There's a very strange story in 2 Kings 13:11-20 that gets me thinking about the ways and the times I
"low-ball" my expectations of God. Elisha's on
his deathbed and the king of Israel comes for a final visit (Israel is,
incidentally, under siege again by the Arameans). So Elisha tells the king to
take a bow and arrow and strike the ground with it. It's an altogether bizarre
request, but King Jehoash complies.
I can only imagine Jehoash's arched, incredulous eyebrow as he
tentatively taps the ground with the arrow, watching Elisha skeptically the
whole while. I have to imagine it, because, although it's not stated, it's
strongly implied that Jehoash's response to Elisha's directive was a
half-hearted flop. He only tapped the ground three times instead of five or
six, Elisha says, and because of that, he'll only win three battles against
Aram, but he won't win the war.
I used to think this was a somewhat capricious
thing for Elisha to do. How could Jehoash have known that the fate of his
entire country rested on his hitting the ground six times with a bow and arrow
rather than only three? But this morning it occurred to me that there is a
deeper kind of "half-hearted obedience" going on in Jehoash's life.
In 2 Kings 2:11, we're told that he did not lead Israel away from the
idolatrous evil that the kings before him had committed. He continued in the
sins of his fathers.
With that in mind, this is my reading of the arrow-tapping incident: Jehoash has woefully low
expectations of YHWH's ability to deliver, prosper, and keep his people at
all--period-- and this is evident, not in his feeble response to the arrow-tapping thing-- but in Baalism that he's allowed to continue unchecked in
his kingdom (why not keep Baal in your corner, just in case YHWH can't pull
through, right?). And the deep spiritual half-heartedness of his life shows up in
his superficial half-heartedness with the arrow thing, only "playing along" with Elisha and tapping the ground three times...you know ... to humour YHWH's
prophet.
And the thing is: God is prepared to live up to the low expectations of his king. Jehoash will win a battle or three, but Aram will win the war. And it leads me to wonder: where, and when, and how I'm like Jehoash. In what
areas of my life doI set the bar pitifully low for God, and how are my low
expectations of him evident in my half-hearted obedience to him?
Because if God can put his finger on that for us, I think that's where we'll start to discover what a whole-hearted life with him might look like.
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