2 Kings 4:8-23

Now there came a day when Elisha went over to Shunem, where there was a prominent and influential woman, and she persuaded him to eat a meal. Afterward, whenever he passed by, he stopped there for a meal. She said to her husband, “Behold, I sense that this is a holy man of God who frequently passes our way. Please, let us make a small, fully-walled upper room [on the housetop] and put a bed there for him, with a table, a chair, and a lampstand. Then whenever he comes to visit us, he can turn in there.” One day he came there and turned in to the upper room and lay down to rest. And he said to Gehazi his servant, “Call this Shunammite.” So he called her and she stood before him. Now he said to Gehazi, “Say to her now, ‘You have gone to all this trouble for us; what can I do for you? Would you like to be mentioned to the king or to the captain of the army?’ ” She answered, “I live among my own people [in peace and security and need no special favors].” Later Elisha said, “What then is to be done for her?” Gehazi answered, “Well, she has no son and her husband is old.” He said, “Call her.” So Gehazi called her, and she [came and] stood in the doorway. Elisha said, “At this season next year, you will embrace a son.” She said, “No, my lord. O man of God, do not lie to your maidservant.” But the woman conceived and gave birth to a son at that season the next year, just as Elisha had said to her. When the child was grown, the day came that he went out to his father, to the reapers. But he said to his father, “My head, my head.” The man said to his servant, “Carry him to his mother.” When he had carried and brought him to his mother, he sat on her lap until noon, and then he died. She went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God, and shut the door [of the small upper room] behind him and left. Then she called to her husband and said, “Please send me one of the servants and one of the donkeys, so that I may run to the man of God and return.” He said, “Why are you going to him today? It is neither the New Moon nor the Sabbath.” And she said, “It will be all right.”