551. Oil aplenty. When a widow asked Elisha for help to pay her creditors, the prophet instructed her to ask neighbors for their empty jars. After collecting the jars, she was to pour oil from her small oil pot into the jars. She kept pouring and pouring, miraculously multiplying her oil until the jars were filled. The widow then sold the oil and paid her debts.
552. Raising the Shunammite's son. When a childless woman invited Elisha to stay with her, then prepared his room and all his meals, the prophet announced she would soon become pregnant and have a son. She did, but the boy died from an internal problem a few years later. 2 Kings 4 reveals that Elisha went to see the body, lay down on top of him, and raised the boy to life.
553. Feeding the multitudes. Elisha took twenty loaves of barley bread and divided them among a hundred men. According to 2 Kings 4:42-44, the Lord multiplied the bread so that everyone had their fill, and there was bread left over. Jesus would later do a similar miracle, feeding five thousand, recorded in Matthews 14.
554. Naaman healed of leprosy. When the commander of Syria's armies came down with leprosy, his wife encouraged him to visit Elisha. The prophet told Naaman to wash seven times in the Jordan River. Though he was skeptical, Naaman did as he was told and was miraculously cured of his disease. 2 Kings 5:15 records his response: "Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel."
555. An axhead floats. 2 Kings 6 tells the story of a workman with a borrowed ax cutting some trees, when the axhead fell into some water. Elisha cut a stick, threw it into the water, and the iron axhead floated to the top.
556. Nebuchadnezzar's dream. The king of Babylon, who conquered Jerusalem and carried off it's citizenry into exile, had a strange dream that none of his wise men could interpret. But the prophet Daniel, a young Jew selected to serve in Nebuchadnezzar's court, asked God to help him understand the dream. Not only did God reveal the dream to Daniel, but the Lord gave him the meaning of the dream-which accurately revealed what would happen to future kingdoms.
557. The fiery furnace. When Daniel's three friends-Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednigo-refused to bow down to an idol, the king of Babylon had them thrown into a fiery furnace. The furnace was so hot that even the soldiers leading them toward it were killed, but the three followers of God were miraculously saved. When the king looked into the furnace, he saw not only the three men but a fourth man, who looked like the "Son of God." Recognizing it as a miracle, he issued a decree that no one was to slander the God of Israel.
558. The writing is on the wall. Daniel 5 records that when the loathsome king of Belshazzar threw a drunken party and used sacred cups that had been brought from the Temple in Jerusalem, the fingers of a human hand suddenly appeared and wrote a message on a wall: "Numbered. Weighed. Divided." Though none of the king's astrologers could divine the meaning, Daniel could. He told the king that God had judged Belshazzar and found him wanting, so his kingdom would be taken away that very night. That is exactly what happened.
559. Daniel in the lion's den. When king Darius decreed that anyone found praying to God would be killed, Daniel went into his room, opened the shutters, and prayed loudly to the Lord. Darius reluctantly had Daniel thrown into a lion's den, but God shut the mouths of the lions and he was preserved without a scratch. The court members who had plotted against Daniel were then thrown into the den and devoured.
560. Jonah and the whale. The last miracle recorded in the Old Testament involves the reluctant prophet Jonah who, while attempting to run away from God, was caught in a horrible storm and thrown into the sea in the sailor's attempt to pacify their gods. He was swallowed by a great fish, survived for three days, then was coughed up onto the shore. Upon reaching the intended city of Nineveh, Jonah preached repentance, and the pagans there turned to God (much to Jonah's disgust).
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