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Man, the title of my sermon this morning is Jesus in the Book of 2 Kings. I'm continuing the series that I was doing a while back where I've been off and on going through different books of the Old Testament. The Bible says to him, give all the prophets witness that through his name whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins. So any book of the Old Testament, we can find Jesus in that book. All the prophets, the law, the Psalms, everything is pointing us to Jesus Christ in the Old Testament. You have to be blind not to see that. In fact, there's a whole group of blind people that don't see that. They're called Jews. And they reject that, but it is so clear. And even in the books that you wouldn't really think of, you'll find Jesus. Now, some books of the Bible, it's obvious. I mean, when you're reading Genesis, it's just screaming at you in every chapter, all the references to Christ and everything pointing you to Christ. And books like Psalms and Isaiah obviously are just brimming over with prophecies about Jesus Christ and so forth. But there are some that are a little bit harder to see. So some of them are easy to see and some of them are hard to see. 2 Kings might not be one that really jumps off the page at you, but yet there is a strong picture of Jesus Christ in the Book of 2 Kings. Now the main thing I want to emphasize this morning about the Book of 2 Kings is the character Elisha. So the character Elisha pictures Jesus Christ in the Book of 2 Kings. Now, of course, we know that before Elisha came another major prophet called Elijah. And Elijah was followed by Elisha. So here's the thing. Elijah represents John the Baptist and Elisha represents Jesus. So let's start out. Go to Matthew chapter 11. Let's start out by talking about the fact that Elijah pictures John the Baptist. Now at the very end of the Old Testament, when you're reading the Old Testament, it's so cool that when you come to the very end, the Book of Malachi, the last two verses that you read at the end of the Old Testament are a prophecy of John the Baptist. Here's what they say. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord, and he shall turn the heart of the fathers to the children and the heart of the children to their fathers, lest I come and smite the earth with a curse. So at the very end, he says, I'll send you Elijah the prophet. You say, well, Pastor Anderson, you know, that's only in the Christian Bible, though. The Jewish Bible's not like that. That's because the Jewish Bible wants to hide the obviousness of the Old Testament pointing to the New Testament, so they put their books in a wrong order that can be demonstrated to be wrong, and it's not just a matter of opinion. It's just wrong. This is what they do, and it's so ridiculous. The Book of 2 Chronicles ends with the beginning of Ezra. So if you take the end of 2 Chronicles and the beginning of Ezra, it's the same thing. So if you're trying to figure out what order to put the books in the Bible, if there ever was a no-brainer, it's that after 2 Chronicles, you put Ezra, which is how the Christian Bible has it. But of course, the Jewish Bible, they end on 2 Chronicles. Why? Because they want to end on, hey, let's go back to the Israel. Let's go back to the Holy Land. Next year in Jerusalem, Passover, Hockflem. So they basically have just put the books in an order that's ridiculous and makes no sense, just so that they can end on this note of, we're going back to the land, instead of ending on, I'm going to send you Elijah the prophet before the great day of the law. I'm going to send you John the Baptist before Jesus Christ. See, the way the Bible lays them out in the Christian Bible actually makes sense. You've got the law, you've got the historical books, you've got the poetic books, and then you have the prophets, major prophets in chronological order, minor prophets in chronological order, and you end on Malachi, and boom, you lead right into Matthew. So he says, I'll send you Elijah. That's how the Old Testament ends. Look at Matthew chapter 11 verse 13. For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John, and if you will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come. Elias is the New Testament spelling of Elijah. So he's saying, this is Elijah. Look at verse number, or look at chapter 17 verse 10. Chapter 17 of Matthew verse 10. And his disciples asked him saying, why then say the scribes that Elias must first come? Now apparently they didn't know the book of Malachi very well because Malachi chapter 4 very clearly says, I'll send you Elijah the prophet. So it says, why must Elias first come? Verse 11. And Jesus answered and said to them, Elias truly shall first come and restore all things. But I say unto you that Elijah, Elias, is come already. And they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. Likewise shall also the son of man suffer of them. Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist. So go back to 2 Kings chapter 1. He spake unto them of John the Baptist when he talked about Elijah. In Luke 1 17 it says, he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah. He's going to go before him in the spirit and power of Elijah. John the Baptist is pictured by Elijah. Jesus is pictured by Elisha. Now if you look at 2 Kings chapter 1, we get a physical description of Elijah. Verse 7. And he said unto them, what manner of man was he which came up to meet you and told you these words? And they answered him, he was a hairy man and girt with a leather, a girdle of leather about his loins and he said, it is Elijah the Tishbite. So that's all he needed to identify him. Just oh, he's hairy and he's wearing a leather belt, it's Elijah. So these were his distinguishing marks. Well of course in the New Testament with John the Baptist, Matthew 3 4 says that John had his raiment of camel's hair. So John wasn't really as naturally hairy, so he had to simulate that with the camel's hair raiment. But he had the leather and girdle about his loins and his meat was locusts and wild hives. So these are both rough guys, right? We've got the rough prophet Elijah and the rough prophet John the Baptist pointing the way to Jesus. Now go to 2 Kings chapter 2 verse 9. Just the next page, it says, And it came to pass, when they were gone over, that Elijah said unto Elisha, Ask what I shall do for thee, before I be taken away from thee. And Elisha said, I pray thee, let a double portion of thy spirit be upon me. And he said, Thou hast asked a hard thing, nevertheless, if thou see me when I am taken from thee, it shall be so unto thee, but if not, it shall not be so. So we see that Elisha is going to be superior to Elijah. He's going to have the double portion of Elijah's spirit. In fact, if you study the whole life of Elijah and the life of Elisha and you count up the miracles that Elijah did, Elisha did twice as many miracles as Elijah. He uttered twice as many prophecies. If you put the works side by side, Elisha did literally quantifiably twice as much. Now what does the Bible say about Jesus? Well John the Baptist in John chapter 3 is talking about Jesus. And he says, He whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God, for God giveth not the spirit by measure unto him. So he said that Jesus had the spirit upon him just above measure, without measure. He said the Father loveth the Son and hath given all things into his hand. He said, I must decrease, he must increase. So we see that just as Elisha outdid Elijah, so did Jesus Christ obviously outdo and outshine and was superior to John the Baptist. Now if you would flip over to chapter 4. Actually stay in chapter 2 because I want to show you something in chapter 2. First of all we see Elisha in chapter 2 is being mocked. Just as Jesus was mocked and ridiculed, Elisha was also mocked. Look at 2 Kings chapter 2 verse 23. And he went up from thence unto Bethel, and as he was going up, by the way, there came forth little children out of the city and mocked him, and said unto him, Go up thou bald head, go up thou bald head. And he turned back and looked on them and cursed them in the name of the Lord. And there came forth two she bears out of the wood, and tare forty and two children of them. And he went from thence to Mount Carmel, and from thence he returned to Samaria. So who does Elisha represent? Elisha pictures Christ here. And just as Christ was mocked, Elisha was mocked. And guess what? Just as Christ then is going to pour out his wrath on those who mocked him, so will Jesus Christ pour out the wrath when he returns at his second coming. If you remember, while Jesus is being beaten, spat upon, he's carrying the cross, he's being mocked and ridiculed, there were women of Israel that are weeping for him. They're crying. They feel bad for him. They're seeing what happens to Jesus. They feel bad about it. And you know what Jesus says to them? He says, hey, don't weep for me. Weep for yourselves and for your children. And he said the days are kind of paraphrasing, but he said the days are coming when people are going to be crying out for the mountains and rocks to cover them. And he's pointing them to the wrath that's coming at his second coming, where the great day of God's wrath comes in Revelation 6, and who shall be able to stand? Jesus alludes to that, even in the midst of being mocked. And so here we see Elisha's mocked, but God sends his wrath to punish those who mocked him. Well, guess what? Those who mocked Jesus Christ today, those who mocked Jesus Christ at his first advent, and those who continue to scoff at him, ridicule him, blaspheme him, if they do not repent, if they continue in their rejection of Jesus Christ, what's going to happen to them? They're going to be on the receiving end of the wrath of God. It's also interesting that these two she bears that come, they tear 40 and two children of them. Well, if you think about it, the end times consist of what? Two great periods of 42 months, right? Because you have, you know, roughly a seven-year period of things going on, bad things happening. And so you can't really see the number 42 without end times popping into your head, if you studied Revelation and Daniel and things. 42 has an instant end times association, doesn't it? So God's wrath is coming on those who mock Jesus Christ, who make fun of him. Even the name, flip over to chapter 4, even the name Elisha is actually similar to the name Jesus. It might not seem like it in English, but actually these two names, if you get at their definition, what they mean, Elisha means God is salvation and Jesus means the Lord is salvation or Jehovah is salvation. And so both of their names have to do with salvation, whether it's Elisha or Jesus. Because you remember in Matthew chapter 1, it says, thou shall call his name Jesus, why? For he shall save his people from their sins. So they both have salvation in the name. Back in the book of 1 Kings, when Elijah first recruits Elisha, the Bible tells us that Elisha is plowing with 12 yoke of oxen. Oxen in the Bible represent preachers. The Bible says thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn, and that's a reference to preachers. Plowing is a reference to preaching in the Bible as well. So he's plowing with the 12 oxen, or the 12 yoke of oxen, and then Jesus of course plowed with his what? Twelve apostles. He had 12 preachers, 12 apostles that he worked with. Their names are the same. Look at chapter 4 and we're going to see that Elisha, just like Christ, raised the dead. Look at 2 Kings chapter 4 verse 32. And when Elisha was come into the house, behold, the child was dead and laid upon his bed. He went in therefore and shut the door upon them twain, and prayed unto the Lord. And he went up and lay upon the child, and put his mouth upon his mouth, and his eyes upon his eyes, and his hands upon his hands, and he stretched himself upon the child. And the flesh of the child waxed warm. Then he returned and walked in the house to and fro, and went up and stretched himself upon him, and the child sneezed seven times, and the child opened his eyes. And he called Gehazi and said, call this Shunammite, so he called her. And when she was come in unto him, he said, take up thy son. Then she went in and fell at his feet, and bowed herself to the ground, and took up her son and went out. You know, this is something that's straight out of Matthew, Mark, or Luke, right? I mean, Jesus raising a dead child to life is something that we see, and here it is with Elisha doing the same type of miracle. And it's not just this one miracle, but Elisha does a lot of miracles that are like the miracles of Christ. And here's the thing. When you read through the Old Testament, this isn't super common. You don't just read throughout the Old Testament people constantly raising dead bodies back to life. This is very rare. Okay, also, how about this miracle? Look at verse 42. Tell me if this doesn't remind you of Jesus Christ. And there came a man from Baal-Shalisha, and brought the man of God bread of the first fruits, twenty loaves of barley, and full ears of corn in the husk thereof. And he said, give unto the people that they may eat. And his servitor said, what? Should I set this before a hundred men? He said again, give the people that they may eat, for thus saith the Lord, they shall eat and shall leave thereof. Meaning, they're not even going to finish their food. They're going to have extra. They're going to have a doggy bag. So he set it before them, and they did eat, and left thereof, according to the word of the Lord. Folks, this is a pretty interesting miracle. It's exactly what Jesus Christ did. So you notice it's what Jesus did only on a smaller scale, okay, because Jesus took, you know, five loaves and two fishes, and fed five thousand people. Jesus took seven loaves, and he fed four thousand people. Here we see that there are only a hundred people that they're serving. But it's still a miracle. I mean, there's a hundred people, and all they have is twenty loaves of barley, just twenty portions, and he feeds a hundred people with twenty portions, and they eat as much as they want. It's all you can eat. It's a buffet, and they never run out. It keeps on coming. Again, these are not miracles that you see throughout the Old Testament. These are things that only Elisha is known for, because Elisha pictures Christ. So he does these type of miracles of helping people, raising the dead, multiplying food. Also, Elisha heals a leper in 2 Kings, chapter 5. Again, that's not something that we just constantly see throughout the Old Testament, just the healing of lepers. But it is something that we constantly see Jesus doing, constantly healing lepers, right? So these are very strong parallels between Elisha and Jesus. Raising the dead, multiplying food, healing a leper, and all these different things. So go to 2 Kings, chapter 5. Not only did Elisha do these same miracles, but right after he healed the leper in 2 Kings, chapter 5, he also had one of his disciples stealing from the offering plate. Now Jesus also had a disciple who was stealing from the offering. If you remember, in John, chapter 12, you don't have to turn there. In John, chapter 12, verse 4, Then saith one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, Simon's son which should betray him, Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred pence and given to the poor? This he said, not that he cared for the poor, but because he was a thief and had the bag and bear what was put there in. So Judas was the treasurer for the disciples and he was stealing from the offering plate. Well guess what? Elisha had a disciple named Gehazi who was stealing from the offering plate. There's another parallel right there. And by the way, look at what Judas said there. Well why wasn't this ointment sold for three hundred pence and given to the poor? These hyper spiritual types end up being phonies. Take it to the bank. The hyper spiritual, laying it on so thick, they spiritualize everything. Holier than thou, they end up being phonies just like Judas was a phony. I've been at this thing for a long time, they end up being phonies. Just believe me. These people who, you know, they catch you because you didn't pray before your food and they're ready to nail you with that. You know, they're the ones who you're out and about. And look, I'm not talking about out soul winning. When you're out soul winning, there's often a command given of like, hey, why don't you guys go talk to that guy? We're going to go over here. I'm talking about when you're just, you're out and about in your everyday life and it's just like, hey, you need to go witness to that guy. It's like, well, if you're, here's what I always say. When people say that to me, I always just say, well, since you're so inspired, it sounds like God's calling you to go witness to that guy. Sounds like the Holy Spirit's moving in your heart, buddy. But you know what I mean? You're just constantly this overly spiritual, hyper spiritual. Everybody look at me. Let me show you how much more spirit, I mean, Judas is so spiritual, he's more spiritual than Jesus, right? He's got to correct Jesus for not being spiritual enough. Jesus isn't loving enough for him. Jesus doesn't care about the poor enough. And folks, there are plenty of Judases out there today. I'm not in the auditorium. I'm not saying that, but I'm saying in our lives, we'll run into these people who are just so holier than thou. Every word out of their mouth is hallelujah, praise the Lord, and they just love to pray publicly in the streets and sound the trumpet, and they just, they want to let you know how they give every last cent to the work of the Lord, and basically they just, if you're not soul-ending 24 hours a day, you're not right with God. If you're not reading the Bible 10 times a year, you're not right with God. You got to pray three hours a day to be right with God. I mean, these just overly spiritual, just, they're just always quick to catch you and nail you and point out how you need to go do that, and you need, that's what we see here with Judas. He was a holier than thou, and he turned out to be a phony. So beware of the hyper-spiritual, overly spiritual type, because let me just let you in on a little secret. Nobody's that spiritual. So if you see somebody that seems just hyper, over, guess what that means? It's fake. It's fake. See, when people are faking something, they're not as good at it as the real thing. So because they're faking it, what ends up happening is they're like an over-actor. You know how actors will sometimes over-act? It's because they're acting. So when you see these hyper-spiritual types, you know what they're doing? They're over-acting, because instead of just being real, instead of just being a godly person and just letting their light shine, and people just see the love of Christ in them, and they see that they know their Bible, and they see that they're living for God, these people put on a façade, but they end up applying too much. They end up pushing it too hard, because they're acting. And it's hard when you're acting to get it exactly right. So they usually end up overdoing it. And I'm telling you, it doesn't fail when you have a holier-than-thou, pharisaical type that's just constantly in a hyper-spiritual mode, and they're just ready to just – no activity can be just an activity. You know what I mean? It's like, hey, we're just going to sit down and eat this meal. They have to find a way to spiritualize that. Hey, let's go throw a ball around. It's like, nope. Spiritualize that. Hey, you want to play a board game? I'm telling you, it's a red flag, but anyway, that's not what the sermon's about, although maybe it should be, but anyway, that's another sermon. But 2 Kings 5, we have the guy stealing from the offering. Of course, Naaman the Syrian gets healed by Elisha. He tells him to go dip in the Jordan seven times. Look at chapter 5, verse 10 in 2 Kings. And Elisha sent a messenger unto him, saying, Go and wash in Jordan seven times, and thy flesh shall come again to thee, and thou shalt be clean. And of course, Jesus heals people in a similar way. He has them wash and be clean. So we see that. Naaman was wroth and went away and said, Behold, I thought he'll surely come out to me and stand and call in the name of the Lord his God and strike his hand over the place and recover the leper. So Naaman's been watching too much Benny Hinn. He thinks that he has to be slapped on the forehead in order to be healed. You know, I want Elisha to come out and be like, Be healed, you know, hallelujah. And because he didn't come out and do that, he's disappointed that he just tells him, Hey, go wash and be clean. And thankfully, he has some servants that talk some sense into him. Verse 13, his servants came near and spake on him and said, My father, if the prophet had bid thee do some great thing, wouldest thou not have done it? How much rather than when he say it to thee, wash and be clean. Then he went down and dipped himself seven times in Jordan, according to the saying of the man of God, and his flesh came again like unto the flesh of a little child, and he was clean. And look, who does Elisha represent? Jesus. Elisha says, wash and be clean. You know what Jesus is saying to us today? Wash and be clean. How do we get saved today? We simply do something that's just so simple, so easy. It's not, is he requiring us to do some great thing? No. We just need to be washed in the blood. That's what the Bible says. Now, it's not being dunked in the water that saves you. It's not getting sprinkled or poured. It's being washed in the blood of Christ. Okay, we're washed. The Bible says in Revelation 1, he's washed us from our sins in his own blood. The blood of Jesus Christ, God's son, cleanses us from all sin. Now, today, people, when they hear Christ's message, they react the same way Naaman did. You know, Elisha tells Naaman, hey, all you got to do is just wash and be clean. It's easy. Piece of cake. In fact, you don't even have to physically see me. I'm not even going to physically show up. You just have to believe. Unseen you have to believe. And we tell people the same thing about Jesus, right? Hey, you don't have to have Jesus physically come and meet with you. You're not going to see Jesus. You just have to believe the word of Jesus and do what he said, which is what? Confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead and you shall be saved, right? Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved. But, you know, a lot of people react exactly like Naaman, and here's what they say. You know, well, that's not enough. And we have to be like those servants of Naaman that say, hey, if he told you to do a great thing, wouldn't you do it? Well, how much rather something easy. But don't people today think salvation is too easy? And they think, like, oh, man, you got to go to church. You got to, you know, give money. You got to keep the commandments. You got to repent of all your sins and turn over a new leaf and start following Christ. You got to take up the cross every single day if you want to get to heaven. Nope. You got to wash and be clean. And they think it's too easy. Some people will even attack the gospel and call it easy believism. Well, guess what? It is easy because Jesus did the hard part and we just have to believe on Christ. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. Just as easy as it was for Naaman to just jump in the river seven times. I mean, that sounds fun. I would do that even if I didn't have leprosy. I mean, I would just go jump in the Jordan River seven times just for kicks. I mean, how easy is that? It's a piece of cake. He's applying human logic, though. Well, I've got a better river to jump in. I'm going to jump in Farpar, right? He's got a better idea. And today, people, they're given God's simple plan of salvation. They're given an easy way to heaven. Jesus paid it all. Believe on Christ. But they have a better idea. Oh, let me go jump in the river of Buddhism. Let me go jump in the Islam River. Let me go jump in the Roman Catholic River and get all sprinkled in pufu dust and burn a bunch of incense and light a candle and pray to the saints and Mary and Saint Farpar and Saint Arbana and let's just go through all these rituals. I'm going to go jump in the Mormon River. I'm going to go jump in the river of Sikhism or whatever. Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. If it sounds easy, it's because it is. God is a loving God who wanted to make it easy for you to be saved. Be happy about it. Don't get upset because God loves you and is making it easy for you. And thank God it's by grace or else none of us would be going. None of us is good enough. We've all seen him come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. And then go to Second Kings Chapter 13. Second Kings Chapter 13 and we're going to see that Elisha's dead body actually revives a dead man. This is one of my favorite stories in reading about Elisha. It's a really neat story because remember, Elisha wanted to have the double portion of Elijah's spirit. And actually, God quantified that because he said, if you see me when I'm taken up, it'll happen. And he did see him get taken up, so it happened. Well, God quantifies that. Like I said, if you go through and count and different people have different lists depending on how you count, you know, when Elijah called down fire on the 50, is that two miracles or one, you know, because he does it twice. But if you apply the same standard to both guys, you'll find that Elisha did exactly twice as many miracles as Elijah. There are a few different ways to arrive at that, but if you apply the same standard of what constitutes a miracle and so forth, you'll come to that. So Elisha, when he dies, he's one miracle short. Okay, so he dies and he's one short of doubling Elijah. But God specializes in things that are impossible, right? So basically, after he's dead, look at verse 20 of Second Kings 13. And Elisha died and they buried him and the bands of the Moabites invaded the land at the coming end of the year and it came to pass, as they were burying a man, that behold, they spied a band of men and they cast the man into the sepulcher of Elijah. So basically, these soldiers are burying one of their dead and all of a sudden, they're about to get raided. They're about to get ambushed. What do we do with the body? I mean, we got to get out of here. They don't want to leave him unburied. They can't carry him with them and they don't have time to dig a grave. So what do they do? They say, Elisha's sepulcher is right here. Let's just throw him in with Elisha, okay? So they throw the man into the sepulcher of Elisha and when the man was laid down and touched the bones of Elisha, he revived and stood up on his face like, hey, guys, wait for me. So as soon as he touched those bones, he's resurrected. He came back alive. Now, think about what a powerful symbolism this is of Christ, that Christ's death in and of itself brings the miracle of life. Think about this. This is arguably the coolest miracle that Elisha did. It's really the most impressive miracle they did, isn't it? You know, when he brought that child back to life in Chapter 4, he had to work pretty hard, didn't he? Stretching himself seven times, walking around, praying, putting his mouth on his back. He had to do all this song and dance to do that. This one, somebody just touches his bones and just, boom, comes back alive. This is the coolest miracle that Elisha did. Even after he's dead, it rounded him out to double Elijah's miracles, but Christ's death is also his greatest. His death brings us life. His death on the cross is what resurrects us, right? It's what gives us life. Of course, it's his whole death, burial, and resurrection, but Jesus dying for us is our way into heaven. His substitutionary atonement for us when he died for us on the cross brings life just as the dead body of Elisha brings life. So let me just summarize the parallels quickly between Elisha and Jesus. Both of their names contain salvation in the name. They both have to do with salvation. Both of them were preceded by Elijah, right, because John the Baptist is Elijah. Both excelled Elijah, right? They were both greater than Elijah, who was already great in the first place. Elisha plowed with 12 yoke of oxen. Jesus plowed with the 12 disciples. They were both mocked. They both raised the dead. They both multiplied food. They both healed a leper, and they both preached an easy salvation that somebody thought was too easy and wanted to do something harder or more dramatic, okay? They both had a disciple who stole from the offering, and the death of both brought life to someone else because the corpse was brought to life by Elisha's dead corpse. So really, a lot of parallels between Jesus and Elisha. So even in a book that you wouldn't necessarily think of, you wouldn't necessarily jump to second kings when you're thinking about Jesus and the gospel and so forth. It's there. Why? Because it's all over the Old Testament. Everything is pointing us to Christ. So the two conclusions that I want to draw from this this morning are, number one, the obvious conclusion that everything in the Old Testament is ultimately pointing us to Christ. Right? To him give all the prophets witness. So that's important. But I want to draw a secondary application. If you would, flip over to Matthew chapter 11, and the second application I would like to make is this, is that Elijah and Elisha and other rough prophets of the Old Testament are still role models for us today. See, a lot of people have this idea that somehow the Old Testament Bible stories or the Old Testament Bible characters are kind of obsolete for us today because, you know, that was just a totally different time. It was a different era. But I want to tell you this morning that actually there's nothing new under the sun, and the Old Testament men of God, although there are differences from their lives to ours, and there are differences between the Old Covenant and the New Covenant, they still serve as role models unto us today. We can still look to them and admire them and learn from them. Now the Bible says in Matthew 11, 11, verily I say unto you, among them that are born of women, there hath not risen a greater than John the Baptist, notwithstanding he that is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. Of course that's because he that is in the kingdom of heaven is sinless. He's the new man, the old man is completely gone at that point. But what you have to understand is that Jesus is praising John the Baptist as the greatest man who ever lived. So this is a guy that's a role model. This is a guy that we could learn from, and this is a guy that preachers should look to and emulate as preachers. But who is John the Baptist patterned after? John the Baptist is not some new character. John the Baptist is in the spirit and power of Elijah. He's reminiscent of Elijah. And so that would point us also not to just look at John the Baptist as a great man of God, but to look at Elijah as well, and to look at Elisha. And by the way, even Jesus was compared to Elijah. When Jesus asked his disciples, whom do men say that I am? They said, well some say that you're John the Baptist, who was a rough guy. Some say that you're Elijah. Some say that you're Jeremiah. Basically he's picking some pretty hard preachers. I mean we know John the Baptist preached hard. We know Elijah was a hairy man in more ways than one. And we know that Jeremiah is probably the most negative book in the whole Bible. I mean numbers in Jeremiah are kind of vying for that distinction. It's a very negative preaching in Jeremiah. So here's the thing. We don't want to get the idea that Jesus is somehow this big softie. If he were so soft as some movies might portray him, or as some Sunday school literature might portray him, where they show him in Catholic images where he's very feminine, and he's very soft, then nobody would look at a soft, feminine, girly man and say, I wonder if this is John the Baptist. Would they? That makes no logical sense. They wouldn't look at a soft, wimpy, kind of a Catholic priest type of a guy and be like, is this Elijah, come back from the dead? I mean the guy who's a hairy man, he's calling down the fire of God, he's throwing the prophets of Baal off a cliff. I mean, you know, nobody would have confused today's limp-wristed, watered-down preachers for a reincarnation of Jeremiah. Oh, this must be Jeremiah, come back. The reason that they say, well, some say you're John the Baptist, some say you're Elijah, some say you're Jeremy the prophet, is because Jesus was a powerful man of God. Jesus preached with the power of God. Okay, Jesus, and when I say that, I mean God the Father. Of course, Jesus Christ is God, he's the son of God, he's also divine, he's deity, he is God in the flesh, but he was powerful, and he had the spirit of God upon him above measure. That's not a spirit of weakness, it's a spirit of power, the Bible tells us. God is not giving us a spirit of fear, but of power. And when we see Jesus casting the money changers out, when we see Jesus flipping over the tables, when we see Jesus just ripping face in Matthew chapter 23, just preaching that hard sermon against the Pharisees and other hard sermons throughout his ministry, when they threaten him that the king has issues, he says, you go tell that fox, right, and he, I mean he's calling names, he's preaching hard, he's rebuking. Why? Because he was like the men of God of old. Can I just explain something to you? That's how men of God have always been. I mean, start at the beginning of the Bible, and look at the great men of God, even in Genesis. Who's the great guy in Genesis? Abraham is kind of the main event in the book of Genesis, depending on how you look at it, and what kind of a guy is Abraham? You know, Abraham has 318 servants that he's trained in martial arts and in warfare in his house, and he just pulls 318 weapons off the shelf and arms them and goes and fights against Kedorlaomer and the other kings, okay, there in Genesis chapter 13, or 14. So basically, you know, we see Abraham's a warrior, right? We see Abraham is tough, all right? And then even we see Jacob being a hardworking guy, he's able to lift the stone off the well that other people, it took a whole team of men to lift off the, he's just like, watch this baby, you know, and it's, the girl that he wanted to marry shows up, all of a sudden he's just, you know, strong enough to lift the thing off by himself to impress the lady, all right? So, you know, we see throughout the Bible men like Moses. I mean, Moses was a warrior, Moses, now he was meek, yes, he was gentle, but he was a powerful man of God, and he was not a weakling, he was tough, the Bible says he was mighty, he was mighty in word and in deed, okay? And so we see great men of God, Joshua, all the judges, men like Saul and David and Solomon and everything, look, all of these guys were not soft effeminates because God says the effeminate are not going to inherit the kingdom of God. So we don't want to get this wrong idea that somehow the Old Testament was sort of the Wild West and then all of a sudden we get into the New Testament and everything's all domesticated and everything's just all neutered in the New Testament, wrong, it's not the neutered testament, it's the New Testament, and let me tell you something, the men of the New Testament are powerful men just like in the Old Testament, and so when we see today's crop of, you know, the pink shirt, lily-livered, pink lemonade kind of preachers, the soft effeminate, skinny jeans, limp-wristed kind of guys today, those aren't men of God is what's going on with that. Those are not men of God. That's a red flag. When you see a pastor that is effeminate, that's not of God, that's a major red flag. We should watch out for pastors that are not manly. Okay, now I'm not saying that we need to be the overly manly type, which is sort of like I was talking about earlier, the overly spiritual. You know, some people kind of have a need to persuade, so they have to kind of like be hyper-masculine, okay? That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about just being a normal man and having the normal roughness that comes with being a man where you're not just all dolled up and all pretty and all worried about your clothes and your hair so much, but that you're a little bit more rugged, right? This is the attribute of men. Men are to be more rugged. Women are the ones who are supposed to pretty themselves, okay? And we're supposed to be able to get out and get down and dirty and work and get greasy and not be afraid to break a nail, okay? And I realize that we are urban dwellers, and I am urban myself. I've grown up in big cities my whole life, and so we're not as rugged as maybe we would be if we were a lumberjack somewhere or if we were out living in the wilderness somewhere. But you know what? We need to strive to retain our sense of manhood today and not buy into the garbage that the world is selling us today that's trying to demasculate, emasculate men and feminize men today. And they're lifting up – I was walking through the airport the other day, and I saw a magazine cover, and it had this black singer named Pharrell Williams. Is that his name? Am I pronouncing that right? Pharrell Williams. What is it? Pharrell. Pharrell. All right. He's semi-pharrell. No, I'm just kidding. So he's a – Pharrell Williams. And the guy's on the front of the magazine, and it's – and he's wearing like a dress or something. But I don't even know if I would call it a dress. It's more like he's wearing a quilt. Like he's – actually, he's wearing a teepee is what it looked like. Yeah, he was wearing like a teepee from his neck. It's just like fanned down. It was very strange. And he just looked like a complete fag or whatever, and it just said, the new masculinity. And I was quoting Luke Chapter 5, you know, the old is better. All right. I was like, what in the world? This is a new masculinity. But seriously, nobody would look at that and say that's masculine. Because a lot of people are like, what does that even mean? What does masculine even mean? What does it even mean to be manly? I don't even know what that means. Yeah, you don't know what it means. That's the problem. Because the rest of us, who knows what that means? Yeah, we all know what that – we all know what it means. When somebody says, hey, be manly. When the Bible says, quit you as men. We all know what that means. We all know the attributes of men are strength and bravery and ruggedness. We get that, okay? The reason that they have to put that on a magazine and say, oh, by the way, this is the new masculinity, they're brainwashing you. Because nobody would think that's masculine on their own. Anyone would think that's feminine, that weird quilted bow, frilly, lace, whatever he was wearing. I don't remember because it was months ago that I saw it. But it was something like a tent or a teepee or dress or I don't know what it was. But the point is, nobody would look at that and say, this is how men are supposed to look. This is masculinity. So they have to start just forcing that on you, like this is the new masculinity. Because you know what they call normal masculinity now? What do they call it? Toxic masculinity. You know, toxic masculinity. Folks, what's toxic is this bunch of faggotry and queerdom. And I don't even know if those are words, but they are now. That's what's toxic. Folks, we need to make sure that as fundamental Baptists, men remain men. Let the world feminize. Let the world shave their legs as men. But you know, we need to be hairy men. We need to be manly. And look, I understand. Some men are more manly than others. And again, I'm not saying we all need to be just super rugged and just, you know, we just wake up in the morning and we just brush our teeth with motor oil or something. I'm just saying, you know, we need to retain our identity as men, even in an urban environment. Okay. So look, if you have a job, let's say you have a job that's not a physical job. That's okay. But if you have a job that's not a physical job, you need to have something in your life that gets you physical so that you don't just become this muffin-topped soy boy. You know what I mean? You need to make sure that, and by the way, eat meat, men. Eat meat. There's more estrogen. Help me out with this statistic. In that Beyond Meat Burger at Burger King, give me the stats on that thing. As in a Backstreet Boys CD, what? As in what? Oh, yeah. So you know, when trannies are converting, when trannies, and by the way, to those of us that are real men, a tranny is something that's under the hood in our car, you know. But anyway, you know, when these trannies are taking shots to get like hormone therapy, she said there's 11 times as much estrogen in one of those Beyond Meat Burgers down at Burger King here on the corner. So go down and get your tranny burger down at Burger King. And you know what? You know what? That stuff's bad for you. You think that our ancestors thousands of years ago, you think the men of the Bible are eating a bunch of soy and tofu and tempeh. And by the way, I can always tell when I get fake phone calls from sodomites pretending to be from our area when they pronounce it tempeh. It's Tempe, Arizona. It's not Tempe. This guy called and he pretended to be from the city government, like, coming down on our church. As soon as he pronounced it tempeh, I'm like, all right, soy boy. You're not from around here because this is Tempe, not Tempe, you know. Tempe is soy. Okay. Right. Isn't it some kind of a tofu type thing? But look, guys, I'm not trying to be up here overly manly here, but let me tell you something. You need to eat meat so that you don't get your estrogen levels up and your testosterone levels down. Right. We as men, we need to eat the normal diet that God intended for us and not get off on these radical fad diets where we're cutting out the animal products because we're some kind of a vegan libtard. Let me tell you something. Jesus Christ ate meat. And if Jesus Christ eats meat, then I can eat meat. And you know what? It's like Judas was trying to be more generous than Jesus. I'm not trying to be more vegan than Jesus. I'm not trying to be more peaceful and loving than Jesus. Apparently Jesus had no problem eating the Passover every year. Right. So he was eating his lamb and he was eating his fish and he ate meat. And the Bible praises the eating of meat. And the priests in the temple that God fed, they ate meat every day. Every day they ate meat. Okay. Don't get off on the world's fads of Beyond Meat Burger and everything as a man. And by the way, you say, well, I'm a woman so I can go ahead and do it anyway. Here's the thing. As a woman, you don't want your estrogen levels to be too high either because that's associated with cancer. All right. So you don't want to have elevated estrogen. We're not meant to be eating all these phytoestrogen mimickers and estrogen in our diet. It's not good for you whether you're a man or a woman. And on men it has a feminizing effect. So if you're living an urban lifestyle, which a lot of us are, you know what? You need to do, you need to make sure you have meat in your diet and you need to make sure that you're getting exercise. If your job is set, look, I'm just trying to keep you alive. Sitting is the new smoking. All right. If you're going to sit on your butt all day at your job, hey, I get it. A lot of jobs are like that now. A lot of jobs are just at the computer. You know what? Make sure that you at least take a walk every day. At least go out and take a walk, hit the gym, lift some weights, play some sports. Do something because I'm telling you, if you sit around all day and then you're eating a bunch of junk food and you're not eating nutritious food and healthy meats, you're going to get low testosterone, high estrogen. You're just going to get soft and flabby and feminine. You know, we need to guard that as urban dwellers of 2020. Now if you have a physical job, praise God, and don't ever let anybody look down on you for your blue collar job. Hey, if you have a blue collar job, praise the Lord. And you know what? I've done both. I love blue collar work. I would love to do blue collar work every single day because you feel better because you're out working with your hands. It's physical. Don't ever look down on the blue collar guys because that is honest work and sometimes they're making more money than you are, by the way, and living a healthier life. But look, I'm not against the white collar jobs. Hey, white collar jobs are great too, but there's a danger with white collar jobs that you just become soft and get out of shape and get unhealthy and just start to become just a big blob or something. You know, you've got to get out and do some stuff, right? Get physical. And you say, well, I hate exercise. Look, do the things you hate because they're good for you. We don't always love everything that we have to do in life, but you know, you're going to die young if you just sit around at the desk eating junk. You got to make a change. You got to get out, get physical, and keep from becoming a softie. Why? Because Elijah and Elisha and by the way, you wouldn't have been able to hang with Jesus if you're, if you're, if you're out of shape because guess what, Jesus walked everywhere he went. It's not one example of him on horseback except when he gets on the colt, the foal of an ass, right? That's the only time he ever gets on an animal is just for one little triumphal entry into Jerusalem. You know, the rest of the time it wasn't saddle up boys, you know, they weren't riding horses around. It was sandal up and we're going to walk 100 miles and we're going to walk 10 miles. So anyway, the point is number one, find Jesus in the word of God. But number two, find role models in every part of the Bible because every part of the Bible is relevant to us today. And Elijah and Elisha are men of God that we need to teach our children about and emulate these guys and look at these guys as our spiritual ancestors and be like Elisha today. Be like Elijah and be like Jesus Christ. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord, and for all the things that we could learn about Jesus Christ in every single book of the Old Testament, even 2 Kings. And Lord, we just pray that you would help us to raise up a generation of Elijah's and Elisha's that would do great works for you, Lord.