2 Kings 5.1-14
The Healing of Naaman
Naaman, commander
of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man and in high favour with his
master, because by him the Lord had
given victory to Aram. The man, though a mighty warrior, suffered from
leprosy. 2Now the Arameans on one of their raids had taken a
young girl captive from the land of Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife. 3She
said to her mistress, ‘If only my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria!
He would cure him of his leprosy.’ 4So Naaman went in and
told his lord just what the girl from the land of Israel had said. 5And
the king of Aram said, ‘Go then, and I will send along a letter to the king of
Israel.’
He went, taking
with him ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold, and ten sets of
garments. 6He brought the letter to the king of Israel, which
read, ‘When this letter reaches you, know that I have sent to you my servant
Naaman, that you may cure him of his leprosy.’7When the king of
Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, ‘Am I God, to give death
or life, that this man sends word to me to cure a man of his leprosy? Just
look and see how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me.’ 8 But
when Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes,
he sent a message to the king, ‘Why have you torn your clothes? Let him come to
me, that he may learn that there is a prophet in Israel.’ 9So
Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and halted at the entrance of
Elisha’s house. 10Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, ‘Go,
wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored and you shall
be clean.’ 11But Naaman became angry and went away, saying, ‘I
thought that for me he would surely come out, and stand and call on the name of
the Lord his God, and
would wave his hand over the spot, and cure the leprosy! 12Are
not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters
of Israel? Could I not wash in them, and be clean?’ He turned and went away in
a rage. 13But his servants approached and said to him, ‘Father,
if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have
done it? How much more, when all he said to you was, “Wash, and be clean”?’So
he went down and immersed himself seven times in the Jordan, according to the
word of the man of God; his flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy,
and he was clean.
1 Corinthians 9.24-27
24 Do you not
know that in a race the runners all compete, but only one receives the prize?
Run in such a way that you may win it. 25Athletes exercise
self-control in all things; they do it to receive a perishable garland, but we
an imperishable one. 26So I do not run aimlessly, nor do I box
as though beating the air; 27but I punish my body and enslave
it, so that after proclaiming to others I myself should not be
disqualified.
Mark 1.40-45
Jesus Cleanses a Leper
40 A leper came to him begging him,
and kneeling he said to him, ‘If you choose, you can make me clean.’ 41Moved
with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to
him, ‘I do choose. Be made clean!’ 42Immediately the
leprosy left him, and he was made clean.43After sternly warning
him he sent him away at once, 44saying to him, ‘See that you
say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer for your
cleansing what Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.’ 45But
he went out and began to proclaim it freely, and to spread the word, so that
Jesus could no longer go into a town openly, but stayed out in the
country; and people came to him from every quarter.
My text this
morning is written in Mark 1.41:
41Moved with
pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him,
‘I do choose. Be made clean!’
In Jesus's day, leprosy was a dreaded disease because there
was no known cure for it. Some strains were highly contagious. This had been
the case for hundreds of years as we were reminded in our Old Testament reading
this morning. The best way for us to understand what leprosy meant for the
people of that day is to compare it with AIDS in our time. Drastic measures
were required to monitor leprosy because every precaution was needed to ensure
that the disease never spread. The priests banished the infectious cases to
beyond the city boundaries, in order to avoid its spread. They also remitted
lepers whose disease was in remission. So great was the dread of this disease
that Jewish law required all sufferers to call out 'unclean' so that passers-by
could give them a wide berth. Lepers had no way of earning a living and so were
totally dependent upon charity. The psychological effects of this disease were
as serious as the physical. The people felt defiled, dirty and constantly
ashamed, even though it was not their fault.
People can feel excluded for many reasons. In our Old
Testament reading we come across a young servant girl who had been captured in
wartime and taken captive into Syria. Naaman, her master alienated himself from
others by considering himself to be better than others. He was so filled with
pride, that he almost robbed himself of God’s blessings as a result. The
Assyrian king too completely misunderstood the way to find God’s blessing; he
thought that he could order things and they would just happen as he wanted them
to happen – thinking that the things of God could be bought. But notice the
example of a young, in the eyes of the world at the time, seemingly
unimportant, yet remaining faithful to God in the ordinariness of the daily
life. And she was the source of great blessing to the people at the time, and
still us today, as we are reminded of her example.
In our Gospel reading, the man who approached Jesus was suffering
from an advanced case of leprosy. In Luke’s account the man is described as
being 'covered with leprosy'. He had more than likely lost a great deal of bodily
tissue. Leprosy destroyed nerve endings and so people unknowingly damaged
fingers, toes and noses. But still, he believed that Jesus could heal every
trace of the disease. Morris writes: ‘He had no doubt about Jesus' ability to
heal, but he was not sure whether He was willing.’ And so the man said to
Jesus: ‘If you choose, you can make me
clean.’
Notice what Jesus did for this most despised and rejected of
people. Verse 41 records: ‘Jesus touched him ...’ Jesus must have been the
first normal non-diseased person to have touched the man in years. Barclay
writes:
That is what Jesus did and does
... it is the very essence of Christianity to touch the untouchable, to love
the unloveable, to forgive the unforgivable. Jesus did and so must we.
Quite often we consider people who are diseased or
handicapped to be repulsive and untouchable. We need to touch them with the
love of Christ. Often we also feel repulsive about ourselves. We too need to
know the comfort of the touch of Christ's love.
Verse 41 continues: ‘I
do choose. Be made clean!’
Notice how the leper did something in order to receive
Christ's touch. He took himself to Jesus, probably ringing a bell and shouting
"unclean, unclean" and facing the rejection by the people. He did
what he needed to do to come to the Lord, receive his touch and be made whole
once more. How often do we deny ourselves God's blessing because we do not take
the opportunities available to us to come to Christ with our needs? How often
do we find excuses for not coming to church, for not attending bible studies,
prayer meetings and other channels whereby God administers his love and grace
to people? If we too want to be cleansed and made whole we need to take every
opportunity to come to our Lord to receive his grace.
Jesus was not yet ready to have his true identity revealed
because he knew the people would not understand and so, like the demons and
others earlier in his ministry, he told the healed man not to tell anybody
about what had happened. Jesus also told the man to go through the prescribed
procedure of being declared healthy by the priest. Here too, we learn and
important truth. Jesus still heals people today. But he also uses others to
assist in the healing process, people like doctors, nurses and other medical
professionals. We need to trust God to use whatever means He chooses to make us
well. We also need to go through the correct procedures to get confirmation
that we are well. You might remember the case in America. It was televised in
dramatised form. A diabetic child's parents believed that he had been
miraculously healed. They stopped his insulin doses and the child died. The
Christian who believes that God has healed them needs to get a doctor to
confirm that this has happened before doing anything irresponsible - or else
only they can be blamed for further suffering - not the doctors, and especially
not God.
But who could remain silent? How many of us are able to
contain good news? When something like this happens we want to tell the whole
world about it. And now we should - because our Lord has been revealed and is
risen and we take every opportunity to give all the glory to Him.
The following are a few closing thoughts to meditate on from
this passage:
Notice the man's request - it was not to be healed - it was
to be made clean. It is important to note that leprosy also symbolised
sinfulness in Jewish culture because Isaiah the prophet had made the link in
1:4-6:
Ah, sinful nation, people laden
with iniquity, offspring who do evil, children who deal corruptly, who have
forsaken the Lord, who have despised the holy one of Israel, who are utterly
estranged! Why do you seek further beatings? Why do you continue to rebel? The
whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the soul of the foot even to
the head, there is no soundness in it, but bruises and sores and bleeding
wounds; they have not been drained or bound up, or softened with oil.
Leprosy made a person isolated, not only from other people,
but also from worship. Some even went so far as to suggest that leprosy was a
sign of divine judgement for the person's disobedience[1]
and so they were outlawed from worship because they were believed to be cut off
from fellowship with God.[2]
Yet Jesus was prepared to touch him - an action that automatically meant that
Jesus made himself unclean.[3]
Over Easter we remember yet another time when Jesus was willing to become
unclean for the sake of those whom he loved - when he took upon himself the sin
of the world and was cast from the Father's presence. The leper had his
priorities right - he wanted to be restored to God, he wanted to be cleansed so
that he could enter God's presence in the temple and synagogue. Do we always
have our priorities right or do we come to our Lord with selfish motives? Is
our relationship with God and our growth in that relationship the most
important thing in our lives - or do we worship other Gods because other things
are often more important to us.
We often rob ourselves of blessing upon blessing because we
do not come to our Lord; we do not avail ourselves of his grace, especially as
we neglect our quiet time with him in silent, private prayer. We need to follow
the example of the young servant girl and the man with leprosy and take every
opportunity we can find to come to meet with our Lord and when we do we know
that he will be ...
41... moved with
pity, Jesus will stretch out his hand and touch us and say to us too: ‘I
do choose. Be made clean!’
Amen.
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