Keep On Striking!!

There is an interesting story in 2 Kings 13 . It’s about Jehoash, king of Israel. He hears that Elisha is sick, and goes to visit him. Before he leaves, Elisha gives the king a couple of strange commands. One of them is to strike the ground with his arrows. So the king grabs his arrows and strikes the ground three times. The prophet then gets mad and tells him that he will only have 3 victories against the Arameans and will not be able to completely defeat them, (which is fulfilled in verse 25). Too bad! Thoses Arameans were horrible people, if King Jehoash had only known, he would have struck with those arrows ‘till he dug a hole to China, (or whatever country is on the other side of the world from Israel).

Wait, let’s give that poor king some slack.
First of all, he did strike the ground instead of arguing with Elisha about the pros and cons of ground-striking and whether left-handed or right-handed striking was more effective.

Secondly, this was the only time (recorded for us) that he was instructed to do this ground-striking thing, so he was kinda new at it.

Thirdly, on top of everything else, he didn’t even know why he was doing it.

Do you see any parallels here?
What happens if we substitute the term “pray about an issue” for “strike the ground”?

How do we compare?

James says“we all stumble in many ways. Could lack of prayer be an area of stumbling? I know that I’m guilty at times, but I’m not alone. Remember the Children of Israel’s defeat at Ai in Joshua 7? If Joshua would of prayed first.......And then threre’s that Gibeonite fiasco in Joshua 9.
Every issue, thing, event, etc... is a prayable issue, thing, event etc....

Secondly, king Jehoash was only told once. How many times has the subject of prayer been addressed in the Bible? Suffice it to say: more that once, (check out concordance if your curious).

The third point is the area where most of us ‘miss the mark,’<~(get it?) This is when it comes to praying long enough. Hebrews tells us ‘we have need of endurance’. Jehoash didn’t know when he was done, and unfortunately, most of us don’t know when we’re done. How many times do you suppose we’ve ‘prayed’ about something and moved on, thinking we’ve been obedient, but really God is saying, “Hey! You’re not done! If you quit now, you will only have partial victory over your enemy! Keep on striking!!”

Until Jesus comes back, we will have to be content with only ‘knowing in part’ and we may not understand all that God tells us to do, but instead of blaming every defeat on ‘God’s will’, maybe a good policy could be: ‘When in doubt, keep on striking.’

By Senia Owensby
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