Study Desk

When she came to the mountain to the man of God, she took hold of his feet. Gehazi came near to push her away, but the man of God said, "Let her alone. For her soul is troubled within her. The Lord has hidden it from me. He has not told me."

Then they poured it out for the men to eat. As they were eating the food, they cried out, "O man of God, there is death in the pot!" And they could not eat it.

A man came from Baal-shalishah. He brought the man of God a gift of the first-fruits. There were twenty loaves of barley bread and new-grown grain in his bag. Elisha said, "Give them to the people, that they may eat."

And she said to her owner, "I wish that my owner's husband were with the man of God who is in Samaria! Then he would heal his bad skin disease."

When the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, "Am I God, to kill and to make alive? Is this why this man sends word to me to heal a man's bad skin disease? Think about it. He wants to start a fight with me."

Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes. So he sent word to the king, saying, "Why have you torn your clothes? Let him come to me. Then he will know that there is a man of God in Israel."

But Naaman was very angry and went away. He said, "I thought he would come out to me, and stand, and call on the name of the Lord his God. I thought he would wave his hand over the place, and heal the bad skin disease.

Then his servants came and said to him, "My father, if the man of God had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more then, when he says to you, ‘Wash and be clean'?"

So Naaman went down into the Jordan River seven times, as the man of God had told him. And his flesh was made as well as the flesh of a little child. He was clean.

Then Naaman returned to the man of God with all those who were with him. He came and stood in front of Elisha and said, "See, now I know that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel. So I ask you now to take a gift from your servant."

But Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the man of God, thought, "See, my owner has let Naaman the Syrian go without receiving the gift he brought. As the Lord lives, I will run after him and take something from him."

The man of God said, "Where did it fall?" And when he showed him the place, Elisha cut off a stick and threw it in, and the iron came to the top of the water.

The man of God sent news to the king of Israel, saying, "Be careful that you do not pass this place. For the Syrians are coming down there."

The king of Israel sent men to the place where the man of God said there would be danger. So he saved himself there more than once or twice.

And one of his servants said, "None, my lord, O king. Elisha, the man of God who is in Israel, tells the king of Israel the very words you say in your bedroom."

The servant of the man of God got up early and went out. And he saw an army with horses and war-wagons around the city. The servant said to Elisha, "It is bad, sir! What should we do?"

Then he said, "May God do so to me and more also, if the head of Elisha the son of Shaphat stays on him today."

The captain on whose arm the king rested said to the man of God, "See, if the Lord should make windows in heaven, could this thing be?" Elisha said, "You will see it with your own eyes. But you will not eat of it."

Now the king chose the captain on whose arm he rested to watch the gate. But the people stepped on him at the gate. He died just as the man of God had said when the king came down to him.

It happened just as the man of God had told the king, saying, "About this time tomorrow at the gate of Samaria, two baskets of barley will sell for a piece of silver. And a basket of fine flour will sell for a piece of silver."