2 Kings 8:1-2 Devotion by Stephen Taylor

2 Kings 8:1-2

Now Elisha had said to the woman whose son he had restored to life, "Go away with your family and stay for a while wherever you can, because the LORD has decreed a famine in the land that will last seven years." The woman proceeded to do as the man of God said. She and her family went away and stayed in the land of the Philistines for seven years.

 

God’s provision doesn’t have to fit into our ideas or expectations. Twice, God provided help and deliverance to this woman, and both times, I’m sure it wasn’t the way she would have wanted or chosen herself. But we don’t get to decide how God works. We are just blessed to be on the receiving end of His mercy and grace!

 

Think about it. This lady had a son who died and then was brought back to life. I’m sure she would have rather had him be healed before he died and saved all the heartache and pain, but that wasn’t the Lord’s plan. The Lord provided her a way. It just wasn’t the way she would have chosen herself. Here again, we see a famine coming, and Elisha warns her to leave her entire life and go somewhere else. I’m sure she is thinking, “Why not just provide my family and me with food so we can stay here? The Lord has done that before, so why not now?” We don’t know why, but we do know Who, and we know that His motives are pure and His character is blameless, spotless, and faultless.

 

It’s easy for us to want to take the easy way out, but what if the easy way isn’t God’s way? Do we still want it that way? Or would we rather walk a path of fully surrendered to Him regardless of what may come? And not everything that comes to us are life-altering events. Some can be minor inconveniences or aggravations, but what I’m asking is, would you rather walk a path that's appealing to the Spirit or to the flesh? One filled with faith or fear? One ends in life, and one ends in death.

 

Romans 6:22-23 - But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.