| New Living Translation | Berean Study Bible |
| 1One day the widow of a member of the group of prophets came to Elisha and cried out, “My husband who served you is dead, and you know how he feared the LORD. But now a creditor has come, threatening to take my two sons as slaves.” | 1Now the wife of one of the sons of the prophets cried out to Elisha, “Your servant, my husband, is dead, and you know that your servant feared the LORD. And now his creditor is coming to take my two children as his slaves!” |
| 2“What can I do to help you?” Elisha asked. “Tell me, what do you have in the house?” “Nothing at all, except a flask of olive oil,” she replied. | 2“How can I help you?” asked Elisha. “Tell me, what do you have in the house?” She answered, “Your servant has nothing in the house but a jar of oil.” |
| 3And Elisha said, “Borrow as many empty jars as you can from your friends and neighbors. | 3“Go,” said Elisha, “borrow jars, even empty ones, from all your neighbors. Do not gather just a few. |
| 4Then go into your house with your sons and shut the door behind you. Pour olive oil from your flask into the jars, setting each one aside when it is filled.” | 4Then go inside, shut the door behind you and your sons, and pour oil into all these jars, setting the full ones aside.” |
| 5So she did as she was told. Her sons kept bringing jars to her, and she filled one after another. | 5So she left him, and after she had shut the door behind her and her sons, they kept bringing jars to her, and she kept pouring. |
| 6Soon every container was full to the brim! “Bring me another jar,” she said to one of her sons. “There aren’t any more!” he told her. And then the olive oil stopped flowing. | 6When all the jars were full, she said to her son, “Bring me another.” But he replied, “There are no more jars.” Then the oil stopped flowing. |
| 7When she told the man of God what had happened, he said to her, “Now sell the olive oil and pay your debts, and you and your sons can live on what is left over.” Elisha and the Woman from Shunem | 7She went and told the man of God, and he said, “Go, sell the oil, and pay your debt. Then you and your sons can live on the remainder.” |
| 8One day Elisha went to the town of Shunem. A wealthy woman lived there, and she urged him to come to her home for a meal. After that, whenever he passed that way, he would stop there for something to eat. | 8One day Elisha went to Shunem, and a prominent woman who lived there persuaded him to have a meal. So whenever he would pass by, he would stop there to eat. |
| 9She said to her husband, “I am sure this man who stops in from time to time is a holy man of God. | 9Then the woman said to her husband, “Behold, now I know that the one who often comes our way is a holy man of God. |
| 10Let’s build a small room for him on the roof and furnish it with a bed, a table, a chair, and a lamp. Then he will have a place to stay whenever he comes by.” | 10Please let us make a small room upstairs and put in it a bed, a table, a chair, and a lamp for him. Then when he comes to us, he can stay there.” |
| 11One day Elisha returned to Shunem, and he went up to this upper room to rest. | 11One day Elisha came to visit and went to his upper room to lie down. |
| 12He said to his servant Gehazi, “Tell the woman from Shunem I want to speak to her.” When she appeared, | 12And he said to Gehazi his servant, “Call the Shunammite woman.” And when he had called her, she stood before him, |
| 13Elisha said to Gehazi, “Tell her, ‘We appreciate the kind concern you have shown us. What can we do for you? Can we put in a good word for you to the king or to the commander of the army?’” “No,” she replied, “my family takes good care of me.” | 13and Elisha said to Gehazi, “Now tell her, ‘Look, you have gone to all this trouble for us. What can we do for you? Can we speak on your behalf to the king or the commander of the army?’ ” “I have a home among my own people,” she replied. |
| 14Later Elisha asked Gehazi, “What can we do for her?” Gehazi replied, “She doesn’t have a son, and her husband is an old man.” | 14So he asked, “Then what should be done for her?” “Well, she has no son,” Gehazi replied, “and her husband is old.” |
| 15“Call her back again,” Elisha told him. When the woman returned, Elisha said to her as she stood in the doorway, | 15“Call her,” said Elisha. So Gehazi called her, and she stood in the doorway. |
| 16“Next year at this time you will be holding a son in your arms!” “No, my lord!” she cried. “O man of God, don’t deceive me and get my hopes up like that.” | 16And Elisha declared, “At this time next year, you will hold a son in your arms.” “No, my lord,” she said. “Do not lie to your maidservant, O man of God.” |
| 17But sure enough, the woman soon became pregnant. And at that time the following year she had a son, just as Elisha had said. | 17But the woman did conceive, and at that time the next year she gave birth to a son, just as Elisha had told her. |
| 18One day when her child was older, he went out to help his father, who was working with the harvesters. | 18And the child grew, and one day he went out to his father, who was with the harvesters. |
| 19Suddenly he cried out, “My head hurts! My head hurts!” His father said to one of the servants, “Carry him home to his mother.” | 19“My head! My head!” he complained to his father. So his father told a servant, “Carry him to his mother.” |
| 20So the servant took him home, and his mother held him on her lap. But around noontime he died. | 20After the servant had picked him up and carried him to his mother, the boy sat on her lap until noon, and then he died. |
| 21She carried him up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, then shut the door and left him there. | 21And she went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God. Then she shut the door and went out. |
| 22She sent a message to her husband: “Send one of the servants and a donkey so that I can hurry to the man of God and come right back.” | 22And the woman called her husband and said, “Please send me one of the servants and one of the donkeys, that I may go quickly to the man of God and return.” |
| 23“Why go today?” he asked. “It is neither a new moon festival nor a Sabbath.” But she said, “It will be all right.” | 23“Why would you go to him today?” he replied. “It is not a New Moon or a Sabbath.” “Everything is all right,” she said. |
| 24So she saddled the donkey and said to the servant, “Hurry! Don’t slow down unless I tell you to.” | 24Then she saddled the donkey and told her servant, “Drive onward; do not slow the pace for me unless I tell you.” |
| 25As she approached the man of God at Mount Carmel, Elisha saw her in the distance. He said to Gehazi, “Look, the woman from Shunem is coming. | 25So she set out and went to the man of God at Mount Carmel. When the man of God saw her at a distance, he said to his servant Gehazi, “Look, there is the Shunammite woman. |
| 26Run out to meet her and ask her, ‘Is everything all right with you, your husband, and your child?’” “Yes,” the woman told Gehazi, “everything is fine.” | 26Please run out now to meet her and ask, ‘Are you all right? Is your husband all right? Is your child all right?’ ” And she answered, “Everything is all right.” |
| 27But when she came to the man of God at the mountain, she fell to the ground before him and caught hold of his feet. Gehazi began to push her away, but the man of God said, “Leave her alone. She is deeply troubled, but the LORD has not told me what it is.” | 27When she reached the man of God at the mountain, she clung to his feet. Gehazi came over to push her away, but the man of God said, “Leave her alone, for her soul is in deep distress, and the LORD has hidden it from me and has not told me.” |
| 28Then she said, “Did I ask you for a son, my lord? And didn’t I say, ‘Don’t deceive me and get my hopes up’?” | 28Then she said, “Did I ask you for a son, my lord? Didn’t I say, ‘Do not deceive me?’ ” |
| 29Then Elisha said to Gehazi, “Get ready to travel ; take my staff and go! Don’t talk to anyone along the way. Go quickly and lay the staff on the child’s face.” | 29So Elisha said to Gehazi, “Tie up your garment, 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. Then lay my staff on the boy’s face.” |
| 30But the boy’s mother said, “As surely as the LORD lives and you yourself live, I won’t go home unless you go with me.” So Elisha returned with her. | 30And the mother of the boy said, “As surely as the LORD lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So he got up and followed her. |
| 31Gehazi hurried on ahead and laid the staff on the child’s face, but nothing happened. There was no sign of life. He returned to meet Elisha and told him, “The child is still dead.” | 31Gehazi went on ahead of them and laid the staff on the boy’s face, but there was no sound or response. So he went back to meet Elisha and told him, “The boy has not awakened.” |
| 32When Elisha arrived, the child was indeed dead, lying there on the prophet’s bed. | 32When Elisha reached the house, there was the boy lying dead on his bed. |
| 33He went in alone and shut the door behind him and prayed to the LORD. | 33So he went in, closed the door behind the two of them, and prayed to the LORD. |
| 34Then he lay down on the child’s body, placing his mouth on the child’s mouth, his eyes on the child’s eyes, and his hands on the child’s hands. And as he stretched out on him, the child’s body began to grow warm again! | 34Then Elisha got on the bed and lay on the boy, mouth to mouth, eye to eye, and hand to hand. As he stretched himself out over him, the boy’s body became warm. |
| 35Elisha got up, walked back and forth across the room once, and then stretched himself out again on the child. This time the boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes! | 35Elisha turned away and paced back and forth across the room. Then he got on the bed and stretched himself out over the boy again, and the boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes. |
| 36Then Elisha summoned Gehazi. “Call the child’s mother!” he said. And when she came in, Elisha said, “Here, take your son!” | 36Elisha summoned Gehazi and said, “Call the Shunammite woman.” So he called her and she came. Then Elisha said, “Pick up your son.” |
| 37She fell at his feet and bowed before him, overwhelmed with gratitude. Then she took her son in her arms and carried him downstairs. Miracles during a Famine | 37She came in, fell at his feet, and bowed to the ground. Then she picked up her son and went out. |
| 38Elisha now returned to Gilgal, and there was a famine in the land. One day as the group of prophets was seated before him, he said to his servant, “Put a large pot on the fire, and make some stew for the rest of the group.” | 38When Elisha returned to Gilgal, there was a famine in the land. As the sons of the prophets were sitting at his feet, he said to his attendant, “Put on the large pot and boil some stew for the sons of the prophets.” |
| 39One of the young men went out into the field to gather herbs and came back with a pocketful of wild gourds. He shredded them and put them into the pot without realizing they were poisonous. | 39One of them went out to the field to gather herbs, and he found a wild vine from which he gathered as many wild gourds as his garment could hold. Then he came back and cut them up into the pot of stew, though no one knew what they were. |
| 40Some of the stew was served to the men. But after they had eaten a bite or two they cried out, “Man of God, there’s poison in this stew!” So they would not eat it. | 40And they poured it out for the men to eat, but when they tasted the stew they cried out, “There is death in the pot, O man of God!” And they could not eat it. |
| 41Elisha said, “Bring me some flour.” Then he threw it into the pot and said, “Now it’s all right; go ahead and eat.” And then it did not harm them. | 41Then Elisha said, “Get some flour.” He threw it into the pot and said, “Pour it out for the people to eat.” And there was nothing harmful in the pot. |
| 42One day a man from Baal-shalishah brought the man of God a sack of fresh grain and twenty loaves of barley bread made from the first grain of his harvest. Elisha said, “Give it to the people so they can eat.” | 42Now a man from Baal-shalishah came to the man of God with a sack of twenty loaves of barley bread from the first ripe grain. “Give it to the people to eat,” said Elisha. |
| 43“What?” his servant exclaimed. “Feed a hundred people with only this?” But Elisha repeated, “Give it to the people so they can eat, for this is what the LORD says: Everyone will eat, and there will even be some left over!” | 43But his servant asked, “How am I to set twenty loaves before a hundred men?” “Give it to the people to eat,” said Elisha, “for this is what the LORD says: ‘They will eat and have some left over.’ ” |
| 44And when they gave it to the people, there was plenty for all and some left over, just as the LORD had promised. | 44So he set it before them, and they ate and had some left over, according to the word of the LORD. |
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