2 Kings 4:8-17 8One day Elisha was passing through Shunem, where a wealthy woman lived, who urged him to have a meal. So whenever he passed that way, he would stop there for a meal. 9She said to her husband, “Look, I am sure that this man who regularly passes our way is a holy man of God. 10Let us make a small roof chamber with walls, and put there for him a bed, a table, a chair, and a lamp, so that he can stay there whenever he comes to us.” 11One day when he came there, he went up to the chamber and lay down there. 12He said to his servant Gehazi, “Call the Shunammite woman.” When he had called her, she stood before him. 13He said to him, “Say to her, Since you have taken all this trouble for us, what may be done for you? Would you have a word spoken on your behalf to the king or to the commander of the army?” She answered, “I live among my own people.” 14He said, “What then may be done for her?” Gehazi answered, “Well, she has no son, and her husband is old.” 15He said, “Call her.” When he had called her, she stood at the door. 16He said, “At this season, in due time, you shall embrace a son.” She replied, “No, my lord, O man of God; do not deceive your servant.” 17The woman conceived and bore a son at that season, in due time, as Elisha had declared to her.
Revelation 7:9-17
9After this I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands. 10They cried out in a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!” 11And all the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12singing, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.” 13Then one of the elders addressed me, saying, “Who are these, robed in white, and where have they come from?” 14I said to him, “Sir, you are the one that knows.” Then he said to me, “These are they who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 15For this reason they are before the throne of God, and worship him day and night within his temple, and the one who is seated on the throne will shelter them. 16They will hunger no more, and thirst no more; the sun will not strike them, nor any scorching heat; 17for the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
Today we met Elisha- with an “sh” … not to be confused with Elijah, with a “j”… the one who built the altar, and ran to the wilderness and all that good stuff… although they did hang out together for a little while. We first hear about the prophet Elisha when he was
sort of an apprentice to the Prophet Elijah. When it was time for Elijah to die, the old prophet asked his apprentice, ‘what can I do for you before I die?’ And Elisha, a quick thinker in my opinion, answers back “I want twice the power that you have.” The short version is that is exactly what happens. But being the new prophet in town isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. He has a couple of key “I told you so” moments with some of the townspeople, and as he is walking away in his first satisfied huff, some local kids start making fun of him. I guess Elisha isn’t the most fun loving of the prophets, or maybe they caught him in a bad mood, but when the boys start shouting at him “hey baldie! Hey baldie!” he can’t seem to let it roll off his shoulders. Instead, he scowls at the rude little urchins and calls a couple of mother grizzly bears out of the woods to tear the little kids to shreds. (All 42 kids to be exact) (For all you kids out there- here’s a lesson- never make fun of the new preacher in town) From there, elisha’s demeanor improves, and he starts acting in a more “prophet-like” way. But by the time we catch up with him today, he has an assistant of his own, Gehazi, and is traveling back and forth through a particular village called Shunam. There is a woman there who invites Elisha, each time he passes through town, to stay at her house. Now… we don’t know a lot about the woman, but we do know that what started out as a simple invitation for dinner, grew into a series of meals, in fact, each time elisha passes through Shunam, he ends up at her house. Other translations of this same text say he would “stay” at her house. Now I don’t know if it was as simply as the text put it: she sees that he is a man of God, or, if frankly, he began to make an after dinner through morning dent in the couch, but
she finally turns to her husband and says “honey, get out the hammer, we need to put on a room to the house for this guy- because I want to go out in the morning and flip on Good Morning America and I can’t because this big sweaty bald guy is snoring on my sofa and I want my living room back!” So they add on a room, and furnish it… a table, a lamp a bed a chair… and next time elisha comes through town, he’s blown away. He’s got a place of his own! And so one day, as he is laying down on his brand new sleep number bed (what number do you think Elisha was?), and he calls to his assistant… “go get the woman”- and Gehazi does… the woman climbs the stairs up to the room and they say to her: “You’ve been so nice to us. What can we do for you? Maybe I can put in a word with the king for you, or with the army? Or, in today’s terms… maybe I can get you some things that you didn’t have access to before… What can I do for you? And here’s why I love this woman. She says “I live among my own people.” “I live among my own people” In other words… I’m fine right where I am… I don’t want any special favors, I don’t to be seen as special with the government, and I don’t need any extra protection. I know where I live- I’m fine with how things are… I’ve made choices in my life and you know what? I know who I am.” What a treasure.. this woman, who has a real sense of who she is… how many of us really know who we are? But we’ll get back to that in a minute. She tells him she doesn’t need anything, and she goes back downstairs to finish febreezing the couch. But elisha can’t let it go. He and his assistant start brainstorming… ‘there has to be something we can do for her. Come on Gehazi, think!’‘OK…What doesn’t
she have… they have the widescreen, they have the home security system…the BMW is last year’s model, but still… wait! Of course! A child! She has no baby!’‘Great idea Gehazi! Call her back up here! So now, the woman, who has only had time to make herself a cup of tea and has finally sat down to check her email gets summoned back up to the room.. what do they want now? So she heads back up the stairs, she stands at the door, puts her hand on her hip and says “what?” And Elisha tells her that next year at this time, she’ll have a child. And as her hand drops to her side, and old memories and hurts are choked back, she answers… “don’t tease me… the kid thing is something I don’t joke about.” But sure enough, that’s exactly what happened. The woman, before she had walked in to the room has a sense that her life was complete… she didn’t realize that just by adding on a room, for creating a space for God in her life, that she would be blessed with things she hadn’t dared to dream about. Yet the initial choice was hers, to create that space, wasn’t it? She recognized that this man of God- this.. spirit of God was going to come through and be a regular, if you will, at her home… she made to decision, not just to crowd God in among the other things in her life, but to make a room, to make physical time and space, for that spirit to dwell in her household. It’s exactly what we celebrated this morning with Crystal and Jeremy joining the church. What they have committed to, and what we acknowledged, is the ribbon cutting to an extra room in their life… its what most of you have committed to as you joined the church,… you have built on an extra room… a place in your life that is separate, where you can put time and energy and resources so that the spirit of God doesn’t have to be
crowded in to the rest of your already overcrowded lives. And even long after we have joined a church, or whether we ever join a church at all, we have the ability to build on and open new rooms in our lives every day. For some, it’s a time set aside each morning for prayer and reflection. For some, it may be a devotional, or a daily Bible study. I have one friend who’s “room” is her car. It’s where she does her one on one with God. There are countless ways that we add God space to our lives, but today, if you haven’t really thought about where that room for God is in your life, I want to encourage you to create one. And your room doesn’t have to look like anyone else’s. It can be and it will be as unique as you are and as unique as your relationship with God is. And if you don’t know how to go about doing that, come and talk to me, or one of your elders or deacons… but I encourage you… do it, because there is nothing that can equal going in to that room and closing the door and spending time with the savior every day. And let me add this… this room is not a quiet room. It’s not a room where you are afraid to be angry or frustrated or that you pull any punches. Can you imagine a place where you can be your authentic self and bare it all, with no fear of repercussion or condemnation? A place where you can let everything out, and when you emerge from that room, you are not holding anything in that might come out in another way… a complete newness. But here’s the best part. (Don’t you love how there is always a “best part”?) The room that you choose to build, even though from time to time may be filled with sweat and tears…isn’t closed up or musty or dark. It’s got a fabulous window with one heck of a
view. Because do you know what you look out on from that wonderful room? We read it today in Revelation. Let me read it to you: I looked, and there was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, robed in white, with palm branches in their hands. 10They cried out in a loud voice, saying, “Salvation belongs to our God who is seated on the throne, and to the Lamb!” 11And all the angels stood around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, 12singing, “Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our God forever and ever! Amen.” Your room looks out on the most perfect picture of heavenly worship that we have in the Bible… because your space… your time with God every day becomes a place of worship… and that worship that connects you with something larger than just yourself and a ‘one on one with God’… worship that connects you with the saints and souls of the past and of the present, and yes, even of the future. It’s the great cloud of witnesses that we celebrated this morning with the flowers… One of my favorite scriptures is Psalm 37:4- Delight yourself in the Lord and God will give you the desires of your heart. Do you know what that means? It doesn’t mean that if you are happy all the time and that if you pray enough that God give you what you want. It means that delighting in the Lord… spending time with Christ and getting to know one another on a regular basis actually changes your heart… The desires of your heart, or the things you think you want when you walk into that
room are not the same things that are important to you when you walk out. Like the Shunamite woman, you may receive things from God that you didn’t even know you desired… things your heart never dared to dream. And did you know that right now, Christ is calling you to that relationship, is calling you to that one-on-one dare to dream room with a view! And it’s not because you did anything, or deserved anything or worked hard enough or were nice enough… it’s because you are loved and cherished by the Almighty Creator of the universe and savior of the world… it’s because you are valued above all else… because spending time with you gives God great pleasure. And I know it’s tough to climb the stairs when you’re busy and crowded by life and when you think that you’ve gone so far off the deep end that God wouldn’t want to see you anyway. But listen… God is still calling… and saying “what can I do for you?” Climb up the stairs! Join in the worship of the heavens in the throne room of God! And the Lamb at the center of the throne is your shepherd, guiding you to springs of the water of life, a place where God wipes away every tear from your eyes.”