Encore - 987 - How Grace Responds To Pressure -2 Kings 6:23

Hey, it's Mike Henry with Follower of One. Today I want to talk about 2 Kings chapter 6 verse 23. "So he prepared a great feast for them; and when they had eaten and drunk, he sent them away and they went to their master. And the marauding bands of Aramaeans did not come again into the land of Israel."     I talked about this a little bit on the episode proceeding, this.    This army of men came to capture Elisha who had been telling the king of Israel about everything that the king of Aram was planning. And so they sent this army of people there. And the chariots of fire were presented to Elisha's helper. That's what we talked about in the previous episode. And then Elisha spoke. He prayed and asked, and God blinded these- this whole army. And he directed them. He guided them to Israel. All the way down to Samaria, actually in verse 20, it says. And when they had come to Samaria, Elisha said, "Lord open the eyes of these men that they may see." So what Elisha did was he took this entire army of people down into the middle of the enemy camp and handed them over to the king of Israel. The king of Israel thought, "Well, should I kill these guys? They're the enemy." But Elisha said, "No, don't kill them." He suggested that they bless them. That they set bread and water before them and let them eat and drink and then go home.    And verse 23, they prepared this great feast and fed these men who came to kill Elisha. I think it's important to note and the point that I want to make today is the grace that we have as followers of Jesus should show up, even when people are trying to do us harm. That grace may not prompt you to do what these people did, but notice how the Israelites were feeding these people, and blessing them, and sending them away filled. They had grace for these people. They didn't kill them even though these people came to take Elisha captive.    I want to challenge us today as followers of Jesus. And this may be a little bit of a stretch from this passage, but we know what elsewhere in scripture.    Where can we bring grace? Where can we go beyond what is expected of us and deliver this grace so that other people might see Jesus? This question, "How can I ship grace into this environment?" Is a good question for us every day. How can we ship grace to the people that we interact with? Even people who would be our enemy.    Today on your marketplace mission trip, as you go into your own workplace, I want to encourage you to be a missionary, to take some extra grace, to build some time into your schedule and pray for the people around you. And then, let God give you the ideas of how to treat other people, so that they might see Him, not us.    The Israelites prepared a feast for their enemy, and we can prepare a feast for the people that we work for as well. Let's be grace distributors in our workplace today. Let's help the people around us move one notch closer to Jesus.    Thank you for being a marketplace minister, and thank you for making a difference, making your faith applicable and relevant in our daily lives. Your movement, your effort as a follower of Jesus Christ matters forever, and I'm grateful for you. If you want to join a community of people who are also trying to make their faith matter on a daily basis, check us out at followerofone.org. Thanks very much.