Bible Doctrine

To the Philippian believers alone did Paul write that he was “confident of this very thing, that he which has begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ (i.e., His return)” (See Philippians 1:6). But to the Galatian assembly Paul wrote something quite different, saying, “I marvel that you are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel” (See Galatians 1:6). He spoke of how the Philippian believers were “filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God” (See Philippians 1:11). But to the Galatian believers, Paul wrote, “O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you that you should not obey the truth?” (See Galatians 2:1).

All too many read Paul’s letter to the Philippians and think that what he says in that epistle applies to every Christian in every assembly throughout the ages, and, of course, such is not the case, nor do his words to the Galatian believers apply to all other believers of any other age and time. Paul told the Philippian believers that they shined as lights in the world. (See Philippians 2:15). He spoke of how God worked in them “both to will and to do of His good pleasure” (See Philippians 2:13). Not so with the Galatians, whom he warned were frustrating the grace of God. (See Galatians 2:21). Vast numbers of Christians today frustrate the grace of God, for God extends to them the knowledge and the strength to overcome every temptation to sin and to shine as lights in the world, drawing others to Jesus Christ by the more than obvious change in their lives, yet the lives many live are not much different than the lives of the unsaved and ungodly among whom they walk day to day.

In summing up his letter to the Philippians, Paul calls them his “joy and crown!” (See Philippians 4:1). But to the Galatians, he writes, “I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain” (See Galatians 4:11). “Am I therefore become your enemy, because I tell you the truth?” (Galatians 4:16). And, again, “I stand in doubt of you” (Galatians 4:20). “Who did hinder you that you should not obey the truth?” (Galatians 5:7). And in closing his letter to the Galatians, Paul warns,”Be not deceived. God is not mocked, for whatsoever a man sows that shall he also reap” (See Galatians 6:7).

That, brethren is rightly dividing the Word of God, something many fail to do. God help you to understand.

Christ’s Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),

Donald Wiley

“All God sees when He looks at a believer is the righteousness of Christ. We’re covered in the blood, brother!” How many times have I heard that, or similar statements, coming from the mouths of preachers, Bible teachers, rank-and-file believers during testimony time at church! “All God sees when He looks at us is the purity of His Son, Jesus Christ.” Sounds so scriptural and right doesn’t it. It’s the devil’s snow job.

Take ten or fifteen minutes to read Chapters 2 and 3 of Revelation. Jesus addresses Himself to seven different literal assemblies of believers. Note well what He points out, what He plainly sees. Notice how often He gives them the command, “Repent!” Notice how He says, “I have somewhat against thee.” Notice how He says, “I will give unto every one of you according to your works.” Notice the chilling words He employs when addressing the Laodicean assembly: “I will spue thee out of my mouth…thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind and naked.” (See Revelation 3:16-17).

Yes, Jesus DID say, “Where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst.” But that doesn’t mean He approves of what He sees as He stands there. Read Revelation 2 and 3 carefully. Jesus says He is standing in the midst of these seven assemblies, too. But note well what He sees and what He says. Yet how many times have I heard believers quote Matthew 18:20 and construe it to mean the Lord is present in their assembly and fellowshipping with them in harmony and peace, etc.

When Paul wrote “All things are lawful for me,” he was quoting the gnostic argument put forth by some of the members of the Corinthian assembly, He warned such that “all things are not expedient,” Rob someone in the marketplace and they might find themselves in a Corinthian jail, or worse. Have sexual relations with their neighbor’s wife and they might find themselves missing a few teeth. Again he quotes the gnostic argument “All things are lawful for me.” And again warns, “but all things edify not.” Some behaviors will benefit us while others can ruin our reputation. (See I Corinthians 10:23).

God have mercy on those foolish ones who do not rightly divide the Word of God, who merely parrot what their preachers and “learned” leaders say. It’s going to be a one-on-one affair at the judgment of believers. We won’t have Reverend So-and-So beside us defending our errors and shortcomings. We have a few (perhaps) years (maybe days) to get it right while we live and breathe. Let’s strive diligently to do so lest we board the ship of fools and sail blindly onto the hidden rocks below..

Christ’s Faithful Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),

Donald Wiley

I have written before of Satan’s blinding power – that it is incredible, stupendous, mind-boggling and little understood. It is his blinding POWER that has resulted in Christianity being divided into dozens, if not hundreds, of differing factions, believers as different as Roman Catholics and snake-handling Pentecostals. He has succeeded in blinding the cleanest living, most wholesome Mormon as well as the television charlatan evangelists who claim to have the “Holy Ghost’s anointing” on their extremely lucrative ministries! And he can blind the average “pastor” in the quaint little church around the corner.

The average pastor does not even comprehend what scripture identifies as his supreme function, the thing he is called to do more than anything else. “And He (Jesus Christ) gave some (to be) ….pastors and teachers (for what purpose?) for the perfecting of the saints…till we all come…unto a perfect man (to what degree?) UNTO THE MEASURE OF THE STATURE OF THE FULLNESS OF CHRIST (that we may) grow up into Him in all things (in every area of our life and understanding), which is the Head, even Christ” (See Ephesians 4:11-15).

That is why Paul wrote “ordain elders in every city…if any be blameless…just, holy, temperate” (See Titus 1:5-8). They are to serve as examples to the flock! Again Paul writes, “And I thank Christ Jesus our Lord, who hath enabled me, for that HE COUNTED ME FAITHFUL, putting me into the ministry” (I Timothy 1:12). Jesus Christ is a wise Master Builder. He will not place into His ministry an unproved novice, nor will He use a carnal, weak-willed and headstrong individual to serve as an under shepherd over His blood-bought flock. Even a deacon had to “first be proved, then let them use the office of a deacon, BEING FOUND BLAMELESS” (See I Timothy 3:10). A gross misunderstanding of Romans 7 has led millions to believe that Paul himself was a carnal, defeated Christian and unable to live up to the requirements he himself said were required by one who desired to fulfill the office of a pastor or deacon.

Through His truly called and anointed pastors and teachers, Jesus Christ is bringing many sons to glory to present us to the Father totally spiritually mature, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord blamelessly – not just religious Joes and Janes, but prime examples of what Almighty God, through Jesus Christ our High Priest and with the Holy Spirit’s help, what He can do in and through and with human flesh, human beings in the here and now!

I assure you the bride of Christ will NOT be comprised of a rag-tag bunch of bickering, dissenting, differing and squabbling religious types who day in and day out have been giving in to every human passion and emotion right up to the moment of being caught up in the air to meet the Lord. Do you really think that is the best Almighty God can do in presenting His beloved Son with a resplendent holy and pure bride??????

Christ’s Faithful Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),

Donald Wiley

In Hebrews chapter 6, verses 4 through 6, we are given the absolute conditions, or criteria, one must meet in order to place them in a position where they might commit the unpardonable sin. That passage reads: “For it is impossible for those who were once enlightened, and have tasted of the heavenly gift, and were made partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the good word of God, and the powers of the world to come, if they shall fall away to renew them again unto repentance, seeing they crucify to themselves the Son of God afresh, and put Him to an open shame.”

Now notice the FIVE CRITERIA one must meet in order to be eligible to commit the unpardonable sin: 1) They must have been enlightened to spiritual truth, the reality of God and His Son Jesus Christ. 2) They must have entered into a vital, life-changing relationship with Jesus Christ, the heavenly gift. 3) They must have been given the Holy Spirit. 4) They must have had Jesus through the Holy Spirit enlighten them to the basic mysteries of God contained in His Word, the Bible. And 5) They must have been given one or more miraculous spiritual gifts, the powers of the world to come.

One major reason so few are given miraculous spiritual gifts by God is because one so gifted, if they shall fall away returning to a life of sin and rebellion against God, is then fully capable of committing the unpardonable sin! The Bible mentions only one lone person having fit all the above criteria – Judas Iscariot! That’s why Jesus said of Judas, “good were it for that man if he had never been born” (See Mark 14:21).

If you think you might have committed the unpardonable sin, ask yourself, “Have I been able to speak a foreign language without ever learning that language? Have I been able to interpret a foreign language without ever learning that language? Have I prophesied about the future to be proven absolutely correct when that prophecy came to pass? Has God in a vision or dream revealed to me something humanly unknowable? Have I performed some obvious miracle that benefited or blessed someone?” If the answer is “no,” then take heart, my friend, you have not committed the unpardonable sin.

Christ’s Faithful Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),

Donald Wiley

Sometimes I wonder if God the Father, looking down on this earth and seeing me, might not have said to His Son, let’s see what we can do with that one. I was a prime candidate for grace. I had embraced so much sin for so long that I had to be a test for God’s ability as a Potter – One who could take my marred clay form and reform and refashion it into something worthy of saving and keeping. But I guess we are all marred vessels, aren’t we? But the question is – are we going to permit the Potter to work, to remold and refashion us into what we might have been had father Adam never sinned? That’s what He is doing with believers, you know. He is blotting out all our past offenses and leading us into the path of righteousness and purity of life.

“And hereby we do know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He that says, ‘I know Him,’ and keeps not His commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him” (I John 2:3-4). The only validation of salvation is a life of obedience. It is the only possible proof that a person really knows Jesus Christ. The test of true, living, God-given faith is whether it produces continuous obedience and does such faith result in answered prayer. It amazes me when I encounter believers who find this scripture in I John 2 threatening.

John knew that Jesus Christ had said, “If you will enter into life (eternal), keep the commandments!” (See Matthew 19:17). When asked which commandments Jesus began reciting the Ten Commandments. And of these commandments Jesus had stated quite clearly at the outset of His public ministry that not one iota, not one jot or tittle of those commandments would be changed or abolished. They were eternal, sacrosanct, originally written in stone by the very finger of God! And there were ten – not nine. (See Matthew 5:17-28 and Exodus 20).

I warn you again: Satan is very good at what he does, folks. Common sense declares there must be an active, ongoing spirit being like Satan operating generation after generation on this earth. How else does one explain the changing of one of God’s commandments by believers when scripture after scripture declares this cannot be done?!!! How could decent folk, Bible “scholars” be duped into abandoning God’s eternal Sabbath for the day long honored by sun worshipers? Jesus plainly said until heaven and earth passed away this could not be done! Yet the overwhelming majority of professing Christians now scorn Sabbath observance and honor the day of the sun. From Roman Catholics to Mormons, from Amish to Baptists they, one and all, believe wholeheartedly the scriptures show God’s Sabbath was abolished and replaced by Sunday! (And, of course, they do have a very few scripture texts that they think supports them in their forsaking the Sabbath – texts they obviously do not understand at all).

God calls the Sabbath “a delight” and commands that we do the same. (See Isaiah 58:13). So men call it a burden and a yoke of bondage! Jesus said the Sabbath was made for man. (See Mark 2:27). So men say it was made for the Jew alone! And you doubt Satan’s existence? There is no other explanation for a religious person’s failure to see what God’s Word so clearly proclaims! There has to be a blinding POWER at work that prevents most believers from seeing the plain truth of God’s Word. They just do not have the ability to put it all together. They can only see those scriptures that SEEMINGLY teach that Sunday is a holy day, calling it the Christian Sabbath! If I had no other reason to believe Satan exists this phenomenon would be sufficient to convince me Satan is real and presently at work on planet earth in the year 2021.

Christ’s Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),

Donald Wiley

I sseriously doubt if the average preacher even knows those words are in the Bible.  I really do.  That’s how astounding is Satan’s blinding power.  And do you know who the “they” are in that sentence?  The elders of Judah!  Here is the complete verse where those words are found: “And He (God) brought me into the inner court of the Lord’s house, and, behold, at the door of the temple of the Lord, between the porch and the altar, were about five and twenty men with their backs toward the temple of the Lord and their faces toward the east, and they worshiped the sun toward the east.”  (See Ezekiel 8:16.  See also Jeremiah 8:1-9).

Worship of the ancient Latin god Sol was prevalent throughout the Roman Empire at the time of our Lord’s earthly ministry.  The apostles would have been well aware of this pagan religion and would have avoided doing anything that might lend itself to an apparent acceptance of this erroneous belief system.  Sun worship, of course, had been practiced by the Egyptians even before the time of Moses.

Anything that even gave a hint of worshiping the sun would have been anathema to the Jewish people when the Lord Jesus conducted His ministry in Judea and Galilee.  They had finally learned their lesson in that matter if in nothing else.  And the early church would have had an impossible task trying to convince the Jewish people that God without any warning whatsoever had abolished the fourth commandment, that commandment that said REMEMBER the Sabbath day to keep it holy, and replaced it with the day of the sun – Sunday.  That didn’t happen.  Satan can deceive everyone from the Mormons to the Roman Catholics and every denomination in between that God abolished the Sabbath day and made Sunday a holy day instead and, still, I assure you that did NOT happen, and I assure you I have meticulously studied the few New Testament texts men use to prove God authorized replacing His eternal Sabbath with Sunday observance and found no such support in any of those texts.

Shortly after the founding of God’s church in Jerusalem, “the angel of the Lord spoke unto Philip, saying, ‘Arise, and go toward the south unto the way which goes down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert.’  And he arose and went, and, behold, a man of Ethiopia (a black man), a eunuch of great authority under Candace queen of the Ethiopians, who had charge of all her treasure, and had come to Jerusalem for to worship, was returning, and sitting in his chariot read Isaiah the prophet.  Then the Spirit said unto Philip, ‘Go near, and join yourself to this chariot.’  And Philip ran there to him, and heard him read the prophet Isaiah, and said, ‘Do you understand what you are reading?’  And he said, ‘How can I except some man should guide me?’  And he desired Philip that he would come up and sit with him.  The place of the scripture which he read was this, ‘He was led as a sheep to the slaughter, and like a lamb dumb before His shearer, so opened not His mouth, in His humiliation His judgment was taken away, and who shall declare His generation? for His life is taken from the earth.  And the eunuch answered Philip, and said, ‘I pray you, of whom speaks the prophet this, of himself, or of some other man?’  Then Philip opened his mouth, and began at the same scripture, and preached unto him Jesus.”  (See Acts 8:26-35).  The scripture text they were looking at was Isaiah 53, verses 7 an 8).

But do you know what is most interesting?  If that eunuch kept reading, and I have no doubt he did, just three chapters later in Isaiah he would have come to these words: “Blessed is the man that does this, and the son of man (Jew or Gentile) that lays hold on it, THAT KEEPS THE SABBATH FROM POLLUTING IT, and keeps his hand from doing any evil.  Neither let the son of the stranger (the Gentile, for example this Ethiopian eunuch) that has joined himself to the Lord speak, saying, ‘the Lord has utterly separated me from His people, NEITHER LET THE EUNUCH say, ‘Behold, I am a dry tree (unproductive),’  For thus says the Lord UNTO THE EUNUCHS THAT KEEP MY SABBATHS, AND CHOOSE THE THINGS THAT PLEASE ME, and take hold of my (Sabbath) covenant, even unto them will I give in my house and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and daughters.  I will give them an everlasting name that shall not be cut off.” (See Isaiah 56:2-5).  Can you imagine the awe that would have swept over that eunuch as he read those words?

This Ethiopian eunuch was the first eunuch in all history invited to come into fellowship with the Lord.  Therefore, let me ask you a fair question.  Seeing this eunuch had just been baptized and joined to God’s church (see Acts 8:35-39), and seeing how he was being led by the Spirit of God to read and ponder the words of Isaiah the prophet, do you think he would have then continued to keep God’s eternal Sabbath holy or do you think he would have abandoned the Sabbath and begun honoring Sunday as a “holy” day?  Let me tell you what I think.  Any Sunday keeper who might have approached him and tried to dissuade him from keeping the fourth commandment would have been looked upon by this eunuch as the devil’s own agent.  That’s what I think.  Remember, this account is found in the 8th chapter of Acts.  Not one scrap, not one word of the New Testament had been written.  Even if there had been a Sunday observer at that point in time – which there wasn’t – that Sunday keeper wouldn’t have had a single text to show this eunuch to convince him to abandon Sabbath observance and honor the day of the sun.  This eunuch would have had Isaiah’s writings as well as the rest of the Hebrew scriptures to guide him and exhort him to honor God’s holy eternal Sabbath.

Folks, I warn you again, Satan is good at his game.  Not only can he deceive Solomon and the apostle Judas, he can and HAS deceived ten thousand times ten thousand preachers and theologians.  Now the question to ask is has he deceived YOU???

Christ’s Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),

Donald Wiley

So WHERE did the whirlwind carry Elijah?  Doesn’t the text clearly say, “Elijah went up by a whirlwind (not a fiery chariot) INTO HEAVEN?”  Yep, it sure does, but then one must ask which heaven, as the Bible clearly indicates that there are THREE heavens.  The apostle Paul mentions “a man in Christ….caught up to the third heaven,” calling the same “paradise.”  (See 2 Corinthians 12:2).  The man he speaks of is himself.  Read the entire chapter.  It is only a matter of conjecture and deduction that one surmises the second heaven must be that limitless expanse of outer space wherein are the billions of galaxies and other heavenly bodies (asteroids, comets, etc.)  The first heaven would then be the atmosphere around this planet, what we normally call the sky.  And THAT is where the whirlwind took Elijah, and, like the 8-year-old boy mentioned in Part 4 of this series of articles, Elijah may well have been lifted only a hundred feet, or so, into the sky.  Maybe not that high, maybe higher.  At any rate, you will soon see from the scriptures that Elijah was transported to another place on earth, not heaven.

I must tie up some loose ends in this account before looking at the text that proves Elijah did not ascend to the heaven of God’s throne in a whirlwind, a fiery chariot, or even a space shuttle.

One must consider the meaning of the Hebrew word “shameh” that is translated by the English word “heaven” in the 2 Kings 2 account.  That same Hebrew word is translated “air” in Genesis 1:26, 28, as well as Genesis 2:19-20, Deuteronomy 4:17 and Proverbs 30:19.  It should also have been translated as “air” in the 2 Kings 2 text.  Translating shameh as heaven in that text has led to a world of confusion.  The whirlwind caught Elijah up into the air – NOT heaven, at least not the third heaven, the abode of God.

Many fail to realize that the Old Testament books of 1st and 2nd Chronicles and 1st and 2nd Kings are parallel accounts and must all be consulted in order to get the fullest picture presented in these texts.  Elijah doesn’t surface again in the book of 2 Kings, leading many to think that having been caught away by the whirlwind Elijah is forever gone and gone to heaven.  Hold on, folks.  Elijah does surface again but only the Chronicles text provides this revelation.  As Paul Harvey would have said, you need to hear the rest of the story.

In 2 Chronicles the 21st chapter, beginning with verse 12, we read these words: “And a letter came to him (King Jehoram of Judah) FROM ELIJAH the prophet, saying, ‘Thus says the Lord God of your father David, because you have not walked in the ways of Jehoshaphat your father, or in the ways of Asa king of Judah, but have walked in the way of the kings of Israel, and have made Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to play the harlot like the harlotry of the house of Ahab, and also have killed your brothers (in order to secure the throne), those of your father’s household, who were better than yourself, behold, the Lord will strike your people with a serious affliction – your children, your wives, and all your possessions, and you will become very sick with a disease of your intestines, until your intestines come out by reason of the sickness, day by day'” (2 Chronicles 21: 1-15, New King James Version). 

Due to the blow-by-blow describing of what King Jehoram had done, and considering that his reign lasted only eight years, it is obvious this letter was written toward the end of his short reign, yet Elijah’s catching away by a whirlwind took place around the second year of Jehoram’s reign!  Elijah is well aware of what is happening in Israel and Judah years after being separated from Elisha, even writing a letter to King Jehoram long after the 2 Kings account.  It is also interesting to note that this account in 2 Chronicles is the ONLY mention of Elijah in all of Chronicles and that Elisha is not mentioned at all in Chronicles.

Christ’s Aged Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),

Donald Wiley

Actually, instead of calling this series of articles “A Chariot of Fire” I should have called the series “The Whirlwind,” because THAT is what caught away Elijah from Elisha’s side – a whirlwind, NOT a chariot of fire.  The first verse of 2 Kings Chapter 2 clearly says, “And it came to pass, when the Lord would take up Elijah into heaven (actually meaning the sky) BY A WHIRLWIND, that Elijah went with Elisha from Gilgal.”  Elijah did not board a fiery chariot at all.  Beginning with verse 9 of 2 Kings 2, we read: “And it came to pass, when they were gone over (the Jordan River – see verses 6 through 8), that Elijah said unto Elisha, ‘Ask what I shall do for you, before I be taken away from you?’  And Elisha said, ‘I pray you, let a double portion of your spirit be upon me.’  And he (Elijah) said, ‘You have asked a hard thing, nevertheless, if you see me when I am taken from you, it shall be so unto you, but if not, it shall not be so.’  And it came to pass as they still went on and talked that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire and horses of fire, AND PARTED THEM BOTH ASUNDER, AND ELIJAH WENT UP BY A WHIRLWIND INTO HEAVEN (or into the sky).  And Elisha saw it, and he cried (yelled to Elijah), ‘My father, my father, the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof.  AND HE SAW HIM NO MORE, and he took hold of his own clothes (in anguish and frustration) and rent them in two pieces.”

Elisha did NOT see Elijah caught away by the whirlwind as God separated them by this chariot of fire.  Not seeing Elijah, not knowing the whirlwind had caught Elijah away, Elisha cries out to Elijah, “My father, my father, the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof!”  He was saying, “Elijah, LOOK, LOOK, a chariot of fire.”  When the chariot of fire passed then Elisha noticed that Elijah was gone.  He then knew he was not going to receive a double portion of Elijah’s spirit as he had missed seeing the whirlwind envelop Elijah and carry him away.

Continuing with the 2 Kings 2 account, we read: “He took up also the mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and went back and stood by the bank of Jordan, and he took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and smote the waters, and said, ‘Where is the Lord God of Elijah?’  And when he also had smitten the waters, they parted hither and thither, and Elisha went over (passing through the dry riverbed much as the children of Israel had passed through the Red Sea when it was parted by Moses).  And when the sons of the prophets, which were to view at Jericho saw him, they said, ‘The spirit of Elijah does rest on Elisha’ (which was true, but not a double portion of that spirit).  And they came to meet him and bowed themselves to the ground before him.” (verses 13 through 15).  To be continued…..

Christ’s Aged Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),

Donald Wiley

Actually, instead of calling this series of articles “A Chariot of Fire” I should have called the series “The Whirlwind,” because THAT is what caught away Elijah from Elisha’s side – a whirlwind, NOT a chariot of fire.  The first verse of 2 Kings Chapter 2 clearly says, “And it came to pass, when the Lord would take up Elijah into heaven (actually meaning the sky) BY A WHIRLWIND, that Elijah went with Elisha from Gilgal.”  Elijah did not board a fiery chariot at all.  Beginning with verse 9 of 2 Kings 2, we read: “And it came to pass, when they were gone over (the Jordan River – see verses 6 through 8), that Elijah said unto Elisha, ‘Ask what I shall do for you, before I be taken away from you?’  And Elisha said, ‘I pray you, let a double portion of your spirit be upon me.’  And he (Elijah) said, ‘You have asked a hard thing, nevertheless, if you see me when I am taken from you, it shall be so unto you, but if not, it shall not be so.’  And it came to pass as they still went on and talked that, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire and horses of fire, AND PARTED THEM BOTH ASUNDER, AND ELIJAH WENT UP BY A WHIRLWIND INTO HEAVEN (or into the sky).  And Elisha saw it, and he cried (yelled to Elijah), ‘My father, my father, the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof.  AND HE SAW HIM NO MORE, and he took hold of his own clothes (in anguish and frustration) and rent them in two pieces.”

Elisha did NOT see Elijah caught away by the whirlwind as God separated them by this chariot of fire.  Not seeing Elijah, not knowing the whirlwind had caught Elijah away, Elisha cries out to Elijah, “My father, my father, the chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof!”  He was saying, “Elijah, LOOK, LOOK, a chariot of fire.”  When the chariot of fire passed then Elisha noticed that Elijah was gone.  He then knew he was not going to receive a double portion of Elijah’s spirit as he had missed seeing the whirlwind envelop Elijah and carry him away.

Continuing with the 2 Kings 2 account, we read: “He took up also the mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and went back and stood by the bank of Jordan, and he took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and smote the waters, and said, ‘Where is the Lord God of Elijah?’  And when he also had smitten the waters, they parted hither and thither, and Elisha went over (passing through the dry riverbed much as the children of Israel had passed through the Red Sea when it was parted by Moses).  And when the sons of the prophets, which were to view at Jericho saw him, they said, ‘The spirit of Elijah does rest on Elisha’ (which was true, but not a double portion of that spirit).  And they came to meet him and bowed themselves to the ground before him.” (verses 13 through 15).  To be continued…..

Christ’s Aged Servant (Galatians 1:10-12),

Donald Wiley