Jottings

by J. Miller | Category: Jottings | Jun 1964

The book of Proverbs is crammed full of instruction. It was written

"To give subtility to the simple,

To the young man knowledge and discretion:

That the wise man may hear, and increase in learning;

And that the man of understanding may attain unto sound counsels" (Proverbs 1.4, 5).

Solomon when he became king of Israel was told by God, when He appeared to him in Gibeon, to ask what God would give him. It pleased the Loan' well that he asked not for long life nor riches, nor the life of his enemies, but for an understanding (hearing) heart to judge God's people, to discern between good and evil and ability to judge. God said, "Lo, I have given thee a wise and understanding heart . . And I have also given thee that which thou hast not asked, both riches and honour" (1 Kings 3. 4-l5).

The wisdom of Solomon is found in the Proverbs, and what emphasis he places upon wisdom! He, like all wise men of old, went back to the law as the source of man's wisdom. The book of the Law which Moses wrote in the wilderness was given to men of old to instruct them morally as to what was pleasing to God and good for men. The Law (Hebrew, TORAH) was the teaching. Thus we find Solomon saying,

"For the commandment is a lamp; and the law is light;

And reproofs of instruction are the way of life" (Proverbs 6.23). He writes somewhat similarly in Proverbs 10:17:

"He is in the way of life that needeth correction:

But he that forsaketh reproof erreth."

Reproof implies chastisement, correction. The psalmist tells us that

"The LORD knoweth the thoughts of man,

That they are vanity.

Blessed is the man whom Thou chastenest, 0 LORD,

And teachest out of Thy law;

That Thou mayest give him rest from the days of adversity"

(Psalm 94.11-13).

We are not to despise the chastening of the LORD, nor faint when we are reproved of Him (Proverbs 3. 11, 12; Hebrews 12.5, 6). Chastening is an evidence of His love, not of severity or hatred. It bears its peaceable fruit in due season.

Sometimes we may be too proud to learn and God has to humble us to teach us. So it was with Israel in the early days of their wilderness pilgrimage. Moses says, "He humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that He might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only but by everything that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live" (Deuteronomy 8.3).

Alas, they learned little of this valuable lesson which God sought to teach them as to the need of the soul, which is fed by the hearing of the word from the mouth of God. They were more taken up with their bodies than their souls. This came out later when, as in Numbers 11, they wept and called out for flesh to eat and said that they remembered Egypt's fish, its cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, garlick, and said, "Our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all; we have nought save this manna to look to" (verse 6).

Later on as they were nearing the end of their journey, they spoke against God and against Moses, "Wherefore have ye brought us up out of Egypt to die the in wilderness? for there is no bread, and there is no water; and our soul loatheth this light bread." Then follows the story of the fiery serpents and the brazen serpent (Numbers 21).

They asked the "whys" and the "wherefores". The human heart is ready to ask, why this and that? It was so with Gideon when the angel of the LORD appeared to him as he was beating out wheat in the winepress to hide it from the Midianites, and said, "The LORD is with thee, thou mighty man of valour." Gideon's reply was, "Oh my lord, if the LORD be with us, why then is all this befallen us?"

We have in Naomi (in the book of Ruth) and the great woman of Shunem two women who left the land of Israel because of famine; in the case of Naomi, she left the land with her husband and two sons, as the result of her own choice, and perhaps that of her husband, but the great woman of Shunem left the land, being warned and instructed by Elisha so to do because of a coming seven years famine (2 Kings 8.1, 2). Both returned again, the woman of Shunem with her son who was miraculously given and miraculously raised from the dead, and Naomi with Ruth the Moabitess, her daughter-in-law, who was said to be better to her than seven sons (Ruth 4.15), Naomi leaving the bodies of her husband and sons in graves in a strange land.

We know not the name of the great woman of Shunem, nor to which tribe she belonged, save that Shunem, as shown on Biblical maps, lay between Jezreel and Endor, in the portion of the land belonging to Issachar. In Naomi's case she and her husband belonged to Judah, which became later the royal tribe, and was so by election from early days (1 Chronicles 5.1, 2; Genesis 49.10, 11), and in the royal line of David the names of Naomi and Ruth are found (Ruth 4. 2l-22). Such was the fruit of repentance and restoration in the case of Naomi and of the noble decision of Ruth 10 cast in her lot with God's people and for the God of Israel(Ruth 1.16; 2.11,12).

The great woman of Shunem was quite evidently of deep spiritual discernment. When Elisha came to Shunem she constrained (Heb." laid hold of him," A.V. marg.) him to eat bread (2 Kings 4.8-37). This was the beginning of a close friendship between her and the LORD's prophet. The character of people is ever known by the company they keep. Thus we are told, "And so it was, that as oft as he passed by, he turned in thither to eat bread."

Those days in Israel were dark days. It was the time of the reign of Jehoram the son of Ahab who did evil in the sight of the LORD, but not like his father and mother, Ahab and Jezebel, for he put away the pillars of Baal, but he cleaved unto the sins of Jeroboam (2 Kings 3.1-3). Though the days were dark her light and her greatness (as God counts greatness) were all the more evident.

Her next move was to get her husband to agree to build a little chamber on the wall for this holy man of God, and to furnish it with a bed, a table, a stool and a candlestick. According to modern standards the furnishings were meagre, but what matters that with such as are pilgrims and on their way to a heavenly country?

Then Elisha thought of her recompense, and she, the Shunammite, was called

in. The prophet referred to her care for him and his servant and would she agree to him speaking to the king or the captain of the host for her. Her answer was one of godly contentment with her circumstances in life, "I dwell among mine own people" Her aspiration in life was not to be a social climber, which, alas, some have been and lost their pilgrim character and all that goes with it.

Elisha consulted with Gehazi his servant as to what should be done for her and he was told that she had no son and that her husband was old. She was called and told by the prophet that she would have a son, and in due time he was born. As he grew up he went out with his father to the harvest field, and there he took suddenly ill. A servant carried him home and he died On his mother's knees. Well might she have asked the question in her: grief and possible bitterness, why had this happened to her that the candle of her life should be so soon snuffed out? But that was not her attitude of mind. She would go to the man of God in her trouble and sorrow. When her husband would have restrained her by saying that it was neither noon nor sabbath, her answer was brief, but it meant so much. She simply said, "It shall be well". Here was the great woman's great faith. When she reached the prophet she caught hold of his feet. She would as her recumbent form lay at his feet put her case before him through whom she received the promise of a son, and draw through him the power of the God he served which she so much needed. Her pleading and her faith never rose higher than when she lay at the prophet's feet; for through her faith her son was raised from the dead (Hebrews 11.35).

If we, too, bring our trials and sorrows to the God of all comfort, "It shall be well."

J. Miller | Jun 1964
Jottings