She
was a little girl, we really don’t know how old she was, but based on the
Hebrew word used, she was less than 12 and older than 5. Her homeland had been defeated. Her home had most likely been destroyed. She had been taken captive, torn away from
the safety and security of her home, taken away from her mother and father,
separated from her sisters and brothers, separated from everyone and everything
she had ever loved or known. She had
been taken to a foreign land and given to the wife of the king’s highest
commander to serve her and live as a slave.
She is a captive. She is a slave. She is a little girl. And she is absolutely amazing.
Here
she is living as a slave in a foreign land serving the wife of the man who is
ultimately responsible for the destruction of her town, the loss of her home
and her family and he comes down with a horrible and highly contagious disease,
which could cost him his power, his authority, his honor, his prestige, his
livelihood and ultimately his life. And
what does she do? Does she smile to
herself and think that this man is getting what he deserves? Does she thank God for vanquishing her
enemies? Does she find a way to make
this work to her advantage? (Those all
things I might have done, had I been in her shoes.) No, she goes to her mistress and tells her
mistress that there is a prophet in her homeland who could heal her
master.
She
does something that many in her position would not even think to do. She does
the last thing that anyone would have thought that this child, this little
captive slave girl would do. She has compassion on someone, most people would
not condemn for hating. She has
compassion on her master, on her enemy.
She has compassion on the very man who has taken away her peace,
security and childhood.
She
has compassion and she has faith; faith not only in the ability and power of
her God, but in God’s compassion. She
might have been taken captive, she might have been forced to live in the
enemy’s land serving the enemy’s wife, she might have lost absolutely
everything that had value or mattered in her life, but in spite of all she has
lost and the bleakness of the situation in which she is now, she still has
faith that her God can do this and believes that her God is bigger than her
family, her homeland, her people, that her God wants to reach out and heal
someone she has every reason to hate, or at least dislike quite a bit. She has faith even when her world has gone
crazy and has been turned upside down and nothing seems to be going right. She has faith and no matter what bad things
may have happened to her in her short life, God is still God. Her faith is deeper than the good or bad
things that happen to her. Her faith is
bigger than whether or not her country has been attacked. Her faith is bigger than what has happened to
herself or to those whom she loves. Her
faith is bigger than her circumstances, bigger than anything that had happened
to her, was happening or even might happen. God is still God even when bad
things happen. And God loves everyone, even people who do horrible things. She has faith that the prophet, whom God
called, can heal her master, can heal her enemy. She has faith and she has compassion on this
man and she shares her faith in God with her mistress and ultimately with her
master.
Naaman
is a powerful man. He is high in the
king’s favor and he is the highest commander of the army. He has quite a bit of power and
prestige. Then something completely beyond
his control happens to him; something his power has no affect over, something
his connections to the King cannot remedy.
He contracts a skin disease that could ruin his whole life. He has tried everything, he has gone to all
the best Doctors, tried all the best ointments and creams, and has even tried
the herbal remedies recommended by his grandmother, but none of it has
worked. His disease still persists. He
is at the end of his rope. What can he
do? Will he simply have to accept his
new lot in life?
Then
his wife comes to him with interesting news.
Apparently the little slave girl, he gave her as an “I’m sorry I was
gone so long at war” present, says that there is a prophet in Israel who can
heal him. So this girl is proposing he
go to the country of his enemy and ask their prophet to heal him. (shrug)
“Guess I can ask, I mean it couldn’t hurt.
Not like things can be much worse for me than they are now.”
And
off he goes. He talks to his king, his
king gives him his blessing and he goes and talks to the king of Israel, who
takes offense at the situation, thinking it is some kind of trick for this
enemy king to find a way to pick a war with him. Somehow Elisha hears about what is going on
and has Naaman sent over to his house.
So
Naaman heads over to Elisha’s house, all the
while Naaman is imagining all the grand things the prophet will do to
cure him of his aliment. He will put on
strange and unusual clothes, he will light a fire and put special things in it
to turn it green, he will dance around wearing a mysterious costume saying
ancient words in a long forgotten language, lay his hands on Namaan at just the
right moment and magically Naaman will be healed. Or perhaps he will circle around the fire 8
times clockwise and 4 counter clockwise.
He will then put the fire out and make a paste of the ashes, rub the
ashes all over Namaan’s body, have him bath in the finest oil and wash with a
perfume made from a special flower that only blooms once a decade that can only
be found on some remote location on a high cliff overlooking a magical
waterfall and then he will be cured of his leprosy. Ok, maybe that is a bit much, but at the very
least he will come out say a magnificent prayer calling out to his God wave his
hand over the spot and it will be gone. But none of these things happened. Not
even close. Instead, the prophet sends out a messenger and tells him to go and
bath in the Jordan.
Naaman
is a little more than annoyed and almost offended. Not only has the prophet not even both to
come out and greet him, but he tells him to go bath in the Jordan river. That is ridiculous. Now if you don’t understand why this is so
ridiculous then you have not heard much about the Jordan River, or like myself
have never seen it in person. Although,
I have never seen the Jordon river myself, I just so happen to live with
someone who has, and from what he has been told, you are more likely to get
clean if you bath in a stagnant pond that has dead fish floating in it, than
you would be if you bathed in the Jordan River (perhaps a bit overstated but
close enough to the truth that you get the point). It is a dirty, muddy,
stinky, foul river that nobody baths in.
There are cleaner rivers back home that Namaan can bath in, if bathing
is what will be the cure.
Naaman
is mad, really mad and heads off toward home.
Then one of his servants talks some sense into him. And says, I remember your ponderings on your
way over here. You would have gone along
with what ever elaborate scheme, climbed countless mountains, gone on almost
any nonsensical quest this prophet could have come up with if it had even a
chance to heal you. But you turn away
from something that seems merely undesirable. Doesn’t it make sense to at least
try to do something simple and counterintuitive like to going wash in a dirty
river in order to be clean. After all it
is not any more preposterous than anything else he could have asked you to do. You
should not at least try.
So
Naaman decided to give it a chance. He
goes and baths in the dirty disgusting Jordan seven times and low and behold he
comes out with skin as smooth and clean as that of a newborn baby’s.
That’s
right ladies smooth, young skin, just like the day you were born – all you have
to do is bath in this dirty water 7 times – this could sell millions.
As
I see it there were two people that have been healed in this story. Obviously
Naaman was healed, but I believe this young Hebrew girl has been healed as
well. This young girl is healed of her
hurt, healed of her anger and healed of her pain. She has faith in God even when things are not
going the way she would have wanted them to go.
She has every reason to despise Naaman.
She has every reason to wish him ill will. She has every reason to be mad at God. But she does not do any of these things. She has faith in God. She has compassion on this man. Even when her life is in complete shambles
she trusts God. Even when her home is
destroyed, she is taken from her family and she has been sold into slavery she
still has faith in God. And her faith
has healed her; healed her of her hard feelings; healed her of her hurt; healed
her of her anger. And it has given her
compassion, compassion enough to wish that her captor be well, healed enough to
share with him information about her God and God’s prophet in her homeland that
could save his life. She has faith and
her faith heals her.
Not
only is this little girl healed but Naaman, is also healed. He has to trust God in a completely different
way. He has to trust what this little
girl has to say about God and God’s prophet.
He has to trust this prophet, which for the people of that day was as
good as trusting God. He had to trust
God when he is asked to do something ridiculous. He has to have faith that God
can work through this prophet without the prophet even giving him as much as a,
“Hi, how are ya doing?” He had to have
faith that getting into the dirty Jordan River would bring God’s healing into
his life. His faith healed him as well.
I don’t
know what all you have been through today.
I don’t know what all may have happened in your lives. Things may be going quite well for you, life
may be on an up swing, or maybe not.
There may be any number of things in your life which need the healing
touch of God. You may be like this
little girl. It seems that nothing has
ever gone right for you. Life keeps
dealing you one bad hand on top of another.
You may not actually be a slave in a foreign land but some pretty bad
things have happened. You are
angry. You have every right to be angry.
You are hurt. You have every right to be
hurt. But you don’t have to live in your
anger and hurt. You can give them to
God, you can allow God to take them from you, simply by trusting and having
faith. God can’t change what has
happened to you but God can take those bad things and use them for good. All you need to do is trust and have faith
and allow God to work through you to accomplish God’s will and God’s work and
it is through that faith and through that trust that you can be healed.
You
may be like Naaman, life was going well but then a curve ball got thrown at you
and you don’t know what to do with it.
Something completely beyond your control has thrown a wrench in the
machinery of your life. You don’t know
what to do. You have tried everything,
nothing has worked. You wish that some
religious nut would come and do something spectacular to heal the broken and
sick parts of your life, but the answers you seem to be getting from God are
not satisfactory. They are not the
things that you expected. You wanted
your healing to come one way and God is giving it to you in another. Again, all you need to do is trust God, have
faith in God and do what you are called to do.
Accept God’s healing, God’s way.
I
don’t know what kind of healing you need this morning; physical, emotional,
spiritual, but I know I can say one thing.
You can be healed but you must have faith. You must trust in God and trust in God’s
ways. No matter who you are, no matter
what is going on or has gone on in your life there is only one thing that can
ultimately bring you to a place of healing in your life and that is faith.
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