Grace, Grace, and More Grace
Download MP3If you have a bible, I invite you to turn to 2nd Kings, chapter 5. 2nd Kings 5. If you had your worship guides with you, you would see that the title for this morning's message is grace, grace, and more grace. Because I don't know about you, but over this past week, I have, I've seen a lot of gloating. I have seen a lot of grieving, a lot of griping.
Joel Brooks:I'm Baptist. I have to make them rhyme. But I I haven't really seen much grace. And we are a people in particular need of grace. So 2nd Kings, chapter 5.
Joel Brooks:And while you're turning there, I'm going to read to you just 2 verses from Luke, chapter 4. This is Jesus speaking. Says, and there were many lepers in Israel in the time of the prophet Elisha, And none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian. And when they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. 2nd Kings chapter 5.
Joel Brooks:We'll read the first 14 verses. Naaman, the commander of the army of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master, and in high favor. Be because by him, the Lord had given victory to Syria. He was a mighty man of valor, but he was a leper. Now the Syrians, on one of their raids, had carried off a little girl from the land of Israel, and she worked in the service of Naaman's wife, she said to her mistress, would that my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria, he would cure him of leprosy.
Joel Brooks:So Naaman went in and told his lord, thus and so spoke the the girl from the land of Israel. And the king of Syria said, go now, and I will send a letter to the king of Israel. So he went, taking with him 10 talents of silver, 6,000 shekels of gold, and 10 changes of clothing. And he brought the letter to the king of Israel which read, when this letter reaches you, know that I have sent you Naaman, my servant, that you may cure him of his leprosy. And when the king of Israel read this letter, he tore his clothes and he said, am I God to kill and to make alive that this man sends word to me to cure a man of leprosy?
Joel Brooks:Only consider and see how he is seeking a quarrel with me. But when Elijah, the man of God, heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, he sent to the king saying, why have you torn your clothes? Let him come to me that he may know that there is a prophet in Israel. So Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and stood at the door of Elisha's house. And Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, go and wash in the Jordan 7 times, and your flesh shall be restored, and you shall be clean.
Joel Brooks:But Naaman was angry, and went away saying, behold, I thought he would surely come out to me and stand and call upon the name of the Lord his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper? Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean? So he turned and went away in a rage. But his servants came near and said to him, my father, it is a great word that the prophet had spoken to you.
Joel Brooks:Would you not do it? Has he actually said to you, wash and be clean? So he went down and he dipped himself 7 times in the Jordan, according to the word of the man of God, And his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean. This is the word of the Lord. Praise to you.
Joel Brooks:If you would pray with me. Father, we ask that you would open up your word to us, because we need to hear from you. Your word brings life. Other words bring death, but yours bring life into us. So come and speak and breathe in our midst.
Joel Brooks:May my words fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore. But Lord, may your words remain and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. So the story begins with a description of 2 people.
Joel Brooks:2 people who could not be any more different from one another. First, we're introduced to Naaman. He was the general of the, the most dominant power of the day, Assyria. He had led Assyria to many victories, he had conquered countless people. He had also led many successful raids into Israel itself.
Joel Brooks:And because of all of these things, he was a man held in high regard both by his people and by his king. And he was also considered one of Israel's fiercest enemies. This was a man, when you think of him, he is a man who just exudes power. A man used to having his own way both at home and abroad. Now what's startling about all of this is we are given this one little detail that the source of all of this power and success has actually been the Lord.
Joel Brooks:The Lord himself has been giving him these victories, even victories over Israel. The Lord has been at work in his life, even though by all indications, Naaman doesn't seem to have the slightest clue that it's the lord at work in his life. I'm sure that he thinks just like all of us think that our success, all of our honors, everything that we have we have in this life, we've earned. We've achieved it. It's all been a result of hard work and effort.
Joel Brooks:But here, we are given a little glimpse behind the curtain, and we are we see that the Lord has actually been behind it all. God has been gracious to him, whether he knows it or not. And so one of the things we learn right here at the start of this story is that that God uses people whether they are aware of it or not, even violent and evil men. There is no person, there is no situation that is outside of God's control. The other important detail that we learn about Naaman besides that he's a general and he's powerful is that he also had leprosy.
Joel Brooks:Leprosy was just a terrible disease. It's likely only in the beginning stages here, because Naaman can still go to work, but he knows that the clock is ticking. This will kill him. And he realizes that despite all of his achievements, all of his wealth, all of his hard earned respect and power, despite all of those things, he was going to die. And not just die.
Joel Brooks:This wasn't gonna be dying an honorable death. He he was gonna die unclean. He's gonna die as a social outcast. He would have been cast outside the city. He would have had to live in a leper camp.
Joel Brooks:And think of it. This is a person who used to enjoy all the high class parties. He was the one who used to receive all the honors, go to all the banquets, and now he's a social outcast. His power and his fame would not be able to save him. And this had to be a devastating blow.
Joel Brooks:But just as the Lord had been at work in his success, we see that the Lord was also at work in his sickness. Because working in this house, we see that there's this little servant girl, and she stands in stark contrast to Naaman. She has absolutely no power, no status. She is she is what you think is the the very definition of someone who has been oppressed. She's actually been she was taken from one of Israel's, one of the times that Israel had been raided by by Naaman's party himself.
Joel Brooks:Naaman being the enemy commanding general who had gone and had taken her. I mean, just just think of that. Think of horrible this girl's life was. She'd been violently ripped away from her home, and now she was having to serve the very commander who had likely slaughtered her parents, the very commander who had kidnapped her. I can't even imagine the the trauma that this girl had experienced.
Joel Brooks:Now you would expect upon hearing those two things, those two people being described, you would expect that when this little girl hears that her master has received this this, mortal sickness, her reaction would be, yes. Justice. I hope he rots in hell for all he has done to me and my family. I mean, you'd you'd expect that. There's not a person in here who would actually criticize her if that had been her response.
Joel Brooks:You'd get it. After all, that's how oppressed people respond when their oppressors finally receive justice. Yes. Finally getting what you deserve. But what we see here in this little girl is grace.
Joel Brooks:Such a remarkable grace. And I I believe this is one of the reasons we have this story in our bible. She actually has compassion for her master and she doesn't wanna see him suffer. Before we go any further, let's let me ask you the question. How does that make you feel?
Joel Brooks:How does it how does that rub you? I mean, if at work, a, a coworker steals one of your brilliant ideas, what do you pray for? Do you pray that they would get a promotion because of it? Do you pray that they would get a pay raise? Or do you pray that the person gets fired?
Joel Brooks:Do you ask for justice? If you were a parent, and someone says something critical about your parenting techniques, I know that this rarely ever happens, but, you know, they might just say, oh, you decide to, to spank your child. How barbaric. We just use positive reinforcement and give out lollipops constantly. How many of you secretly rejoice when their child throws a tantrum, or or or not so secretly?
Joel Brooks:Anybody here ever have that glorious feeling of someone coming up right behind you as you're driving down the highway? They tailgate you. Their brights are on. You can hardly see anything. After a few miles, they finally just zip right past you, and then they get pulled over.
Joel Brooks:And you just kinda slow down, because you're just really admiring justice, not vengeance at this point, isn't it? You slow down, you lower your window, you you wave with a few less fingers, and all because you're you're really passionate about justice. It has nothing to do about vengeance, does it? No, we we delight in those things because the hard truth is our hearts are just as evil as theirs. It's the reason we gloat.
Joel Brooks:It's the reason we love instant karma. When we are wrong, we delight at the downfall of those who have wronged against us. And it's not because we are rejoicing in justice. We rejoice because our hearts are evil. However, if we understand that we have been saved by grace, that ultimately everything we are, every good thing we are has come to us as a gift from the Lord, and that we have never done anything to deserve his good gifts, then we can never never exalt ourselves over another another.
Joel Brooks:We can never somehow think that we are better, we are more deserving. Once grace has been poured into our lives, we must in return then pour out this grace into other people's lives. God's grace spills out from us to others. And here we see such grace in this little girl. I mean, far from delighting in the suffering of of her master, she hurts for him, and she tells him that she knows of a prophet who could heal him.
Joel Brooks:Can I give just a little aside to the parents here? This is a little girl who who lost her parents at a a way too early age, And I'm sure that these parents, they wanted to watch her grow up. They wanted to, to be there for all of the big and the small events in her life, and they never got the chance to do that. They also never got the chance to give her any inheritance. But what we actually see here is she did bring something from her parents into this pagan land.
Joel Brooks:She did have an inheritance, and it was a spiritual one. Her parents had taught her about the Lord. She knew 3 very important things. She knew that there was a God who spoke through his prophets. She knew that there was a God who heals people.
Joel Brooks:And she knew that she was expressed love for even her enemies. She knew those three things, and can I tell you that is an incredible spiritual inheritance? As a parent, I cannot think of anything I would rather hand down to my children. Who cares about all of the stuff that we will someday hand down? It's the spiritual heritage that matters.
Joel Brooks:Here, we see those things had been instilled in her at an early age. It's all she has left. Now when Naaman here, he hears about this little girl's words. He he hears about the prophet. He he immediately goes to his king, and he asks permission to go to this man, and the king says go, and he sends with him this huge entourage and a boatload of money in order to pay for the healing.
Joel Brooks:And so he goes off to Israel, he finds Elisha, he he knocks on the door, and he gets the first of what will be several blows to his pride. Elijah Elijah, he hears the knocking. He knows it's Naaman there at the door, and Elisha won't even get off the couch. Just lays there. Sends a servant.
Joel Brooks:Sends a servant to the door, and the servant probably says something like, hey, I'm sorry. I know you've come an awful long way to see Elisha. He's really busy at the moment, but he did give me a message for you. He said, after such a long journey, you need to go and take a bath in the Jordan. I mean, it certainly seems here that Elisha is just blowing him off.
Joel Brooks:Not only does he not come to the door, but then the command that he gives is just utterly ridiculous. This is the equivalent of going to the hospital with cancer. And instead of a doctor coming to see you, the doctor sends an assistant to tell you to go home and take 2 aspirin. I mean, if if that were to happen to you, what would your response be? No.
Joel Brooks:Excuse me. Can I talk to an actual doctor? Can I get some real medicine here? Don't treat me like that. I mean, Naaman here, he's understandably furious.
Joel Brooks:I mean, he'd expected to come out and do whatever prophets do. You could tell he's not really sure what a prophet does. He just says, I thought he'd come out and, like, wave his hands around. Wave his hands and, you know, call on the Lord, and I'd be cured. Instead, he tells me to go bathe in a dirty river.
Joel Brooks:Bathing in the Jordan wouldn't cure him of poison ivy, let alone leprosy. I've been to the Jordan River, and, it is so dirty that if you put your feet in it, you can no longer see your feet. You are more likely to get a disease from bathing in that river than healed. And so Naaman is furious. Although it's a simple thing he's been asked, in his pride, he won't do it.
Joel Brooks:He he walks away. And and this is what we really have going on here. This is what we really see when we were to look at the life of Naaman. Naaman is a guy who thought he could earn his salvation, just like he had earned everything else in his life, or thought he had earned everything else in his life. He wanted to get his salvation just like he got his status.
Joel Brooks:Work for it. He was ready to pay a tremendous price for it. I mean, he had cartloads of money, had all the the latest designer fashion ready to give away for it. He's prepared to do some great deed for it. I mean he understands how things like this works.
Joel Brooks:I mean normally you're supposed to do some great task to show your worth. Somehow that, you know, you're worthy of being healed, because all the legends work that way. You know, like Hercules expected to capture the Cretan bull, kill the 9 headed, hydra. Dorothy's supposed to go and bring back the the broom of the wicked witch of the west. I mean, you gotta go do something big.
Joel Brooks:Show your worth. Show you're worthy. But to go and bathe in the river Jordan, well, anybody could do that. Absolutely anyone. I mean, to go and bathe in the Jordan was to accept that he can no longer look down on anybody.
Joel Brooks:It was to acknowledge that all of his honor, all of his wealth, all of his power were worthless before God, that he could bring nothing to the table. God was going to heal him to save him just by his pure grace. You have heard me say this, several times, and I will say it again. But in regards to your salvation, the only thing that you bring to the table is your sin and the need to be forgiven. In regards to Naaman's healing, the only thing he brought to the table was his leprosy and his need to be rid of it.
Joel Brooks:You see, before God, no one stands on a pedestal over another. Everyone is the same. Everyone is a sinner. Everyone is saved by grace. If you've been going to church your whole life, you have your entire life walked little old ladies across the street.
Joel Brooks:You have done every good deed you can imagine. All those things, you know what? You are saved by grace. If you're a prostitute, if you're the drug dealer who's never stepped foot in a church, you were saved by grace. Do you see how humbling that is?
Joel Brooks:I mean, Christian, we can never look down on another person. You can never think of yourself as superior over someone else, as somehow being more deserving of God's love. You can't go around bashing people on social media, to be blunt. That has no place among the Christian. You should be the most gracious people on earth, because you alone understand that you have been saved by sheer grace.
Joel Brooks:No one stands on a pedestal before God. Have you ever noticed, like, we keep we keep hearing the same theme over and over in scripture, and it's that it's not the good that get into heaven and the bad that go to hell. It's the humble who get in, and it's the proud who are excluded. What is Naiman gonna do? Well thankfully, he's got servants who who run after him, and they convince him like, hey, just, I mean, forget about trying to do some great thing.
Joel Brooks:Just humble yourself and take the bath in the dirty river. And he does so. We read in verse 14 that his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child. He was in a very real sense born again. Both his heart and his skin were now cleansed.
Joel Brooks:Have you ever done that? And not jumping the Jordan River, but have you ever humbled yourself before God and acknowledged that there's absolutely nothing you can do to save you from your sins? If you haven't, then like Naaman, your time is ticking. And at the end, all of your money, all of your power, all of your education, all of your reputation, all the things that you have held on to so much in this life, they will be useless to you in the end. But what Jesus is offering you today is a new life if you will simply ask for it.
Joel Brooks:He will wash you of your sins. He will give you a new life. Now, most of the sermons that I have ever heard on this usually stop here. I mean, it's a good landing point. I gotta confess.
Joel Brooks:But what happens next is just fascinating. So if if I could have 5 more minutes, can I have 5 minutes? I can't see your face. I'm assuming all of you are saying, yes. Go for it.
Joel Brooks:Take 10. I'll take 5. Alright. So go back to 2nd Kings. Let's read the rest of that.
Joel Brooks:Beginning in verse 15. Then Naaman returned to the man of God, he and all his company, and he came and stood before him, and he said, behold I know that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel. So accept now a present from your servant. But he said, as the Lord lives, before whom I stand, I will receive none. And he urged him to take it, but he refused.
Joel Brooks:Then Naaman said, if not, please let there be given to your servant 2 mule loads of earth. For from now on your servant will not offer burnt offerings or sacrifice to any god but the Lord. In this matter, may the Lord pardon your servant. When my master goes into the house of Rimmon to worship there, leaning on my arm, and I bow myself in the house of Rimmon. When I bow myself in the house of Rimmon, the Lord, pardon your servant in this matter.
Joel Brooks:And he said to him, go in peace. So Naaman is just been healed. He's exploding with joy. He's converted, and then it dawns on him that his life is about to get really complicated and hard. He's returning to a job, and to a culture that involves pagan worship.
Joel Brooks:In other words, he's gonna have to return to Wall Street where everyone worships money, and he's gonna be expected to as well. He's gonna have to return back to his neighborhood where everyone worships beauty, where everyone worships sports. He's that photographer or that baker that's being asked to go and to support something that now he sees as against his faith, or that physician being asked to do a procedure or to prescribe medicine that he now believes is both harmful and wrong. In other words, if he goes back, his life is about to get really complicated and hard. And so what should he do in this moment?
Joel Brooks:I mean, should he should he not go back? Should he stay with Elijah? Just that would be a whole lot easier, or does he go back into all of that mess and try to be salt and light? He asked Elijah about it and Elijah says, go in peace or shalom. He doesn't say, you crazy?
Joel Brooks:You can't go back there. Think of what I mean think of all the situations you're gonna be put in. I mean, no, you can't stay here. Elisha doesn't say that. He says, go in peace, and by saying go in peace, he's saying, take that peace with you.
Joel Brooks:Take that peace with you back into that pagan culture. He is telling Naaman to go back into a nearly impossible situation, and to bring the peace of God there. Now in doing so, we see Naaman, he lays down some parameters. Absolutely. He says, I'm not gonna sacrifice to any pagan god.
Joel Brooks:I won't do it. There's some things he will absolutely not do. He will not make sacrifices to the idols of his culture. But there's other areas, gray areas, like helping his king kneel and worship to a pagan god, he's gonna have to do. This is what being the salt of the earth looks like.
Joel Brooks:We also talk about this often as a church, but the main role of being the salt of the earth, being salt is not that we're the spice of life. The main role of salt in this day is a preservative. Salt was utterly worthless unless it was worked into something that would rot without it. And when salt was worked into something that would rot without it, it acted as a preservative. Naaman was going back to this pagan culture to try and preserve it.
Joel Brooks:He's being salt and light here. And now to help Naaman do this, he makes this strange request. He says, can I bring back 2 mule loads of dirt? I mean, what the heck is that all about? I I have seen people, you know, go to the holy land and they, for 1, they all get rebaptized in the Jordan River.
Joel Brooks:Talk to me if you've done that. The Lord will forgive you. But other people, you know, they come back and they've gotta bring the special holy oil, you know, because it's from the holy land. They gotta bring back maybe some of the Jordan River. I don't know what you would do with that, but you bring back these little trinkets and stuff like that, but I've never seen anybody bring back just dirt.
Joel Brooks:He wants to bring back a lot of dirt from the Holy Land back home, But the reason he is doing so is, this is his gospel track. This is how he's gonna get to share the gospel with his people, because the people where he came from, they associate their gods with the earth, with the land. And by him coming in now and and bringing land from another place, he is saying that he is bringing his God, this new God back into that pagan land. And so now when the people look at him, they're gonna know 2 things. They wanna know that Naaman has been healed of his leprosy, and it was a god outside of their land, this other god they did not know who had done it.
Joel Brooks:And so now what we see actually is Naaman is becoming an instrument of God's grace. He's actually becoming just like that little servant girl. I mean, think of it. Now he's being thrown into an impossibly hard situation. Now what can he communicate?
Joel Brooks:Well, there is a God, and he's a God who heals. And he knows that it's his job to now share it with the people. Share the good news of this with everyone, however he can possibly do it. It's not a bad message for the church. Pray with me.
Joel Brooks:Lord, your people are often put in some very precarious positions, situations in which it's really hard to navigate as to what's right and what's wrong. I pray you'd give us extraordinary wisdom. Help us to find creative ways to share your gospel. Tell us where we need to take a stand. I pray that everyone around us would know that we worship a different God, and he is a God who heals, and he is a God who pours out grace even on our enemies.
Joel Brooks:May that message be loud and clear to a dark and dying world. And, god, we confess that we we deserve nothing but your wrath, but you have shown us tremendous grace. Thank you for the ways that you have forgiven us, for the way you have given us new life. And I pray that with this new life, we would live it in complete and total devotion to you. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus.
Joel Brooks:Amen.
