2 Kings 4:26 Run now, I pray you, to meet her, and say to her, Is it well with you? is it well with your husband? is it well with the child?… I. Affliction comes TO CALL OUR SIN TO OUR REMEMBRANCE, and to humble us for it beneath the cross of Jesus. II. Another end for which God sends His heavy hand upon His children is TO LOOSE THEM FROM THE WORLD — to make them cease from the idolatry of the creature. III. Again, another object of the trials which God sends His children is TO MAKE HIMSELF MORE DEAR TO THEM. Dear indeed He is to all who have learned to view Him as a God of love — as the God who hath "so loved the world as to send His only-begotten Son" to die for it — dear is He to all of us whose souls. He has sprinkled with the blood of Christ, "in whom" He has "revealed His Son, and whom He has made heirs, through Christ, of life eternal." IV. A further end God has in view in laying crosses on His people is THAT HE MAY CONFORM THEM TO THEIR SAVIOUR, by admitting them into the fellowship of His sufferings." "If we suffer," says the apostle, "we shall also reign with Him." Justly then might we feel uneasy to be the prosperous followers of a suffering Lord — light-hearted servants of a sorrowing and weeping Master. V. But, when God makes His children acquainted with affliction, He has a purpose in His view, beyond any of the objects we have yet enumerated. HE INTENDS BY IT HIS OWN GLORY. Eminently is that glory promoted and set forth by the patience of His people in the hour of trial, and by their cheerful acquiescence in His will. The world is then compelled to see that there is truth, that there is power, in His Gospel. "It is well," very well, with every child of God, however great be "the fight of affliction" he is called on to sustain. For look at the issue of these things! These afflictions are not everlasting. God "will not always chide, neither keepeth He His anger for ever." As soon as the ends of His chastening providence are answered, the dispensation will be changed. "It is well," then, with believers even in their most afflicted moments. The Shunammite spoke truth when she uttered that saying in the midst of her affliction. Christian brethren, are any of us her fellow-sufferers? (A. Roberts, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: Run now, I pray thee, to meet her, and say unto her, Is it well with thee? is it well with thy husband? is it well with the child? And she answered, It is well. |
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