Week 1 October 2025, Devotion Part 1

And he left the oxen, and ran after Elijah, and said, “Let me kiss my father and my mother, and then I will follow you…” And he…took the yoke of oxen, and slew them… 1 Kings 19:20-21

The great prophet Elijah, wearied from being God’s conscience to His vacillating nation, had been authorized to cast his mantle of witness on young Elisha. After six years of close companionship, the apprentice prophet witnessed his mentor’s miraculous departure for heaven by flaming chariot and horses. Elisha inherited a double portion of Elijah’s visionary spirit and served God’s highest interests in Israel for fifty-five years. No Old Testament prophet counseled more kings or performed more miracles than Elisha. Foreshadowing the ministry of Christ, he fed multitudes and raised the dead. Ironically, this dynamic, holy man of God had sought to make his debut on the strength of his parents’ nod of approval.

Scripture is silent on their disposition but draws a telling picture of Elisha’s position when he was tapped for a higher duty than the filial one. He was plowing “with twelve yoke of oxen before him, and he was the twelfth.” There is an impression of perfect fit; he was precisely where the team needed him to be. No wonder mom and dad merited a consultation. Elijah had simply walked up to him and “cast his mantle upon him.” What sounds quaint to us was perfectly clear to the young man. God was laying claim to his life. To his credit, he was “willing to be made willing” but unsure if his family would thrill to such news. So he ran after Elijah to get his permission to get theirs.  Part 1 of 2

Comment:  Some numbers worth looking into will surface in this story, but we won’t crunch them or give credit to numerology steeped in the occult.  Lucky numbers are not biblical and the celebrated Cedars of Lebanon grew far away from Irish four-leaf clover. When I grew up, folks wanted to “have swine,” this literal  translation of “Schwein [pig] haben” being a good-luck idiom.  On Elisha’s family farm they had cattle and he and 11 workers plowed with 12 “yoke of oxen.”  The latter is a biblical number of completeness as seen in the 12 tribes of Israel, the 12 apostles, the 12 gates and foundations in the New Jerusalem.  When Jesus fed the 5,000, 12 baskets were filled with leftovers, but only 7 after 4,000 had eaten their fill. The N.T. Greek uses two different words for “baskets,” which explained why in the latter case “seven” sufficed.  It’s actually the foremost number of completeness and perfection, connected to divine order and God’s plan for the world. In the OT there are 7 days of creation, 7 lampstands in the Tabernacle, 7 years of plenty and famine in Joseph’s time. In the NT there are the 7 churches of Revelation, the 7 spirits of God, the 7 seals.  Now we are nearing the crux of the matter, since God had told Elijah He had yet 7,000 left in Israel, “all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal, and every mouth which hath not kissed him.”  Why break up 12 yoke of oxen and a close-knit family?  What made Elisha so special?