“And when the sons of the prophets which were to view at Jericho saw him, they said, The spirit of Elijah doth rest on Elisha. And they came to meet him, and bowed themselves to the ground before him.
And they said unto him Behold now, there be with thy servants fifty strong men; let them go, we pray thee, and seek thy master: lest peradventure the Spirit of the LORD hath taken him up, and cast him upon some mountain, or into some valley.
And he said, Ye shall not send.
And when they urged him till he was ashamed, he said, Send. They sent therefore fifty men; and they sought three days, but found him not.
And when they came again to him, (for he tarried at Jericho,) he said unto them, Did not I say unto you, Go not?”
2 Kings 2:16-18
Carl Sagan, the American astronomer, popularized the statement, “Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.” The quote is used by lost scientists to hold onto the hope that there exists something in the universe to prove the Bible wrong. But long before Carl had been potty-trained, God taught and demonstrated a wisdom far deeper than this phrase.
“You don’t know what you don’t know” is another sage saying. Every young man needs to own the fact that he doesn’t have everything figured out. Most young people never emerge from the phase of life that puffs them up into thinking they know more than their parents. But as many an old-timer has observed: “They don’t have a clue; they don’t even have a suspicion!”
The truth of our mortality is that we will never know all there is to know. The finite cannot comprehend the infinite. The mind locked in time cannot grasp eternity. We can posit and theorize, test and prove till we have a mental blowout or a physical breakdown, and all it will serve to show is that at some point we are going to have to trust what somebody says. This is where faith comes in.
Evidence of Absence?
There is absence of evidence for much in life. Electrical inventions rely on infintessimal particles operating according to ‘atomic theory’ without ever seeing the electron, proton, or neutron they necessitate being there. Harvesting of solar power is precipitated on guesses whether light exists in rays, waves, or light particles called photons. Even that device you hold in your hand is an experiment, an expensive survey of how radiation held up to your face for 3+ hours per day may affect the human brain.
Lost man is comfortable in those ‘unknowns’, yet he balks whenever he is confronted with his lack of “repentance toward God, and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Acts 20:21) The world mocks the flailing of Anti-christian placebos like the shroud of Turin, Nephi’s golden plates, flamboyant apostolic sign-gifts, and various other relics and aides to worship. Those are religious-but-lost attempts to give proof of a cause bigger than themselves for which to live for. Those rotting, antiquated lies piled along the Dead Sea Scrolls, Siniaticus, Vaticanus, and the Book of Mormon, compose a sad substitute for reading and believing God’s Words in a King James Bible. The Bible gives solid proof where none could be conjured, while reserving the surety of proof for believers only. You can’t have what God gives until you fully believe what He says.
Elijah had Ascended
Our text is one of many rich tales from the ministry of Elisha. Elisha had seen some supernatural things. A fiery chariot, the old prophet whisked away. Elisha had done some supernatural things. Twice he went over the River Jordan on dry ground. Returning to the sons of the prophets who chose not to stick with them, Elisha is urged for “proof” of what had happened. Elisha knew that there would be no proof, yet he was harassed to the point of humiliation to send out ‘a team of experts in their field to verify the findings.’
They searched for three days– and came back empty.
Elisha had no one on his side. Nobody believed him. All he had was an old, used rag– the mantle of Elijah– to carry around to remind him where the LORD God of Elijah was. As it turned out, the old rag was all he needed. Elijah was gone– that absence was evidence enough.
The Sepulchre was Empty
A Bible believer does not ever need to fear the absence of evidence for his faith. The lost world has faith in their bias. We have chosen to place our faith in a Book.
The difference is two-fold. First, in what we are looking for. Second, is where we are looking for it. In such a technologized, automated, intelligent, connected pace of life, every “science falsely so called:” (1 Timothy 6:20) looks for proof consistently in the wrong places. They live for unearthing dead fossils, dead artifacts, and dead discoveries. Whether searching for the origin of the universe, the origin of the species, or the destiny of mankind without God, our Book begs this question: “Why seek ye the living among the dead?”
“He is not here, but is risen: remember how he spake unto you when he was yet in Galilee, Saying, The Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and the third day rise again.
And they remembered his words,”
Luke 24:5b-8
Jesus Christ died for three days– and left His tomb empty.
I cannot point out the tomb outside Jerusalem today if my life depended on it. I wouldn’t know how to read the Hebrew on the buryingplaces, or translate the Latin from the broken seal. Many scholars with degrees after their names have urged me till I felt ashamed; after all, shouldn’t I have something to shew for what I believe?
As Elisha gathered up the shreds of a well-worn mantle in his hands, I too have a bundle of tattered Pages that have been undervalued, discredited, and overlooked. But I love them. They are all the evidence I need. Soon the One Who left them for me will be back. And I will be ready for His return.
“And they remembered his words“
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