Then he (Elisha) went up from there to Bethel; and as he was going up the road, some youths came from the city and mocked him, and said to him, “Go up, you baldhead! Go up, you baldhead!” So he turned around and looked at them, and pronounced a curse on them in the name of the Lord. And two female bears came out of the woods and mauled forty-two of the youths. (2 Kings 2:23-25, N.K.J.V.)

Question: “What do you call a preacher’s belt?” Answer: “A fence around a chicken graveyard.” Such jokes serve to lower the respect given to preachers. And I’ll freely admit that we preachers don’t always help ourselves by our conduct. When we get caught in scandals involving money or sex, it hurts our level of respect. When we come off as immature, shallow, uncaring, greedy, or lazy, it hurts our level of respect. When we act more like the world than the Savior we preach, it hurts our level of respect. Furthermore, the problem of “preachers” who aren’t truly God-called and God-ordained also hurts the cause.

Still, though, through it all, the God-called/God-ordained preacher really should merit a certain level of respect, and the more of God you see upon the man’s life the more respect you should give the man. This is a Bible truth that is on display in our text story. Is this story a shocking one? Yes. Is it a tragic story? Yes. But is it an example of a spiritual principle that is still relevant today? Absolutely. It’s an extreme example, I’ll grant you, but it’s an example.

Elisha was a farmer before God instructed the great prophet Elijah to anoint him as his successor (1 Kings 19:15-21). Elisha then became Elijah’s servant, traveling companion, and prophet-in-training. Elisha was with Elijah when Elijah left this earth to go to heaven by way of a chariot of fire and horses of fire (2 Kings 2:11-12).

Just prior to Elijah’s departure, Elijah promised Elisha that if Elisha was with him when he was taken away Elisha would receive a double portion of Elijah’s prophetic power (2 Kings 2:9-10). Consequently, as soon as Elijah was removed from the earth Elisha picked up Elijah’s cloak (mantle) that had fallen off Elijah during the miraculous event, and from that point on Elisha started performing one miracle after another as a part of his prophetic ministry (2 Kings 2:13-14). As a matter of fact, most of the Bible’s stories concerning him involve some type of miracle or incredible event. It’s all a fascinating read. Suffice is to say that if there was one guy in the whole world that you didn’t want to mess with at that time, it was Elisha.

This brings us to our story. Elisha is in the city of Jericho, and some of his fellow prophets ask him to solve the problem of the city’s bad water supply (2 Kings 2:19). Elisha does this by requesting that a new bowl with salt in it be brought to him. Once he has the bowl, he goes out to the source of the water, casts the salt into the water, and says, “Thus says the Lord: ‘I have healed this water; from it there shall be no more death or barrenness’” (2 Kings 2:20-22).

Next, Elisha departs from Jericho and starts down the road toward Bethel (2 Kings 2:23). Whereas the city of Jericho was very appreciative of God’s prophets, Bethel was one of the primary centers for idol worship in the land (1 Kings 12:25-33, Amos 7:13). It was just the type of city that would produce irreverent, disrespectful young people who would mock and taunt a true prophet of God. So, not surprisingly, somewhere along the road a group of such youths go out to meet Elisha and give him a hard time.

The classic King James translation has unintentionally caused a distorted view of this story by describing these youths as “little children.” The Hebrew word is na’ar and it is used 235 times in the Old Testament. Admittedly, there are a few instances in which the word obviously refers to a very young child. For example, 1 Samuel 1:22 uses it to describe a child that hasn’t been weened yet, and Isaiah 7:16 uses it to describe one that doesn’t yet know to refuse evil and choose good. Likewise, 2 Samuel 12:16 uses it in reference to the sickly infant son of David and Bathsheba.

By in large, though, na’ar refers to a much older youth, and this is seen in the K.J.V.’s more frequent translation term “young man.” When David’s son, Absalom, attempted a coup of David’s throne, Absalom was a na’ar (2 Samuel 18:5). Also, when Rehoboam sought council in his role as the king of Judah, he received it from a group of na’ar that had grown up with him (1 Kings 12:8).

Basically, na’ar can refer to various ages and its proper translation into English on a case-by-case basis depends upon the context of the story. Therefore, in our story from the life of Elisha, clearly the na’ar are either teenaged or older. They are a large group, at least 42 in number. If you are envisioning them as a sizable gang of young punks and thugs, you’re on the right track.

Their words to Elisha, “Go up, you baldhead! Go up, you baldhead!” have significant meaning. For one thing, they plainly indicate that Elisha suffered from what we now call male pattern baldness. While this is fairly common among American men, it doesn’t seem to have been so common in ancient Israel, which means that Elisha’s baldness no doubt made him an easy target for ridicule.

But then also, the young punks twice tell him to “Go up.” Why do they say that? They say it because by that time the story is well known of how Elijah, Elisha’s spiritual mentor, was taken up into heaven by way of a chariot of fire and horses of fire. Evidently, then, the smart alecks are saying to Elisha, “Why don’t you go on up into heaven too and leave us alone? We don’t want your kind in Bethel. Get out of here.” It’s even possible that the gang has been sent out by the citizens of Bethel to intercept Elisha and discourage him from entering the city.

Whatever the exact details of the situation are it doesn’t take Elisha long to get tired of hearing the ridicule. So, he wheels around, stares a hole through those young people, and pronounces a curse upon them. The key to the curse is that Elisha does it “in the name of the Lord.” You see, if those youths were simply disrespecting Elisha as a man, he could have swallowed his pride and kept on moving down the road. But he understands the spiritual implications behind their taunts. Those ruffians are disrespecting God and the office of prophet. That puts their actions onto much more dangerous ground and means that a lesson is in order.

And so, what happens? Oh, not much, two female bears just come out of the woodwork from somewhere and maul 42 of those young men! Wild beasts were actually common in that part of the world. As evidence of that, Samson had once killed a lion (Judges 14:5-6) and David had defended his sheep against lions and bears (1 Samuel 17:37). God had even warned the Israelites during Moses’ time that if they would not obey His law He would send wild beasts among them to rob them of their children, destroy their livestock, and make them few in number (Leviticus 26:21-22).

While I doubt that Elisha had that specific promise from God in mind when he pronounced his curse, he certainly got an eyewitness taste of it. Did those bears literally kill those 42 mockers or did they just severely injure them? Since the word “mauled” can be understood either way, it’s hard to say. One thing is for sure, the point was made: God’s prophet should be respected.

Now, I realize that we don’t have any modern-day Elishas. As a matter of fact, since Ephesians 2:20 says the church was built upon the foundation of the New Testament’s apostles and prophets — and once the laying of a foundation is completed, the foundation is no longer seen — I would go so far as to say that God no longer imparts the spiritual gifts of apostleship and prophesying. We do, however, still have men who are God-called and God-ordained to be preachers (pastors), and these men are to be respected. There are various verses I could cite here, but I’ll go with 1 Timothy 5:17:

Let the elders who rule well be counted worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in the word and doctrine. (N.K.J.V.)

In the New Testament, the title “elder” (Titus 1:5-9) is synonymous with the titles “pastor (Ephesians 4:11), “shepherd” (1 Peter 5:1-4), and “bishop” (1 Timothy 3:1). It’s the guy we call “the preacher.” And while the idea of such men having “rule” in the church keeps some people up at night, it’s a common theme when the New Testament talks about the local church (Hebrews 13:7, 17, 24; 1 Timothy 3:4-5).

Of course, whatever leadership comes with the role should be exercised in the right way. As 1 Peter 5:3 puts it, these men shouldn’t operate as “lords” over those whom God has entrusted to them. Instead, they should serve as examples to their flocks, with the best example being that of servant leader. With this understood, the men of God who rule well and labor in word and doctrine should even be counted worthy of not just honor but double honor. You see, here again we find the Biblical principle that the God-called/God-ordained man of God should be respected.

We all need to be reminded of this principle every now and then because the devil and the world have many ways of stealing honor from the man of God. The theft can happen by way of a local gossip, a problem church member, a community leader who wants to push an ungodly agenda, or anyone else who runs down the preacher, but however it happens, it happens. Putting it simply, there are a lot of folks out there these days who are doing the work those young punks were doing in Elisha’s day.

This is to say nothing of the television and movie industries. Check out how preachers are typically depicted in television shows and movies prior to the 1970s. With a few exceptions, those fictionalized preachers are generally good men who are trying to do good things. By contrast, start paying attention to how things changed in the television shows and movies that were made during the 1970s and beyond. Somewhere along the line preachers became at best foolish, cowardly buffoons and at worst hypocrites, con artists, liars, thieves, murderers, and sex perverts.

As a result, when many people hear the words “preacher,” “pastor,” “minister,” or “reverend” these days they just roll their eyes and mock. Truth be told, though, none of this should surprise us because no less an authority than the greatest preacher who ever lived told His “preacher boys” that if the people of the world persecuted Him, they would surely persecute them (John 15:20). In that way, the disrespecting of today’s God-called/God ordained preachers is really just the continuing fulfillment of Jesus’ warning about the ministry and the men who populate it. All I’m saying is, don’t you be the one who disrespects the preacher. I doubt that you will get mauled by bears for doing it, but then again you just never know.