up golden calves in Bethel and Dan, and through all of Israel’s history these two idols led them to rebel against the Lord. In fact, we read that the new king, Jehoram, continued worshiping Jeroboam’s golden calves. So I suspect this large mob of youths – perhaps sent by their elders? – were deliberately mocking and threatening the man God had sent to call them back to himself. This was entrenched idolatry by a city in the land of promise, and the old covenant had made very clear what the consequences would be (see Deuteronomy 13).As people of the new covenant, I’m so grateful that it’s not our job to bring down God’s judgment on unbelievers. They will do that themselves if they reject Christ, and God has appointed Jesus to judge the world (Matthew 25:31-46). But yesterday, we saw that we are Jesus’ Spirit-anointed agents – and that means we get to bring miraculous life to a dead world by speaking about Jesus and showing people Jesus’ love. Jesus has made us the salt of the earth, so that people will glorify the Father (Matthew 5:13-16). What an amazing privilege! ABOUT THE AUTHORStephen is our Senior Minister.