Dr. Manny Arango (0:00)

Hey, Bible nerds. This is Dr. Manny Arango and I'm your host for the Bible department podcast powered by Arma. This podcast follows a Bible reading plan we created to help you read the entire Bible in a year. You can head to the show notes or thebibledepartment.com to download our reading plan and join the Journey family. Welcome to day 171. Also, welcome to a brand new book of the Bible. It's not gonna feel like a brand new book of the Bible because two Kings is simply a continuation of First Kings, but hey, welcome to a brand new book of the Bible. Like always, I am going to give you context. I'm going to give you some nerdy nuggets, and I'm always going to leave off with a timeless truth. Something that is not contextually bound, something that is true forever and ever and ever and always. And so, if you're ready, let's dig in. Hey, if you've done the reading today, we are in Two Kings, chapter one and chapter two, just two short chapters. If you've already done the reading, great job. If you haven't done the reading yet, pause the video, stop the audio. You wanna make sure that you actually do the reading before you listen to this episode. So let me give you context, okay? Two big things happening contextually. The first is that Ahaziah has succeeded Ahab as king of Israel and Elisha will succeed Elijah as God's prophet in Israel. Okay? So two big things that we're looking at, okay? Ahaziah succeeding his father Ahab, and Elisha succeeding the prophet Elijah. Now, we are going to spend the majority of our time today, I mean, all of our time today really focusing on that second thing. Eli Shah succeeding Elijah as the prophet of God in Israel. Now, most people, I'm going to give you a disclaimer right up at the top, okay? Most people, for reasons that we're gonna get into, naturally assume that what's happening here in the beginning of 2 Kings, 2nd Kings, chapter 2, is that Elijah is getting taken up to what we would call heaven, okay? So that Elijah is gonna be with God in a place called heaven. Now, I'm gonna challenge that interpretation, and I'm gonna give you tons of context for why I'm challenging that interpretation. But that's the main thing that we're really going to talk about today is this whirlwind that takes Elijah up to what we call heaven. All right? Now, big picture is that most of the time when this is preached or taught, we communicate it as if it's a positive thing. Elijah didn't die. Elijah just got taken up to heaven, similar to Enoch. The Bible says that Enoch just walked with the Lord and was no more. Okay? So I'm going to challenge that perspective. I'm going to offer a perspective that you don't have to agree with, but I'm going to offer a perspective that I think is likely, okay? I'm not going to say, you know, one way or the other, what's correct, but I am going to present a perspective that I think is probable, that I think is likely. And it's a point of view that does not see this scenario as positive, but actually sees it as negative. So let's dive in. That's our context. Let's get into some. I'm actually going to provide a little bit more context so that we can actually start to interpret this stuff to what. What I. What I would say is, like, really well. All right, so some context clues, some contextual questions that I think we should ask. The Bible's gonna say that Elijah is gonna get taken up to heaven. Now, the first thing that I just need everybody to wrap their minds around is what we call heaven is like the afterlife, okay? Whereas if you actually look this word up in Hebrew, they would call this the skies, okay? So this is like back in Genesis when the Bible says that God created the heavens, okay? That's like the place where the stars live, okay? The heavens are the realm of the clouds and the stars in the sun, okay? So you gotta just know culturally, okay? When the Bible. When there's a heading in the Bible and it says Elijah taken up to heaven. Let me just remind everybody theologically that no one can go to heaven without the shed blood of Jesus, okay? And this is the First Testament. I like saying First Testament more than Old Testament. I've just gotten in the habit of saying First Testament. Sometimes I slip up and I do say Old Testament, but First Testament, Second Testament, Old Testament, New Testament, you get the gist. Prior to Jesus shedding his blood as a sacrifice for your sins and for mine, no one is in heaven, okay? And I hope this isn't like a shocker to you, but in the First Testament of the Old Testament or the Old Covenant, under the Old Covenant, everyone's in Sheol, which is a holding place for the dead, okay? There is no heaven or hell, really. Everyone's just in Sheol because there can't really be judgment there because this is prior to Jesus. Okay? So first, let's just start off with heaven. It's probably an irresponsible translation. And really, I'm reading here the niv every. I've got the nlt, the nrsv, the esv, and the NIV on the table with me. They all say heaven. And I'm gonna say that's not just a translation, but an interpretation. And I don't really like it when Bible translators make interpretations. That's just first context clue that we need to know. Second context clue is that the Bible is going to say that Elijah is not taken up in a chariot, but that a chariot separates. A chariot of fire separates Elijah from Elisha. And then Elijah gets taken up in a whirlwind. Now let's actually unpack the biblical context of a whirlwind because I think that we need to ask the question, how do whirlwinds get used in other parts of the Bible? And what's their function in those other parts of the Bible? So I'm just going to list a couple of places in the Bible that talk about whirlwinds. Family. The wait is over. My brand new book, Crushing Chaos is out now and available everywhere. Books are sold. Literally. Today I walked into a Barnes and Noble and I signed a bunch of copies at a physical location. So you can grab this book at a physical Barnes and Noble or you can go to a Books A Million or Amazon or anywhere books are sold and grab a copy. If you enjoy reading the Bible from an ancient perspective, if you understand that the beauty of Scripture is actually knowing it in context, then you'll love this book. And if there's any chaos in your personal life, I think that reading the Bible from an ancient perspective can actually help to crush the chaos in your life. I think this book is going to be a New York Times bestseller. I really do. I think we wrote a good one. I think you should get a copy today. All right, back to the episode. I'm just going to go ahead and list a bunch of places, and if you want to write these down, you know, I'll try to go as slow as I can. Okay, number one, Job 30. Number two, Job 38. Number three, Psalm 11:6. 4, Psalm 53:5, Proverbs 1 verse 24:6, Ezekiel 37, Proverbs 10:24:8, Isaiah 40:9, Isaiah 66:10, Jeremiah 4:11 Jeremiah 22:12, Hebrews 12:18, 13 Zechariah 7, 14. I think maybe 14 is next. Nahum 1, verse 3 or 14:15, Jonah 1, verse 4. And then lastly Jeremiah, chapter 30. And all of these passages of Scripture, a whirlwind signifies the judgment of Yahweh, all of them. So in all of the passages that we've listed, okay, Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Ezekiel, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Hebrews, Zechariah, Nahum, Jonah, whirlwinds equal the judgment of Yahweh. That's what they mean. So we would have to make a really strong argument that although whirlwinds always mean judgment, and this passage, because we really like Elijah, it doesn't mean judgment here, but it means judgment everywhere else. But it doesn't mean judgment here. I would maybe argue or just present the information that maybe, maybe it does mean judgment here. But we've interpreted this story as if Allah is just getting taken up to heaven. And this is just like the whirlwind is sent as the what? The escalator to heaven. And that is. That's ridiculous. Well, number one, it's ridiculous because Elijah can't go to heaven. Cause it's the Old Testament. So that's number one. Number two, whirlwinds don't mean that you did a good job. That's not how God comes down to congratulate people. It's actually how he comes down to judge people in and confront people. Next bit of information that we kind of need to go over is that Elijah is moving east. Ok? There are three cities that Elijah is going to hit, okay? And what he's going to say to his servant Elisha is, hey, like, you know, if you see me while I'm taking up, you know, if you see me while I'm taken away from you, you know, you'll get a double portion. So that's what he said. And then he proceeds to like, you know, run away from Elisha. Perhaps he's running away because he's ashamed of the judgment that his servant is about to have to witness Elijah go through, ok? Because getting dying in a whirlwind sucks. Like, like if I could just think about ways to, to, to die like a tornado kind of ripping me to shreds is just not the way that I'd want to die like that. And I definitely wouldn't want people like looking like, hey guys, two o' clock on Thursday, the prophet's going to die in a tornado. Everybody come out. You know, I would probably be saying to my servant Elisha, like, hey, like don't watch this, you know, so, so okay, let me like present the next piece of this argument every time. Character. So the three cities that Elijah is going to are Bethel, Gilgal and Jericho. And finally we know that Elijah leaves the land of Israel because, what, he crosses the Jordan. He crosses the Jordan, and Elisha is gonna have to cross the Jordan to go back into the land. So Elijah crosses the Jordan, which means he's out of the land. And if this tracks, if Elijah is a new Moses, then that's going to mean that both Moses and Elijah die where outside the land. So the fact that Elijah is moving east out of the land, eastward movement is always bad in Scripture, which then means Elisha, like Joshua, is going to have to move west to go back into the land because Moses and Elijah parallel each other, which means Joshua and Elisha parallel one another. Now, eastward movement is always bad, and Elijah's moving east to get out of the land. And I think what God is saying here is, since you wanted to be a new Moses, then you're going to be a new Moses. Since you wanted to live like a new Moses and force that narrative, then now you're going to be judged like a new Moses. You're going to die like a new Moses. In the same way that Moses was not able to die in the land, you are not going to die in the land. You are going to die outside the land. Okay, so we got one last kind of clue before. I hope this is kind of coming into this picture is kind of maybe coming in into clarity. So it says this in my notes. Does Elijah ever obey the command of Yahweh in 1st Kings 19, verse 15, 16? And the answer is no, which means Elijah deserves judgment, punishment. Prophets have to be judged by God. There's no checks and balances. There's no way to keep prophets in line if they don't obey God. And so I would honestly say, man, I think that this whirlwind is here to judge Elijah for disobeying a clear command from Yahweh. Now, next, couple of things. The end of Elijah's ministry and the start of Eli Shu's. This is my nerdy nugget at this point. The end of Elijah's ministry and the start of Eli Shuz ministry actually mirror each other and create a chiasm. You can find it on on your own. I would contend strongly that what we have created, this cute Bible story of a chariot from heaven, essentially like, you know, a heavenly limousine coming down to get Elijah and him going up, is really not. I don't think that's accurate. Let's actually look at 2 Kings 2:16. Okay, 2 Kings 2:16. This is after the death of Elijah. It says this the Company of the prophets, okay, who were at Jericho, saw Elisha, and they declare the spirit of Elijah rest on Elisha. Okay? They came to meet him and bowed to the ground before him. Okay? This Elisha has just watched Elijah die. And now, verse 16, they said to him, See, now we have 50 strong men among your servants. Please let them go and seek your master. And it may be that the spirit of the Lord has caught him up and thrown him down on some mountain or into some valley. They are not thinking, oh, he's in heaven. They are thinking, maybe the spirit caught him up and threw him somewhere. Maybe he's not dead. Maybe, maybe, just maybe. Come on. You know when something difficult happens and you know what the truth is, but there's a party that just wants to hold on to hope? It's like maybe, just maybe, just maybe. It's like you see a really bad car accident and you're thinking to yourself, oh, God, I hope they're alive. But something in you just goes, that car accident is bad. Like, it does. It's not looking good. Okay? This company, the prophets are like. They just. They. They probably saw this whirlwind, okay? Most likely, they're. They're. They're clearly aware of what happened. They know Elijah went up in the. In the sky. They know that. Okay? So the question is, does he die while he's in the tornado? Does he die in the whirlwind, or does the whirlwind throw him somewhere? This is the question that they're trying to answer. And they say, hey, we've got 50 strong guys. Maybe the spirit of the Lord caught him up and threw him down on some mountain or in some valley. And then finally, Elisha says, yes, send them. And so they search for three days, but did not find him. And so I think that in church, I was taught they didn't find him, which means he's in heaven. I think they didn't find him. Cause he's. Because he. Maybe his body got torn to shreds. Like, there's other reasons why they couldn't. Maybe couldn't find him. But for people who are there, their natural response to this is not, oh, my gosh, this is awesome. Elijah's in heaven. That's not how they respond. They respond by going, this is bad. Okay, so timeless truth. Let's get into our timeless truth. What's gonna be really, really evident, and we'll talk about this as 2 Kings progresses, is that Elijah had 7 recorded miracles in the Bible, and Elisha is gonna have 14 recorded miracles. And so Elisha is gonna ask for a double portion of Elijah's spirit. And the double amount of miracles is the confirmation that that actually happened. However, sometimes I think people can be distracted by that result and lose out on the heart of what Elisha is actually saying. Elisha is not saying, I want to do double the amount of miracles as you, or I want to be double as effective as you. He's actually using sonship language. In the world of the Bible, it's only the Bahor, the firstborn son, the Bahor, who would receive a double portion of his father's inheritance. And so what Elisha is saying to Elijah is, I want to be known as a spiritual son as Elijah, I want to be known as someone who is a rightful heir to the prophetic ministry of, of my spiritual dad, Elijah. That's what he's saying. And that gets granted to him. And the proof of that is that he's able to perform miracles and then he ends up doing double the amount of recorded miracles that we have with Elisha versus Elijah. Okay, but the heart of this is Elisha is not asking to be double famous or to be double wealthy or to be double as successful. No, he's saying I want to be known as a son. I want to be known as someone who, who genuinely inherited your ministry as, as a spiritual son. And I know that the idea of being a spiritual son or a spiritual daughter or a son of the house can be like very, can feel like language that can be used to manipulate people or could be seen as like overly spiritual or churchy. But the reality is that it's very, very biblical. Like that idea is very, very, very biblical. And Elisha is now bringing that up to Elijah. And I think that that is really, really, really moving and powerful. And my timeless truth is this, that ministry really is all about sonship. To be in ministry doesn't mean that you're just a full time employee or that you're just doing a good job as an employee, that, but that you are a son, that you're a daughter. And really effective ministry happens when you are someone who's saying, man, I want to be seen as a son of the house and as a son or a daughter of my pastor. And there's so much family language in the New Testament that honestly I could make a whole argument that God is more concerned with family and church feeling like family than church feeling like the professionalization of ministry. And I think that that is a timeless truth. And I think that we should be desiring the same thing. We should want to be sons and daughters and not just staff members and employees. We should want to be sons and daughters of a particular ministry. So it's my timeless truth for the day. Hey, I'll see you right here tomorrow for day one 72. We're going to continue our trek through two kings. I think it's going to be incredible. Don't break your streaks if you're on one. I love you guys. So proud of you. I'll see you right here tomorrow. Peace. Thanks so much for joining us on the Bible Department podcast. You can find us online and learn more about the show@thebibledepartment.com and on Instagram hebibledepartment. If you enjoyed this episode and want to dive deeper into the Bible, you can get free access to our library, of course courses@thebibledepartment.com we'll see you back here tomorrow.