H. Michael Brewer
Crescent Springs Presbyterian
28 August 2005
DEAD BONES AND LIVING GRACE
2 Kings 13:20-21
We’ve spent most of the summer with the Old Testament prophet Elisha, and today we turn to the
last story in the Elisha cycle, a kind of epilogue to the life of the prophet. Sometime after Elisha’s death,
maybe several years later, a funeral was in progress in the same cemetery where the prophet had been
laid to rest. The funeral was interrupted by a raid from marauding Moabites. In their haste to escape the
bandits, the funeral party threw the dead body into the nearest tomb—which happened to be the tomb
of Elisha. When the dead man rolled into the tomb, he tumbled among Elisha’s bones. When the corpse
touched those bones, the dead man suddenly came back to life, got on his feet, and came out of the
tomb.
I assume that whoever wrote down the Elisha stories and compiled them in 2 Kings included this
odd story as a final tribute to a remarkable prophet, a reminder of the incredible things Elisha did during
his life. The lesson might be that Elisha was such a great man that even in death he continued to work
miracles.
But I get something quite different from the story. I am a great admirer of Elisha, as I hope the
sermons of the last few weeks have made clear, but I want to point out that technically Elisha never
worked a single miracle in his life. God worked the miracles. Elisha was merely the vessel God chose to
work through. When the widow’s jar of oil flowed endlessly, when the Shunnamite woman’s son was
raised from the dead, when the water of Jericho was cleansed, when a hundred people ate their fill from
a few loaves of barley bread, it was God’s goodness and power at work through Elisha.
And while I don’t want to diminish Elisha, the final story makes the point too plainly for us to
misunderstand. When the dead man rises to life after encountering the bones of Elisha, we understand
that God can use anyone to accomplish God’s purposes. If no one else is available, God can even use a
corpse.
You see, it’s all grace. Our calling is grace. Our salvation is grace. And anything beautiful that
emerges from our life, any good work we do, any service we render to God, that’s all grace, too. In the
end, it’s not our doing, it’s God’s. That’s why Paul can say, “I have worked harder than all the other
apostles, yet my most strenuous effort turns out to be God’s grace working through me,” (see 1
Corinthians 15:10).
I remind us of this so that we might avoid the wrong-headed pride that believes we have somehow
saved ourselves, that we are better than other people, that we deserve our salvation. The doctrine of
grace leaves no room for any such arrogance.
On the other hand, our belief in grace does set us free to follow Christ without fear. Grace allows us
to serve God without worrying about our failings, our short-comings, our inadequacies. Grace teaches
us that life isn’t about our ability, but rather our availability to a good, loving God who can make use of
anybody.
I love the story of an elderly Chinese woman who carried water each day in two large pots, hung on
the opposite ends of a pole that she balanced across her shoulders. One pot was perfect and always
delivered a full measure of water. The other pot had a hairline crack from which the water slowly
dribbled. At the end of the long walk home from the stream, the cracked pot arrived only half full.
For two years this went on daily, with the woman bringing home only one and a half pots of water.
Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments. But the poor cracked pot was ashamed
of its own imperfection, and miserable that it could only do half of what it had been made to do.
Finally, bitter because of its failure, the cracked pot spoke to the woman one day as she knelt
beside the stream. “I am ashamed of myself because this crack in my side leaks so much water.”
The old woman smiled and said, “Did you notice that there are flowers on one side of the path, but
not the other? I have always known about your leak so I planted flower seeds on your side of the path.
Every day while we walk back, you water those seeds so that I can pick flowers to decorate my table.
Thanks to your being just the way you are, my house is adorned with beauty.”
God can use anybody. God used a runaway murderer to lead Israel out of Egypt. God used a
donkey to preach to a prophet. God used a rash, fumbling fisherman to build a church and an angry
tentmaker to carry that church to the ends of the earth. God can use anybody—sinners, crackpots, and
incompetents included. You do not have to be willing and able, just willing. If God can use one dead
man to raise another, think what God can do with you.
Why not give yourself up to grace and see what God will do with you?
Soli Deo Gloria!