2 Kings 2:9-10: And so it was, when they had crossed over, that Elijah said to Elisha, Ask! What may I do for you, before I am taken away from you? Elisha said, Please let a double portion of your spirit be upon me. So he said, You have asked a hard thing. Nevertheless, if you see me when I am taken from you, it shall be so for you; but if not, it shall not be so.

You know this story.  Elijah’s ministry is over, and he is getting ready to depart.  He travels from place to place throughout the land, and at each stop he tells Elisha to go home.  Elisha refuses.  He won’t stay behind while Elijah vanishes.  Elijah rolls his cloak and slaps the Jordan with it, and the two cross over together on dry land.  Then Elijah turns to Elisha and asks what he wants.

Elisha asks for the privilege of a firstborn.  A “double portion” isn’t twice as much as Elijah had, but the inheritance of the firstborn.  Elijah is his father, and Elisha wants to carry on Elijah’s prophetic ministry after Elijah is gone.  He knows he can do that only if he has the firstborn’s portion of Elijah’s spirit.  When Elijah is carried up to heaven by the whirlwind, Elisha watches and receives the spirit that he asked for, signified by Elijah’s mantle that Elisha grabs as if falls to the ground.

This is a richly allusive passage itself on several levels.  Elijah has been a Moses figure, and Elisha is his Joshua.  As Joshua was filled with the power of Moses, so Elisha carries on his work in the spirit of Elijah.  The passage points ahead too: We know from the New Testament that John the Baptist is a new Elijah, and therefore Jesus is the new Elisha, carrying on the work of John in the power of the Spirit that filled John.  And this is also a story of Jesus and His disciples, Jesus and the church.  When Jesus is swept up to heaven, He leaves a double portion of His prophetic Spirit to the disciples.  He clothes them with His mantle so that they can carry on His work.  Because Jesus has ascended as the new and greater Elijah, the church as a whole is a new Elisha.

As I noted in the sermon, the gift of the Spirit in the new covenant fulfills the hope of Moses that all the Lord’s people would be prophets.  By the Spirit of Jesus, we become a prophetic community, equipped by the Spirit to speak the words of God to one another, qualified by the Spirit to draw near into the Lord’s council and to offer our petitions and prayers before Him.

In baptism, your children are being inducted into that prophetic company.  They are being incorporated into the Prophet Jesus, engrafted into the church that is the temple of the Spirit.  They are being clothed with the mantle of Jesus, and gaining their share of the double portion of the Spirit that He poured out on His church.  They are being marked out today, by this baptism, as prophets in training.

That is a great privilege for them and for you, but this privilege comes with a task for you as parents.  If they are going to be faithful in the company of prophets, you must teach them the Word of God.  As prophets, they also have the privilege of the floor in the council of God.  You need to remind regularly that they are prophets and by word and your own example, you need to teach them to pray.  Above all, if they are going to be faithful prophets, the need to be filled with the Spirit.  So ask our heavenly Father, who gives good gifts to His children, to give them a portion of the Spirit of Jesus, the greater Elijah.