The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Kings — Section 347

no~ un~ Hezekiah, when he persuadeth you, sayiug, The Lord_ will deliver us." It is easy to 1mRgme_ t~e efl'.ect of such statements upon a people fow m ?umber compared with the Assyrian s m1gh_ty host.. The_ horrors of a protracte~ siege were in prospect. The longer they contmued their resistance, the more desolation and devastation would be committed by the Assyrian army in their fields and homesteads. Many of them doubtless were a.lreadr murmuring at Hezekiah, and some of them perhaps ready to make an agreement with the enemy. It was a trying position for Hezekiah. Both the letter of Sennacherib, and the circumstances in which he was placed, were a stron" tempt.ation to him to distrust God. He might have said, "Is this the rewiird which my service of God ha.s brought me? I have been faithful to God's commands. I have restored the temple; I have restored the service of God. I have thrown down the altars and high places, and broken the images in pieces. Even the brazen serpent, which the people valued so highly as a relic of the past, I have ground to powder, because their idolatry of it was dishonouring to God. And now is it thus that God rewards me?" This is just the temptation that our difficulties and troubles constantly bring to us, They tempt us to distrust God. 1. It is so in the growth of our own spiritual life. How often the young beginner in the Christian life is discouraged by the difficulties which arise, and which he did not calculate on! He finds that there is still an old nature within him which has to be grappled with and conquered. He meets, perhaps, with opposition and discouragements from the world without, and perhaps even from those from whom he expected sympathy and help. These difficulties tempt many a one to distrust God. Many there are still who, like the disciples when difficulties arose," go back, and walk no more with " God. One of the common difficulties which tempts us to distrust God is the prosperity of the wwked. Everything seems to prosper with men who have no respect for the Law of God. The temptation is for us, in distrust of God's promises, to imitate their godless practices. We begin to say, "There is no use in our being too scrupulous." Ah! what a mistake that is I Supposing we had all their prosperity, would it compensate us for the loss of a quiet conscience? Prosperity is dearly bought, business is dearly bought, for which we have to sacrifice one command- ment of God, or silence the still small voice of conscience that speaks within. " What shall it profit a man if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" When- ever this difficulty of the prosperity of godless men troubles you, and success which seems to be reached by questionable and unscrupulous means, remember the grand words of the thirty-seventh psalm, "Fret not thyself because of evil-doers, neither be thou envious against the workers of iniquity. For they shall soon be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green herb. Commit thy way unto the Lord: trust also in him; and he will bring it to pass." 2. In the same way there are difficulties in Christian work. How common a thing it is for Christians, who make much profession of their faith in God, to be dismayed and discouraged by difficulties that arise I Very often they are hindered from engaging in Christian work at all just by the difficulties that exist. I do not mean to say every person will suit every kind of work. There may be many kinds of work in which a man should not engage, because he has no fitness for them. But every Christian ought to be engaged in some work. If you are doing nothing for the Master, may we ask you why? What is your reason? What difficulty is in your way? No difficulty is an excuse for idleness. You may think yourself too young, or too inexperienced, or too humble; you may find others hard to work with; you may meet with discouragement and opposition; but no one of these things is any excuse for idleness. If difficulties were a reason for doing nothing, no Christian work would ever Lave been done-no churches built, no missionaries sent forth, no schools erected-for there never was a Chri6tian work yet that had not its difficulties. Let us learn to take as our motto in Christian work, "I can do a 11 things through Christ which strengtheneth me." Each one of you, no doubt, has his or her own difficulties to contend with-difficulties in your daily employment, difficulties from those you come in contact with, troubles and anxieties of £:pirit, cares and worries of various kinds. My message to you is this. Be not unduly cast down by your difficulties. Don't make too much of them. Just do with them a.~ Hezekiah did, and you will see how soon they will disappear altogether, or at any rate they will be very considerably diminished. II. liEZEKl.All's PRAYEB. (V crs. 14.-19.) Hezekiah had learned by experience. As OH, XIX, 1-37.) THE SECOND BOOK OF THE KINGS. 395