But as one was felling a beam, the axe-head fell into the water.
The axe-head
1. The first thought presented is, when Christ dwells in the hearts of His people there is a deep inward conviction of our own narrowness. The sons of the prophets dwelling with Elisha are conscious of the straitness of their dwelling, and earnestly long for enlargement. So it is with every true child of God. The soul that dwells in Christ and Christ in it is conscious of its straitness. It longs for enlargement. More room for Christ--this is its intense inward breathing. And this yearning cannot rest with inaction. Its course is always onward. “Let us go, we pray thee, to Jordan, and take thence every man a beam, and let us make a place there, where we may dwell. And he answered, “Go ye.” “Let us go”--that is its motto. This is the only form in which the yearning within can find rest. It carries the soul with it into higher aims and holier aspirations. It lays hold of everything that would lift it nearer to God.
2. But observe, there can be no onward movement, no enlargement of soul, without God’s presence with us. “And one said, Be content, I pray thee, and go with thy servants. And he answered, I will go.” The language of this unknown one is that of every true child of God, under all circumstances. The believer knows that God’s abiding presence with him can alone assure growth in grace, or security against evil. Without the constant presence of the Lord he has nothing to keep him from lapsing into coldness or deadness, nothing to meet the powers of evil that lie so thickly in his path. The presence of the Lord is his joy, his pavilion in trial, temptation, and danger, his light in darkness, and his life in death.
3. We see these remarks confirmed by what happened in this narrative. “So he went with them. And when they came to Jordan, they cut down wood. But as one was felling a beam, the axe-head fell into the water.” Here at this critical moment, the very weapon needed most of all for carrying on the work--the axe-head--suddenly and unexpectedly fell into the water. Alas, alas! how is the wood to be cut down now? How is the building to go on? What are we to do? All is over now! At one sudden stroke everything collapses, and there is a cry of despair. If Elisha had not been with them in this crisis what could they have done? They would have wrung their hands in unavailing sorrow, and the work must have ceased. And are there not such crises in the history of every believer? Has not the Church of Christ, in her passage through this world, volumes of such to record? Some great work of the Lord is prospering when, suddenly, the one who is the very centre of it, on whom it all seems to hang, is taken away by death. Happy for those who have with them the presence of the true Elisha. They “sorrow not as others who have no hope.” Their hope is in God.
4. But notice another truth in the reason given for this sorrow here: “Alas, master! for it was borrowed.” The axe-head was not this man’s own. It belonged to another. See how this applies to the believer. Like these sons of the prophets dwelling with Elisha, he dwells with Christ. Abiding in Him, he fully realises that everything he possesses is only lent. It belongs to another, even God. It is just given him to use for his Master’s glory, and nothing else. It is but the axe-head which is “borrowed.”
5. But now observe what “a very present help” Elisha was: “And the man of God said, Where fell it?” This was all. All the responsibility now was Elisha’s. So is it in the Christian’s life. In all our circumstances the Lord is saying, “What is it? Tell Me.” He is ever asking us to lay before Him these emergencies. He sends them for this purpose that we may “show Him the place.” When this is done He will “undertake for you.” You cannot bring up from the deep that that will fill your soul with joy, but He can. So it was here: “And Elisha cut down a stick, and cast it in thither; and the iron did swim.” The axe-head--that which your soul needs, that which can alone enable you to make your way, the true Elisha can bring back to your soul. It may seem to you to be hopeless, lost in the fathomless deep; and a world that can see nothing beneath the surface may pity, and write despair on your hopes. But Elisha, Jesus, is with you. “Is anything too hard for the Lord?. .. I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpillar, and the palmerworm: and ye shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God that hath dealt wondrously with you: and my people shall never be ashamed.” Oh, trust the Lord! With such assurances as these how can you doubt? He will undertake for you, and the lost hope shall “swim” again before your eyes. You shall “eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord your God.”
6. Here is presented a picture of death and resurrection. In the axe-head down in the waters, we see man “dead in trespasses and sins,” “far off” from God, a lost and ruined sinner. Who shall go down into the waters of death and bring him up? Jesus, He has done it. “All thy waves and thy billows have gone over Me,” was His cry. Thus He went down to the depths, and brought up the poor lost one. In His death the sinner has died. In His resurrection the believer has “risen again from the dead.”
7. “And he put out his hand, and took it.” Faith is the hand. Have you indeed put it forth, and taken hold of Jesus for your soul? Is it religion with you or Jesus? Which? (F. Whitfield, M. A.)
The lost axe-head
Elisha’s recovery of the lost axe-head is a sad stumbling-block to rationalists. The miracle seems to them childish. They cannot explain it away, and they do not like to accept it. The Christian, however, does not sit in judgment upon God’s Word. It is unreasonable to believe in God and to object to miracles; nor are we fit judges as to what is or is not a sufficient cause for God to interfere, as we call it, with His own laws, but to learn more of God’s faithfulness and thoughtful care. The prophet’s college was overfull; there was no tooth for the growing number of students. This was very encouraging. There had been no such difficulty in Elijah’s day; but Elisha had reaped where Elijah had sown. This blessing entailed increased responsibility. It always is so; the reward of work is more work. There can be no standing still or resting upon our oars. The Divine command is always “Spare not,” “Stretch forth.” We must be ever pressing forward, both in the pursuit of personal holiness and in our efforts to win lives for God. They wish to build, therefore, and they go about it wisely. But, in spite of Elisha’s presence, a serious embarrassment arose. “Alas, master,” he cried; “for it was borrowed.” He was an honest man, you see. He might have exclaimed, “What a stupid and worthless tool--the owner deserves to lose it”; or, “That’s not my fault, it was pure accident; what a good thing it isn’t mine.” We must not let our good be evil spoken of. Dishonour often accrues to God’s cause if we are careless about what is due to others. Elisha saw it would be for God’s glory that the axe-head should be restored. But what a beautiful parable the story makes. We are all workers for God. We work with borrowed power. This power may be lost, not only from indolence and neglect, but even through over-energy in God’s work. God’s carpenters sometimes show more strength than skill. The energy of the flesh or the wisdom of the flesh leave no room for God to work, and so the power is lost. Learn then how the lost power can be regained.
1. The man stopped working. Of course, you say; how could he cut down trees when the axe-head was gone? But Christian workers are not always so wise; they think to make up by their own energy and earnestness for the lack of Divine power. They use the haft of human wisdom or ecclesiastical status, although the cutting, driving power of God has been forfeited.
2. He told Elisha at once. That is always the first thing to do. Go and tell Jesus; confess to Him that you have lost the power. In this case the confession was made in public. Sometimes it is well for ministers and workers to acknowledge openly that they have lost the blessing they had. Generally, however, it is enough to tell Jesus. You do not need to tell others; they see it for themselves.
3. He showed Elisha the place where it fell. It is always well to be definite. Confess exactly where it was you lost touch. Perhaps you were puffed up with your success; or you began to distrust and doubt when that trouble came; or you were contaminated by that company; or you allowed that new interest, that book or game, to rob you of your secret time with God.
4. Elisha at once brought it within reach. Interpret as you like, the casting in of the wood. There is one power that always brings forfeited blessing within reach: it is the Cross of Calvary. The precious blood of Christ has brought within faith’s reach every blessing that we need. Bring the Cross to bear upon your lost peace and power, and at once it is within reach.
5. The man put out his hand, and took it. There must be the personal appropriation of faith. He did this at the bidding of Elisha. Do the same at the bidding of the Lord Jesus, who still says to His disciples, “Receive ye the Holy Ghost.” (F. S. Webster, M. A.)
The borrowed axe
I. That it is the privilege of People to expect and receive Divine interposition, when overtaken by trouble of misfortune, in any laudable undertaking. The enterprise in which these young men were engaged was both laudable and praiseworthy. “Into the water!” What an unusual, perplexing occurrence. How trivial it would have been, if it had fallen on the land. Such is life. It is the unexpected that happens. It is what may be called the stupid and vexatious occurrences of life that cause much of our daily trouble and disappointments. This young man was evidently careless, or he would not have allowed the axe to come clear off. I also learn from this narrative that, if a poor man should have no axe, and not well able to buy one, that God has no objections if he should go to a neighbour and borrow one.
II. That it is the privilege of God’s people to look for and receive Divine interposition in seasons of legitimate anxiety and worriment. Every honest man should feel worried, who has borrowed the property of another and cannot return it according to promise. Christian people, especially, should be very sensitive on this point. A religion that does not make a man honest and truthful is spurned and ridiculed by the world, and justly so, for it is worse than no religion at all. This young man had a noble sense of honour and equity about him. As I look at the Divine interposition, in behalf of this anxious, disappointed young man, I draw lessons of encouragement.
1. Let us be sure, first of all, that the business, the enterprise out of which our troubles arise, is legitimate and proper.
2. That we entered upon it in the right spirit. That, during its prosecution, we sought to go in and out under the smile of God.
3. That our troubles are not the result of our own ignorance, indolence, or sin, but from causes we did not suspect, and over which we had no control. The axe is off, and in the water. Legitimate anxiety and worriment from unusual and unsuspected quarters. The zeal and energy of this young man brought him this trouble. I suppose that some men could have used that axe all day, and it might not have slipped a quarter of an inch, But he swung it as a man who intended to make the chips fly. Therefore, I should say it came off, and all this trouble came on. So, the man who works with both hands heartily, in felling souls for the spiritual temple of the Lord, will be sure to make himself trouble. A cold, formal Church and the wicked world will unite to oppose and do him harm. Indeed, any man who has anything worthy of the name of zeal, in the cause of God, will soon find cause for legitimate anxiety about himself, his reputation, and his work.
III. That God’s method of interposition, in behalf of His people, is frequently through human instrumentality. Elisha was the instrument God used to help this young man out of his trouble. So now, God often helps us, even answers our prayers, through persons to whom he has given the will and power to do it. There are many striking instances of God’s interposition in behalf of His people, in temporal matters.
IV. That, although in this case the interposition was miraculous, the end was not fully secured without human co-operation--“Take it up to thee.” In the Divine economy, man must be more than a mere negation,--he must be more than a passive recipient of God’s interpositions and blessings. He has raised us to the dignity of co-workers with Himself, in the great work of rescuing our sin-cursed race from the service and dominion of Satan. Just as God and man work together in nature, He always doing the supernatural,--producing the seed, and the vast possibilities of life slumbering in the face of nature, and the external influences fitted to call them forth: and man, as though everything depended upon him, clearing the ground, sowing the seed, cutting weeds and thistles, arranging his fields, gardens, and orchards, until the face of nature is a very paradise of beauty and blessing. So in the spiritual world, God’s purpose is that through human and Divine co-operation. Oh for the eager promptness of this young man, in grasping our lost blessings. Reflections:--
1. Learn from this narrative that God is not displeased with His zealous, whole-hearted servant, who by his extra zeal disables himself or loses his axe; and that he would rather work a miracle, to put him in working trim, than to see him lazy and sleepy at his work.
2. That every man who has lost his axe of spiritual power must find it again, or, so far as he is concerned, the work of God is stopped. That one idle man among God’s workmen counts more than one in the aggregate of his influence. His very presence will retard the workman and slacken the movements of many.
3. That in seasons of misfortune, it is well to be calm, and not by our own impulsiveness and imprudence make matters worse. Like the man I saw in a machine shop who chaffed his hand in attempting to put the belt on a machine, and became so furiously angry that he cut the belt in pieces, but had to replace it, at the cost of nearly a week’s wages.
4. That the sinner should not make his case any more desperate by continuing to sin against God. That it is dangerous, unmanly, add very displeasing to God for one to deliberately add to the moral turpitude of his case, thus necessitating a greater miracle of Divine mercy, in order to save him. (T. Kelly.)
The iron axe-head that swam
“Our trials are often the shadows of coming mercies. God will appear at the ebb of the tide. He will turn the year at the shortest winter’s day. When He has shown us our entire dependence upon Himself, He will stretch out His glorious arm, and work deliverance.” The life of the true child of God is as constantly watched over, guided, protected, and blessed, as though the bright spirits who attend about His throne came visibly to minister to the heirs of salvation. The idea that the Almighty One, who made and governs all things, could not so change the usual course of nature as to cause the iron to swim, is simply absurd. In the working of a great printing-press, if any thing goes wrong with the paper, the feeder has only to touch a lever with his foot, and, while the ordinary movements of the press are undisturbed, the impression is not made upon the sheet. The skill and genius of man have brought the laws of nature under his control so far that distant countries are reached by the steamship and the telegraph. And even so, the God of nature bends these mighty forces to suit His own good pleasure, God gave power to Elisha to befriend the disconsolate young man, when he lamented the loss of the axe-head. And in every generation since, He has enabled other faithful ones to do Elisha’s work, and make the iron to swim. The trifling and licentious Charles the Second locked up John Bunyan in Bedford jail, and kept him there with his Bible for twelve long years. There the despised tinker wrote the Pilgrim’s Progress, and that iron is likely to swim for many ages yet to come. The lukewarm age in which we live is satisfied with ordinary prayers, ordinary faith, ordinary works--and, hence, it has to put up with ordinary blessings. The power of God to do wonderful things is none the less than in ancient days; and His hand only seems shortened, because the faith has died out in selfish, worldly hearts, that “All things are possible to him that believeth “ (Mark 9:23). (J. N. Norton.)
The restoration of the axe
It cannot be denied that the restoration of the lost axe was miraculous, if we consider--
1. That the man who lost it appealed to the prophet, and to him alone, for help in his extremity, as the only person who could help him, because he was the only person to whom it was given to exercise supernatural power.
2. That the axe came to the surface at the very spot where it was dropped. The Jordan is a rapid river, and if the axe had floated from any natural cause, it would have risen to the surface lower down the stream.
3. The means used to raise it were in no way adapted to the end in view. The narrative suggests--
I. That the accomplishment of the great works of the world depends very much upon keeping little things in working order. A great victory may be lost by the snapping of the linch-pin of an artillery wheel. The sons of the prophet could not raise a house to the honour of God without the help of an axe. “Great weights hang on small wires.”
II. That what is small and what is great depends entirely upon its relation. To many men the loss of a five-pound note would be a mere trifle, scarcely worth the mention; to millions it would be the loss of all their ability to feed and clothe their families for many days. So there were many men in Israel to whom the loss of an axe would have been nothing, but to this member of a poor community it was a misfortune so serious that it could only be remedied by a miracle.
III. The smallest trouble which comes upon a servant of God, or upon a community of men engaged in his service, is a matter for Divine help. The Lord God Almighty is indeed the “high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity” (Isaiah 57:15), yet He “considereth all the works of men” (Psalms 33:15), “His eyes are open upon all the ways of the sons of men” (Jeremiah 32:19), and “He dwells with him also that is of a humble and contrite spirit” (Isaiah 57:15). This is sufficient to account for His interposition in the matter of the lost axe. (Outlines of Sermons.)
Miracles ethical
Oh, how frightened some people are of these miracles! A young fellow-student and a preacher to-day, under the influence of modem criticism, told me that he could not swallow this miracle--he is very narrow in the swallow anyway!--he could not swallow this miracle about the axe-head that swam, “because, you know,” he said, “it has a suspicious look about it. I’m all right, I trust,” he said, “I’m all right upon the miracles of our Lord. But between you and me, M’Neill, that miracle, you know, is not ethical.” That is the great word, “ethical”; if you are not ethical, you’re not in it. “It is not ethical!” I said. “Well, now, that is very funny. It is very ethical, according to me. Do you mean to say,” I said, “if you borrow an axe-head from me, that it is quite ethical to come back with a bit of stick, and the head. .. gone! Why,” I said, “the miracle is bottomed upon ethics. God was so anxious that the axe should be given back by the fellow who borrowed it, as he borrowed it, that He worked miracles on behalf of the ethics that underlie borrowing and lending.” And then he said, “I have no difficulty about the miracles of our Lord, because they are ethical.” “Well now,” I said, “there is one of our Lord’s miracles, and if you are squeamish about the axe-head that swam, then logically you ought to be squeamish about it, too, although our Lord worked it, for it is this kind of ‘grotesque miracle ‘--making a display of Divine power. You remember,” I said, “one day when our Lord had to pay His taxes and He did not seem to have enough loose money about Him--it is a kind of pathetic touch, you know--He did not have enough loose money about Him, but He evidently considered tax-paying ethical, and He wanted to pay them, and, of course, tie might have borrowed from somebody, or He might have got it in some way or another; but in spite of these critics He went away and made a display of the miraculous, and He said, ‘Go to the sea and cast in a hook, and the first fish that comes up you will find my taxes in its mouth.’“ The pride of intellect. Oh, if you are troubled, and if you boggle and stumble at the miraculous, Jesus will be the biggest stumbling-block and rock of offence of all the miracle-workers in the Bible. (John M’Neill.)
Divine concern
The French Marshal Turenne was the soldiers’ hero. He shared in all their hardships, and they entirely trusted him. Once when the troops were wading through a heavy morass, some of the younger soldiers complained. But the older ones said, “Depend upon it, Turenne is more concerned than we are; at this moment he is thinking how to deliver us. He watches for us while we sleep. He is our father, and would not have us go through such fatigue unless he had some great end in view which we cannot yet make out.” How much happier and stronger we should be if with this kind of simple confidence we trusted the Captain of our Salvation, Jesus Christ, who came on earth to share all our hardships! (Quiver.)