Study Desk

Therefore this is what the Lord says, "You will not leave the bed you lie on, for you will certainly die!"'" So Elijah went on his way.

They replied, "He was a hairy man and had a leather belt tied around his waist." The king said, "He is Elijah the Tishbite."

The king sent a captain and his fifty soldiers to retrieve Elijah. The captain went up to him, while he was sitting on the top of a hill. He told him, "Prophet, the king says, ‘Come down!'"

Elijah replied to the captain, "If I am indeed a prophet, may fire come down from the sky and consume you and your fifty soldiers!" Fire then came down from the sky and consumed him and his fifty soldiers.

The king sent another captain and his fifty soldiers to retrieve Elijah. He went up and told him, "Prophet, this is what the king says, ‘Come down at once!'"

Elijah replied to them, "If I am indeed a prophet, may fire come down from the sky and consume you and your fifty soldiers!" Fire from God came down from the sky and consumed him and his fifty soldiers.

The king sent a third captain and his fifty soldiers. This third captain went up and fell on his knees before Elijah. He begged for mercy, "Prophet, please have respect for my life and for the lives of these fifty servants of yours.

The rest of the events of Ahaziah's reign, including his accomplishments, are recorded in the scroll called the Annals of the Kings of Israel.

Elijah took his cloak, folded it up, and hit the water with it. The water divided, and the two of them crossed over on dry ground.

While Elisha was watching, he was crying out, "My father, my father! The chariot and horsemen of Israel!" Then he could no longer see him. He grabbed his clothes and tore them in two.

He did evil in the sight of the Lord , but not to the same degree as his father and mother. He did remove the sacred pillar of Baal that his father had made.

So he took his firstborn son, who was to succeed him as king, and offered him up as a burnt sacrifice on the wall. There was an outburst of divine anger against Israel, so they broke off the attack and returned to their homeland.

Now a wife of one of the prophets appealed to Elisha for help, saying, "Your servant, my husband is dead. You know that your servant was a loyal follower of the Lord . Now the creditor is coming to take away my two boys to be his servants."

He told his servant Gehazi, "Ask the Shunammite woman to come here." So he did so and she came to him.

The boy grew and one day he went out to see his father who was with the harvest workers.

He said to his father, "My head! My head!" His father told a servant, "Carry him to his mother."

So he picked him up and took him to his mother. He sat on her lap until noon and then died.

So she went to visit the prophet at Mount Carmel. When he saw her at a distance, he said to his servant Gehazi, "Look, it's the Shunammite woman.

But when she reached the prophet on the mountain, she grabbed hold of his feet. Gehazi came near to push her away, but the prophet said, "Leave her alone, for she is very upset. The Lord has kept the matter hidden from me; he didn't tell me about it."

When Elisha arrived at the house, there was the child lying dead on his bed.