And Elisha saw it, and he cried out, “My father, my father, the chariot of Israel and its horsemen!” So he saw him no more. And he took hold of his own clothes and tore them into two pieces.

II Kings 2:12 NKJV

Which is better for a nation: to have the greatest, fiercest, most powerful army or to have the Lord? The psalmist said, “Some trust in chariots, and some in horses: but we will remember the name of the LORD our God” (Psalm 20:7). The fiercest warrior did little to assist the Philistines on the day a young shepherd went against him with a sling. So Israel with its weak armies found success only from the Lord. Elijah was to Israel like an army, a warrior, a general. He was the chariot (the captain), and he was the horsemen (the cavalry and strength of the army).

When Elijah ascended into Heaven a great loss came to Israel. Israel lost its prophet who had proclaimed over and over and against all persecution, that the Lord, He is God. They lost their prophet who had performed great miracles by the power of the Lord, even stopping the rain for three years and praying for fire to come down from Heaven. And now this man had left them and ascended into Heaven.

Elisha’s relationship with Elijah was even closer, like that of a father and son. His cry and rending of his own clothes at the ascension of Elijah demonstrated the closeness of this younger prophet to the older. It reminds us of the relationship of Paul and Timothy and Moses and Joshua. There are those who taught us in the way of truth who have become like fathers to us, sometimes more so than our biological fathers because they showed us not only the way in this present world but also the way to the world to come.* For this, the cry is doubled, “My father, my father…”

When Jesus told His disciples He would depart from them in John 13:31-38, Peter expressed his desire to go with Jesus, that he would even lay down his life to follow Jesus. But Jesus would not allow it. Jesus went to prepare a place for His people and left them behind to carry out His work of making disciples of all nations. He also left His Spirit to be with them always.

When Elijah was taken up to Heaven, he was taken away from Israel. Israel had suffered a great loss. While few may have known it at the time, Israel’s loss was also its gain, for the Lord had prepared another prophet to rise up in Elijah’s place. Israel gained Elisha!

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* ”Jesus said to him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me” (John 14:6).

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