Steven Furtick - Pound the Ground (03/05/2017)
This sermon from 2 Kings 2 and 13 focuses on Elisha's transition into his ministry after Elijah's departure. The preacher emphasizes that our identity in God, affirmed before any great works, is the foundation for faithful action. The message concludes by urging believers not to settle for partial victories but to persistently "pound the ground" in faith for total and complete victory in their calling.
The Transition at the Jordan River
I feel really strongly what God put in me to give to you tonight. And I feel like it was the right time and the perfect moment for us to be together. And so I want to share with you tonight a passage that may be familiar to a lot of you, and it's in Second Kings chapter two. I want to share with you about a transitional moment in the life of Elisha the prophet. I'm going to try to weave two things together. I hope they make sense when I'm done, but kind of go with me here. I want to preach a message to you called Strike the Water. At the beginning of Elisha's ministry, as we see Elijah's ministry end and Elisha's begin, I want to read a fair amount of context. So try to just stay with me because it'll pay off if we do.
There's an inciting incident that gets Elisha's ministry started. I guess we'll just pick up and read it in verse one, and the background will fill in itself. Second Kings chapter two, verse one, Scripture says: When the Lord was about to take Elijah up to heaven in a whirlwind, Elijah and Elisha were on their way from Gilgal. Elijah said to Elisha, "Stay here; the Lord has sent me to Bethel." But Elisha said, "As surely as the Lord lives and as you live, I will not leave you." And this is the kind of people you want around you. There are some people who are so tenacious about the destiny that God has called them into that you can't stop them from pursuing the purpose of God, even if you try to run them off. And you can't run them off because it's a calling deeper than commitment.
Verse three says: The company of the prophets at Bethel came out to Elisha and asked, "Do you know that the Lord is going to take your master from you today?" "Yes, I know," Elisha replied, "so be quiet." I'm sad about it. I don't want to hear about it. The Bible is just funny. I didn't even make any commentary; you're laughing. I love the Bible. People say the Bible is boring. No, you're boring. I don't want to read the Bible. It's not boring. Elisha is heartbroken. This is the man who called him out to do greater things from a predictable life into a life of unimaginable significance for the kingdom of God. And now Elijah is about to leave. He's about to be taken up in dramatic fashion. And Elisha knows this, and he's sad, and he's torn.
Pursuing Purpose Through Confusion
Yet some of the most incredible things that God will do in our lives will come at the time when we're the most confused and the most bewildered and the most disoriented. So if you feel any of those three ways tonight, congratulations. It means you're set up. Verse four: Then Elijah said to him, "Stay here, Elisha; the Lord has sent me to Jericho." You can't come. And he replied, "As surely as the Lord lives and as you live, I will not leave you." So they went to Jericho. The company of the prophets at Jericho went up to Elisha and asked him, "Do you know that the Lord is going to take your master from you today?" "Yes, I know," he replied, "so be quiet." And then Elijah said to him, "Stay here; the Lord has sent me to the Jordan." And he replied, "As surely as the Lord lives and as you live, you're not getting rid of me."
Verse seven: Fifty men from the company of the prophets went and stood at a distance, facing the place where Elijah and Elisha had stopped at the Jordan. The Jordan River always represents transition in Scripture. This river is central to the transitional history of the people of Israel. Joshua had crossed the Jordan River. And now that story, the story that began long before Joshua, the story of God claiming a people for himself, and the story of God sending his people into a land of captivity for a season, but then bringing them out into their own land. Now that story is colliding with Elisha's story, and there's an intersection happening. And they're standing at the Jordan River.
The Mantle, the Request, and the Whirlwind
Verse eight says: Elijah took his cloak and rolled it up and struck the water with it. And the water divided to the right and to the left, and the two of them crossed over on dry ground. And when they had crossed, Elijah said to Elisha, "Tell me, what can I do for you before I am taken from you?" You've been with me for years. You've packed my suitcase and carried my briefcase, and you've been by my side. What is it that you want? And you've got to love Elisha, because he does not care. He is not scared to ask something ridiculous. God likes people like that. "Let me inherit a double portion of your spirit," Elisha replied. Whoa! "You have asked a difficult thing," Elijah said.
I heard a quote the other day: "The dream is free, but the journey is not." He said, you don't know what you're asking for. I know people tell me, and I'm sure you've heard it a lot more: "I want to do what you do." That was cute. That was real cute. Dude, you've got to do it. No, I think we read this verse wrong. I mean, a lot of people have preached on these verses. It usually makes it sound like Elijah was saying, "I can give you a double portion of my spirit, but it would be kind of hard for me to give you a double portion." He wasn't saying, "It'll be hard for me to give you a double portion of my spirit." He's saying, "It'll be difficult for you to carry it." The burden weighs the same as the blessing. Want the heavy blessing? It's going to be a heavy burden.
That's what I told the teenagers today. I said, everybody isn't going to like you if you live for God. You're not going back to your school to change your school with people who necessarily know they need to be changed or want to be changed. "You have asked a difficult thing. Yet, if you see me when I am taken from you, it will be yours. Otherwise, it will not." You choose. How closely you want to follow. How passionately do you want to pursue. As they were walking along and talking together, suddenly a chariot of fire and horses of fire appeared and separated the two of them. And Elijah went up to heaven in a whirlwind. A lot of great stuff here. Verse twelve: Elisha saw this and cried out, "My father! My father! The chariots and horsemen of Israel!" And Elisha saw him no more. Then he took hold of his own garment and tore it in two. That's sadness.
Strike the Water: Stepping Into Your Identity
But then Elisha picked up Elijah's cloak that had fallen from him and went back and stood on the bank of the Jordan. And he took the cloak that had fallen from Elijah and he struck the water. Everybody say, "Strike the water." And he struck the water with it. And here's what he said: "Where now is the Lord, the God of Elijah?" I can tell you what he's thinking while he's doing this, because the cloak is like a hairy garment, animal skin. And while he's got it up in the air, just like he saw Elijah do, I can tell you exactly what he's thinking: "Dear God, I hope this works." That's what he's saying. Have you ever been standing to do something for God that you think He told you to do? Don't act like you know He told you to do it, and you saw somebody else do it, and it looked real good when they did it, and it was so effective when they did it.
And then you get out there in the Jordan, in transition, and you kind of throw up in your mouth a little bit and have to swallow it back down. Look, unless it's in the Bible, like, don't commit adultery, don't kill people, the most sure you're going to be about most things God tells you to do is about 65%. That's about as good as it gets. And you'll be thinking, "I hope this works." Any pastors here have ever been in a, "Dear God, I have people around me watching this, depending on me. This feels really silly for me to expect this result"? I remember the first time I stood up in front of our church and I said, "We're going to have 2,000 people in the church." We had 200. I said, "By next Easter, 2,000." Please, God, please make this work. If you don't part this water, it ain't going to part.
But watch. Watch how faithful God is to anybody who will trust him with a relentless, persistent, dogged faith. The Bible says that when he struck the water, he said, "Where now is the Lord, the God of Elijah?" God, please come through for me. God, please don't leave me out here in this transition by myself. God, please back this up. I'm trying my best to do what I think you want me to do. God, please show yourself strong. God, Elijah is gone. What I knew is no more. Please make it work. The Bible says, When he struck the water, it divided to the right and to the left, and he crossed over. Everybody clap for Elisha. It's a big deal. Verse fifteen. The Bible says that when they saw Elisha cross over the same way Elijah had crossed over.
Identity Before Activity
The company of the prophets from Jericho who were watching said, "The spirit of Elijah is resting on Elisha." And they went to meet him and bowed to the ground before him. And his ministry began. But I can tell you something else that's not implicit in the text, but we know it to be true. Elisha had the spirit of Elijah on him before these 50 men recognized it and affirmed it. And Elisha goes on to do magnificent miracles. He throws some salt into the water. Very first public miracle that we read about. And the water, the Springs that were contaminated and brought forth death were purified and brought forth life. He commanded rain to come through the power of the prophetic word into the desert where the Israelite armies were dying of thirst. Amazing.
He multiplied a widow's oil supply. Incredible. He prophesied that a woman who was barren would give birth. When that child died sometime later, he raised that child from the dead. And I could go on and on about how he made an axe head float to the surface of the water. But that's not nearly as cool as raising somebody from the dead. So we'll skip that one. That's a deleted scene. On and on it goes. But can I say something to you? I believe that the primary significance of Elisha striking the Jordan River had less to do with the activity that he would go on to perform. And everything to do with the identity that God wanted to establish. Here's why. Identity always comes before activity in the order of God.
And before Elisha could go on to do greater things, he had to have a baptism, if we can call it that, in the affirmation of God that the same God who worked miracles through Elijah, that same character was residual inside of him. And that's what happened in the water that day. And when he said, "Where now is the Lord, the God of Elijah?" He's establishing: I need that same God. I need the God of Paul and Peter and James and John, who broke men out of prison cells at midnight. I need that God to come right now and show himself strong on my behalf.
This Is Not a Walkthrough
Back in the day of real video games. I don't know how much of this culturally will translate, but I'm going to try. Games like Super Mario Brothers. Donkey Kong. How far will you go with me? Contra? Getting a little thin. Anybody remember the code for 30 extra men on Contra? If anybody knows it, you can get a double portion right now. It could be yours. Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, start. You're my man. Go preach the gospel now. Cast out demons. My son, the older one, Elijah…. I don't mean to confuse you with all this Elijah, Elisha stuff. This is my actual son, Elijah. He's seven. He asked me recently, "Daddy, tell me about some of the video games from way back when you were a little boy."
So, ignoring the inherent insult in his comment, I went online. I didn't know you could find these, but I found some walkthroughs on YouTube. I didn't even know there was such a thing. How many of you know what a walkthrough is? Okay, I didn't either. You can go on YouTube and watch somebody else play the whole game and beat the game. So, here's what happened. We did that for about an hour. I got really entranced. I got in the flow. And my wife, Holly, walks in, and she had been out doing something completely unproductive like grocery shopping or something while I was teaching my boy about punch out. And when she came back in, she wanted to know…she said, "So what are you doing?"
Because she could tell that we had not kind of completed the tasks that we were going to do, and we've been around the computer for a little while. And so, she said, "What are you doing?" I said, "We're watching a video game." She looked confused. She said, "You mean you're playing a video game?" "No," I said, "I wish I was. I would feel so much better about myself, but I'm actually…" A video game is already a vicarious activity. You're already pretending to do something. You're not actually doing it. Now, how sad is this? I'm watching somebody pretend to do something on a computer. Please don't laugh at me. That's how a lot of people come to church. That's how a lot of people read the Bible.
See, this is not a walkthrough. Touch your neighbor and tell them "This ain't a walkthrough." The point of all of this… This is why I love this conference. Can I be honest? Because you don't wait on anybody to lead you to worship. You just worship, because this is not an opportunity for you to observe a professional. This is an opportunity for you to engage with the God who has all power. Until you pick up the cloak, you don't have to have somebody from the other side of the world. You need good preachers. You need good teachers. Thank God for all of that. But the point of all of this is so that you would actually do it. So, when you know who God is, and he shows you who you are, you will know what to do. Identity, then activity.
That's why I love how God said about Jesus, "This is my beloved son, with him I am well pleased," before he did any miracles. It's so cool to me how Elisha struck the water. And you know what's amazing about it? The mantle was his before he did any miracles. That mantle hid his shoulders before he did anything to earn it. I was thinking the other day how most of us spend our whole life auditioning for a part that God has already given us to play. We have this show in the States called The Voice. Have you ever seen this show? Has it made its way to your fair place of residence? Do they have the judges with the big chairs?
The Audition Is Canceled
Do they have the blind auditions where the singers come in, and they can't see the singers, so they just listen to them, and the singers start singing, and the judges, if they like what they hear, they hit their button, and their chair turns around, and they choose that singer for their team? I was watching The Voice, and God said, "That's a picture of how most people do life in ministry." Auditioning for people who frankly don't have a button to push. Who are you auditioning for? God spoke a word into my heart, and I hope he'll speak it into yours as well. Now, the audition has been canceled. Here's why. You don't have to perform any activity to register approval with God. You don't have to sing another note.
You don't have to get another person to believe in you. You don't have to chase the affirmation of people who, truth be told and truth be known, don't really have the affirmation to give. Once you've been baptized in the affirmation of your Father, here's all you have to do. You just show up and sing. You just show up and play the part. And now I don't have to live up to anything that anyone expects. I can live out of the calling that God has already put inside of me, and it's a fundamental shift. Would you please be so kind as to touch three people in your general seating area and tell them, "The audition has been canceled." The audition has been canceled. The audition has been canceled.
I don't know if you got the memo, but you don't have to get your act together so some people will like you. God accepts you. He's working on you. You don't have to wait until a future point in time when you've got your act all together to be greatly used by God. He can deal with your downside. He knew you were dysfunctional when he called you. He wants to work some things out in your life. He doesn't want to leave you like you are, but just like you are right here, right now, he already looks at you through the lens of the beloved Jesus Christ. And when he sees you, he doesn't see your filthiness, he sees his righteousness, and you've already been called, and you've already been chosen. You've already got the part. Now play it. And guess what? All the people standing up and clapping are people I brought with me. I pay them to do that. I bring my own love.
Pound the Ground for Total Victory
You know what, though? That's not even really the thing I wanted to tell you. I'm not going to be much longer. Don't get nervous. But I wanted to show you something, because I was reading through the Bible in a year. I'm reading through the Bible in a year right now, and I was reading about Elisha. I came across this the other day, and I thought it was so significant. At the end of Elisha's life, he's very sick, and there's a king in Israel who is worshiping other gods, and the nation is in trouble. And so trouble often causes you to turn to God at a different level with a different intensity. And so this king comes to see Elisha, and we're going to pick it up in 2 Kings 13, verse 14.
Now Elisha had been suffering from the illness from which he died. Jehoash, king of Israel, went down to see him and wept over him. "My father! My father!" he cried, "the chariots and horsemen of Israel!" We've seen this scene before. We saw it when Elijah was taken up. That was chapter 2, verse 12. But now Elisha, after all the ministry he's done, he's being taken up. He's going on. Verse 15, Elisha said, "Get a bow and some arrows." And he did so. "Take the bow in your hands," he said to the king of Israel. And when he'd taken it, Elisha put his hands on the king's hands. "Open the east window," he said, and he opened it. "Shoot," Elisha said, and he shot. "The Lord's arrow of victory, the arrow of victory over Aram," Elisha declared. "You will completely destroy the Arameans at Aphek."
Then he said, "Take the arrows," and the king took them. Elisha told him, "Strike the ground." He struck it three times, and he stopped. The man of God was angry with him. He said, "You should have struck the ground five or six times. Then you would have defeated Aram and completely destroyed it. But now you will defeat it only three times." And then verse 20 says, Elisha died and was buried. How strange. The last time we see this guy… Remember, he raises the dead. It's his day job. And the last time we see him, he's given an archery lesson to some wicked king, and he's mad. And I can't figure out why he's mad. Because all he told the man was, "Take the arrow, strike the ground." Okay, the dude did what he said. He didn't tell him how many times to strike the ground. The dude did what he was told. And he stopped.
Why Did You Stop Striking?
Perhaps a little historical context will be helpful to us in discerning the meaning of this passage. So it's very likely that the king knew that the number of times he struck the ground represented the number of victories that he would win. In this day, in this culture, in this time, you didn't just beat your enemy one time and the war was over. Or two or three times. It would typically take five or six attacks. It would take that many to completely destroy the enemy. So you defeat them one time, that's a start. Defeat them two or three times, that's enough to back them off. But to really completely destroy them, it's going to take five or six times. So it's as if Elisha is watching this king, and this king takes the arrow, and the king goes, "Uh-uh. You want me to strike the ground? I'll strike the ground." And Elisha says, "Is that all you got? Are you serious?"
The God of victory is fighting for you, and you just want partial victory? You should have kept striking. Now, Elisha has the right to say this. Remember, this is the one who Elisha told three times, "Leave me alone. I'm not going anywhere." This is the one who, when they said, "The Springs are polluted," he said, "Bring me some salt." I threw salt in the water, and the whole economy turned around. This is the one who struck the water with everybody watching. Here's the second title of my sermon. It's a sermon with two titles. That's not very good form, but I felt like doing it. I'm going home in a couple days anyway, so I don't really care what you think about it. The second title of this sermon is Pound the Ground.
Touch your neighbor, tell them, "Pound the ground." Pound the ground. Strike the water. Pound the ground. Pound the ground. Pound the ground. Elisha said, "You should have kept pounding, because then you would have had total victory. Is that enough? You should have kept striking. Why did you stop striking? If you'd have kept striking, you would have completely destroyed your enemy." But most believers are content to settle for simply surviving the world. But God didn't raise you up to survive the world. He raised you up to change the world through the power of the movement of his church. There's somebody here, and you're doing what God told you to do, but you're just kind of doing it. You're just barely doing it.
You're showing up, but you're not really showing up. You're in ministry, but you're not really doing it with the passion you used to do it with. You're raising your kids, but you've gotten so overwhelmed by the battles that you've settled into survival mode. I'm not screaming because I'm angry. I'm screaming because God has sent me here to ask you, "Why did you stop there?" With the Spirit of God living in endless, abundant supply inside of you, why in the world would you strike three times? You know why I think he stopped after three? Because he knew that every victory he would win meant another battle he would have to fight. And there are some people here, and I know I don't know you, but I know me, and so I'm speaking to your situation because I know my own.
Keep Going For The Glory of God
There are some people here, and you stopped striking the ground because you're tired of fighting the battles. Look, you're not here because you're a horrible Christian. Most of you here are committed to doing the will of God, but how much victory do you want? How much favor do you want? How much legacy do you want to leave? How much impact? How much mission? How much glory? You ought to pound a little more. How much faith? And the Spirit of God is saying tonight, in this open session, God is listening. He can stand up to be learned. If this breaks, I'll put 200 pounds of tons in the offering, and it'll be all good. God is saying, "Strike again and again and again and again and again. Don't stop pounding now."
I know you're doing pretty good. I know you're going to heaven when you die. I know things are going pretty good in your ministry. I know you're doing better than most people. I know you've already come a long way, but there's more victory. I know you feel like giving up, but the Spirit of God says tonight, "You haven't seen anything yet." I know you might not have much fruit on the vine right now, but there's something growing on the inside of you that can't be stopped. Don't you stop pounding. Don't you stop believing. Don't you stop praying. Don't you stop dreaming. Don't you stop preaching. Don't stop teaching. Don't stop raising. Don't stop... Keep going. Keep having faith. Keep loving. Keep forgiving. Keep preaching. Keep preaching. Keep doing it. For the glory of God. For this kingdom cannot be shaken. And there is total victory in his name. In the name of Jesus.