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A Sermon by Dr. Bob Griffin, Teaching Elder at Sovereign Grace Church
I. RESTORING THE CUTTING EDGE
A. OLD STORY
>1. EXPANDED NEED
II Kg 6:1-2 Now the sons of the prophets said to Elisha, “See, the place where we live under your teaching is too small for us. Let us go to the Jordan and each of us get a log, and make a larger place for us to dwell there.”
And he answered, “Go.”
>2. EXPANDED CARE
II Kg 6:3-4 Then one of them asked, “Would you please go with your servants?” He answered, “I will go.” He went with them, and when they came to the Jordan, they cut down trees.
II Kg 6:5 As one was felling a tree, his axe head fell into the water, and he cried out, “Alas, my master! It was borrowed.”
>3. EXPANDED PROVISION
II Kg 6:6-7 The man of God asked, “Where did it fall?”
When he showed him the place, he cut off a stick and threw it in there and made the iron float.
Elisha said, “Pick it up”, so he reached out his hand and grabbed it.
B. MODERN APPLICATIONS
>1. RESTORATION INVOLVES REALIZATION
(also Heb 4:12; Rev. 3:17)
>2. RESTORATION INVOLVES REPENTANCE
(also Rom 1:16; Acts 1:8)
>3. RESTORATION INVOLVES RETURNING
(also I John 1:9)
>4. RESTORATION INVOLVES REACHING OUT
(also I Pet 5:7)
II. RESTORING THE LAND
A. OLD STORY
>1. EXPANDED OBEDIENCE
II Kg 8:1 Now Elisha had told the woman whose son he had restored to life, “Arise, and depart with your family, and live where you can, for YHWH has decreed a seven-year famine on the land.”
II Kg 8:2 So the woman arose and obeyed exactly the Word of the man of God. She went with her family and lived in Philistia seven years.
(also Jas 1:21-24
>2. EXPANDED PROVIDENCE
II Kg 8:3 After seven years, when the woman returned home, she went to appeal to the king for her house and her land.
II Kg 8:4-5 At the same time the king was conversing with Gehazi the servant of the man of God, saying, “Tell me all the great things that Elisha has done.” While he was recounting how Elisha had restored the dead to life, behold, the woman whose son he had restored to life appealed to the king for her house and her land.
>3. EXPANDED REWARD
II Kg 8:5-6 Gehazi said, “My lord, O king, here is the woman, and here is her son whom Elisha restored to life.” When the king asked the woman, she verified it. The king appointed an official for her, ordering, “Restore all that was hers, together with all the produce of the fields from the day that she left the land until now.”
B. MODERN APPLICATIONS
>1. RESTORATION INVOLVES FAITH
(also John 20:29)
>2. RESTORATION INVOLVES WITNESS
>3. RESTORATION INVOLVES BETTER FUTURE
(also Prov 21:1; 14:34; Ps 144:15; 33:12; Mt 19:29; I Pet 5:10; Rev 2:4)