TREASURES OF THE BIBLE, Week of November 7 to 13, 2022, “There is more with us than with them”, Prepared Speech.

TREASURES OF THE BIBLE, November 7-13, 2022, “There is more with us than with them”, Prepared Speech.

“There is more with us than with them” (10 min.)

Sight is generally considered the most precious and important of all the senses, especially by those who have lost it. And it is interesting that those who do not see develop other abilities and qualities, so to speak, develop other senses that they did not have before. They improve their sense of smell, their perception of hearing, their touch. And so in that way they compensate or maybe even do better things than us who can see.

Sometimes they have a clear advantage over those of us who can perceive things with our eyes. That's what we're going to talk about in this section of Bible Treasures: "There is more with us than with them." And it is that sometimes we are scared by what we see. And we try not to perceive everything that surrounds what is happening.

That happened with Elisha and his servant. They were in a pretty critical situation. They were the ones who passed the word to King Jehoram about the entire strategy that King Ben-Hadad the Second was following. So they put on notice of what was going to happen, and for that reason they were prepared to defend themselves and act or frustrate any plan. 

However, upon learning that it was Elisha who was informing this King Jehoram of everything that was happening, they decided to finish him off so that this advance information would end. Once they discovered where the king of Syria was, God issued the following order that we find in Second Kings chapter 6 verses 13 and 14.

WE WILL READ 2 KINGS 6:13,14.

He said, "Go and find out where he is so I can send men to catch him." And later they informed him: “he is in Dothan”.14 He immediately sent horses, war chariots and a large army. They arrived at night and surrounded the city.

How can we see, according to the text read, a city as small as Dothan surrounded, as the story says, by a great army. All for just attacking a man, Eliseo. What was the natural reaction? What would you have thought when you only saw that bunch of war horses and a big army surrounding you? 

Of course, our vision or our sight would make us see what we have there in front of us. And I think that each one of us would think that that is the end of it. And that is what Eliseo's servant also went through. His vision allowed her to see only that He had not developed any other qualities, skills, or enough faith like Elisha. If we continue reading this same text from 2 Kings 6:15-17, let us examine the reaction of Elisha's servant and what this prophet said to him to reassure him.

 LET'S READ 2 KINGS 6:15-17.

When the servant* of the man of the true God got up early and went out, he saw an army with horses and chariots surrounding the city. Immediately, the servant said to him: “Oh, my lord! What are we going to do?". 16 But he answered, “Don't be afraid! There are more who are with us than those who are with them”. 17 Then Elisha began to pray and said, “O Lord, please open his eyes so that he can see.” Immediately, Jehovah opened the eyes of the servant, and he could see… The mountainous region was full of horses and chariots of fire around Elisha!

If we see in the drawing that we have in our activity guide, we perceive the scene, Elisha showing the servant what he did not see, of course for this he had to resort to Jehovah through prayer, asking him to please allow him to see the servant everything what they had around them, and we see his reaction. He now he was scared more than he was watching, now he could perceive what his physical eyes could not before. What was the difference between Eliseo and his servant to be so calm one unlike the other?. Elisha had a lot of confidence in Jehovah, he knew who he was serving and he knew perfectly well that he could safely say there is more with us than with them. 

Something similar happens in our days, every time the situation that we see around us is something that worries us. We cannot deny that, insecurity, unemployment, diseases, pandemics make us think when the end will come and if we can withstand everything that will come. And this is where our vision comes in, what we see either through the news media can make us have a certain fear and in some others even terror of the things that happen.

But if we use our spiritual vision we could observe more than what we are seeing in front of us. It is that Jehovah already demonstrated it that way. And it is that somehow Jehovah will be in charge of giving a solution sometimes even very strange, for example, what was the solution that Jehovah gave when all that army of the Syrians was surrounding Elisha? Let's see what happened in 2 Kings chapter 6 verses 18 and 19. 

WE WILL READ 2 KINGS 6:18,19. 

When the Syrians came down to where he was, Elisha prayed to Jehovah: "Please make this nation blind." So he made her blind, just as Elisha asked. 19 Elisha then told them, “No, it's not this way. This is not the city. Follow me and let me lead you to the man you are looking for.” But he took them to Samaria.

Eliseo himself approaches them to indicate that this was not the city where they should arrive, but another. What had happened? For the sentence we just read. Elisha asks Jehovah that they go blind. 

Apparently he is not referring to physical blindness, because otherwise Elisha would have to lead them from hand to hand, each one by one, in order to perceive the path. According to a work it is indicated that it may be a mental blindness. That is, the inability to understand things and simply go with what they think is right, and so he led them 10 miles to Samaria and left them there. What a miraculous way Jehovah will bring salvation to his prophet and his servant. 

If we look again in our activity guide in the following drawing, we can perceive that we are going to possibly be frightened when we see the armies looking for the people of Jehovah. At the end of the Great Tribulation, however, we can perceive the spiritual world that will be protecting the people of God. In those moments, as we see here, the angels are just waiting for the precise moment to intervene and we will be sure that we could also say like Eliseo, there is more with us than with them, we want to remember that the power of the angels, of a single angel, since it's enough to kill thousands and thousands of highly trained soldiers. We are sure that Jehovah will be in favor of his people. 

It is true the things that we see today frighten us and sometimes we even think if we can withstand everything that will happen during the great tribulation, but Jehovah has everything ready, he already has everything ready to save his people and his loyal servants, but you have to keep something in mind Elisha's servant served Jehovah and Elisha the prophet also both served the same God but their faith and his was different.

That makes us think that even today, even though we serve Jehovah, we have to strengthen our trust in him. We want to be completely sure of who we have by our side and be able to serve them without conditions. Let us remember there is more with us than with them let us show Jehovah that we have full confidence in him and help others also to see what they have not yet perceived. All the support we have from our Almighty God.