I want you to know, Gabriel, you can be on our worship team anytime you want to be. Thank you, Pastor Kevin. Thank you, worship team. Thank you, church. We continue our series in the Elijah and Elisha series, and we look at the raising of the Shunammite's son. We've entitled it, Believing When All Is Not Well. Even though we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, we need fear no evil, for God is with us. Though the fig tree doesn't blossom, though there be no fruit on the vines, though the olive tree should fail, though there be no sheep in the folds and no calves in the stall, yet we will rejoice in the Lord. He's made our feet like hind's feet. He makes us walk on our high places. And today I want to just read A passage here, a short part of the passage Pastor Larry read, this passage about this plan of faith that this Shunammite woman had from verse 25 to 30. She is out to get the man of God to go to that upper room, that prophet's chamber, and see what she laid on his bed. That's her plan. So she set out and came to the man of God at Mount Carmel. When the man of God saw her coming, he said to Gehazi, his servant, look, there is the Shunammite. Run at once to meet her and say to her, is all well with you? Is all well with your husband? Is all well with the child? And she answered, all is well. And when she came to the mountain to the man of God, she caught hold of his feet. And Gehazi came to push her away. the man of God said, Leave her alone, for she is in bitter distress, and the Lord hath hidden it from me, and hath not told me. Then she said, Did I not ask my Lord for a son? Did I not say, Do not deceive me? And he said to Gehazi, Tie up your garment, Take my staff in your hand and go. If you meet anyone, do not greet him. If anyone greets you, do not reply. And lay my staff on the face of the child. Then the mother of the child said, as the Lord lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you. So he rose and followed her. Thank you, Andrew. I'd like to dedicate this message to any of you right now that are going through any kind of a trauma in your life, whatever it may be. You feel like you're in the shoes of a Shunammite woman, whether you're a man or a woman, boy or girl. Trauma comes in all different shapes and sizes. Let's ask God. to help us believe Him even when all is not well. Father, in Jesus' name, we come to this passage. Lord, it's a passage that grips our hearts. It's a passage that quickens our spirits. It's a passage that at times leaves us broken, and at other times it leaves us amazed to overflowing. Teach us through this woman, this amazing woman of God, this Shunammite woman, teach us. And we give you all the praise. In Jesus' precious name we pray. Amen. Life in the United States back in the 50s, and some of us lived those 50s, all of them, has become, in retrospect, looking back, what many people call the good old days. You've heard of that. The sitcom from 1974 to 1984, Happy Days, was all about the 50s. You know, history's largest war was over in 1945. I was born before it was over in early 45. Our family even received ration stamps, war stamps. I still have them right beside the bed. I just keep them over there. You can't spend them, but it's kind of fun to keep those stamps. American factories were producing baby strollers instead of bullets, which was a good thing. Our hero, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, was our president, and all the revolutionary 1960s hadn't even been dreamed of. It was, in many ways, the good old days. When we talk about happy days being here again, it's because most of us know really well how to live in the past. Have you figured out how to live in the past? Most people do. Job did a good bit of that after all ten of his children died. You remember that great wind? It had to have been a tornado. It lifted the roof up off the house and it slammed down, killed all ten of the kids, seven sons, three daughters. Then his health broke and his grief-stricken wife, as a foolish woman, he said, told him to curse God and die. It wasn't the good old days then. Long before his health was restored, long before his wife bore him seven more sons and three more daughters that were the most beautiful in all the land, long before that happened, when he had boils all over his body and he was scraping the boils In an ash heap, he was longing for the good old days, the once happy days. And like many of us, he had only two kinds of memories, and most of us really only have two kinds of memories. We have strong, sweet memories, and we have strong, severe memories. And those are the kind of memories most of us have. Perhaps you remember some of Jobís words back in Job 29, 25 verses about his good old days, wishing they were back. Let me just give you about five of those verses and excerpt them from that context. He says, ìOh, that I were in the months of old, as in the days when God watched over me. As I was in my prime, when the friendship of God was upon my tent, when the Almighty was yet with me, when my children were all around me, when my steps were bathed with cream, and the rock poured out for me streams of oil, then I thought, I shall die in my nest, and I shall multiply my days as the sand. Men listened to me and waited and kept silence for my counsel. After I spoke, they did not speak again. I smiled on them when they had no confidence, and the light of my face they did not cast down." Isn't that a beautiful picture of those good old days he used to have? As we come to this text, this Shunammite woman never started out with happy days. She had decades that were strongly severe. In Israel it was the worst possible curse for a woman to be barren and she was barren and her husband, much older than she was, the two of them had given up all hope of a child. And then Elisha had prophesied she would have a son and happy days finally came for this woman and for her husband. No longer was she barren, the prophesied son came. They both must have felt like living in Shunem was a little bit of heaven on earth. And it was a bit of heaven on earth. Some of you right now in this room are living in a time when it's a little bit of heaven on earth. But it can go so quickly from a little bit of heaven on earth to severe. Strongly severe. Oh, the joy of strong, sweet memories. And in the gladness of that shoonam home, the little baby boy began to grow up. He was probably not a teenager yet, probably nine, 10, 11, or 12, somewhere in there. He wasn't old enough to do a man's work, but he was old enough to try. And he got to go out in the field. His mommy had said, you can go out in the field. It's just adjacent to them. And so if you want to come back in, it's OK. Just walk in out of the field. So there he was cutting and binding the sheaves, making them into shocks, lifting up the shocks and the sheaves into the carts to be brought into the threshing floor. It was threshing gang time. and that's what the dad was leading him in doing, and they had many servants. This boy, about nine to 12, was learning his daddy's work. He was learning to be his daddy, if you will. It was in those pre-combined days when you cut the wheat and the barley with a sickle, and you built shocks and tied sheaves of grain. I've tied shocks like that together. This growing boy must have been the apple of his daddy's eye, the apple of his mother's eye, until this hot summer day, probably it was in the heat of dog days, sometime in August, though they didn't count their months like we do, as far as counted as August. But the scorching sun in the early morning was so hot, and as he's running around cutting and binding and putting shocks on the cart, He got too hot. And in that middle of that harvest morning, in the field adjacent to the Shunam Hall, that son went to his daddy and he said, oh my head, oh my head. And his father, running that thrashing gang, just ordered one of his servants, he says, carry him back into his mom, okay? He didn't feel good. There's no doubt that the dad really didn't know how bad off he was. He had no idea the severity of his son's condition. He was happy that morning. It had gone from sweet to severe so quickly. Sweet, happy days were soon to return into severe grief as the servant carried the miracle boy into the Shunammite's arms. And there he sat in his mother's lap until noon. And there he died in his mother's arms at lunchtime. Maybe right here in this room, at this sanctuary right now, maybe right now in your life, you're just as broken as that Shunammite woman was. Things have gone from sweet to severe. Where's your heart today? How broken are you? How grieving is your heart? How impossible does your plight seem today? And I want you to know that all of us, all of us at one time or another, go from sweet to severe. And then it can go back from severe to sweet. And those cycles run throughout our whole life. Sweet and severe. There are five lessons that we can learn that the Lord showed to me as I studied this passage. And we can learn from this severely grieving Shunammite woman as she rocked her son until he died in her arms. What are these five lessons? And as we look at them today, they kind of build. But I believe they can build, even the severity of them, they can build our faith. I trust they are faith-building lessons for you. First of all, all of us can learn to exercise self-restraint and quiet faith in the face of shocking calamity. Most of us need to learn that. Most of us probably haven't learned it. but it's still a lesson from the Shunammite. You'll notice it's almost as if she had planned for the death of the child, even though she had no idea what was going on. Verse 21 says that after the son died in her arms, she went up and laid him on the bed of the man of God in the prophet's chamber and shut the door behind him and went out. Now, what's the context of the death of this young boy? He's working in the field with his dad. There seems to be no doubt about the fact that he's working around with the workers, doing what they're doing, and all of a sudden, he goes to his dad, covers his head. Or maybe he hadn't covered his head, just like I don't sometimes. Maybe you don't, often enough, cover our head in severe heat. And he began to feel dizzy. He had overworked in the hot sun. Sunstroke, whether you know it or not, has killed thousands of people. It's a very dangerous thing to have sunstroke. If you start to feel dizzy or a headache working in this sweet water August sun, then you need to get inside, drink, drink, drink, drink, drink, Let someone kind of watch you for a while. It's a dangerous time. You can be overcome by the inflammation of your brain that sunstroke brings. Imagine this Shunammite, as she sensed the gravity of her son's condition, and she held him in her loving arms until noon, and then he's gone. And in those couple of hours, she must have realized, my boy isn't doing well, and she must have prayed and prayed and prayed, But as she was praying, she realized he's not gonna make it. But the faith of this woman, even as Job was tested severely, when our faith is put to the test, how do we respond? Now, I wanna give you a few ways most of us respond. And I'm talking about even Christian people, good Christian people respond in a default way. in the shock of calamity. Some of us panic. Others of us lash out at those we love the most, including God. Others of us try to bury the shock and the sorrow, and it finds its way to the surface. What we learn from this Shunammite woman is that she stepped up to the plate in self-restraint and quiet faith. sensing the boy was limp and lifeless and no longer alive, she carried him in her arms and she brought him upstairs and put him in that prophet's chamber, laid his body on the bed, the man of God shut the door and went out. Now we don't know contextually all the reasons that she didn't tell her husband, but you can tell she never told her husband. What did she worry about? Why didn't she tell him? I can only guess, and I'm gonna guess out loud with you. I believe in her heart she didn't believe the last chapter had been written in the life of her miracle son. Somehow, in her heart, she didn't believe the last chapter was over. And it's a hot sun. And in those times, as even when I was growing up in Kentucky, within 24 hours, if a body was not embalmed, it had to be in the ground. If her husband knew the boy was dead, he might well have the servants bury him immediately. You say, people don't do that. Read Acts 5. You remember when Ananias lied to the Holy Spirit and they took him out and buried him? He didn�t even notify his wife. Three hours later she came in, they asked her the same question and she lied to the Holy Spirit and they took her out and buried her immediately. It was something in those days they often buried people immediately. But I see in this woman's quiet faith and in her choice not to go inform her husband that she was not yet willing to believe this was the final chapter for her miracle son. So first of all, we can learn to exercise self-restraint and quiet faith in the face of shocking calamity. Number two, all of us can learn to think through a plan of faith before we collapse in our storms. It says in verse 22, then she called to her husband. They were within calling distance. Send me one of the servants, one of the donkeys. I want to go quickly to the man of God and I'll come back again. There was no plan in this woman's heart to interrupt the harvest with this shocking news. Everybody would have quit work. Maybe there were storms coming. She wasn't going to stop the thrashing gang. All the men were cutting and binding sheaves and placing them on carts to be driven in with the donkeys to the threshing floor. This father had no idea apparently how sick his son was. He never dreamed he was dead. This Shunammite was calling in distance to him as she had often called, lunchtime, suppertime. And everybody would come in. He could hear her. There was no loud tractor sounds, no John Deere, no combine sounds, no. He could hear his wife. He only had one objection. He says, why would you go to the man of God at Mount Carmel? That's one of the schools of the prophets. Why would you go up there now? His speaking days would usually be at new moon or on the Sabbath. That's when he would be speaking for everybody to come, just like church. Why would you go today? And all that she could say to him was, shalom. All is well, all is well. You know, it's interesting. It's interesting. All is well, and yet her son is dead in the upper room of the prophet of God. His corpse is there. I did a little study on this word shalom. One of the things it means is trust me, all is well. but it's not the normal meaning of shalom or peace. The normal meaning, you'd say, couldn't be what it was. Well, it is one of the normal meanings. Kyle, in his commentary, states, and I quote, Shalom is often used when the object is to avoid giving a definite answer to anyone, and yet at the same time, to satisfy them. Have any of you ever had a way of giving an answer that is oblique, it's an answer that really doesn't get at the heart of things, but it satisfies whoever needs to know. He's out there with the thrashers, and she says, shalom, all is well. It's our equivalent of saying, trust me, everything is gonna be okay, everything is gonna be all right, I'll see you soon, I'll be back this evening. And as far as he knew, the child was playing in the sandbox outside the house. Go ahead with the harvest, sweetheart. I'll see you later. Permit me to do this thing. What I gather from this woman's plan is that she had no other faith plan but one. She was going to go grasp the feet of the man of God, get him to come back, and go into the room and find what he would find on her bed, or on his bed. There's something about this woman's composure. of how God can help us stand tall and have faith, even in the face of our most vicious and severe life storms. It really speaks to me. I hope it speaks to you. So often, we have no plan of faith, we collapse. It's almost as if our faith is temporarily gone. Not this woman of faith, number three. All of us can learn that seeking help as God directs us precludes and shuts out bearing our soul to any others. If God sends you to get advice or to get counsel, He is sending you to no one else but that person that He is sending you to. Hear me out on this one and think about it. This Shunammite woman was off. She was riding the 17 to 25 miles on a donkey between Shunamm and Mount Carmel. Elisha saw her coming and he said to his servant, run at once to meet her and say to her, is all well with you, is all well with your husband, is all well with the child. And she answered, same thing she said to her husband, Shalom. Everything's okay, everything's okay. When God sends us on a mission, one of the tricks of the enemy is to get us to bear our souls to others along the way. What that does is it diffuses the counsel of the man or the woman of God that the Lord has sent us to in the first place. Many of the believers who are on their way to get counsel from a man or woman of God, and they stop and get other opinions from others, and by the time they come to us as pastors or others for help, they have already been told in no uncertain terms what they should do. And so what do we combat? We combat an awful situation where they've been told by their dearest friends, don't you dare stay with that woman. Don't you dare stay with that man. I wouldn't put up with that. I wouldn't put up with that for another day. I'd get out. And then they walk in, Pastor Larry or myself, Pastor Will, whoever it is, and say, what do you think I should do? You're not the first opinion. You're about the 10th opinion. I want you to know spending time getting confused when God has told you where to go blunts the counsel that you receive from God. that He sent you to get. over what that thing is. Matthew Henry wrote about this woman and her saying shalom to Gehazi. He wrote, her answer was general, it is well. Why? Gehazi was not the man she came to complain to and therefore She put him off. Kyle wrote in his commentary, she answered, Shalom, that she might not be detained by any further discussion and could come to the prophet and embrace his feet to pray for the help of this holy man of God. H.J. Carpenter in his commentary said, not even to Gehazi, the servant of Elisha, could she unburden her soul and tell the dread news. We must learn to bypass burying our souls until we have come to the person or the counselor or the pastor, whoever it is, man or woman, that God directs us to go to. W.A. Criswell put it this way. He said, This great woman at Shunem intuitively, spiritually knew who Gehazi was, what he was like. She knew his inner person. When Gehazi came and asked her, is it well with you, your husband and your child? She answered, all is well. Then Pastor Criswell said, don't you do that every day of your life? Walk down the street with a burden on your heart that's crushing your soul and somebody you hardly know walks up and says, how you doing? And you say, shalom, pretty well, thank you. Shalom, pretty well, thank you. The person you're getting something from the store, how you doing? Pretty well, thank you, shalom. Shalom is a word that we probably could use better than just straight up lying to people. It really is a word that means I'm putting you off, but I'm telling you something okay so that I can go on to talk to someone to whom I can bare my soul. How are you? Pretty well, thank you. She must make it in her faith plan. She must make it to the feet of Elisha, the man of God. There her dead son's body lay in the prophet's chamber bed. She could not and she would not tell Gehazi. She could only say, how you doing? Pretty well, thank you. Shalom. Fourthly, All of us can learn when to press in and lay hold of the horns of the altar and persevere to get help we need. Another way of saying it, all of us need to know who we need to pray through. We need to keep on and get to what God is asking us to go for. She laid hold of Elisha's feet. Gehazi came to push her away. The man of God said, leave her alone. She is in bitter distress and the Lord has hidden it from me and has not told me. Now this Shunammite is finally where she was asked by God in prayer to go in faith. She's made it to her destination, 17 to 25 miles. Now she's got to retrace those miles. What a day it was. She's finally where she was called to go. Now the full emotions of this woman burst out She is unable to say the dreadful words. And if a person is unable to say the dreadful words, listen to what they're saying and you'll get it anyway. She never ever told Elisha that her son was dead. She never once said, my son is dead. but the full emotions broke out. The very words that she said to him when he said, next year at this time you're going to have a son. She said to him then what she said again now. What's going on? Did I ask my Lord for a son? Did I not say, do not deceive me? Her outburst was not rebuked. It was enough. He was tipped off. This woman wouldn't say it. She couldn't say, my son is dead. She had too much faith. She had too much faith to say the obvious. But he got it. And she had sized up Gehazi correctly. We find out in our next chapter, he was both a thief and a liar. 1 Kings 5, 27. This man was all Elisha had for a servant. So getting the picture and hearing no more, Elisha just sent Gehazi immediately to place his staff on the dead son. Gehazi was to tie up his garment. You pull up the robes in those days, just like you take a jacket and you tie it around yourself, tie it twice. That's what he did. He pulled up his robe so he could run. He said, go back all those miles to Shunam and lay my staff on the face of her son. He got the picture. He says, don't stop for any customary Jewish greeting. Those formalities took a long time. He said, don't even say hi, don't say hello, just run right past people. Get there, lay my staff on the face of the child. Now notice this Shunammite responded to those instructions. How did she respond? She wasn't going to accept that for her answer. That was not God's plan of faith. Somehow inside her soul, she knew if Gehazi had 10,000 of his staffs for him to put on his face, none of them would work. She pressed in. It would never help her dead boy if she didn't get Elisha back. That was the faith plan. She pressed in. She must pray through. She must not only ask to receive and seek to find, now she must knock that the door might be opened. And now, just like Elijah did, she swore with an oath. Whatever you think about what she did, that's what she did. She said, as the Lord lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you. And she's holding on to his feet like the front of that picture that you see. She's at his feet. And she says, I'm not going anywhere. Realizing he was not going to get out of it by sending his staff, he arose and followed her. Now Gehazi beat Phoenix to shoo him. He laid His staff on the child and the child did not arise. His mission was not successful. He went back and found Elisha coming and he gave the awful news to the Shunammite woman and to Elisha and it never deterred this woman in any bit because you see she had a faith plan. What�s your faith plan in calamity? She had a faith plan, and the plan was get Elisha and bring him to His chamber and let him see what�s in His room on His bed. She grasped His feet, they were walking together, She let Elisha know all was not well in her home with her son. The faith plan was still at this moment. He has not arisen. It was running right on schedule. The faith plan was a good plan, and God's plan, when we follow it, never falters. God's plan, when we question it, God's plan, when we abandon it, God's plan, when we disrespect it, God's plan, when we deny it, always ends in confusion, heartbreak, anger, and unbelief. This you know, I kept believing when all was not well. It was well as far as her faith. When somebody says, how are you doing? You say, pretty well, thank you. That can be very true. You're doing pretty well in your heart, but your heart is crushed. but you still are doing pretty well. You know where you're headed when you die. You know Jesus is your Savior. You're doing pretty well, even though all is not well. It was well as far as her faith, but her mission would not be even close to completion until Elijah walked upstairs and found what was lying on his prophet Chambers' bed. Number five, all of us can learn God's plan of faith, regardless of its nature or its strangeness, is a plan that holds life in it. When God has a plan, there's life in that plan, because who is God? Jesus says, I and my Father are one. And he says, I am the way, the truth, and the life. God's plan has life in it. And so let's read verse 32 to verse 37 one more time. They finally get to the house. He goes upstairs and when Elisha came into the house he saw the child laying dead on his bed. So he went in and shut the door behind the two of them and prayed to the Lord. Then he went up and lay on the child, putting his mouth on his mouth, his eyes on his eyes, his hands on his hands. And as he stretched himself out upon him, the flesh of the child became warm. Now don't for a moment think that this is some kind of artificial respiration or something like that. This is only what it says it is. He is making skin contact with this little boy whose flesh is cold and he lays on him until his flesh becomes warm. Then he got up again and walked once back and forth in the house. He went up and stretched himself upon him, and the child sneezed seven times, and the child opened his eyes. Then he summoned Gehazi and said, call this Shunammite. So he called her, and when she came to him, he said, pick up your son. She came and fell at his feet, bowing to the ground, and she picked up her son and went out. Now let's look at this carefully. This is an incredible passage. There had been many hours that had gone by since this woman had laid down her son's body in the prophet's chamber. Think about how many hours it took to get that 17 to 25 miles and how long it took to come back. This child is cold and stiff. You know anything about dead bodies? And I've been around a lot of dead bodies as a pastor. Then with the word shalom to her husband and his sending a servant and a donkey, she tells the servant, urge the animal on, don't slacken the pace unless I tell you. It had been a trip of a lifetime. It had been a trip of faith. She would never forget. She must find the prophet of God, ministering in the school of the prophets. Her faith convinced her that somehow Elisha could be instrumental in doing again the seemingly impossible. He had done it before. I got to do something to let you know how I thank you for this prophet's chamber. What does she need? Well, she has no son, Gehazi said. Give him credit for that. He had picked that up. And he says, about this time next year, you'll have a son. Do not deceive me! He had previously announced to her that life would begin to form in her womb, though she hadn't asked for a child. She and her husband had had no hope of seeing life form inside her. Pregnancy had long since been given up. This woman saw what God could do through the faith of this man of God, and now she has got his faith. Probably no woman in the Old Testament had the faith of Elijah or Elisha as much as this Shunammite woman. She would not call that the last chapter when she laid him on the bed and shut the door. Modeling that faith, this elderly man and his wife had renewed their hopes. of ending barrenness. The child had come. God rewarded the faith of Elisha. Now that faith was in the Shunammite woman. Do you realize that you can be a mentor? That the faith that you have can be implanted into the heart of another. They learned the faith through you. She learned the faith through Elisha. That faith was now abiding in her marvelously. Perhaps God again would minister to her. Once again, maybe he would give more life to her dead son. So this moment of truth arrived and Elisha and this woman came to the home. He went up to his room. He saw the picture before his eyes. The miracle child was lying dead on his bed. Elisha must have heard his mentor Elijah tell him over and over the story about the widow of Zarephath and her son and the story about how he laid down on the child three times and prayed and said, Lord, let life return to this body and life return. You can read about it in 1 Kings 17, eight to 16. We preached on it earlier. Elisha told the widow of this seminary student, remember? He told her, go into your room with your two boys and all those borrowed vessels and take that measly little bit of oil after you shut the door, pour into it. It happened behind closed doors. And now he goes up to his room and shuts the door. And behind closed doors, there's something about closed doors that God likes. It says, go into your closet and shut the door and pray to your father in secret. And your father who seeth in secret will reward you openly. He found the boy pale, cold and lifeless. The first thing he did was shut the door. This was a room that had been built for him. And by this elderly man, this elderly husband, the two of them had built a room that breathed kindness and welcome rest. Would that room now become for him forever? I don't want to stop there. That's the chamber of death. With this room, have that memory. It was a meeting place now of life and death. Would life triumph? Would God win the battle over this last dread enemy of our soul's death? Would this prophet's chamber be forever for Elisha, the death chamber of this woman's faith and dreams? Would God let this woman live to think that Elisha and even God had fooled her? Or would it be what it was? Would it be a fresh lesson of God's wonder working power? As God would be seen not only as the giver of life, but as the restorer of life. Here in Elisha's prayer, the boy sneezed seven times and God opened the dead son's eyes. Now it's a dramatic story. You don't have many of these in the Bible. You don't have many of them in history. It's a sacred thing to read something as precious as this miracle. But Elijah praying over this dead son, he had a much faster miracle. And so I found some commentators saying, well, he really didn't get a double portion of Elijah's spirit because Elijah prayed and the miracle happened faster. Oh, beloved. This miracle did take longer. He shut the door and he prayed to the Lord. He went on the bed and he lay on the child. He put his mouth on his mouth. He put his eyes on his eyes. He put his hands on his hands and he laid there for a long time until cold flesh became warm. And then he got up and he began pacing in the chamber back and forth. And you know he was praying and praying. You can bet your life he's still praying. And as he finished pacing, he got back up on the child and he laid upon the child, his mouth to his mouth, his eyes to his eyes, his hands to his hands. And you can imagine what happened as his mouth was on his mouth and the young man sneezed for the first time. Oh, can you imagine what faith is like? It's like a cloud about the size of a man's hand. He sneezed right in his face, right in his mouth. And he sneezed seven times. And he opened his eyes and he looked at the prophet of God. He wasted no time in calling downstairs, opened the door and said, Gehazi, go get that Shunammite. She got upstairs and he said, pick up your son. But she didn't pick him up. She fell at his feet. She's back at his feet again. She's thanking him. And then she picked up her boy alive. And all this while, the threshing gang is still going in the field. Daddy's still working. All the threshers are still binding, cutting wheat, cutting barley, binding it, bringing it into the threshing floor. By the time she yelled supper time, Her son probably was playing in the sandbox. Sweet times were back because she followed her faith plan that God gave her. And God's faith plan always works. May God teach us to become people of faith, to exercise self-restraint and quiet faith in the face of shocking calamity. To think through a plan of faith before we collapse in our storms. To learn to seek help from the one God directs us to go to, and to shut out and preclude any bearing of our souls to others first. To learn when to press in, when to lay hold of the horns of the altar, when to pray through, when to persevere to get the help we need. And lastly, to learn God's faith plan, and regardless of its nature or its Strangeness. Know that it's a life plan that holds life in it. If God gives you a plan, He is the giver of life. There's life in His plan. Would you bow your heads? As your heads are bowed and your eyes are closed, I want to say to us today that many of us may be going through something right now And we're kind of holding on for dear life. And I'm asking for you in faith to ask the Lord for some kind of a faith plan. It may be very simple. All this lady had for a faith plan is go get Elisha and bring him to his room. That was it. But what are you facing? What's your faith plan? What are you gonna do? Do you have a faith plan so you don't collapse? Maybe you have to go and find a faith plan by seeking counsel and God sent you to someone. Don't go anywhere, but go to that person and seek that faith plan from the word of God. God will come through. If he gives you a faith plan, there's life in it. There's life in it. Now, beloved, if you just right now would say, pray for me, I need a faith plan for what I'm facing right now. I need a faith plan. Pray for me. Just raise your hand. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Yes, ma'am. Yes, sir. I need a faith plan. So many men. Anyone else? Yes, sir. I need a faith plan. Oh Father, help us, help these, help these men, help these women. Make us Shunammites for your glory. As I look at us this morning, as far as I know, we're believers. But maybe we aren't all. Maybe there's one or more of you that would say, I really don't know yet what it means to know Jesus. And this is the day for me. This is the day for me to put my faith in the Lord Jesus Christ. And I'm gonna do it this day. This day is my day to say yes to Jesus. Would you be willing? Just either look at me or raise your hand and say, it's my day. It's my day. I'm giving my life to Jesus. I'm giving my life to Jesus. Pastor Larry, would you close us in prayer? Father, what a wonderful message to our hearts, every one of us. whether we may be in the season of joy or in the season of sorrow, whether today we may be living, as it were, above our circumstances, or whether today it may seem that the circumstances are seeking to come between us and our vision of God, even as the clouds outside today have come between us and the sun. But Lord, I pray that we would remember these wonderful insights. I pray, Heavenly Father, that if we today are under the circumstances, that we would press through to Jesus, that we would see that above the circumstances of our life, the son of righteousness would shine upon us with healing and help and health and holiness in his wings. Take these powerful words and may we not forget the personal applications to our lives today and in the days ahead, even as we praise you for the example of this godly, gracious woman. May we so model that same faith of godliness and graciousness to others because of our faith being strengthened this very day to know that nothing is too hard for God. We pray in Jesus name. Amen. God bless you. I love you.