Our scripture reading this morning comes out of the book of 2 Kings, 2 Kings, chapter 5, with this account of Naaman the Syrian. We will read verses 1 through 19. 2nd Kings chapter 5 verses 1 through 19. Let's give our attention to the word of the Lord. Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master and in high favor, 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 was in Samaria, he would cure him of his leprosy. So Naaman went in and told his Lord, thus and so spoke 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 ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold, and ten changes of clothes. And he brought the letter to the king of Israel, which read, When this letter reaches you, know that I have sent to you Naaman, my servant, that you may cure him of his leprosy. And when the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, Am I God to kill and to make alive that this man sends word to me to cure a man of his leprosy? Only consider and see how he is seeking a quarrel with me. But when Elisha, the man of God, heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, he said to the king, saying, Why have you torn your clothes? Let him now 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 seven times, and your flesh shall be restored, and you shall be clean. 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 the Abana and Farpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the 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 the prophet has spoken to you. Will you not do it? Has he actually said to you, Wash and be clean? So he went down and dipped himself seven times in the joy. According to the word of the man of God, and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child when he was clean. Then he 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. Then Naaman said, If not, please let there be given to your servant two mules' load of earth, for from now on your servant will not offer burnt offering 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 Ramon to worship there, leaning on my arm, when I bow myself in the house of Ramon, when I bow myself in the house of Ramon, the Lord pardoned your servant in this manner. He said to him, go in peace. May the Lord bless the hymn of this word. Well, I'm not sure how much you take the time throughout the course of a week to reflect upon how great and wonderful the Lord has been to you in his gospel and his mercy. But as I grow in the ministry and as I grow as a pastor, one of the things that has become really clear to me is the single great truth of what Jesus said to Zacchaeus. The Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost. I love that verse. That has just been the reality. Looking at it from my perspective, had the Lord not relentlessly pursued me, had the Lord not come after me with grace, had He not in sovereign power and in sovereign love reached His hand down and pulled me out of the darkness, I would still be there. I would still be there. From the beginning, as a child, he marked me with his sign, and all throughout the story of my own life is that whenever I wanted to walk away from the Lord, whenever I wanted to pursue a path of darkness, he never let me get very far. He was going to bring me home, kicking and screaming, even if that's how I came. That's how it's been. That's what he's done. The whole way is a testimony of grace. The whole way is a testimony of sovereign power to preserve and to hold. Anyone who understands their sin, anyone who understands the depravity of their own hearts cannot argue with this. My story is your story. The blessing that I've received is the blessing that you've received. And if you're here as a true worshiper in spirit and in truth, you've come because you're overwhelmed with gratitude for what Christ has done for you. That's why you're here. That's why you worship. That's where this text is going to end us today. And sometimes, as we go through, we need to be reminded of just how simple and how beautiful this gospel message is. We tend to make things very difficult. We tend to make things very muddled. And here the Lord wants us to see his sovereign power working in somebody so long ago to believe the gospel. What he did. How he brought him to that place. How he saved man in Syria. This is what the Apostle reminded the church in Thessalonica, and it becomes our reminder today. We are bound to give thanks to God always for you, brethren, beloved by the Lord, because God from the beginning chose you for salvation through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth, to which he has called you by our gospel for the obtaining of the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that a wonderful, wonderful verse? I want us this morning to see afresh this gospel, see that truth of God laying his sovereign power and hand upon somebody to save. And as we see that, that we would respond today in the very same way that Naaman responded. The Lord is giving us this whole snapshot, this whole Old Testament story to teach us of the Christian gospel that we might be here today as the same kind of worshiper Naaman was, to be one who in gratitude worshiped his Christ in spirit. Let's open this up. Let's look at this this morning. In verse 1, it's an amazing little account that's given here with detail about Naaman and Assyria. You have some remarkable things said about Naaman. Now, Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Assyria, was a great and honorable man in the eyes of his master because by him, the Lord had given victory to Assyria. He was a mighty man of, it says, valor. This was quite a guy. This was quite a figure. The text can't say it any more clearly. This is within just a few sentences. We have every accomplishment set before us that we could only dream of accomplishing in life. He was the commander-in-chief of the powerful Syrian army at the time. Naaman was ruling. Naaman was leading that army into great victories. And you'll notice it says that he was great and honorable. This man was lifted up, literally, is how it reads. He was lifted up in the sight of all the people. And what we see here is that behind the scenes, the Lord was working through Naaman to give Syria these victories. Even though Naaman did not see that, everyone looked at Naaman as a sort of god, as a powerful military figure. You think of all the military figures of our day who we hold in high esteem because of the battles they won. This was Naaman. Valor here is an interesting choice. It means strength, but wealth. You can think about how much this man had accomplished and how much he had done. There's really nothing more life Naaman the Syrian could have accomplished. He arrived. He got it. If this is sitting in our terms, he is living the American dream, isn't he? He's living the American dream. What an accomplished figure. What a man of integrity. What a hard worker. Everyone knew Naaman the Syrian. Everyone spoke well of Naaman. He had prestige. He had power. He had position. He got it. This is somebody in our society like a Trump, everyone looks to. A Fortune 500 guy. Now, if the text stopped here, wouldn't be much of a story, would it? A lot of people like this. They've accomplished a lot more. Coming from Linda, I've passed by a lot on the freeways around here. I think probably fit name and well. At the very end of this long list of accomplishments one of the worst things is said about naming that could possibly be said after this list it says but he was a leprosy we really can't get a sense of just how repulsive this was to the Jews and if you know anything of the Old Testament and the laws about leprosy it was an awful sin it was an infectious disgusting disease characterized by large scabs and sores. The skin would turn white beneath. And eventually, those parts of the body would fall off and die. You stung. No one wanted to come near you in its worst forms and in its most advanced cases. Highly infectious, it spread even to the bone. You couldn't even look upon it. If you look upon some pictures of lepers, we've all but eliminated it here in our society in time. But if you do look at pictures of lepers, You'll see how repulsive this was to even look upon the person. This was naming so much, and he had that. I was watching an interview the other day of Magic Johnson. I used to really love watching Magic Johnson play ball when I was a kid. It was interesting that this post was working through all of Magic Johnson's accomplishments. And forgive me, but as we went through everything that Magic Johnson did, at the end of it, I couldn't help. It was just maybe my own sinful self, but I couldn't help but thinking, he's got the virus. And there's nothing he can do about that. It's going to get him. And then what? What is Magic going to do then? What do all the accomplishments mean then? The virus has got Magic. And that's just what I thought. It reminded me a lot of this account of Naaman. Now, what do we have here? Well, if we understand at all the whole teaching of Scripture, what the Bible is doing, what the Lord is doing for us in this account is giving us a powerful illustration of what sin is like before him. Powerful illustration. The sickness in the Bible often is treated, and especially this particular disease of leprosy, is treated as kind of a parable of sin and death. You run across this constantly in the scriptures. And these physical conditions often in the scriptures are teaching us something about the spiritual condition. Over and over we see this in the Gospels. And the text is showing us something that is just as common today as it was back then. That the most accomplished in this world, the most successful in this world, The most respected, the most honorable, the most lifted up, the people that we esteem the highest and the most have a grievous infection before God that makes them absolutely repulsive to him. That's what it's being exposed to. And what it's doing is that it's doing nothing but constantly working death in them. The text seems to indicate that Naaman had tried everything. I was about to go to Israel to find the remedy, but I'm reminded as the Gospels continue to show us these stories and these same truths of that woman who had a flow of blood. And it said that she had, over and over, all she had done, suffered many things from many physicians, and she spent all that she had, and she was, no, better, but rather the worse. This is an extremely important section to understand that though Naaman had everything in life, his condition rendered him a completely unhappy man. Unhappy. Naaman had every recourse to buy it, of course. You'll notice the emphasis here on how much he had brought with him to buy this healing, to get this healing. He brought ten shekels. He brought changes of clothing. Whoever was going to offer him the healing, he would give. He would give back. He would buy it and get it. He has much to offer. The problem is no one can do it. This is the problem about sin. The reality about sin. All of us, by nature, are trying desperately to fill that void. Oh, God, it's all there. We're trying to fill that void with something other than Christ. And so we go through life and it's full of pains and sufferings and we do everything we can because of what sin has brought to try to numb that, to try to fill that, to try to temporarily cover that. And we've got a million things and a million things that we can buy and buy into and a million idols to jump to just to get some kind of temporary relief from the burden that this has all caused. I remember when Jesus dealt with the woman at the well and he had to observe that she was jumping around from man to man to man to man and that this was like jumping around the fountain to fountain to fountain to fountain and she was never being filled. She was thirsty. She was intensely thirsty and only Christ could give her the living water she needed to be truly satisfied, to be truly healed, to be truly born again. Well, the Lord gives us this glimpse here in 2 Kings chapter 5 of what he has to do in the heart to bring someone to this place, to receive the gospel, the good news. So notice verse 2. We read that the Syrians have gone out on raids, and in the process of these raids, they had brought back a young captive slave girl from the land of Israel. I could have a whole sermon on prophets here, but she waited on Naaman's wife, didn't she? And this slave girl observed the struggle of Naaman. As she observed the struggle, she makes an offhanded comment to Naaman's wife. And she says, oh, if only my servant, my master, were with the prophet who is in Samaria, for he would heal him of his leprosy. So Naaman hears this, and he goes to the king. And the king in turn sends a kind of threatening letter to the king of Israel, and you'll notice how pointed and directed it is. This is not really an option for the king of Israel. Be advised, O king of Israel, when this letter comes to you, I have sent Naaman, my servant, so that you may heal him of his leprosy. So Naaman leaves and he departs off to the land of Israel. And he takes, you'll notice there, all sorts of silver and gold and ten changes of clothing to present, to get this healing. Shouldn't pass too quickly over this account of this little slave girl, should we? Amazing little inclusion, isn't it? Little slave girl, we don't even have her name. Here we have kings and letters and trying to get solutions. and the top-ranking official in the Syrian army and riches and gold and status and wealth and valor and strength and everything you could possibly name under the sun. And you have to pause and you have to think about this single question, where did the answer come from? Interesting, isn't it? This is just how God works. This is how the whole Bible has presented our Lord in how he works. You see what he's doing? The answer could have come from a million different places. There could have been a million different means. But here a total unlikely slave girl, if it's a servant, a slave girl, weak, powerless, a nobody, not even named, presents the source. Now, I pause and I think about that. And I think about the whole work of salvation and about grace and about the gospel. It has to be other work. No one could ever say that they brought this about because man would never stoop low enough because of pride and because of who he is, because of sin. He would never stoop low enough to listen to a little girl who presents the place to go to get it. We would never look there for the answers to our problems. We mock these kind of positions. She has an apron on. God could have sent Elijah to Naaman's doorstep. But here, the Lord is using this little girl to point Naaman to the place of healing. Think about this whole thing. The principle that Paul had to reiterate to the church in Corinth who was getting caught up and tampering with things and trying to be a relevant church in such a relevant culture and how are they going to keep the youth and how are they going to do all these things, right? Very things we struggle with today. The apostles had to remind the church in Corinth a fundamental principle about gospel ministry right at the beginning in 1 Corinthians chapter 1 that God has chosen the foolish things of this world to put to shame the wise. Remember that? God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty and the base things of the world and the things which are despised. God has chosen and the things which are not to bring to nothing the things which are. Naaman is and God's bringing him to nothing. That no flesh should let glory in his presence. We should remember this. And what's coming out here, what the Lord is showing us, that often the things that we esteem the least, the people we esteem the least, the pastors that we esteem the least, the messages that we esteem the least, are the greatest often of God's answer to us. Because through them, the most unlikely of answers, he's demonstrating his power. And we're going to see that right now, where the power is, where it came from. What happens? Elisha hears how the king of Israel responded to the letter from the king of Syria, tearing his clothes and acting in total unbelief. And Elisha says to him, why have you torn your clothes? In verse 8, let him come to me and he shall know that there is a prophet in Israel. So we read that Naaman went with his horses and his chariots and he's got a grand escort, right? And he comes and he sparks them all right at the door of Elisha's house. That must have been an amazing sight to behold It's a real moment The most powerful military commander of the day Shows up with all of his armed servants And all of the war chariots And they stop right at God's servant's house The prophet of the Lord What does Elisha do? What do you think Elisha should do? I love verse 10 Verse 10 is such an amazing verse, isn't it? That Elisha sends a messenger. Elisha sends a messenger. And what does the messenger say? Go and wash in the Jordan seven times and you shall be clean. What strikes me there, he didn't even come out the door. Elisha stays in his house. And he sends a lowly servant out, a voice, that's all it is, a voice, with a message. I mean, this is becoming clear. You have to think about it. Put yourself in Naaman's shoes just for a moment. Think about Naaman just for a second here. Feel the anger. Look at verse 11. But Naaman became furious and went away and said, Indeed, I said to myself, he will surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God and wave his hand over the place and heal the leprosy. Well, Naaman had expectations, didn't he? Naaman had expectations about how he was going to be healed. If I'm to come to Israel, if I'm to come on this soil and to this great prophet of Israel. I expect things, after all. I've come with my money. I've come with my pomp and my prestige. I've got a lot to offer. This Elisha had better come out and he better heal me just as I've decided he should heal me. This is what I expect. This is what we should do. And so here comes the presidential house court. Here comes hall of the leaders. Here's where they come and they're parked right in front of Elisha's lowly little house. And Elisha doesn't come out. There's no pomp. There's nothing exciting about this. There's nothing overwhelming about this. He doesn't even come out and greet him. Come on. Naaman says, I want to see the power. I want to experience here. So in terms of Naaman's healing, they are his own. His own way, his own method, his own means, all in a way that preserves Naaman's own honor, right? Naaman had tried everything, and now this lowly prophet from Israel doesn't even come out to greet me. And does he know who's come to his house? Has he even thought through who has stepped on his doorstep? He tells me to go where? He wants me to go out to that filthy little Jordan River and stand in that river and dip down in that to be cleaned. So think of the scenario so far of what the Lord showed you. An unlikely answer through this little slave girl, now an unlikely solution through a total unlikely figure which requires a total humbling of name. His pride is totally exposed. His self-esteem, by the way, is real hurt, which is a good thing. And he's deeply enraged by the solution. I don't need that. Then comes verse 12. Are not the Abana and the Farpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than the waters of Israel? Could I not wash them down and be clean? So he turns away, and he goes in rage. The rivers of Damascus were powerful rivers. They were flowing rivers. They were really nice rivers. And then when you compare that to this little Jordan River, the Jordan River was muddy, it was dirty, it was not an attractive river. I will not stoop down and go to the Jordan. There's no way I'm out of here. The mighty nations of Egypt, the Chaldea and Syria, are better than Israel anyways. I'm not stooping down into this little insignificant water of Jordan. Did you know about 200, I don't know, maybe it's 200 miles from here? I grew up in the Central Valley. Did you know there's a big hole up there? It's called the Central Valley. It's not a nice place. A lot of cows there. And in the middle of this little town where I grew up, right on the experts, is a little river called the King's River. And I see River and Canada's here. You only catch carp out of that thing. You don't catch salmon. It's an awful place. This would be like telling a USC medical center patient who has cancer to drive up to that place that big hole north of us and go dip down in that awful King's River. No way. I'm not going there. This is me. Full of pride. He'll have nothing of it. That's ridiculous. And that's what happens. He turns around and he goes home. He goes away from the one who can heal. He turns right away like the rich young ruler, right? He's gone. And then, one of the most powerful statements in this whole section is here. Notice again who speaks to Naaman. It's his servants. His servants now. So you have a slave girl, you're at the house of a lonely prophet, His servant comes out, and now Naaman's servant speak. Slave, slave, slave, slave speak. Notice the response. My father, if the prophets had told you to do something great, I think your translation is a great word, would you not have done it? How much more when he says to you than wash and be clean? It really comes to us as a question, doesn't it? If he would have told you to go do something hard to do, In the Hebrew, it's difficult. It means a difficult word. If he would have given you a difficult task, a difficult word, wouldn't you have tried it? But he's just telling you, wash. That's all he's saying. Just wash in the drawer. Go do it. So, how do you understand that? Elisha was saying that if he had told you to do the hard work of the law, They were saying, if Elisha had told you to go try to do the law, if Elisha had told you to go climb Mount Carmel 10 times, if Elisha had told you to circle down to Egypt 20 times, if Elisha had told you to try to keep the Ten Commandments, you would have tried it, wouldn't you? You'd try to keep their law. But all he's saying is, wash and be clean. You just see the fundamental difference between the law and the gospel. You just go. We will try anything in our own money, our own works, to cleanse ourselves, and if not, to get out of it. And if Naaman had been told, we'll give all your money to the poor, I think he would have tried it. But submit this simple message. Think about it today. Think of how blessed we are. This is where it's all going to go. To submit to this simple message of gospel that says, Go wash in the Jordan, and you will be cleansed. Unthinkable! And there you've got the whole Christian gospel set right in front of you. You see, this is a passage that teaches us that the Lord comes to us, and he comes to us without any partiality, and it clears away, this passage totally clears away all the surface that we're good at. You know, the surface stuff that we're good at. I always say in Linden, they have beautiful windmills, but they're really hollow on the inside. The outside, they're gorgeous. And this is what the Lord deals with, doesn't it? It says, no matter who you are, whether you're Donald Trump or you're a little slave girl, you are in need and all are under sin. And that is the message. And we tell them, as gospel ministers, we tell them, come to Christ. Believe in Christ. And people today have all their great ways of getting their own deliverance. Look around. Boys and girls, look at all the world religions. And the high school students, when I was a Bible teacher, they used to always ask, well, how do we know all these world religions aren't right? Because they all are climbing the ladder to God themselves, presenting their own righteousness, which cannot stand. It cannot heal. Nothing anyone does can heal. And what do we do? We stand up and we point them to Bethlehem. We say, Bethlehem, the least of all the cities, out of there comes who? Out of there comes one born not in a king's town, but in a stadium, a feeding trough. And he grew up and despised Nazareth, Like him at an awful place, right? He rode not on a white stallion, but on a donkey. He was despised and rejected of men. Our Lord was not a good-looking man. Our Lord was not desirable to look upon. And when he was lifted up, it wasn't first to a throne, was it? He was first to a cross. And he had to go through an excruciating agony that when the Christians, early Christians, had to go out and proclaim that, that message was so foolish. How could anyone believe that? And those dead in trespasses won't in sin. But it is the power of God to save us from our leprosy. The waters of the Jordan are the most unattractive. And yet they're God's answer to name. And nothing makes Jesus attractive to the natural man. No matter how relevant we are today, people are just as insulted as ever by the solution. This is the challenge of gospel ministry. And no matter how hard it gets to continue to give this message, we've got to give it. Because the results are the Lord's anyways. If the Spirit is not at work in someone's heart to receive the truth, you can't change that. And we say this message, we say there's nothing you can do to please God. And all of your righteousness is filthy and you're under the wrath of God because of sin. And we give a simple message and the goal is always salvation. The goal is not condemnation, the goal is gospel, the goal is salvation. We say come to Christ, believe in Christ, receive the forgiveness that he gives. Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give you rest. And how many hear that? And what do they do today? They storm off in rage. It's just true. Everyone wants to go to heaven. They just want to go to their first class, right? Surely they will come if the healing is their way. Surely they will come if by their good moral lives and their good law-keeping efforts they can get into heaven. Naaman says, how about this one? If he just waved his hand, if I just saw a little bit more excitement from this whole thing, if I just saw a little more factor, exciting factor from it, just wave it, show me that, I'll believe it. And we today are obsessed with magic workers in the church. We are obsessed with ministers who give us the great wow. We're obsessed with those who act like they can give us the grace. That's what we want. By their creativity and their wisdom and their personality, they can win souls for Jesus. And what does Elisha show us? Well, he shows us Christ. But he also shows us that we in this pulpit are just a voice. We're just a voice. We give a message. We remain hidden. We are heralds of the cross and we don't feed self-righteousness in people by acting as if your own good works will save. We say with the prophets, Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters. You who have no money, come, buy and eat. Yes, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Why do you spend money for what is not bread and your wages for what does not satisfy. Listen carefully to me. Eat what is good and I will let your soul delight itself in abundance. And this is where the Lord sends us today. He sends us today to the little insignificant Jordan. What a simple gospel. He sends us to Jesus and Jesus extends those arms and He washes us clean from all of our sins. And you'll notice that verse 14. So he went down, he had to humble himself. He had to go down into the Jordan and he kneeled and he dipped seven times according to the saying of the man of God and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child. He was born again, right then and there. And it required faith. That's it. He couldn't work. He had to go down believing because somebody else had to wash him. Washed in Christ's blood and his flesh became like that of a little child. And I'm reminded of Jesus who said that whoever does not enter the kingdom as a little child will by no means enter. You need to be born again. You need to be regenerated. So Naaman is healed, and I want you to notice verse 15. He returned to the man of God, he all his aides, and he came and stood before him and said, notice the confession, now I know that there is no God in all the earth except in Israel. Please take a gift from your servant. And I see our time's running, but I want you to think about this. The whole thing turns into worship. Maybe in this thing, we're going to come back tonight, and this will be a good follow-up to this message on worship. But I want to close with this this morning. You know, Jesus applied this. Jesus applied this. One day, ten lepers came to him, didn't they? He healed them. He was constantly dealing with the problem of leprosy. and what happened is that along the way they all were healed and one of them when he saw that he was healed returned and what did he do? Gave glory to God and it's an amazing passage because what it says is here's what it reads he returned, this is worship with a loud voice and glorified God and fell down on his face and his feet giving him thanks that's what we do That's what we do. And Jesus chided the Jews over Naaman the Syrian. You know, he mentioned Naaman the Syrian. You know what Jesus said about Naaman the Syrian? He said, after they rejected, there were many lepers in Israel, but none of them was healed except Naaman the Syrian. They didn't believe. Now I want you to think today about how blessed you are in closing. The Lord's worked this faith in you. He's given you grace to stand. He's loved you. You believe the gospel? You believe the gospel. Do you understand that you've gone down into that Jordan? You've been washed by Christ's blood. You've been forgiven. You are loved. Nothing can separate you from that love. And he wants you today to reflect on that. I'm going to come back tonight and bless his name in worship. Amen. Heavenly Father, we are so grateful for your wonderful love. Sovereign grace. that you reached down and pulled us out of the darkness. Thank you for loving us with that kind of love. Forgive our pride. We are so prideful. We need daily, daily to come to Christ. Thank you, O Lord, that you have done this and that in sovereign grace you have brought us into the light and forgiven us all of our sins. Encourage your people with these thoughts greatly today. And may they always remember what a privilege it is to come to worship and to bow down and to bless the Lord our God. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.