This is a sermon for tough times. Elijah was living in a very difficult day during the reign of King Ahab. And that wicked Jezebel, that daughter of an ungodly king, was influencing greatly the nation for evil. We know that God has a plan for His church in the midst of wicked days. And that is something we need to reinforce. Because the days are evil does not mean God's work does not go on. The Lord always promises, I will build my church. And the plan of God is that this world will function and perhaps even decline in deeper wickedness with evil men abounding and the light of the gospel growing ever so dim and challenged. But in such times, we need servants of God, and we need the 7,000 who will not bow the knee to Beal." Now, there's a debate on why Elijah did not recognize that there were 7,000 who had not bowed the knee. If he was such a sage and prophet, a man in touch with his times, how did he not know? Some explained that there were 7,000 that would yet arise, and they would come forth in a very soon future date, and therefore Elijah was not personally aware of them. And that added to his despondency. Threatened by Jezebel, Hated by Ahab, haunted by all, we find Elijah under a juniper tree, wishing to die. He is really saying, it's over. It's over. There is nothing more to do. God intervened and through an angel and other means, he rested him and he fed him. And he recommissioned him to anoint two men who would be kings and to anoint Elisha. And it is Elisha's commission that becomes the strong hope of Elijah as his work, not quite, but soon, comes to an end. And so this chapter is really about Elijah's recovery. Who is Elisha? Well, he is described here as the servant and successor of Elijah. He was the son of Shaphat. verse 19, and the name would betoken that Shaphat was a judge. He was some kind of governor or leader in the land. He was a landowner. He had quite a large farming operation going on. And we find Elisha coming behind the twelfth man in twelve set of oxen. And Elisha is now most likely the master plowman. He's the one coming behind, keeping an eye on the others as they go in and out of the furrows and as they plow the land. His call, well, absolutely sudden. There seems to be no prior preparation. God sovereignly commissions Elijah to go down and anoint Elisha as a prophet. Now, the prospects to be a young prophet and a servant to Elijah were not good. You'll find in verse 1 that Elijah was very unpopular. In verse 4, he was very depressed. In verse 10, he was very lonely. He thought the work of God was on its way out. There was no way ahead. And then in verse 16, You will see God commissioning him, saying, going down, and anoint Elisha, the son of Shaphat, to be prophet in thy room. Now, that would appear to be like a pension scheme. You're going to get pensioned off, your work's over, and a young man's going to come along and take over. But instead of depressing Elijah, it really became a tremendous encouragement to him. In verse 19, Elijah found Elisha plowing. He called him, cast his mantle upon him, and he marks him as his successor. Tonight I want us to look at Elisha's response. This young man on his father's farm, in a safe, prosperous industry, without risk, without any complications in life, And suddenly, he's called away from it all to become a servant of God. And what we're going to see here tonight is absolute, total consecration. No going back. No hesitation. He is totally committed, and he is in no way half-hearted in what he's going to do. I think you'll agree tonight that the difficulty of our age is half-hearted service. I think there are many that claim to be God's workers, and they do so half-heartedly. They do so with a double mind. They want to serve the world, they want to serve God, they want to have mammon or money, they want to have the popularity of man, and yet they want to serve God. We see that this certainly was not the approach of Elisha, and we mark here his total consecration and the obedience that that requires. Now let's look at it in three ways. Number one, accepting the mantle. Number two, conquering the temptation to go back. And number three, arising to serve. And all of this comes together in these short few verses, 19 to 21 in 1 Kings chapter 19. So in verse 19, you will see his obedience in accepting the mantle of Elijah. Now, this mantle was not just a cloak, not just a garment, it was a symbol. It was a symbol of the office being conferred or transferred from Elijah to Elisha. It was most likely a very loose kind of garment or cloak that would have been draped around the body. It would have been quite easy to come from any angle and just take it off and sling it around the other person and say, you are called to serve God. And so if we can picture this scene, we see Elijah arriving in this plowed field. Have you ever walked over plowed field? It's a bit like walking in deep snow. The ground underneath you is crumbly. Or if it's a wet weather, it's muddy and dirty, and your boots might well stick in the freshly plowed soil. And here arrives Elijah, and he is seeking his man. He is to anoint this man, Elisha, the son of Shaphat, of the area of Abel Meholah. He gets his address and he arrives in the plowed field. He clamors over those fresh furrows. He seeks out Elisha and he switches off his own garment and slings it around this young man, Elisha. And lo and behold, without hesitation, Elisha accepts it. There's no protest. There's no questioning. There's no apparent confusion. What does this mean? What does this mean? How am I really to do? There seems to be immediate comprehension of the significance of this mantle. And Elisha was convinced that this mantle was God's call to him. And when you follow the steps of his responses and the few questions he had, you will see that he's not questioning the call, He's just wanting to get things in order to immediately obey. Now, I don't read that Elisha saw this coming. We are not told that there was some heads up for him. He was busy on the farm. He was the twelfth man in a row of twelve sets of oxen plowing. In Canadian modern farming, that would be like a prairie field with twelve tractors, and whatever number of furrows they are turning each up and down the field. And there's a sense of accomplishment. There's a sense of a good day's work getting done. There's a sense of managing these oxen and the men who are plowing with them. Elisha has a lot to look forward to in the very world in which he's living on his father's farm. And there's no hint that he had heads up in what was coming. We know from the Scripture in verse 16 that God had appointed Elisha. This was a sovereign act of God. In verse 16, you will read here that Elijah was sent, and Jehu the son of Nimshe, shalt thou anoint to be king over Israel, and Elisha the son of Shaphat. And so Elijah was merely carrying out God's bidding, and he was coming to do what God had appointed him to do. And so we can expect that God is preparing the heart of this young man, Elisha. That's God's business. It's God that prepares hearts. It's God that raises up men and sometimes women who do special work for God. It is God who puts the burden, the obedience, and the aptitude within the soul that they might fully and with whatever knowledge they have, Step out and do the will of God with all their hearts. Every Christian should be praying for an obedient heart. We don't know what twists and turns there may be in the road ahead of us. We don't know what door of service God might have. But we ought to be constantly praying, Lord, get me to the place that when you show me the way, I am ready to walk. and do the bidding of the Lord. Lord, make me willing for thy will. Today we had our sermon this morning on looking unto Jesus. Well, let's look to him in the Garden of Gethsemane. Let's think of the Lord Jesus praying, not my will, but thy will be done. I wonder, are you surrendered to that point where you erase your own will? and say, Lord, I want to be lost in doing and genuinely obeying Thee to do Thy will. Would you look unto the Lord as our example of surrender? You look at the whole life of our Savior. It was a life surrendered to the will of God. He set His face as a flint to Jerusalem and to the cross. His goal was to do His Father's will in suffering to save His people and to redeem His church. Now, as we look onto Jesus as our example in this, we ought to be on bended knee and say, Lord, take my life and let it be consecrated, Lord, to Thee. Now the bestowing of the mantle was the mark of Elijah's obedience, and I mean Elijah, the older man. Taking that mantle off himself and casting it on Elisha was a direct act of his obedience. He did exactly what God told him to do—go down and anoint Elisha, and he used this mantle as that symbol of his offers being conferred upon him. Now, Because Elijah was in the will of God, and because he found the right man at the right place at the right time, and Elijah was doing God's will, that became the green light for Elisha. And so the obedience of the older man Elijah became a green light for obedience for the younger man, Elisha. And we learn from this that it is by the obedience of each Christian, each brother in the Lord, that we impact others to obey God. None of us live unto ourselves. And yes, I am my brother's keeper. If I become careless, if I don't seek God's will for my life, if I lose out in fellowship with God and don't listen to His voice, then I'm going to walk astray. I'm going to miss those cues that God gives, and I'm going to impact others who might be seeking God's will and might be desiring to do God's work. When you're waiting on God to know His will, ask God to open a door, do something, show me, guide me. And surely this young Elisha was doing that. I can't see how he would have immediate response in his obedience without being a prepared young man. and God sent Elijah. I can parallel this in my own call. I happened to be in Calgary in 1982. It was a long weekend, helping out the minister who was the founding pastor of the congregation there. And he had never had a vacation in a few years, and I was asked just to visit for a weekend. I preached on the Sunday and I stayed for the Tuesday prayer meeting. And the minister didn't take a holiday at all. He led the services and he was right there and was in on everything. But at that prayer meeting, God was working. There were prayers for Canada, there were prayers for family, and family members in Vancouver. It was definitely a time when the Lord was in the midst. After the meeting was over and we were going out, the lady who was the wife of one of the elders, she opened her Bible, and she showed me Jeremiah 315. I will give you pastors after my own heart. Now, why she did that that night, Why she chose that verse, but God used that verse and her witness, just like Elijah to Elisha. She had a burden, obviously, that God would raise up preachers, pastors, after his own heart. I don't think she knew that about six months later, the minister of that church would be departing because of the health issues of his wife. I don't think she knew that at that time. But she was burdened. And God took her burden, stirred her heart to share that very verse with me. And the rest is history. God works. in signal ways, unexpected ways, ways that we may not even imagine. But if you're on your knees asking God to guide you, He will. He certainly will. And so we see the importance to always and earnestly follow God's Word and to be in prayer that we might even be that green light to some servant of God, and to see them thrust out into God's work. And of course, it will impact a generation to come. I think of a father, and there are dads here tonight. Your walk with God will impact your witness to your children, your obedience to God, will be the instrument that will guide your children. And when a father loses out with God, it makes an amazing impact in the home. And you need to be walking close to the Lord and seeking his will. Now, all of that from the mantle, his readiness to accept the mantle. And we need to be ready to say, Lord, show me. guide me." Then there was conquering the temptation to go back. In verse 20, we have a scene that really parallels a scene we have in the Gospels. It says here in verse 20, he left the oxen and ran after Elijah. Notice the immediate, no hesitation response. And he said, Let me, I pray thee, kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow thee. And Elijah said unto him, Go back again, for what have I to do with thee? Now, it is very possible that in Luke's gospel, the Lord Jesus referred to this whole event when he said that no man, having put his hand to the plow and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God. Going back at God's call is a very serious matter. And we fear that too many, too many who hear the voice of God calling them, stop their ears and find some excuse or some way to go back. Now, here is where a great struggle lies. And there is this battle, this temptation to go back. And of course, Elisha is seeking to go back to his family and explain things and so on. Now, this applies also to some unconverted soul. This might apply to someone who is not a Christian, and you know that the Lord is speaking to your heart and calling you to give your life, give your heart to the Savior, and you say, but let me first do this. Let me sort this out in my life, and then I'll become a Christian. Well, that has its problems. So I want us to see here tonight this conquering family ties. He says here in verse 20, "'Let me, I pray thee, kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow thee.'" So he has to conquer family ties. And you know, another incident in the Gospels where the Lord Jesus said, "'Follow me,' But the man said, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. And Jesus said unto him, Let the dead bury their dead. And another also said, Lord, I will follow thee, but let me go bid them farewell, which are at home at my house. And it was that that prompted Jesus to say, No man having put his hand to the plow, and to go back as worthy, as fit for the kingdom of God. Now, in this case, it appears that Elisha has permission to go back. There is a difficulty in interpreting verse 20, that statement, go back again, for what have I done to thee? At first reading, that might sound like, oh, just forget it. You're not the man that God was looking for at all. But upon pondering this, There might be a sense in which, go back, but don't forget what I have done to thee. Don't forget the mantle. Don't forget the conferring of office. Yes, go back, but don't forget. forget to go through with God and serve him." And I think the best commentary on this difficult statement is really how things played out, the story itself. And it says, "...he returned back from him, and took a yoke of oxen, and slew them," and so on. So you'll see that Elijah got the victory. He got the victory over his family, He got his victory over this temptation of forgetting and denying and running from the call of God. And then we also see that he had conquered his farming ties. There were these oxen, the instruments of the plow and so on that he was working with. And you'll see the very radical approach that he took. It says he returned back from him and took a yoke of oxen and slew them, and boiled their flesh with the instruments of the oxen, and gave unto the people." And so, this is it. His life's going to change. He won't need these oxen anymore. He won't need these instruments by which he's boiling the beef in the pot. And Elisha is done with the old life, the ties to his farming life, and here is his victory over these farming ties. And the lesson is that it takes total consecration to serve the Lord. The power of this world, the power of business, the power of making money, the power of the well-done of man is so hindering to serving the Lord that there are times when we need to make that clean brick and just put away everything. and follow on to serve the Lord. I think we see here that there is good reason why God even today calls people full-time into the work of the gospel. It is impossible for a man to equip himself for Christian ministry to be a preacher of the Word and a pastor of the Lord's people, and to be a witness for Christ, and to do it without total surrender of life, and to give himself from the rigors of this world, free himself from that, that he might become dedicated, consecrated to the service of the Lord." Now, in 2 Timothy 2.4, the apostle Paul says, "...no man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life." that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier. And Paul was speaking to Timothy and saying to him, what does a soldier do? When a soldier signs up for the military, for the army, he puts on that uniform and he puts away the old life. He shuts down business, shuts down his old employment. He says goodbye to all his friends and he goes into the ranks of the army as a soldier. He can no longer serve king and country. by being entangled in the affairs of this life. And this is God's call, certainly to his servants, and sometimes to his people, that there are things that you've got to put away that you might totally dedicate your life to the Lord. For me, I was like Elisha. As I've read over, studied over, and prayed over these, I've had many thoughts of the hours and the days when I was a young man on the farm, when responsibilities on the farm were growing, and ties were strong. My father was deceased. My brother was still on the farm. He was sort of the machinery guy, and I was the stock person. And God just had to deal with my heart. And there came a point where I had to surrender. I remember standing at the top of a little hill above our home and farm, looking over the dairy cows grazing in the green field. And that text came to my heart, lovest thou me more than these? And I had to say, yes, Lord, and I'm willing to break the ties and serve the Lord. There is consecration demanded to serve Christ. It's going to cost you, and it's going to mean sacrificing the oxen, giving up the plow, and going after the Lord. He also had to conquer friendship ties. You'll notice here that he threw a party. In verse 21, he slew the oxen, boiled their flesh with the instruments of the oxen, and gave on to the people. Now, the people may have been the workers and the farm, but I'm sure a family like that had many connections, and Elisha was making a very sudden departure, and this was an opportunity to make it known. make it known that he was done with the farming life. He was going to be servant with Elijah. And we're told here that they did eat. That means that they acknowledged the message. They entered into the eating and in a sense supported or at least gave consent to what Elisha was soon to do." And this is a great testimony of Elisha. He is now the servant of the Lord. And I wonder tonight, have you told your friends that you're a Christian? Have you told your circles that you don't follow the world, you serve the Lord? And when you make that stand and make that testimony, What a great witness it can be for the Lord Jesus. And that testimony will help you all your days, all your life. You need to be radical. Make the break. Slay the oxen. And there's another term that's often used, burn your boats. And that came from an experience with Alexander the Great when he led his army against the Persians. And as they sailed in ship and came on shore to the land of the Persians, and I couldn't find out exactly the geographical location, but when they landed on shore, The first command that Alexander gave was, burn your boats. And after they had burned their boats, he said to the men, if we ever return home, it will be on Persian ships. We fight or die. They won the battle. Their complete consecration. was a mighty power with God. And you'll see with Elisha, there was no plan B. This doesn't work out. This fails. Then I'll come back. It was over, and he went to serve God. The last point I make here tonight is that we see his obedience in a rising to serve. We're told here at the end of verse 21, then he arose and went after Elijah and ministered unto him. That one little sentence completes the obedience of Elisha. He had new work to do and he had a new master to serve. He arose and went. And there is a statement here of ready service. It was not lip service. Elisha shows that words are not enough. It was his up and going that proves his consecration. And the Bible has so much advice for us against lip service versus real service. And in Matthew 7, let me just quote these verses. You'll know them. Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven. Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name, and in thy name have cast out devils, and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you. And the Lord went on in that Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 7, ending up with the example of the one building on rock versus sand. Those building on the rock were those that did the will of God, not just saying that they would do the will of God. And so disobedience is a true test of the heart. He arose and went. I wonder tonight, are you willing to show your obedience, not just by words, not just by lip service, but by real action, real dedication, real consecration to go through with God? And if you're not a Christian tonight, your words mean nothing. Words do not prove your repentance. The Lord told the occasion of two brothers. One said that he repented and went not. The others who said, I will not go and repented, that was the one who did the will of God. So tonight, if perchance you are not a Christian, have you obeyed the gospel call? The call to cease living for the world and to be a true disciple and follower of the Lord Jesus. False repentance merely says sorry and does nothing. True repentance is to arise and go. Tonight, as we come to the end of this Lord's Day, Come to Christ. Give your heart to the Savior. Not just say sometime, not say somehow, not merely give words, but quit the world. and follow after and serve the Lord as your service." We see Elisha got the victory over family ties, farming ties, and friendship ties. Those are things that every convert has to break. There are women who cannot—they say they cannot become a Christian because their husband will not support them. There are children who say, I cannot go home and tell my parents I've become a Christian. There are many difficult things to face if we will serve the Lord to the saving of our souls. And so tonight, I leave with you this great example of a man called of God, consecrated, burning the oxen, sacrificing them, boiling them, feeding his friends, and going off to serve Elijah. What a great picture. What a great picture. I pray that God in this nation will raise up men called of God. Not half-hearted men. Not men who will put one foot in the world and one foot in the work of God. But dedicated men. And our example in the church can become the green light to such men. And so we all have a responsibility, and we're all called to totally dedicate ourselves to the Lord.