2 Kings 4:20-24: a reflection

20When he had taken him and brought him to his mother, he sat on her knees until noon, and then died. 21She went up and laid him on the man of God’s bed, and shut the door on him, and went out. 22She called to her husband and said, “Please send me one of the servants, and one of the donkeys, that I may run to the man of God and come again.” 23He said, “Why would you want to go to him today? It is not a new moon or a Sabbath.” She said, “It’s all right.” 24Then she saddled a donkey, and said to her servant, “Drive, and go forward! Don’t slow down for me, unless I ask you to.”

The Shunammite woman, who had shown such kindness to the prophet Elisha, faces a mother's worst nightmare: her young son, the child God had given her, suddenly falls ill and dies in her arms. What she does next is remarkable. She carries him up and lays him on the bed of the man of God, shuts the door, and prepares to go straight to Elisha. In the crushing first moments of grief, she does not collapse in despair; she moves toward God's prophet with quiet, determined faith.

When her husband asks why she is going to the man of God on an ordinary day, she gives a short, striking answer: it is well. She does not yet know how it will be well; her son lies dead. But she refuses to speak the language of hopelessness. Instead of surrendering to despair, she saddles the donkey and urges her servant onward, running toward the only source of help she can imagine, the God who had given her the child in the first place.

This mother models a faith that runs toward God in the worst moment rather than away from him. When grief or crisis strikes, the temptation is to collapse in despair or to turn from God in anger. She did neither; she carried her dead child to the place of God's presence and said, against all appearances, it is well. Her story ends, just beyond this passage, with her son restored to life. When your own darkest moment comes, follow her example: do not despair, but run to God, and hold onto hope even when you cannot yet see how it will be well.

Lord, in the crushing moment of her son's death, the Shunammite woman ran to your prophet and said, it is well, refusing despair even before she could see how. When grief or crisis strikes me, keep me from collapsing or turning away. Give me her faith to run toward you, to hold onto hope when I cannot yet see the outcome, and to trust the God who gives and restores life. Amen.