Elisha Promises Food
7 Then Elisha said, “Listen to the word of the Lord; thus says the Lord, ‘Tomorrow about this time a [a]measure of fine flour will be sold for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, in the gate of Samaria.’” 2 The royal officer on whose hand the king was leaning answered the man of God and said, “Behold, if the Lord should make windows in heaven, could this thing be?” Then he said, “Behold, you will see it with your own eyes, but you will not eat [b]of it.”
Four Lepers Relate Arameans’ Flight
3 Now there were four leprous men at the entrance of the gate; and they said to one another, “Why do we sit here until we die? 4 If we say, ‘We will enter the city,’ then the famine is in the city and we will die there; and if we sit here, we die also. Now therefore come, and let us [c]go over to the camp of the Arameans. If they spare us, we will live; and if they kill us, we will but die.” 5 They arose at twilight to go to the camp of the Arameans; when they came to the outskirts of the camp of the Arameans, behold, there was no one there. 6 For the Lord had caused the army of the Arameans to hear a sound of chariots and a sound of horses, even the sound of a great army, so that they said to one another, “Behold, the king of Israel has hired against us the kings of the Hittites and the kings of the Egyptians, to come upon us.” 7 Therefore they arose and fled in the twilight, and left their tents and their horses and their donkeys, even the camp just as it was, and fled for their life. 8 When these lepers came to the outskirts of the camp, they entered one tent and ate and drank, and carried from there silver and gold and clothes, and went and hid them; and they returned and entered another tent and carried from there also, and went and hid them.
9 Then they said to one another, “We are not doing right. This day is a day of good news, but we are keeping silent; if we wait until morning light, punishment will [d]overtake us. Now therefore come, let us go and tell the king’s household.” 10 So they came and called to the gatekeepers of the city, and they told them, saying, “We came to the camp of the Arameans, and behold, there was no one there, nor the voice of man, only the horses tied and the donkeys tied, and the tents just as they were.” 11 The gatekeepers called and told it within the king’s household. 12 Then the king arose in the night and said to his servants, “I will now tell you what the Arameans have done to us. They know that we are hungry; therefore they have gone from the camp to hide themselves in the field, saying, ‘When they come out of the city, we will capture them alive and get into the city.’” 13 One of his servants said, “Please, let some men take five of the horses which remain, which are left [e]in the city. Behold, they will be in any case like all the multitude of Israel who are left in it; behold, they will be in any case like all the multitude of Israel who have already perished, so let us send and see.” 14 They took therefore two chariots with horses, and the king sent after the army of the Arameans, saying, “Go and see.”
This is a surprising thing here, that the King is one of two people in the royal court that was told directly that things would change tomorrow. Here it is, and he can’t believe his own ears. To be fair, it IS the middle of the night, he’s probably sleep deprived already and they’ve been short on food for some time, so his judgment was impaired.
But the lepers were not afraid to take a chance, because they saw clearly their situation. If they died from the spear, it would be no worse for them than dying of starvation. And one of the king’s servants saw the situation for what it was also, when he asks the king to send five men to investigate. Those men had no hope just staying in the city. To do so was to become like those who had already perished.
They couldn’t just sit on their hands if they were going to survive. While God had intervened, He didn’t drop the food in their laps. Well, He kind of did, but not quite. And so it is with us, that God may intervene in our lives, but He doesn’t hand the results to us on a silver platter. Quite the opposite, He expects us to work for the good things in life, to take action and take responsibility. Much like the men in the parable of the talents, the results were up to them, nothing would happen by accident.
But when we DO take action, when we follow His leading, that’s when things start to come together. God can and will work through His people, but He won’t often work without them. Someone must be willing to take a chance, to take a problem head on, and say “what have we got to lose?” If God is for us, than who can be against us?