II. Note the refuge of tempted faith. What was Hezekiah to do with the
crafty missive? It was hoped that he would listen to reason, and come
down from his perch. But he neither yielded nor took counsel with his
servants, but, like a devout man, went into the house of the Lord, and
spread the letter before the Lord. It would have gone hard with him if
he had not been to the house of the Lord many a time before. It is not
easy to find our way thither for the first time, when our eyes are
blinded by tears or our way darkened by calamities. But faith
instinctively turns to God when anything goes wrong, because it has
been accustomed to turn to Him when all was right, according to the
world's estimate of right and wrong. Whither should the burdened heart
betake itself but to Him who daily bears our burdens? The impulse to
tell God all troubles is as truly a mark of the faithful soul as the
impulse to tell everything to the beloved is the life-breath of love.
The act of spreading the letter before the Lord is an eloquent symbol,
which some prosaic and learned commentators have been dull enough to
call gross, and to compare to Buddhist praying-mills! Its meaning is
expressed in the prayer which follows. It is faith's appeal to His
knowledge. It is faith's casting of its burden on the Lord. Our faith
is of little power to bless, unless it impels us to take God into
confidence in regard to everything which troubles us. If the letter is
not grave enough to be spread before _Him_, it is too small to annoy
_us_. If we truly live in fellowship with God, we shall find ourselves
in His house, with the cause of our trouble in our hands, before we
have time to think. Instinct acts more quickly than reason, and, if our
faith be vital, it will not need to be argued into speaking to God of
all that weighs upon us.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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