CHANGE, ENDURANCE & CHALLENGE...

Elijah passes mantel to Elisha; redemption is as significant as creation; transfiguration

TERRIBLE JOKE: How many folk singers does it take to change a light bulb? Answer: 10 - 1 to change it, the other 9 to sing about how good the old one was - How many residents of Markwick Gardens? Answer Two: one to mix the G & Ts, the other to phone the electrician .....How many Anglicans does it take to change a light bulb? Answer: Change??!

The story is in one sense about change, as Elijah hands over to Elisha and the style of Prophet-ing changes. It’s also story about the stickablility required from disciples and about some of the challenges which will face us as disciples.

A LITTLE CONTEXT

Just to set the historical context so you know where we are: this is in the period of the divided monarchy in Israel. Abraham and come and gone, the Israelites have been delivered out of slavery in Egypt, and after 40 years of wandering in the desert have ended up in t he Promised Land; the Law has been given at Sinai - Moses has come and gone. The Judges have helped to lead and direct Israel, but the people wanted a King, like all the other nations around them and that’s what they requested of the prophet Samuel. God directs Samuel to anoint first Saul then David as king. David’s son Solomon inherits the glory days of his father, but after him his sons fight over Israel and the kingdom is divided into two which are confusingly known as Judah in the south and Israel in the north: with two separate kings. So we’re approx round about 800 BC.

ELIJAH: WAITING IN THE WINGS

From the time Israel settles in the Promised Land the prophets are around, speaking God’s word into the situation - and the greatest of these prophets is generally considered to be Elijah. Elijah didn’t die, but was taken up into heaven in a whirlwind (as we saw today); so the expectation became that Elijah would return to herald the dawn of the Messiah. So you may remember that when people asked John the Baptist who he was one of the possibilities was that he might be Elijah. And in fact Jesus suggests that John was a kind of Elijah (Matthew 11.14).

THE LAW & THE PROPHETS

And as we notice in the gospel reading at the Transfiguration Jesus talks with Moses - who represents the Law; and Elijah - who represents the Prophets. And again this is to underline the importance of Jesus, and show that he is indeed the one in who all the Law and the Prophets find their fulfilment.

So in our OT reading we see the great prophet Elijah departing and the mantle - literally - passing on to Elijah.

ELIJAH: ESTABLISHMENT

Elijah is very establishment - he’s part of the guild of Prophets. So these groups they encounter as they make their way to their Jordan River, are other fellows in the Guild. Elijah is a bit like the Reader, or the Church Warden or the curate or the vicar... you can imagine the local meeting of the Prophet’s Guild is something like a Clergy Deanery Chapter meeting.... although I hope for the sake of Elijah’s sanity it wasn’t quite as bad as that... So these prophets that stand at the roadside and warn him are a bit like the clergy from the parishes in Hastings as the vicar and curate make their way through the town...!

ELISHA: ON THE EDGE

But whilst Elijah is very much Establishment, Elisha turns out to be a bit of a loner - he keeps himself slightly distant from the establishment, he’s a bit of a hermit, a bit of a nonconformist - possibly less respectable, certainly more “on the edge” than Elijah, and his ministry is a lot more involved with Israel’s military activities than was that of Elijah.

THE PARALLELS

There are lots of echoes in the narrative with significant events in Israel’s history already. The Jordan River is separated and crossed - just as Moses parted and crossed the Sea of Reeds (or the Red Sea). And it’s the River Jordan which is crossed - just as Moses died on one side of the Jordan in sight of the Promised Land and Joshua parted the waters and led the people through without getting their feet wet! (Joshua 3-4). Elijah and Elisha cross to the other side - the side Moses died on, the non-Israel side, the side where the great leader Joshua was commissioned...

And this is where Elijah is taken up to heaven and where Elisha’s new role starts.

Elisha has been chosen as Elijah’s successor some years before hand - as Elijah is wandering round Israel he tosses his cloak over Elisha (1 Kings 19.19) - which, although it might sound a little bizarre to us, is how Prophets selected their disciples... Elisha sounds like a wealthy man - he’s overseeing ploughing with 24 oxen when Elijah calls him, and Elijah is pretty scornful when Elisha says he just wants to say goodbye to those he’s leaving - in effect he throws a cloak at him and expects Elisha to run to keep up with him! In fact throughout it seems that Elijah makes it hard for Elisha. In today’s episode we see him tested to see whether he will stick with Elijah to the very end... Elijah tried to dissuade him from following, the guild of prophets they meet warn him that there’s sorrow in store... yet Elisha is faithful and sticks with his boss.

DISCIPLESHIP IS HARD!

Being a disciple is never an easy role. Disciple means one who learns. It’s trendy these days to talk about the “University of the Third Age” or one of the phrases banded about in business and commerce is “life long learning” - there is a recognition that as human beings we never stop learning (or perhaps we should never stop learning!). So when we come to think of our Christian discipleship we are reminded that there is so much for us still to learn... There is much to learn about what it means to walk in the footsteps of Jesus; about how our lives need constantly to be lined up with God’s will and plans; about how we are to learn to love others, to love God, to love ourselves. And that’s without thinking about learning a bit more about our faith, or Church History, or doctrine, or the Church, or the Scriptures...

I was delivering my annual (and now world famous!) lecture to the ordinands at St Stephen's House in Oxford on Thursday (my old college) and we were talking a bit about confirmation preparation and one student was saying that when he was confirmed the course was every week for two years... And we were reflecting that in the very Early Church the period of the catechumenate - before converts were baptised (which only took place at Easter) - that “course” lasted three years... So there is a long and honourable tradition in the Church of learning being a life long activity.

If you felt that you’d like to come along to the Confirmation course as a refresher course then please do; if you felt you’d like to join one of the four house groups that meet fortnightly around the parish for prayer and study, then come and talk to me about it... We have many opportunities to stretch our brains a little in our discipleship. When Jesus summed up the Law and the Prophets he said the most important command was to love the Lord your God with all you heart, and soul and mind... (Matthew 22.37)

So being a disciple of Christ involves a life time of learning and growing and developing. And we know that learning is not without its pains... sometimes it can be hard to change our ways of thinking... it can be a challenge to be faced with new ideas, or things to which our first reaction is “No way!”... After mass this morning we’re going to be sharing lunch together and then we’re going to begin to stretch our brains a little and think about what it might mean to admit children to communion before confirmation... This might be a different way of thinking to the way you and I were brought up... But we’re going to look at how other Churches have been doing this for years, and at how the Church of England’s General Synod approved the legislation.

CHANGE & CHALLENGE

If we do it will mean a change. It will mean re-learning some ways of doing things. It will mean the death of an old way of doing things and the start of a new way... It will involve us having to look again at what is important to us and how we express the faith today...

Just as the Guild of prophets warned Elisha that there was heart ache and sorrow ahead if he continued to follow Elijah towards the Jordan, so there will be heart ache and sorrow ahead for us as we embrace discipleship, as challenges cause us to think again.

Elisha cannot complain that nobody told him!

We need to remember that following Jesus is also not an easy route. There will be sacrifices we have to make. Difficult choices will face us. Our discipleship may lead to us becoming unpopular or misunderstood, or rejected - all these things happened to Jesus...

The primary symbol of our faith is an instrument of execution... we follow one who walked the via dolorosa (the way of sorrows) which led to the cross. If we look carefully at the footsteps of Jesus that we are invited to walk in, we’ll notice that they bear the imprint of the nails which were driven through them on the cross.

BUT NOT ALONE...

But we don’t follow in our own strength. You’ll remember how Elisha pleaded with Elijah to give him a double portion of his spirit - that was the phrase of inheritance of the oldest son; so for Elisha it was about being recognised as Elijah’s successor, about having the help of the Holy Spirit to fulfil the role to which God was calling him.

And we know too that God is so willing to give us his Holy Spirit to help in our discipleship; to help mould us more and more into the likeness of the Lord Jesus: to help us become more Christ-like each day.

I’d like to end with two quotations. One is what Jesus said about God’s attitude towards helping us:

“Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for a fish, will give a snake instead of a fish? Or if the child asks for an egg, will give a scorpion? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!"

Luke 11.11

.. the other is a marvellous passage from the Methodist Covenant Service. Each year - usually in January - the Methodists re-commit themselves in their discipleship, and this is part of the service they use, and it neatly sums up not just the challenge to discipleship - which Elisha knew about; but also reminds us that we can do all things through Christ who gives us his strength (Phil 4.13):

“Christ has many services to be done. Some are easy, others are difficult. Some bring honour, others bring reproach. Some are suitable to our natural inclinations and temporal interests, others are contrary to both... Yet the power to do all these things is given to us in Christ, who strengthens us.

...I am no longer my own, but yours. Put me to what you will, rank me with whom you will: put me to doing, put me to suffering; let me be employed for you or laid aside for you; exalted for you or brought low for you; let me be full, let me be empty, let me have all things, let me have nothing; I freely and wholeheartedly yield all things to your pleasure and disposal...”

Fr. Andrew J Perry
Rector, St John the Evangelist, Pevensey Rd, St Leonards on Sea

Picture Credits on this page: Carl Bloch 1834-1890