O blessed death!
"Until I visit him." Zedekiah does not seem to have been a bad man, though he did evil. Weak rather than wicked. One like our own Charles I. or Louis XVI. of France. One of those men unhappily called to places of great responsibility and difficulty, without the moral strength requisite for so arduous a post. A sadder life than that of King Zedekiah, the last king of Judah and Jerusalem, cannot be conceived. It is a piteous tale. Bereaved, a captive, blinded, he was dragged to Babylon, and there died. And it is because the prophet of God recognizes that death to such an one could not but be a sweet messenger of relief, therefore he calls it "the Lord visiting him." True, the visit of the Lord often means the wrath of the Lord. He will "visit the sins of the fathers," etc. But it yet more often means the goodness of the Lord. "The Lord hath visited and redeemed his people." He visited Hannah. He visits his flock. And this gentler meaning it has here; for the sore punishment of his sins Zedekiah had already been visited. This visit, therefore, tells of God's merciful visitation.
I. DEATH NOT ALWAYS A VISIT OF MERCY. Not to those who die in their sins. It is represented often as the judgment of God. "It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God," as they who die impenitent and unbelieving fall.
II. BUT DEATH IS MORE OFTEN THE LORD'S VISIT OF MERCY. It is:
1. To those whom God punishes in this life. Zedekiah was an instance. Cf. those of whom St. Paul says (1 Corinthians 11:33). that they were judged now that they might not be condemned with the world. And probably there are many such.
2. To the sorrowful and those whose lives are a prolonged pain. We speak of death for such as being a merciful relief; and we are right.
3. To all believers in the Lord Jesus Christ. Death for them is the Lord's visiting them—Christ's coming again, as he said he would, and receiving them unto himself, that where he is they may be also. Which kind of visitation of the Lord shall death be to us?—C.