When the Tough get Going, a Devotional Thought

There's an especially sobering story in 2 Kings 6:30-33 that's meant I think, to send a spiritual chill down the spine.  The city of Samaria is under siege by the Syrians. There's a horrible famine, the people are starving, and in his despair, the King sends soldiers to have Elisha the Prophet beheaded.

This seems a bit capricious, until you remember that in the passage just before this story (the chariots of fire episode), a huge contingency of the Syrian army had fallen into the King's hands, and he stayed their slaughter at Elisha's command (6:21-22). Elisha told him to let them go, and faithfully he did, and now here they are, in greater numbers, attacking his city. The siege itself is one of the most gut-wrenching and horrifying episodes in the whole Bible, and when the king hears a story about a mother forced to eat her own child just to survive, he finally snaps: if he hadn't listened to Elisha and spared those Syrian warriors, maybe they wouldn't be at his doorstep now, terrorizing and dehumanizing his people. So, like I say, he sends his men to have him beheaded.

Verse 33, in particular is especially haunting: "All this evil is from the Lord," the King says, "Why should I wait on him any longer?" Back in 6:21, he was quite happy to obey the Word of God and spare the Syrian warriors (he even called Elisha "my father" back then), but now, in the face of what must have been unimaginable stress, pain, terror and despair, he's ready to turn his back on God altogether. After all: look where obedience got him.

It gets me wondering if, and how, I'm like that King. Like him, I'm usually willing to obey when the going's good; would I, like him, let go as easily in the midst of such pain (it's easy to sniff self-righteously at this poor king, sitting here in my brightly-lit living room, but it's pretty hard to imagine myself on the city wall in 6:29 and not feel my blood run cold with his)? So I'm praying ahead of time, that God will grant me deep faithfulness if and when I go through desperate times, and despite what struggles may come, he'll keep me holding on. It doesn't hurt to plan ahead.