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Well good evening and howdy. It's nice to get response with that. It's always awkward when you're with a different crowd and people don't howdy back. So for those who are visiting, Pastor Tom really is the main speaker at this church. He's been out the last uh this Sunday and the previous Sunday, but please come back this coming Sunday morning and he should be continuing his series in Revelation.

So with that, my name is Noah Bittner. I'm a member here at Emmanuel Baptist Church. And I don't have anything else real special to say than that. Credentials are somewhat limited. But let's pray before we get into this. Thank you, Father, for this day, this beautiful weather, and this time that we have to get together with our fellow believers, our brothers and sisters in the faith.

I pray that I would properly preach your word, that your message would shine forth as Scripture speaks for itself, but this would function as stirring up by way of reminder as we can look back on this wonderful Old Testament story. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Am I breathing into it?

You gotta have a roadie. That's your work. Something changed. Do I sound better? We'll go with that. It feels a little better. All right, we'll go with that. So, I'd like to start with a question that I think will be helpful to have in the back of our minds as we approach this text.

What does God desire from those who seek His favor? What does God desire from those who seek His favor? Our text today will be 2 Kings chapter 5, the entire passage, 2 Kings chapter 5. So, those of us who are believers in this room can look back on Christ and His work, and we have a clear prescription of what is pleasing to God, how we come into a relationship with Him, believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, and look to Him as the perfect covering for our sins, and we will be forgiven and experience eternal life in Him.

John 5:24 says, Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes Him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life. The message is clear. But what of those before Christ's coming? It's a question that we all have to consider as post-New Testament believers, which is what we will be looking at today in 2 Kings 5.

There will be two main characters in this story: Naaman, the commander of Syria, but there's kind of a second part of the story that forms a nice contrast to his character, Gehazi, a faithless, is. Israelite. So our outline will be three responses to God's message in 2 Kings 5 so that you will rightly respond to God's Word in your life.

Three responses to God's message so that you will rightly respond to God's Word in your life. The first will be a response of faith, which will be in verse 14, a response of allegiance in verse 17, and a response of exploitation in verse 19. You may have noticed one of those is bad, the other two are good.

So faith, allegiance, and exploitation. The first 13 verses will really be kind of introduction and setting the scene as we approach this text. So with that, 2 Kings chapter 5, verse 1. 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. So this story begins in Syria, or as many of your translations may say, Aram. So if I say Syria and you're reading Aram, same thing. And I'd like to refer to Jeff's famous hand map. Those who are in the YAG group will be familiar with this map.

So if this is Israel, we have the southern kingdom, northern kingdom, kind of the Mediterranean to the west. Did I have this right? I've been practicing this. And then Syria. To the northeast. And that shares a border with the northern kingdom, which will kind of come into play with how the northern kingdom and Syria relate to one another.

There had been on and off conflict between the two nations leading up to this, going all the way back to the reign of Solomon. So exactly the nature of this isn't really explained a lot, but they weren't friends. So I'm going to read the verse again. Naaman, commander of the army 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. So this is an impressive picture for Naaman. Commander of the army seems to be a standard term for the highest-ranking officer in an army, so five-star general or whatever you want to compare it to, the highest guy in the army.

And he's a man of valor. He's not some admin, you know, desk guy. He's really a warrior. And God's hand is already visible in his life. He'd apparently been giving victory to Syria through him, which might have included victory against Israel, which is interesting to think about and reflects on the spiritual condition of Israel at the time.

But like so many stories, there's a catch: he's a leper. It doesn't seem to be the kind of horrible, degenerative condition that we may think of today, but probably just some kind of skin disease, still incurable and true. Troublesome, but not enough to interfere with his duties. He's still the commander of the army of Syria.

So, verse 2. 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, she would cure him of his leprosy.

In this text, Samaria is referring to the northern kingdom. During one of these Syrian raids, so they're sharing this border and able to cross back and forth and do these raids, they had apparently captured this little girl. And this is an amazing witness to the nations by a really unlikely source of help for Naaman.

With no obligation, she shares with him what she is sure a way that he can be healed, looking to a prophet in Israel, either Elijah or Elisha. So this is not a typical place that one would turn for medical advice, but apparently it was enough for Naaman. So verse 4.

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 clothing.

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. So, the king of Syria at this time is Ben-Hadad II, which isn't terribly important for the story, but he's contributing this incredible amount of kingly gifts to go along with Naaman.

Cost is going to be no object in trying to get help from this Israeli prophet. It's about 750 pounds of silver, about 1,500 pounds of gold, and 10 changes of clothing, which seems a little out of place. But this venture probably seemed unlikely to succeed, maybe even crazy, but there was going to be no cost restriction here.

They were going to be able to pay anything that the guy asked for. Now, before we look at the king of Israel's reply in verse 7, we'll just kind of get caught up with where Israel is at this time, what king this is. So, as review, 1 Samuel marks the transition from the Judges' era to the monarchy, the first king being Saul, and then David, and then his son Solomon.

In about 931 BC, the kingdom split, and that's where we get this northern kingdom, commonly referred to as Israel, and southern kingdom, Judah. This is taking place during the reign of Jehoram, which, if you read in this area, there's a king of Judah named Joram/slash Jehoram, and also this guy is named Joram.

Slash Jehoram. So if you're reading in this area, it's pretty confusing. But this is the northern king, Jehoram, who is the son of Ahab. And if you know anything about Ahab, wow, this is not a good sign. This is not a good king. And the track record of the northern kings, the question is never, oh, is this a good king?

The question is, how bad is this king? The northern kings are not good. So this is happening a little bit under 100 years after the split of the northern and southern kingdoms. So the northern kingdom is just a mess at this point, a spiritual mess. So, verse 7.

And when the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, Am I God to kill and to make alive 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. So his first response is distress.

He thinks that the king of Syria is trying to pick a fight with him, which is not an unreasonable thing to think, given the ongoing conflict. But his distress reflects his unbelief. The fact that he didn't even consider, oh, yes, there's this prophet, Elisha, it reflects his unbelief and the unbelief of the northern kingdom at that time, which is just a grim indictment on Israel.

So, verse 8, Elisha steps into the picture. But when Elisha, 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 now to me, that he may know that there is a prophet in Israel.

Elisha's stated purpose in stepping into this kind of bumbling king's response to all this whole situation, his stated purpose is amazing. See there in verse 8, that he may know that there is a prophet in Israel. And this is not just a general, oh yes, there's a religious figure in Israel that has to do with this God, Yahweh.

That there is a prophet of the one true and living God in Israel, and making this known to all the nations, shouting it to the whole world, God's prophet is in Israel. Look to Israel. Look to their God. And this will be, I think, kind of a theme verse of the actions of characters in this story.

And thinking back to verse 1, God's hand in Naaman's life and delivering him victory, getting him into this position as the commander of the army of Syria, getting him into this communication with Elisha and Elisha reaching out. It reminds me of in John chapter 9, Jesus' interactions with the blind man that he had healed.

And when being asked about why the man was blind, Jesus said, It was not that this man sinned or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him. It seems clear. Than in this passage, the works of God are going to be displayed in Naaman's leprosy.

So, moving on to verse 9. 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 will be restored, and you shall be clean. Naaman's arrival at Elisha's house was probably quite a display.

I mean, he's got enough people to bring along, you know, over 2,000 pounds of precious metals and all this other stuff. He's got chariots, he's got all these servants. And Elisha is unfazed. He doesn't even come out to meet him, simply sends out his servant or messenger with an astonishingly simple prescription: Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored, and you shall be clean.

Now, Naaman's come a long way, so you might think the response would be positive. But let's look to verse 11. But Naaman was angry and went away, saying, Behold, I thought that 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 Pharpar, are not the Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean? So he took the curse. Turned and went away in a rage. This is not what Naaman was expecting at all.

He's come a long way and he is frustrated. First, why is there not a religious ceremony? I thought there would be this is a prophet, right? There should be some kind of ceremony he's going to do to clean or cure my incurable disease. And then, second, if he's going to wash in a river, why not one of the pretty rivers back home rather than the dirty Jordan River that we crossed over to get here?

And I was confused by this response from first reading the text. It just seems out of place with where we'll see Naaman in a few verses. But I think it may help to have a modern-day example of the sort of gut reaction frustration that Naaman would have at this kind of command.

So imagine that you are a Longhorn living in Austin. Hard to imagine, but just imagine that you are a Longhorn living in Austin. And you have had persistent back pain. It hurts, it's frustrating, it doesn't get in the way of your work. You can still do all right at your job and stuff, but it just hurts.

And you've tried everything. You've tried every stretch, every doctor, every online remedy, anything you can think of. None of it works. And then you hear that there's a guy in Aggie Land. He's kind of a different doctor, but he's somebody in Aggie Land. There we go. And so you've tried everything, you're at your wit's end, all right, go give it a try.

So you make the long journey from Austin to Aggie Land, and if you're expecting a different, you know, physical therapy routine, some medicines or something, no, no, no, it's it's real easy. Just go to the campus of Texas AM, this is what the doctor's telling him, go to the campus of Texas AM, go to the Sully statue, and walk around it seven times.

What does that have to do with anything? What does that have to do with my back pain? Why, how will that help? This is just insulting. I've come all this way. Our campus is better. It's prettier back in Austin. I don't like any of this. This is all just silly.

I think that's the sort of reaction that Naaman is having here. This just seems ridiculous with their dirty river and who is this guy? This isn't going to do anything. The prescription is not difficult to carry out, but it pushes right on Naaman's pride. The thing that was stopping him from truly approaching Yahweh, the God of Israel, to be saved, he probably still has in the back of his mind the various pagan ideas from back home and different ways that he can resolve this issue.

Now, verse 13, he gets a voice of reason. 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? Rather than being angered by the request, the servants saw how simple and accessible the request is.

Wouldn't he at least try? They certainly cared for his well-being and wanted him to try. I think it may be helpful to keep in mind the kind of reactions that we've had to God's word in our lives. I think in a lot of ways we're not so unlike Naaman in ways that we've responded.

How many of us had to hear the gospel dozens, hundreds of times before it really penetrated our hearts to where we put away our pride and actually turned to the living God to be saved? So it's kind of easy to be hard on Naaman in this verse, but I think it really exposes the kind of difficulty we have in putting away our pride and approaching God.

Now we've reached the first point of our outline. In verse 14, we see a response of faith. There's no description of the transition, nothing really talked about that's changed, but verse 14. So he went down and dipped himself seven 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.

We can Be sure that there was nothing special about the Jordan River that healed him. The God of the universe, through his prophet, told this Syrian commander what he ought to do, and his obedience reflected his faith. The word isn't used here, but he clearly trusted in God's servant enough to take this action and obey and turn to the God of Israel.

And he's healed. And it doesn't seem like, oh, it's just it kind of removed the disease. It says his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child and he was clean. Total cleansing, total restoration of how things ought to be. And verses 15 and 16, the next verses are in some ways even more amazing.

So he could just go back home. He's done the deed, he's at the Jordan River, he could head up northeast to Syria and be out of there. But verse 15, 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, Elisha, said, As the Lord lives, before whom I stand, I will receive none. And he urged him to take it, but he refused. Could there ever be a more astonishing and quick fulfillment to Elisha's stated purpose in verse 8?

Let him come now to me, that he may know that there is a prophet in Israel. This foreign pagan commander's conclusion from the miracle worked in his life was that all the other gods of the earth were phony. None of them were real. All these other experiences he had, no.

This is the one true living God who really heals people, who really acts, who really saves. It also prompted gratitude from Naaman. Even though he was healed, like I mentioned, he came back and all the more wanted to give all these gifts that he brought. He wasn't just interested in buying the healing of his leprosy, but he wanted to show his gratitude for what had just been done for him.

Now, verse 17, we have our second response to God's message. The first was faith in his obeying, dipping himself in the river. Now we have a response of allegiance. Verse 17, then Naaman said, If not, please let there be given to your servant two mule loads of earth, for from now on your servant will not offer burnt offering or sacrifice to any God but the Lord.

So Naaman first asks for something that sounds kind of strange, two mule loads of earth. But the stated reason is. That he's going to only offer sacrifices to the Lord. And if you notice, your Bible should have some indication that this is Yahweh. Really, the Lord, pretty much throughout this whole text, small caps or something like that.

This is Yahweh. The God of Israel is the only one he will serve. But implicitly, it seems like he was going to build an altar. Apparently, it was common at that time to bring holy dirt from some other site and bring it home so that you can then worship on the soil of your God.

Now, Naaman's confession shows this was not just an intellectual statement. He's not just saying, I acknowledge that this is the true God. He seems like a pretty cool God. I respect him. This is impacting his entire life, and he is only going to worship this God. This exclusivity is demanded.

It's similar to the kind of demand of allegiance that Christ demands of those who would follow him. In Matthew 16, 24, Jesus said, If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. God, in this passage in 2 Kings 5 and today, does not desire your material gifts.

He does not need money. He does not need your efforts. He desires your faith. Your firm commitment to him as the only true God and the only one deserving of worship. Now, verses 18 and 19, we're going to run into a little issue that he's concerned about in his life.

Verse 18, 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, and I bow myself in the house of Ramon, When I bow myself in the house of Ramon, the Lord pardon your servant in this matter.

He said to him, Go in peace. So Ramon, from what I read, he seems to be basically the Syrian version of Baal, so a disgusting pagan God. And part of his responsibility in his position in Syria is that he accompany his master into this house of worship and bow down to this God, maybe do some sort of religious ceremony.

That's part of his job responsibility. And the first thing that he's thinking about upon now committing himself to Yahweh is, what do I do when I go home? And I have these responsibilities. What do I do? And he asks for pardon from Elisha on, let's look at the text again, saying that he's going to just simply do the motion, asking for pardon in the previous version.

Verses, he says that he's only going to worship Yahweh. So he's not going to worship Ramon in this house. So is Elisha's response too lenient? Go in peace. It seems like a yes. There's some commentators who seem to fall on the side that this is sort of a disconnected statement, that he's just saying kind of a farewell, and then you just kind of have this dangling question that isn't resolved.

But I don't think so. I think Elisha is giving the affirmative that he's pardoned in this situation, and I don't think he's being too lenient. The first thing to consider is that there is almost certainly no community of Yahweh worship in Syria at this time. And he has these prior commitments that he is obligated to follow through with.

Some commentators even think that he planned to put the dirt underneath his knees when he bows down in this house of worship so that he is bowing on Israeli soil rather than on this Syrian soil, signifying that he's really worshiping Yahweh and not one of these foreign gods.

But whatever the case, the image painted of Naaman in the rest of this passage, he will show up again, is really nothing but positive, and he's given. His astounding confession. So I don't see from the text that we can judge Naaman. It seems that God simply showed him grace in this situation, that he was in this tough, unique situation that he genuinely wanted to know how to deal with.

And we don't know what might have happened later on in Naaman's life. We don't see him again after this text. But this is an incredible story of a foreign enemy commander turning to Israel's God in faith. Now, the other character in this story, Gehazi. Gehazi, Elisha's servant, is going to be basically the opposite of Naaman.

Naaman lived in Syria, far away from God's revelation and his prophets. Gehazi is Elisha's servant. He shows up previously in the prior chapter. He was there for the healing of the Shunammite woman's son. He gets constant exposure to God's revelation and is totally aware. And then their responses are so polar opposite.

Starting in partway through verse 19. But when Naaman had gone from him a short distance, Gehazi, the servant of Elisha, the man of God, said, See, my master has spared this Naaman, the Syrian, in not accepting from his hand what he brought. As the Lord lives, I will run after him and get something from him.

Gehazi exhibited the third response to God's message in this text. The first was faith, the second was allegiance, both demonstrated by Naaman, and this third is exploitation. So, as I mentioned, Gehazi had the same sort of abundant revelation that we have today. We have texts on our lap.

He had the prophet of the Lord as his master that he'd been following along for who knows how long. And all he can think about after this amazing confession of faith is the stuff that he can get out of the situation, the material goods that he can use because of his position as the servant of Elisha.

Verse 21. So, Gehazi followed Naaman, and when Naaman saw someone running after him, he got down from the chariot to meet him and said, Is all well? And he said, All is well. My master has sent me to say, There have just now come to me from the hill country of Ephraim two young men of the sons of the prophets.

Please give them a talent of silver and two changes of clothing. And Naaman said, Be pleased to accept two talents. And he urged him and tied up two talents of silver in two bags with two changes of clothing and laid them on two of his. Servants, and they carried them before Gehazi.

So you can see the gears turning in Gehazi's deception here. He's not going to plainly ask for all the gifts that were just rejected by his master. There's some reason that's just come up. How about some sons of the prophets that just came along, who seem to be some members of maybe a prophet guild, disciples of Elisha and Elijah?

And he's not going to ask for all the stuff, just some of it. It's very reasonable to help out these prophets who have just showed up. And you can see this deceptive calculation. This one-tenth of the silver he was asking for was 75 pounds of silver. And Naaman ends up giving him 150 pounds of silver and a couple changes of clothing, which reflects on Naaman's changed heart.

What is he going to get out of this situation? He jumps down from his chariot. It's not even Elisha, it's Elisha's servant, and he is eager, please take my stuff. His gratitude is just flowing. And Gehazi is thinking about how much he can leverage out of the situation because he's in this position of serving Elisha.

Thinking back to verse 8, Elisha's stated purpose. Having a hard time navigating up here. Let him now come to me, that he may know that there is a prophet in Israel. This is not on Gehazi's mind as he's doing this action. So, moving on with this kind of horrible ending to the story, verse 24.

And when he came to the hill, he took them from their hand, the stuff that these servants were carrying, and put them in the house. And he sent the men away, and they departed. He went in and stood before his master, and Elisha said to him, Where have you been, Gehazi?

And he said, Your servant went nowhere. Elisha's simple question, Where have you been? prompted the lame answer that we have probably all given when we're kids. What were you doing? Hmm, nothing. Where have you been? Nowhere. Not very convincing. So verse 26, verses 26 to 27, the end of the text.

But he said to him, this is Elisha speaking to Gehazi, but he said to him, Did not my heart go when the man turned from his chariot to meet you? Was it a time to accept money and garments, olive orchards, and vineyards, sheep and oxen, male servants and female servants?

Therefore, the leprosy of Naaman shall cling to you and to your descendants forever. So he went out from his Presence, a leper like snow. What Elisha exactly meant by his heart going out isn't really explained, but the point is made clear. He knows exactly what Elisha has done.

Somehow, God has revealed to him his deception. And he's putting pressure on the issue at hand. Was this the time to be accepting these gifts? The message that Gehazi is giving is: the God of Israel can be bought. The message of Elisha is: turn to Yahweh in faith.

He does not need any of your gifts, any of your efforts, any of your stuff. And this is a devastating reversal. Gehazi went out to get something from Naaman, and what he gets is his leprosy. And it will cling to his descendants forever. And Elisha focuses on a little more detail that he's asking about all this other stuff: orchards and vineyards, sheep, oxen, servants.

What's he talking about? He seems to be talking about all the various stuff that you might be offered as someone in a position like this. He may have been offered all of these things at some time in his career and presumably declined all of these things. So we've reached the end of the text.

Made it. Application. We've looked at three responses to God's message, and the goal is that we rightly respond to God's Word in our lives. First, consider Naaman's faith. I pray that everyone in this room is a believer in Jesus Christ and has turned to Him in faith for forgiveness of sins and a relationship with God.

He's the only one who can cleanse us of our sin, and our sin is certainly worse than Naaman's leprosy. Ephesians 2:1 says, And you were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you once walked. We are dead in our sins, causing separation from God. The outward sort of probably grossness of Naaman's leprosy doesn't compare to the inward corruption of our sin.

Romans 10, 9, and 10 say, If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.

And when we're forgiven of our sins, we are truly cleansed of our unrighteousness. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins. And to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 1 John 1:9. So, in the same way, the text describes Naaman's skin as being like a child's, clean, totally restored, we are truly forgiven, truly cleansed, when we turn to Christ for forgiveness of our sins.

For the second point, Naaman's allegiance. For us, following Christ means making him our king. It has profound implications for our entire lives. If he is our Lord, our sovereign, the one that we serve, is going to affect every single aspect of our lives. The way that we speak, the kind of entertainment we consume, the kind of job that we will accept.

There may be jobs that you just can't. And there may be jobs that are rough, but you will serve as an evangelistic light in that job. Turn to the scriptures for wisdom on these matters and see how your actions and I pray this for me most of all, that everything that I do has consideration of my declared allegiance to my King, who is Christ.

Now, the third, Gehazi's exploitation. When reading about Gehazi, It's easy to make him the bad guy. The DTST is purely bad. Beat up on Gehazi. Ooh, that bad guy. But I think it's easy to see his motivations in our own motivations at certain points in our lives. Are the decisions that we make for ways that we work in the ministry, you know, go help this person, give money for this, volunteer for this?

Is it for men's praise, or is it for the glory of God? Am I making life decisions chiefly for financial gain without consideration of God's glory? Or is it primarily I must glorify God in how I live my life? It's a sobering text, and the consequence for Gehazi was dire.

We, as believers, are not in fear of leprosy that will cling to us and our generations forever, but it impacts our ministry and consideration of God's glory among the nations. So I don't want to end on a totally downer note. 1 Peter 1, 14 and 15. We are called to a high calling.

I'm sorry, I'm reading something that's not in the text. 1 Peter 1, 14, and 15. As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy. In all of your conduct, I hope that this text is an encouragement to see the simple act of faith, the kinds of simple acts of faith that God asks of us.

He is not asking for something burdensome, but he asks for things that are simple and obedient. And it's been an enormous blessing for me to study this text and see an amazing example of faith in the Old Testament. Let's pray. Father, I thank you for this time. I thank you for attentive ears and for those who have come and the fellowship that we have with one another.

I thank you for the testimony that we have in your word of your glory going to the nations through such unlikely people. And I thank you for the work in our lives, how unlikely we are as people to bear your favor. And I pray that we would honor you in all of our actions throughout our lives and truly live as servants of the king as we go this week.

In Jesus' name I pray. Amen.