Transcript
For those of you that maybe aren’t familiar with Zane Hodges, he’s written a number of books, and he is a man who has become identified with a movement that is trying to keep the gospel clear. And one of the problems we have today is that we’ve got a lot of fuzzy thinking about the core of our belief. You go up to some preachers, and you ask them, “What do I need to do to be saved?” and you get all kinds of fuzziness when it comes to those things. And so we just like to thank Zane for his faithfulness to the Scriptures. But of course from this he’s taught so many other wonderful truths.
We welcome Zane. We thank God for his ministry, and we just pray that as he teaches us today that we might have a receptive heart to hear what God’s laid on his heart today. Zane, thank you.
Arch, and it’s always a pleasure to come here to Coast Bible Church and to experience the warmth and love and hospitality that you always shower on me. And once again we’ve experienced it this time. I don’t want to fail to thank this church for the very generous regular support that you send to my ministry under Kerugma Incorporated in Dallas, Texas. And I want you to know that when we produce books and they go out, and if the Lord is pleased to use them, you have had a part in that ministry. And I thank you very sincerely. Keep us in your prayers, and remember that God blesses his word as we handle it properly. So ask God to give me the skill to do that as I write books.
And for our consideration of the word of God this morning, I’m going to invite you to turn to the book of Second Kings chapter 8, and we’re going to begin reading at verse 7.
Then Elisha went to Damascus. And Ben-Hadad king of Syria was sick, and it was told him, saying, ‘The man of God has come here.’ And the king said to Hazael, ‘Take a present in your hand, and go to meet the man of God, and inquire of the Lord by him, saying, Shall I recover from this disease?’
So Hazael went to meet him and took a present with him of every good thing of Damascus, forty camel loads, and he came and stood before him and said, ‘Your son Ben-Hadad king of Syria has sent me to you, saying, Shall I recover from this disease?’ And Elisha said to him, ‘Go say to him, You shall certainly recover. However, the Lord has shown me that he will really die.’
Then he set his countenance in a stare until he was ashamed. And the man of God wept. And Hazael said, ‘Why is my lord weeping?’ And he answered, ‘Because I know the evil that you will do to the children of Israel. Their strongholds you will set on fire, and their young men you will kill with the sword, and you will dash their children and rip open their women with child.’
So Hazael said, ‘But what is your servant, a dog, that he should do this gross thing?’ And Elisha answered, ‘The Lord has shown me that you will become king over Syria.’
Then he departed from Elisha and came to his master, who said to him, “What did Elisha say to you?” And he answered, “He told me that you would surely recover.” But it happened on the next day that he took a thick cloth and dipped it in water and spread it over his face so that he died. And Hazael reigned in his place.
This strange and tragic story took place twenty-three years ago this past January, on January the 8th, 1980, about six a.m. in the morning. A man with a shotgun holed himself up in an apartment building in the town of Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania. The incident started early, and after a very short time his girlfriend, Doris Pack, escaped from the apartment. Randy Garman, a member of the police force of Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania, answered what he considered a routine domestic disturbance call. But what he found when he got to the scene was anything but routine.
After the incident had gone on for about two hours, in a period of five minutes the gunman shot his mother, who was inside the apartment building, and shot Randy Garman in the head outside of the apartment building. Now the apartment building was surrounded by police cars and ambulances and fire trucks and armed policemen and firemen. Reporters were dodging behind trees and even behind some eighteenth-century tombstones that were located in an adjacent yard belonging to Christ Lutheran Church, where, by the way, twenty-five children were playing in a day school.
The standoff lasted till about noon, when the authorities persuaded the gunman—you’ll never guess how they persuaded the gunman to give himself up. They did this by quoting to him the Twenty-third Psalm. So thirty-one-year-old David Brady came out of the building and surrendered himself to a state police major named Tittle, who had convinced him that God would forgive him. He was dressed in a white shirt, green trousers, black work shoes. And as he was led away to an unmarked police car, he threw his hands up in the snowy yard and he said, “Dear God, dear God, get this stuff out of my head.”
Now when this story was reported in the newspapers, David Brady was still in prison in Elizabethtown awaiting charges. But the headline on the story was very arresting. It said, “Psalm lures gunman out of bloody home.”
Now I strongly suspect that when we hear a story like that we come to the conclusion that the gunman was either high on drugs or he was psychotic or maybe both things at the same time. And the chances are very good that we are right in that analysis. But I’m here this morning to caution you that it really isn’t necessary to be high on drugs. It really isn’t necessary to be psychotic to have bad stuff going through our heads.
And therefore, with a little poetic license this morning, I have decided to borrow the words of the gunman as the title of my message to you today. And therefore my title is “Get This Stuff Out of My Head.” Now you probably won’t have trouble remembering that title, right? But just in case you haven’t quite got it yet, let me repeat it: my title is “Get This Stuff Out of My Head.”
Now I hope you were paying close attention as we read the passage of Scripture this morning, because the opening words of our passage are very arresting indeed. The opening words are, “Then Elisha went to Damascus.” Then Elisha went to Damascus. Does that surprise you? Well, it should, because according to the biblical record this is the only time during the career of Elisha the prophet that he leaves the land of Israel. And where does he go? Right into the heart of enemy territory, right to the capital city of Israel’s bitterest enemies in those days. He goes to Damascus, the capital of Syria. And the king of Syria hears that he has come.
Now in the younger days of the king of Syria he might have tried to arrest Elisha if he had come to Damascus. After all, a king of Syria did send an army to arrest Elisha one time, and they surrounded the city in which Elisha was. And instead of arresting Elisha, the whole army got captured and was sent back to their master empty-handed. And as recently as the previous chapter, the king of Syria had sent his soldiers to besiege the city of Samaria. They had it surrounded and cut off from all provisions, and they were apparently in the final stages of starving the citizens of Samaria into surrender. And then God caused the Syrians to hear noises that sounded like the armies of the Hittites and the armies of the Egyptians. And the Syrians fled in panic and left all their foodstuffs behind, and that fed the starving people of Samaria.
So maybe by this time, folks, the king of Syria has gained a little respect for the prophet of God. And anyway the king of Syria is sick. Apparently he is seriously sick, and he really doesn’t know whether he is going to survive. And so he calls for his servant Hazael, who was probably one of his commanding officers. And he says to Hazael, “Take a present and go to Elisha and say to him, The king of Syria says, Shall I recover from this disease?”
And what happens next, folks, is almost funny. In fact it would be humorous if it were not all so terribly sad. You see, when the king of Syria refers to a present, he’s not referring to a single box filled with gold or silver or other precious things. No, Hazael goes out and he collects all the good things that are found in Damascus, and he loads them on camels. And if you try to think of the very best Christmas that you ever had in your entire life, you didn’t have a Christmas like this. Because by the time he had loaded all the camels, he had a caravan that was forty camels long.
Can you imagine it? Here they come: camel number one, all loaded with gifts; camel number two, all loaded with gifts; and on down the line, forty camel loads of gifts. And don’t you see, the king of Syria has bad stuff going through his head. He has bad stuff going through his head. You see, he knows that whatever God speaks through Elisha the prophet will come true. And he doesn’t want Elisha to say, “You’re not going to recover from that disease. You’re going to die.” He wants Elisha to say, “You’re going to get well.” And obviously the king of Syria is thinking, “If I send him gifts loaded on forty camels, there’s no way he’s going to say to me, ‘You’re going to die.’ He will surely say, ‘You will recover from your disease.’”
And don’t you see clearly that the king of Syria is trying to bribe the prophet of God? And through the prophet he is trying to bribe the Lord. Now when we hear that we say, “Oh well, that was the pagan king of Syria. After all, what do you expect?” But that’s not me. I would never, never try to bribe the Lord. Really? Really? Here I am and I need a job, and I say to myself, “If I start reading my Bible more regularly and saying my prayers more regularly, maybe God will help me find a job.” Or here I am having trouble with my kids, and I say, “If I start going to church more regularly, maybe God will help me with my kids.”
Dr. Haddon Robinson was for many years a colleague of mine on the faculty of Dallas Theological Seminary, and he has a story that fits in, I think, right here. He kind of told it like this. He said, “When my children were young we had a game that we played. They would sit on my knee and I would have some pennies in my fist, and they would try to open the fingers of my fist so they could get at my pennies.” And says Dr. Robinson, “According to the international rules of finger opening, once you have opened a finger you can’t close it again.” And so my kids would work on my hand until finally they had opened my fingers and they got the money, the pennies that I had in my fist.
And then Dr. Robinson would say, “Do we come to God for the pennies that are in his hands? ‘Lord, I need a job. Lord, I need a passing grade. Lord, my mother is sick.’” And don’t you see, folks, that a lot of times we are kind of like little kids trying to pry God’s fingers open one by one because he’s got something that we need. We kind of do this and that or promise this or that in order to get at the pennies that are in his hand, instead of coming to him for who he is, to worship him, to praise him, to know him better. And when we behave like that we have bad stuff going through our head.
So please don’t think that the king of Syria had suddenly gotten religious. Don’t think that he is about to seek the true and living God of Israel. God has something that the king of Syria needs. And so there is Hazael standing in the presence of Elisha the prophet with forty camels loaded with presents. And Hazael says, “Your son Ben-Hadad,” since when was the king of Syria the son of Elisha? Well, that’s a way of expressing submission, I guess. “Your son Ben-Hadad says, Shall I recover from this disease?”
And the answer that Elisha gives to him is very remarkable and very unusual, because then Elisha said, “Go say to him, ‘You shall surely recover. However, the Lord has shown me that he will really die.’” Now if as if that were not unusual enough, Elisha’s behavior after he says it is also unusual, because he just stands there and he stares at Hazael like he’s staring into his very heart and soul. Finally Hazael was embarrassed by that. And then Elisha begins to weep. And Hazael says, “Why is my lord weeping?” And Elisha replies, “Because I know the evil that you will do to the people of Israel. You will tear down their strongholds with the sword. You will kill their young men. You will dash their infants to the ground. You will rip open their pregnant women.”
Now at this point, folks, I think Hazael should have started to cry, don’t you? And I think Hazael should have said something like, “Oh, man of God, is there any way that I can avoid doing the awful things that you have just told me I’m going to do?” But no, folks, that is not the way Hazael replies. And Hazael says, “But what is your servant, a dog, that I should do this gross thing?” Free translation: “I’m not that kind of person. I’m not a dog. I am better than that.”
And don’t you see, my friends, Hazael has bad stuff going through his head. He has bad stuff going through his head. He has just rejected the testimony of the word of God to his own sinfulness, and he is saying, “I am better than that.” Oh, you say he’s a pagan military man. How about us? Now I assume in an audience like this that most of you understand that it is by grace that you are saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. And you understand that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, and that we’re not saved and taken to heaven because we’re nice people but because we have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ for the free gift of everlasting life.
And yet after we’ve been saved a little while we may say to ourselves, “You know, I’m not a bad person really. I’m not all that bad. I mean, I’m not a wife beater. I’m not a serial killer. I’m not a drug addict. I even go to church. I even say my prayers. I do some good things for people. I’m a good person.” You think a Christian can say that? You better believe Christians can say that. But what did Jesus say? Jesus said, “There is none good but one, that is God.” There is none good but one, that is God.
And my dear friends this morning, starting in this pulpit and stretching throughout the whole audience, there is not a single really good person in this audience, because there is none good but God. There had been a snowstorm, and the snow was fresh on the ground and it was gleaming with the light of the sun shining on it. And as he watched the winter scene out his window he saw a drab and dirty looking dog walking across the snow. And he said to himself, “I wonder whose dog that is?” And then he realized it was his dog. And that against the beautiful, perfect whiteness of the snow his well-groomed white Highland Terrier was drab and dirty.
Oh yes, when we compare ourselves with other people, folks, we can make ourselves look pretty good. But in the sun, when we compare ourselves to the living God in all his perfect purity and holiness, we are drab and dirty sinners. And if we ever think differently we have bad stuff going through our head.
But Hazael wasn’t buying it, was he? He’s not buying it. He’s better than that. And then Elisha says to him, “The Lord has shown me that you will become king over Syria.” Hey, that’s a new idea. Now maybe Hazael had thought of it before. Maybe he had wished he could be king over Syria. But this is different. I mean, this is a prophet that even his own master respects. And here is this prophet saying to him, “You are going to be king.”
And so Hazael turns around and he goes back to his master. And as he walks into his master’s bedchamber the king of Syria says to him, “What did Elisha say to you?” Well, what had Elisha said? He said, “Go tell him that he will surely recover, but the Lord has shown me that he will certainly die.” So when the king of Syria says, “What did Elisha say to you?” Hazael says, “He told me that you would surely recover.” And apparently he didn’t tell him anything else.
And here’s what I think happened, folks. I can’t prove this all right, but here’s what I think happened. During the night the king of Syria began to sweat profusely, and whatever his sickness was he sweated it out of his pores. And by the morning he was well, but he was weak. And when Hazael came to him the next day and said to him, “Your majesty, how are you?” the king of Syria said something like, “I’m all right now, but I have been sweating all night and my face is covered with dried sweat. Hazael, would you please go over to that bowl of water over there and dip a towel in that bowl of water and bring it over here and wipe my face off?”
And Hazael goes over and dips the towel into the water, and he lays it on the face of the king of Syria. But instead of wiping the face off he just holds it there. And the king is too weak to resist, and he can’t breathe, and he strangles to death. And if you and I had walked into the bedchamber at that point and seen that, we might have said, “Hazael, what are you doing? You have just killed the king of Syria.” And you know what I think Hazael would have said? I think he would have said, “Well, Elisha told me that he would surely die. And furthermore Elisha told me that I would be king over Syria, and I’m getting ready to take over.”
Do I need to tell you that Hazael had bad stuff going through his head? It is obvious that his actions are based on what he had heard from Elisha. But Elisha had not said to him, “Go kill the king.”
And how about us? Now back in Dallas I preached to small audiences at Victor Street Bible Chapel, and it has occurred to me sometimes that if I were not primarily interested in preaching the truth that I could maybe increase my audience. And what I would do in that area is to send out flyers all over the neighborhood announcing a healing meeting. Then I’d put up a big sign and say, “Come one, come all. Be healed of your sicknesses. You can be healed if you have faith.” That gives me an out in case somebody’s not healed. And I think I could maybe double, triple, quadruple the number of people that I had in church.
But how about laypeople? You go to somebody in the church and you say, “You know that couple that comes to church, they’re really not living up to the standards of the word of God. They’re not obeying the Lord in this way or in that way or in the other way.” And we manipulate and use the word of God to tear somebody down in order to build ourselves up. And listen carefully. The information that comes to me from all over this country suggests to me very strongly that maybe at least half of the troubles the churches have are from people who are convinced that they are doing the will of God, that they’re following the word of God, that they are serving the Lord, but when in reality they are serving their own private agenda.
Let’s face it, my friends. Hazael used the word of God obviously as an excuse for murder. And if we are not careful we can use the word of God as an excuse for our personal sin as we seek our personal goals. And when we do that we have bad stuff going through our head.
Dr. M. R. DeHaan was probably the very best radio Bible teacher that I’ve ever heard. I listened to him often when I was growing up as a little boy. And he tells this story. He said that on one occasion he had visited a widow woman who had one daughter who was the apple of her eye. At the age of three this daughter had become seriously sick, and the doctor had told her that her little girl was going to die. And she had reacted violently. She had refused to accept that, and she told God that if he didn’t heal her little daughter she would never trust God again for anything. And guess what happened? Despite the doctor’s predictions the little girl recovered, and she lived a normal life for thirteen years. And then at the age of sixteen she began to go around with undesirable companions, and at the age of seventeen she got into some very serious trouble and went to Dr. DeHaan.
He got to the widow’s house. The widow said to him, “My Jeanie is dead, a suicide. She hung herself in her room last night.” And then after some convulsive sobbing she said, “Oh, doctor, I wish the Lord had taken her at the age of three.” And listen to me, my Christian friends. We are perfectly capable of taking what we know from the Bible and trying to manipulate even God himself with his own word. And we forget that God is not up in heaven to do what we want him to do. We are on earth to do what his word tells us to do. And if we think differently maybe we need to pray a prayer like this: “Dear Lord, help me to remember that you are God and that I am your servant and that I am to do what you want me to do.” And then maybe we could add, “Dear God, get this other stuff out of my head.”
Shall we pray? Help us, Father, to know that you are God and that we are your creatures, your servants, your children. And help us to accept from your hand whatever you are pleased to give and be ready to do whatever your word tells us to do. And we ask this in Christ’s name, amen.