“Taking up the Mantle of Christ”

Since I’ve come to understand that the whole of the Bible is about Jesus, I’m constantly amazed at how the old familiar stories, especially the familiar stories of the Old Testament, come alive and reveal in a fresh way something of the nature and work of the Lord Jesus. Like how the relationship between the great prophet Elijah and his servant Elisha prefigures the relationship between Christ and His Church, the relationship between Christ and us who believe in Him and follow Him as His disciples.

Think about the story again. Elijah has come to the end of his earthly ministry. He’s taking his last journey, and he knows that he is just about to be taken up bodily into heaven in a whirlwind – only the second person in the whole history of Man to be directly translated into heaven without experiencing death. (Who was the first? Enoch.) And Elijah intimates to his servant Elisha that he will soon be taken from him. Why do you think we read this passage in Ascensiontide? Because it points forward to Christ’s ascension.

But Elisha tells Elijah in no uncertain terms that he will follow him wherever he goes. “As the Lord lives, and as your soul lives,” he says, “I will not leave you.” It’s very reminiscent of Peter’s statement to Jesus the night before His crucifixion: “Lord, I am ready to go with You, both to prison and death.” Of course, Peter didn’t do any such think, but denied the Lord three times.

But now remember how Elisha was first called to be Elijah’s servant and to follow him. Elijah was returning from the wilderness of Sinai and he found Elisha in a field plowing behind twelve yoke of oxen. And as Elijah passed by he threw is mantle, his cloak – the symbol of his prophetic office, onto the shoulders of Elisha. And the Scripture says that Elisha immediately left the oxen, and after going home one last time to kiss his father and mother, “he arose and followed Elijah, and became his servant.”

Now doesn’t that sound just a tiny bit similar Jesus’ calling of the disciples – His call to them to leave their nets or their tax receipts and their mothers and fathers and to follow Him? The similarity is no coincidence.

But now Elijah has come to the place where he will be taken up. But before he goes he says one last thing to Elisha. He says, “Ask whatever I may do for you, before I am taken away from you.”

On that night before Jesus’ last journey, from the cross to the right hand of God, He said, “Ask of me anything in My name, and I will do it.” Do you see? Elijah is prefiguring Christ.

But the most significant part of the story is what Elijah’s disciple, Elisha, asks for. Remember what he said? He said, “Please, let a double portion of your Spirit be upon me.” A double portion of his Spirit. Not money. Not riches. Not cars, but twice the measure of the Holy Spirit that was upon Elijah in order to continue to do his master’s work, in order to continue to do the work of the ministry where Elijah left off. That’s what Elisha asks for.

Now don’t miss what he’s asking for. Elisha is asking that he be made a greater prophet than his master - a greater prophet than Elijah himself, the #2 man in the ranks of the Old Testament prophets, right after Moses. That’s some request! And so Elijah answers, “You ask a hard thing. You didn’t hold back, did you Elisha? You went right for the grand prize. As a matter of fact, it so great a request that I can’t even promise to give it to you. It’s beyond me, because the Spirit of the Lord is the Lord’s. But,” he goes on to say, “if you see me when I am taken up, it shall be as you have asked.” “If you see me ascend, Elisha, you will have your double portion of the Spirit; you will continue my work.” And as the words were still in his mouth, as they continued to speak together, suddenly the chariot of fire swooped down and carried Elijah up into heaven as by a whirlwind.

“And Elisha saw it.” Those are the very next words that follow. Elisha stood and looked and saw Elijah go up. What does that mean? It means Elijah’s promise would be fulfilled. It means Elisha would go forward in his master’s office, but with even greater power and with even greater results. And the sign that this would indeed be the case was the transferal of the prophetic mantle. Elijah’s mantle fell back to earth as he was carried up into heaven. And Elisha took it up and immediately set out on his prophetic career – a career that almost duplicates, times two, the ministry of his master.

So how does this reveal the relationship of Christ to His Church, the relationship of Christ to you and to me? Jesus said to his disciples on the eve of his last journey, “Most assuredly I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these will he do, because I go to my Father.” Do you see the connection?

The Scriptures say that Jesus ascended into heaven to receive from the Father the gift of the Holy Spirit that He might pour down His Spirit into His people. For what purpose? So that He might perpetuate His ministry, but with even greater power and greater effectiveness, through His Church - through you and me who have His Spirit dwelling in us.

If you have a hard time believing that the Church could do greater works than Christ Himself, just look what happened after Pentecost when the mantle of Christ fell upon His disciples.

You know, for three years Jesus preached and taught, but by the end of his earthly ministry he had made only about one-hundred and twenty disciples. But in one day, with a sermon that lasted all of two or three minutes, Peter was able to add some three-thousand souls to the Church. We read in the Gospels that Christ healed with the hem of His garment, but we’re told in Acts that people were healed if only Peter’s shadow fell on them, or if only the touched with handkerchief that had touched the apostle Paul. The apostles preached more, converted more, healed more, communed more, ordained more, and in more countries, than Jesus ever did. Why? Because the servants were greater than their Master? No. But because the Master promised to increase in them, exponentially, the power of His Spirit. He said, “It is expedient that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper - the Holy Spirit - will not come to you”… but “when He does come, you will be endued with power from on high.”

But now I want you to notice something very important, so pay close attention. Jesus doesn’t say that it is only the apostles Peter and Paul that will do the greater works than His. He doesn’t say that it’s only the one-hundred and twenty upon whom the Spirit fell with the sound of a rushing wind and with tongues of fire on that first Pentecost; He doesn’t say that only Bishops and priests will do the greater works. He says, “Whoever believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father.”

The mantle of Christ has fallen upon all of us. It’s written in Ephesians, “To each one of us grace was given according to the measure of Christ’s gift. Therefore He says, ‘When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive, and gave gifts to men.’… And He gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, and some pastors and teachers, for the equipping of the saints to do the work of the ministry.” The mantle of Christ has fallen upon all of us to advance His mission. Each and everyone of us have been given the gifts of His Spirit to continue to do His work, but with even greater power and greater results.

And what are those works? He told us just as He was ascending into heaven. He said, “Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and rise from the dead the third day, and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations…And you are my witnesses of these things, and behold, I send the Promise of My Father upon you.”

The works of Christ and the greater-than-Christ’s works are to bring His work of forgiveness to all the nations. All the miracles of the apostles were designed only to advance that one purpose: to bring Christ’s work of forgiveness to the very ends of the earth. And here we are. If Jerusalem is the center of the world, here we are at the western-most ends of the earth. And because each of us bears the mantle of Christ, even if we can’t heal the sick or raise the dead, we can still do the greater work of bringing Christ’s work of atonement to bear on our little portion of the world.

As we continue in our mission here at St. Stephen’s to be Christ’s instrument of salvation in our little town of Montrose (and don’t be tempted to think that it is anything less than that), let us ever be mindful that we are not going forward on the basis of economics, or on the basis of demographics, or even on the basis of having a nice meeting place, but on the basis that each one of us bears the mantle of Christ’s Spirit to do His work. And there’s our confidence that we can do it. We may be confident that our witness to the gospel will be effectual to bring the dead to life, to heal the broken-hearted, to give sight to the spiritual blind, and to make the deaf to hear. Why? Because we’re anything? Not at all. But because Christ has multiplied His Spirit upon us.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we bear the mantle of Christ. Therefore let us go forth and do His works. +