The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Kings — Section 90

Vers. 16, 17.-77ie spirit-world, and the power to discern it. The little episode of the alarm felt by Elisha's servant, and the manner in which Elisha. removed it, teaches us principally three things. J. THE REALITY, AND PERPETUAL PRESENCE, AROUND US AND ABOUT US, OF THE BPIRIT-WOBLD, The existence of an order of spirits intermediate between God an,l man, who are closely connected with man, and play an important part in the Divine government of the world wherein we live, is an essential pa.rt of the scheme of things set before us in the Scriptures. "The doctrine of angels," as it has been called, is this: "That there lives in the presence of God a rnst assembly, myriacls upon myriads of spiritual beings (Ps. lxviii. 17; Dan. vii. 10), higher than we, but infinitely removed from God, mighty in strength, doers of his word, who ceaselessly bless and praise God, wise also, to whom he gives charge to guard his own in all their ways, ascending and descending to and from heaven and earth (Gen. xxviii. 12, 13; John i. 51), and who variously minister to men, most often invisibly. All these beings are interested in us and in our well-being. When our earth was created, ' all the sons of God burst forth into jubilee' (Job xxxviii. 7) in prospect of our birth, who were to be their care here, their fellow-citizens hereafter in bliss. At the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai, they were present in myriads. When God vouchsafed his presence on Mount Zion, and the holy pla.ce became a. new Sina.i, 'twice ten thousand a.ngels, yeri., thou_sa.uds ma.ny times repeated' (Ps. lxviii. 17) were there. They are present with God, witnessing the trials of our race (Job L 6; ii. 1; 1 Kings xxii. 19). Their love for man is indicated by the charge given to them when they a.re set to destroy the guilty in Jerusalem, 'Let not your eye spare, neither have pity' (Ezek. x. 5), as though they would have pity, only that they must needs be of the same mind with God. There is a distinction, or gra.da.tion of ranks, among the members of the heavenly host-Cherubim, seraphim, archangels, principalities, powers" (a.bridged from Pusey's • Daniel the Prophet,' pp. 517-524). It is irrational to explain away as embellishment or poetic imagery a. representa.tion of the actual condition of things in God's unive se, which is so frequent, so all-!lervading, so harmonious, and, it may be added, so con- sistent with what we should have naturally expected apart from revelation. !I. THE PERPETUAL REALIZATION OF THIS PRESENCE BY THOSE POSSESSED OF F.UTH. There is no reason to believe that Elisha saw the angels that compassed him round, with his bodily eyes. But he knew that they were there. He was sure that Goel would not desert him in his peril, and had such a confident faith in "the doctrine of angels,'' that it was as if he could see them. And so it was with David. "The angel of the Lord," be sa.ys, "encampeth round a.bout them that fear him, and delivereth them" (Ps. xxxiv. 7). So with Hezekiah, who, when Sennacherib invade,! his land, "sp~ke comfortably to the people, saying, Be strong and courageous, be not afraid nor dis111ayed for the King of Assyria, nor for all the multitude that is with him : for there be more with us than with him" (2 Chron. xxxii. 7). Judas Macrabreus bad probably the same faith when he uttered the words, "It is no hard matter for many to be shut up in the bands of a few; and with the God of heaven it is all one, to deliver with a great multitude, or a sma.11 company: for the victory of battle standeth not in the multitude of an host; but strength cometh from heaven " (1 Mace. iii. 18, 19). St. Paul realized the continual angelic presence when ho declared, "We are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men" (1 Cor. iv. 9). The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews realized it when he told the Jewish converts," Ye are come unto Mount Zion, a·nd unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels" (Heb. xii. 22). St. John the divine realized it, when he ga.1·e the angelij a large share in nil the Inter judgments that should befall the earth, and ma.de them dispensers of the blessings and of the wmth of Gcid (H.ev. vii. l-:ix. 3). If the doctrine has been at any time obscured, it has been when  128 'l'lIE SECOND DOOK OF THE KINGS. [err. VJ. 1-38,