Donkey Soup

DONKEY SOUP

2 Kings 6:24-33, "And it came to pass after this, that Benhadad king of Syria gathered all his host, and went up, and besieged Samaria. And there was a great famine in Samaria: and, behold, they besieged it, until an ass’s head was sold for fourscore pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a cab of dove’s dung for five pieces of silver. And as the king of Israel was passing by upon the wall, there cried a woman unto him, saying, Help, my lord, O king. And he said, If the LORD do not help thee, whence shall I help thee? out of the barnfloor, or out of the winepress? And the king said unto her, What aileth thee? And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him to day, and we will eat my son to morrow. So we boiled my son, and did eat him: and I said unto her on the next day, Give thy son, that we may eat him: and she hath hid her son. And it came to pass, when the king heard the words of the woman, that he rent his clothes; and he passed by upon the wall, and the people looked, and, behold, he had sackcloth within upon his flesh. Then he said, God do so and more also to me, if the head of Elisha the son of Shaphat shall stand on him this day. But Elisha sat in his house, and the elders sat with him; and the king sent a man from before him: but ere the messenger came to him, he said to the elders, See ye how this son of a murderer hath sent to take away mine head? look, when the messenger cometh, shut the door, and hold him fast at the door: is not the sound of his master’s feet behind him? And while he yet talked with them, behold, the messenger came down unto him: and he said, Behold, this evil is of the LORD; what should I wait for the LORD any longer?"

Israel, God’s chosen nation, was constantly in trouble for their rebelliousness and disobedience. Every time God would reach out to them and bless them, they would answer God’s expressions of love by turning their backs on him and start chasing after other gods. If there is one thing that is encouraging to me, it is the fact that God never completely gave up on Israel.

Even when the Jews took God’s only begotten Son and murdered him upon a cross, God did not give up on them. Even when they rejected Jesus, God’s Son, after his resurrection, God didn’t give up on them. Even today, 2000 years later, God is still working on behalf of the Jews and He has promised them that they will never be utterly destroyed.

What a faithful God we have! It is impossible to comprehend God’s love for fallen man, or for a rebellious child! Oh but aren’t you glad that God loves you so much that he just keeps giving you opportunity after opportunity to make things right with him! I’m so glad that God doesn’t give up on us after the first, second or ten thousandth try. I’m so glad that his mercy endures forever.

In the scriptures that we read we see that Israel is under siege again. This time it’s part of the Northern Kingdom of Samaria under the King Jehoram who was as godless a king that ever ruled in Israel.

If there is one thing that amazes me about the way that God deals with his people, it’s the fact that he uses ungodly man to bring judgment upon his own people who are living in sin and this was another of those instances.

King Benhadad of Syria had come down and entrenched his army, and laid siege to the Samaritan King and his capitol city. There was no way in or out and Benhadad’s plan was to starve the city into surrendering. This has been a long-standing method of warfare for as long as war as existed.

The campfires of the Syrian army looked like one long continuous campfire at night that ringed the entire city and by day it seemed that there were so many Syrian guards that they were standing shoulder to shoulder with no possibility of sneaking out at any time to go after help from the rest of Israel.

Things really looked bad for Israel and for King Jehoram. There was no escaping the inevitable outcome of defeat, slavery and even death.

Have you ever felt as though the devil had you hemmed in on all sides? So often we find ourselves involved in things or desiring things that are not a part of God’s perfect plan for our lives, but being the proud and sometimes rebellious people that we are, we throw caution to the wind and go do those things anyway.