2 Kings 4

1The wife of one of the company of prophets cried out to Elisha, “Your servant my husband is dead, and you know that your servant feared Yahweh. But now the creditor has come to take my two children as his slaves.”

2Elisha said to her, “What should I do for you? Tell me, what do you have in the house?” She said, “Your servant has nothing in the house except a jar of oil.”

3He said, “Go outside and borrow containers from all your neighbors, empty containers, and not just a few.

4Then go in and shut the door behind you and your sons, and pour oil into all these containers. As each one is filled, set it aside.”

5So she left him and shut the door behind her and her sons. They kept bringing the containers to her, and she kept pouring.

6When the containers were full, she said to her son, “Bring me another one.” But he said to her, “There are no more.” Then the oil stopped flowing.

7She went and told the man of God, and he said, “Go, sell the oil and pay your debt. You and your sons can live on what is left.”

8One day Elisha went on to Shunem, where a prominent woman lived, and she urged him to stay for a meal. So whenever he passed that way, he would stop there to eat.

9She said to her husband, “Look, I know that this man who often passes our way is a holy man of God.

10Let us make a small walled room on the roof and put a bed, a table, a chair, and a lamp there for him. Then whenever he comes to us, he can stay there.”

11One day he came there, went up to the upper room, and lay down there.

12He said to Gehazi his servant, “Call this Shunammite woman.” So he called her, and she stood before him.

13Elisha said to him, “Tell her, ‘Look, you have gone to all this trouble for us. What can be done for you? Can we speak on your behalf to the king or to the commander of the army?’” She answered, “I live among my own people.”

14He said, “Then what can be done for her?” Gehazi said, “Well, she has no son, and her husband is old.”

15He said, “Call her.” So he called her, and she stood in the doorway.

16He said, “At this season next year you will be holding a son in your arms.” She said, “No, my lord, man of God, do not lie to your servant.”

17But the woman became pregnant, and at that season the next year she gave birth to a son, just as Elisha had told her.

18The child grew, and one day he went out to his father, who was with the harvesters.

19He said to his father, “My head! My head!” His father said to a servant, “Carry him to his mother.”

20The servant picked him up and brought him to his mother. The boy sat on her lap until noon, and then he died.

21She went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, shut the door behind him, and went out.

22She called to her husband and said, “Please send me one of the servants and one of the donkeys, so that I can hurry to the man of God and come back.”

23He said, “Why are you going to him today? It is not a new moon or a Sabbath.” She said, “It is all right.”

24She saddled the donkey and said to her servant, “Drive on and go. Do not slow down the pace for me unless I tell you.”

25So she set out and came to the man of God at Mount Carmel. When the man of God saw her in the distance, he said to Gehazi his servant, “Look, there is the Shunammite woman.

26Run to meet her now and ask her, ‘Is everything all right with you? Is everything all right with your husband? Is everything all right with the child?’” She answered, “Everything is all right.”

27But when she came to the man of God at the mountain, she took hold of his feet. Gehazi came over to push her away, but the man of God said, “Leave her alone, for she is in bitter distress, and Yahweh has hidden it from me and has not told me.”

28She said, “Did I ask my lord for a son? Did I not say, ‘Do not deceive me’?”

29Elisha said to Gehazi, “Tuck your robe into your belt, take my staff in your hand, and go. If you meet anyone, do not greet him, and if anyone greets you, do not answer him. Lay my staff on the boy’s face.”

30But the boy’s mother said, “As Yahweh lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So he got up and followed her.

31Gehazi went on ahead of them and laid the staff on the boy’s face, but there was no sound and no response. So he went back to meet Elisha and told him, “The boy has not woken up.”

32When Elisha came into the house, there was the boy, dead, lying on his bed.

33He went in, shut the door behind the two of them, and prayed to Yahweh.

34Then he got up on the bed and lay on the child, putting his mouth on his mouth, his eyes on his eyes, and his hands on his hands. As he stretched himself out over him, the child’s body grew warm.

35Elisha got up and walked once back and forth in the house. Then he went up and stretched himself out over him again. The boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes.

36Elisha called Gehazi and said, “Call this Shunammite woman.” So he called her, and when she came to him, he said, “Pick up your son.”

37She came in, fell at his feet, and bowed to the ground. Then she picked up her son and went out.

38Elisha returned to Gilgal when there was a famine in the land. While the company of prophets was sitting before him, he said to his servant, “Put the large pot on the fire and cook some stew for the company of prophets.”

39One of them went out into the field to gather herbs and found a wild vine. He gathered from it wild gourds, as many as his garment could hold, and came back and cut them up into the pot of stew, for they did not know what they were.

40They served it for the men to eat. But as they were eating the stew, they cried out, “Man of God, there is death in the pot!” And they could not eat it.

41Elisha said, “Then bring some flour.” He threw it into the pot and said, “Serve it to the people so they can eat.” And there was nothing harmful in the pot.

42A man came from Baal-shalishah, bringing the man of God bread from the first of the harvest: twenty loaves of barley bread and some fresh grain in his sack. Elisha said, “Give it to the people so they can eat.”

43But his servant said, “How can I set this before a hundred men?” He said, “Give it to the people so they can eat, for this is what Yahweh says: They will eat and have some left over.”

44So he set it before them, and they ate and had some left over, according to the word of Yahweh.