But the child’s mother said, “As surely as the LORD lives and as you live, I will not leave you.” So he got up and followed her.– 2 Kings 4:30

Today’s Scripture Reading (June 5, 2013): 2 Kings 4

When I was in grade school, my teacher told us the story of Adanac. Adanac was a strange place of tribal customs and the story of Adanac lifts these customs out of context and just leaves them there for us to see. I remember parts of it. One of the coming of age rights of Adanac was to send the maturing male into a closet (a small room) with an extremely sharp knife and attempt to scrape the hair off of his face without cutting himself. It is an art that takes men in this culture years – decades – lifetimes to try and perfect. Another of the strange cultural phenomenon is that when they get sick they go to this “building of the sick.” It is inside of this building that strange practitioners of the mystic healing arts go through their regimen of healing spells on the sick – which includes the repeated bindings of the arms, and poking with long pins, and in some cases even cutting into the flesh with the hope that somehow the sickness will escape. And the truth is that in the kingdom of Adanac, most people die inside of these cultic buildings of healing – and yet people still go.

Of course, Adanac is Canada spelled backwards, and all of these things are things that Canadians do looked at without the meaning that we would attach to these activities. The mystic cutting into the patient in a building of healing is not because we believe that sickness or evil will somehow escape through the opening, but because there is something inside the person that needs to be taken out or fixed. We place faith in doctors; even though most of us will die within the walls of these healing places we call hospitals in the care of these doctors. The story of Adanac is meant to warn us to be careful when we look at the strange beliefs and activities of cultures that we do not understand. We know that there are reasons behind the things that we do – but outsiders often cannot see those reasons.

This woman’s child is sick (in fact, the child has died.) And Elisha is trying to take care of the situation long distance. He is willing to part with his staff so that the mother can hurry back to her child and place the staff on her child. His intention is that this act – done quickly enough – Will result in the child being miraculously revived. But this mother makes it clear that she has no faith in things. Her faith is in Elisha – and in God. She does not want the things of Elisha to take back to her child – she needs the presence of Elisha.

Elisha probably does not miss that the words that this women speaks to him are the very words that years before Elisha had spoken to Elijah. And he remembers the persistence that he had felt as he spoke the words to Elijah, and realizes that this woman is experiencing the same kind of persistence – especially when it comes to the life of her child.

We are called to live that kind of life of persistence. And I believe that Elisha was honored by this women’s persistence in wanting Elisha’s presence and not his things. I also believe that God is honored when we persistently chase after the presence of God – and not all of the things that we hope that God will give to us. As a people we stand in need of God’s presence – and not his presents.

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: 2 Kings 5

Note: The VantagePoint message "Seeds of Love" from the series "I Married a Prostitute" is now available on the VantagePoint Website. You can find it here.