This woman and her much older husband had no children. In return for showing him hospitality by keeping a guest room available for him, Elisha told her she would soon have a son. She had been married for many years and had given up on ever having a child but Elisha's words came true. Then, while the boy was still quite young, he died very suddenly and unexpectedly one afternoon. The woman rushed to Mount Carmel to bring the prophet back to her home where he raised the child from the dead.
In today's text we find Elisha warning her that famine is coming. He tells her that she and her husband and son should leave the country for seven years until the famine is ended. "Now Elisha had said to the woman whose son he had restored to life, 'Go away with your family and stay for a while wherever you can, because the Lord has decreed a famine in the land that will last seven years.' The woman proceeded to do as the man of God said. She and her family went and stayed in the land of the Philistines seven years." (2 Kings 8:1-2) The author of 2 Kings is backing up several years in time here in Chapter 8 to provide us with the information that Elisha warned the woman that famine was coming. There was already famine in the region back in Chapter 4 and I presume this is all part of the same famine. So at some time prior to the arrival of this time of hardship in the nation, Elisha warned the woman to leave the area until the seven years were ended.
Seven years pass between verse 2 and verse 3. "At the end of seven years she came back from the land of the Philistines and went to appeal to the king for her house and land." (2 Kings 8:3) We don't know exactly what happened to her house and land during her absence. A close relative may have laid claim to the property, assuming the family would not return from the land of the Philistines or that they had died there. A person placed in charge of managing the estate in the family's absence may have proven untrustworthy by keeping all the profits for himself and refusing to turn the estate back over to its rightful owners. Squatters may have taken it over in the family's absence and are now unwilling to relinquish it. The Bible doesn't provide us with any details but she decides to go to the king for help.
On every occasion when the author of 2 Kings deals with this woman's life, he presents her as the dominant force in the family. This may be because her husband is "old" according to 2 Kings 4:14. He may be experiencing mobility issues that make it difficult or impossible for him to visit the king's palace to appeal for the property to be returned. Or it could be that the house and land in question were inherited by the wife and not by the husband. Earlier in the Bible we found the Lord telling Moses to make it a law that when a man dies without any sons, his daughter or daughters are to inherit his property rather than it going to their father's nearest male relative. This law stipulated that the daughter or daughters must marry within the same tribe of Israel so that the ownership of the property remains with the original tribe to which it was allotted. It could be that this woman inherited the property because she had no brothers and that she married a man of her father's own tribe so that as the land passed down through the generations it would remain in the same tribe, presumably Issachar since that's where Shunem was located. If the Shunammite inherited the land from her father, it makes sense that she would be the one to go to the king about her property rights.
The Lord has arranged for her (along with her son) to arrive at the royal palace while Elisha's servant, Gehazi, is telling the king about the time Elisha raised the Shunammite's son from the dead. This is divine timing! I've witnessed instances of divine timing in my own life and I bet you have too. There are probably far more of these instances than we are even aware of. But when the Shunammite arrives at the palace, the king has already heard her story and this moves him to be gracious to her.
As far as Gehazi is concerned, we don't know whether he's speaking with the king before or after he was struck with leprosy as judgment for his sinful greed in Chapter 5. It may be that our text today took place before the events of Chapter 5 but many scholars believe it's not unreasonable to imagine that Gehazi might have spoken to the king from a distance with the lower half of his face covered (as was the rule for lepers in Leviticus 13:45). The reason scholars believe Gehazi's leprosy would not have deterred the king from calling for him is because the king displays a keen interest in hearing about the acts of Elisha. Gehazi has been Elisha's servant for many years and would be the person who knows the most about him. "The king was talking to Gehazi, the servant of the man of God, and had said, 'Tell me about the great things Elisha has done.' Just as Gehazi was telling the king how Elisha had restored the dead to life, the woman whose son Elisha had brought back to life came to appeal to the king for her house and land. Gehazi said, 'This is the woman, my lord the king, and this is her son whom Elisha restored to life.'" (2 Kings 8:4-5)
To an unbeliever this might seem like a mere coincidence. But to a child of God it is divine timing. The Lord has orchestrated events in such a way as to place the woman in the right place at the right time. If she had come to plead her cause before the king had ever called for Gehazi and heard her story, the king would have been less likely to hear her case or grant her request. If she had not arrived while Gehazi was still there and could identify her, the king would never have known she was the Shunammite from the story and would have had less interest in her case and might not have decided in her favor. But the Lord caused the king to become extremely curious about Elisha, to call for Gehazi, and to hear about her son being raised from the dead just prior to her arrival at the palace. Right after Gezahi finishes relating the tale to the king, the woman comes into the king's judgment hall with her son and Gehazi points and says something like, "Why, here she is now! And this is her son who once was dead but now is alive! You can hear the story again straight from their mouths if you'd like."
The king does indeed want to hear the story again from another viewpoint. "The king asked the woman about it, and she told him. Then he assigned an official to her case and said to him, 'Give back everything that belonged to her, including all the income from her land from the day she left the country until now.'" (2 Kings 8:6) The Lord championed this woman's cause in the past and, following His example, the king stands up for her now. King Joram isn't all that he could be, spiritually speaking, but he isn't as reprobate as his father Ahab. If the Lord wanted to do good things for this woman, he does too, either because he's moved by compassion for her or because he doesn't want to get on the wrong side of God.
The Lord is able to bless His children---even through those who are unbelievers or who have backslidden from a close relationship with Him. A person who doesn't like us or who genuinely hates us can be compelled by the Lord to show us compassion, for Proverbs 16:7 assures us that when the Lord is pleased with the way we're living, He will make even our enemies to be at peace with us.
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