Need Something New

Campbell Chapel Free Will Baptist Church

Ironton, Ohio

Campbell Chapel FWBC of Ironton Ohio - Pastor Bob Bradley

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Free Will Baptist Church
1709 Campbell Drive
Ironton, Ohio 45638

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The Need for Something New

April 27, 2008

Bob Bradley

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II Kings 2:19-22

19 And the men of the city said unto Elisha, Behold, I pray thee, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord seeth: but the water is naught, and the ground barren.

20 And he said, Bring me a new cruse, and put salt therein. And they brought it to him.

21 And he went forth unto the spring of the waters, and cast the salt in there, and said, Thus saith the LORD, I have healed these waters; there shall not be from thence any more death or barren land .

22 So the waters were healed unto this day, according to the saying of Elisha which he spake.

Elijah and Elisha

Elijah left here this day. He was taken up by a whirlwind. God took him up by a whirlwind. That would be a good way to go. Wouldn’t it? Not necessarily in a tornado, but in a whirlwind; that would be a good way to go.

If you look backwards maybe 10 or 15 years in Elijah’s life, you will find out he was doing some praying and he was probably feeling sorry for himself. He wanted to die a long time ago.

I know people everywhere I have ever been that has always wanted to die. They just always want to die. The great things is when we live as we should live and allow God to have control of our lives and when it comes time for us to leave here; He will take care of that too.

Elijah left here in a whirlwind. There are a lot of things probably about that that I don’t understand. That’s the way he left here. As we look at what is happening here. Elisha is the man that is going to be the prophet here in the land. Elijah is gone. Elisha takes Elijah’s mantle. When Elijah goes up, Elisha gets his mantle. As you read the first part of this chapter, Elisha does many miracles here after Elijah is already gone. We know that some of the sons of the prophets did not really believe that Elijah was gone.

Do you remember how they came to Elisha and sent out search party? They sent out a search party to make sure the Lord just did not come and take him and drop him off somewhere and leave him alone. They sent out a search party to find him. God does not do that. God does not just come and pick us up and drop us off somewhere and forget about us.

The Bible tells us here that Elisha is at Jericho.

What do you know about Jericho?

[Answer from congregation] It was a great walled city.

What else do you know about Jericho?

[Answer from congregation] It was destroyed.

Also, God placed a curse upon the man that would rebuild it didn’t he?

Jericho, when the children of Israel came across the Jordan River and he was bringing them into the land, this one of the first cities that they were going to have to face. This was going to be one of the cities that they were going to have to fight and be with. We know that God gave the city, in a very miraculous way to the children of Israel. As was said, Jericho was destroyed and God placed a divine curse upon the city of Jericho. He made the statement that if a man comes and rebuilds the city, he was to lay the foundation in his first born and his younger son was to be laid in the gates of the foundation. So God pronounced a curse.

When you go ahead and read some things here in I Kings 16, you will find out that is exactly what happened. After the city of Jericho was destroyed many years later, there was a fellow come along; the city was rebuilt. He laid the foundation with his first born. It is something that when God pronounces a curse, many times men don’t think anything about that. This guy was probably going to rebuild this city probably may not have thought too much about it. May not even knew anything about it, but it does not matter whether he thought much about it or did not know much about it; when God said He was going to do something, then that is exactly the way it is going to be. It is serious stuff. The city of Jericho here had been rebuilt.

That is where they were at here. In a place that had been cursed. In a place that God had did some great miracles and given victory here when the come across the Jordan and when they come into the land. God gave a great miracle here in this land but yet He cursed it. This is where Elisha is at.

Let us look at something here just for a few moments. The Bible says here, the men of the city came to Elisha in verse 19.

19 And the men of the city said unto Elisha, Behold, I pray thee, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord seeth: but the water is naught, and the ground barren.

They come and say Elisha look around at this city. Look around at this here how pleasant things really are.

19 And the men of the city said unto Elisha, Behold, I pray thee, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord seeth: but the water is naught, and the ground barren.

So the city here, if you look at Jericho it was a little bit to the north here of Jerusalem. If I understand things correctly as we look at where Jericho was at, they probably was right at the foot of some mountains that was there. The Jericho was probably down at the base of this mountain. I know that we all have probably seen cities, houses, little places that were down at the foot of a mountain and when the mountains would be behind and just a very beautiful place. There is no doubt in my mind that this is what Jericho was. Things here were very pleasant in Jericho. No doubt here they had a lot of good things going for them when you look at the city of Jericho. The land was fertile and the soil was great, the climate was good. They had a lot of things here that was very pleasant here at the city of Jericho. The Bible says that it was a very pleasant place to be.

People had jobs and things were going real well. It would have been a pleasant place to be. [There was] probably not too much crime going on. The men said, “Hey, everything is pleasant here. The climate is good. We have fertile ground. It is a good place to be. It is a good place to live. But it says here that we have some problems here. The problem that we have here is the water supply that we have. I have though about that many times over the years. In the land of Israel, in the land of Canaan there is limestone everywhere. You usually just have a little bit of dirt and you have got stone and lime stone. The Bible says here in this particular place I don’t know what may have happened. However the Bible tells us here that they water was poison. It was not any good. As you read on down through do you know what you will find out? That the land was barren, People that died because of this water that was here.

I thought about today in our own land, in our own lives; I thought about people that are lost today, within our souls things maybe pleasant. Not only that, but in the souls of man today things can be ideal. Do you know what we don’t understand sometimes? We don’t understand sometimes the situation that we are in—we want to talk about that just in a moment. Did you ever think about all the opportunities that the city of Jericho had? They had a problem. They didn’t have any water that was any good. Did you ever think about us today, you today, and your self today that the situation you have and the potential that is there? Your life maybe very pleasant today. Everything maybe going real good today. Your kids maybe healthy. You may have a good job. I want you to understand you have an issue in your life if you have never been born again. Do you know what that issue is? You have something that is poison. It is keeping you from doing anything that will bring glory to God.

Here these guys are. The city is a pleasant place to be. Houses are good. The economy is great. Everything is going fine. They had a problem that the water was bitter. Their water here was poisoned. It wasn’t letting the crops grow. I can just look out and picture where the Jericho was at here and look out over the fields that were there. Even though the ground may have been good; you can take the best ground in the world and if you don’t have the right kind of water supply. Then it is not going to do any good.

That was what was going on here. Everything was fine. They had good houses. They had a great place here to live. They had great ground and the climate was good. They had everything going for them. However, there was something very wrong in their lives and in the city and that was the water supply.

You that are unsaved, I want to talk to you. I want you to understand tonight that when you evaluate your life everything maybe, and your situation may look real well, but there are some things that are lacking in your life and that is going to destroy you if you don’t get this thing fixed.

When you look at what happened here, there were people dying. These people were working and laboring, they were planting crops; they may have been doing everything they could to be fruitful and do some good. Do you know why they couldn’t do any good? They didn’t have any water. They didn’t the right kind of water. They may have had all kinds of water, they may have had an abundance of water but it was not any good.

These people had a situation that was pleasant, it was good. You may have that in your life tonight, but I want you to understand that death is on your trail. You are never going to do anything that is going to be any count or that will bring glory to God if you don’t get your water supply fixed. Do you know what you can do? You can work well. You can have a good job. Everything may be going well, but what you need is something that will change you on the inside. That has to come from Almighty God. That doesn’t come from anywhere else.

19 And the men of the city said unto Elisha, Behold, I pray thee, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord seeth: but the water is naught, and the ground barren.

That would be horrible. I don’t know if you have ever lived any place that doesn’t have good water or not. We lived in a place for a long time where you couldn’t drink the water. We had all kinds of water. There was a great supply of it, but it was so salty that you couldn’t drink it. We carried water. We had to go get water. It was a very unpleasant thing.

These folks—I can put myself in their position.

20 And he said, Bring me a new cruse, and put salt therein. And they brought it to him.

Look what is going to happen here. The Bible tells us that Elisha, the man of God, tells them, “You go get me a bowl. You go get me a new container and put some salt in it then bring it unto me.” That is exactly what they are going to do. I thought about what Elisha was going to do here. He was going to take something new, he was going to take salt and he was going to go right to the source where the water was bad.

Do you know what people are doing tonight? People are laboring. They are doing all kinds of things today trying to heal the spring that is within them. However, we cannot do that. We cannot do that with our own. Do you know what we need? We need something brand new. We may be trying all the situations in the world and they all may be pleasant to you, but I want you to understand everything that is going to be coming forth from your life. It is going to be evil, that’s all it is going to be. It’s going to bring you all kinds of problems.

Do you know what the man of God knew? He knew that they needed something new. He said, “Bring me a new bowl and put some salt in it.”

Do you know what you need today? You need something brand new. You don’t need something old. You don’t need something that has not been proved. You don’t need something that is all wore our and decayed. Do you know what you need? You need Jesus Christ. He is the One that will heal the spring of your heart. That is where the problem is at in your life. It is not your neighbor. It is not your family. It is not your husband. It is not your boyfriend, or your girlfriend. The reason that you are dying tonight, the reason that you are not bearing any fruit tonight, is the spring of your heart. It is down on the inside of here. Evil is coming forth from that and it is going to destroy you if you don’t get it fixed.

He said, “Bring me a new cruse. Bring me a bowl and put some salt in it.” May not make much sense would it?

Do you know what we need today? We don’t need people to be reformed. We need people to be regenerated. There is a difference there. We want to reform the outside, and forget about the inside. We want work on the outside of things and forget about the inside of things.

21 And he went forth unto the spring of the waters, and cast the salt in there, and said, Thus saith the LORD, I have healed these waters; there shall not be from thence any more death or barren land .

Do you know where he went? As you look at this city, there is no doubt that there were great streams and creeks that were running forth and coming forth from the mountains. They probably were running right through and in front of some of these people’s houses. It is probably running down the middle of the street or beside the street. Do you know what the man of God, Elisha could have done? He could have gone out here and poured the salt in the stream/creek that was out here but that would not have fixed the problem. Do you know why? That would not have fixed the problem because the water would have still yet been coming from up above. Do you know where he went to? He went right to where the water was coming forth from. He went right to where the water was originating from and that’s where he was going to heal.

Do you know what we want to do today? As I said a minute ago, we want to work on the outside but we can work on the outside all we want; we can work on all the streams and all the channels that [comes] forth from us, but that won’t change us a bit. We need to have a change of heart.

That is what Elisha did. He went right to where the water began at. That’s where he put the salt in the spring at.

Do you know what we need tonight? We need to be born again. We need the power of Almighty God to be placed within our lives and when that happens, the creeks and the streams that come forth from our lives are going to be good creeks and they are going to be good streams. We are gong to be able to be some people and we are going to be able to have some water come forth from us that people will be able to drink from. Do you know what it will be? It will be a blessing to them and not only that but it will be a blessing to us; if we just listen and do what God says.

He took the salt to where the water began at, where the problem issued from; that is where he took the salt and placed it. We can go down to the car wash and wash ourselves off with 3000 pounds phi but that won’t change our heart not one bit. We can reform. We can do all kinds of things. We can have schools and we can have programs and do all kinds of things, but that don’t change the spring of our heart. That don’t change the place where the evil that’s within man comes from and evil comes forth from the heart. You can wash the outside and still yet be evil. However when you change the inside, then the outside is going to change.

He took the salt to the source. He took the salt right to the source, to where the water was coming out of the mountain, to where the water was originating from and that is what needed to be healed. Elisha knew if that was healed there then all the other creeks and streams that broke off of this would also be healed.

Do you know what we need in our lives today? We need Jesus Christ to heal the spring of our heart. From our heart springs forth all the issues of life. Everything about you and I comes forth from here friend. It needs to be changed.

In the city of Jericho, there were people dying because they had bad water. There were people barren here. No doubt, as I read history and read things about the city here, women could not have children because of the water that was here. They were not growing any crops because of the water that was here. However, Elisha healed them.

21 And he went forth unto the spring of the waters, and cast the salt in there, and said, Thus saith the LORD, I have healed these waters; there shall not be from thence any more death or barren land .

Do you know what he knew? He knew that there was nothing necessarily in the salt and nothing in the new cruse, but he knew the power was in the Word of the living God.

21 And he went forth unto the spring of the waters, and cast the salt in there, and said, Thus saith the LORD, I have healed these waters; there shall not be from thence any more death or barren land .

Elisha did not say that these words are coming from me. He says, “…thus saith the LORD, I have healed these waters; there shall not be from thence any more death or barren land.”

Isn’t that awesome to think about? Isn’t it awesome to think about what God can do, not only in a city the size of Jericho and not only in our hearts when we are evil and everything coming forth from us is evil, and a lot of times people are dying because our evilness that is issuing forth and coming forth from us. No man lives unto himself and no man dies unto himself.

My life affects other people and so does yours. Wicked people and sinful people are not satisfied with just being sinful themselves they want to drag other people into their sin with them. That is ungodly people that do that. A lot of people that go to church want to do that. They are not satisfied with being ungodly themselves, but they want to drag you along with them. Sometimes we are not smart enough to figure that out until it is too late.

He goes to the source and casts in the salt and he says, “…thus saith the LORD, this water is healed…” The Bible says that it was healed. The Bible says that there is not going to be any more death or barren.

22 So the waters were healed unto this day, according to the saying of Elisha which he spake.

Get this.

The problem was not with the city. The problem was not with the climate, soil, people, but the problem was with the water supply. It was causing these folks all kinds of problems. Elisha took the cruse and salt; he goes to the source and he heals the problem. The lifestyle of these folks in the city of Jericho changed forever.

Do you know what God can do for you tonight? Things may be pleasant in your life tonight. Situations may be good in your life tonight. Everything may be going good for you tonight, but death is on your trail. Death is out there in front of you. Do you know what the things that are coming forth from your life are evil? Do you know what you need tonight? You need to be healed. You need to be healed.

Do you know what Jesus Christ does when He saves us? He goes right down here to where a man is put together at where the body, soul and our spirit comes together, and that is where He saves us at. When he does that and we live according to His will then there will be good things that will come out of our lives. The question that we need to ask ourselves tonight is: Are we willing to do that? Are we willing to ask the Lord to come into our life and to cleanse us and to forgive us of our sin? Are we willing to understand and are we willing to agree with God and confess as He has already said that we are lost and that we are dying and we have no hope if we don’t accept Him as our Savior.

If we are willing to accept that then we are getting on good grounds that we can be saved and be forgiven. If you don’t think that you need any help, if you don’t think that you need to be saved, if you are satisfied with your life and the way that you are going right now today, then you are not a candidate to be saved.

Like these folks, they had some good things going for them, but they also knew they had some needs.

Things may be going good for you today. You may be healthy, you may have a good job, you may have money in the bank, but something is greater than all that. You need to be saved tonight. You need the spring of your soul redeemed and saved and cleansed tonight. I promise you if you will turn to Jesus Christ and ask Him to forgive you of your sin, He will do that this evening and you can get ready to go to heaven. You can do some good things that will bring glory to His Name.

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