Irredeemable
Naaman the Leper
The Servant Girl
Naaman's Wife
The King of Syria
The King of Israel
The King of Israel
Jehoram, the king of Israel,[1]
is utterly unfamiliar with the workings of God in his kingdom. Perhaps this
could be forgiven him if he and his army hadn’t just been saved from dying of
dehydration in the wilderness of Edom by the intercession of Elisha the
prophet. As though a massive spring of water in the desert weren’t easy enough
for God, he went further to save Jehoram, his army, and his allies from the
hand of the Moabites. Which is more difficult? To save a man from leprosy or an
army out of the hand of the enemy into whom the Lord has given them?
They are both impossible, but with God nothing is
impossible! Jehoram, despite the powerful lesson he had just received, failed
to open his ears to the teaching of God and so when confronted with Naaman and
his letter, he tears his clothes and laments and is sure that this is some sort
of trap to start (or continue) the war with Syria!
Jehoram is a hindrance to this journey that Naaman is on, so
maybe we should just stop here. But if we stop the story here, then Naaman dies
in his leprosy, the little girl is a liar, his wife is full of vain confidence,
and Ben-Hadad ventured for nothing.
The saying goes that God can draw a straight line with a
crooked stick. There is more to Jehoram than meets the eyes, and he’s not just
a bad example. We can learn several things from him.
An Honest Self-Assessment
The first is that he was willing to admit his own
shortcomings. “Am I God, to kill and to make alive?” Jehoram didn’t learn as
much from his father’s sins as he should have, but he did learn that he
couldn’t control God or be God. King Ahab–Jehoram’s late father–had four hundred
and fifty prophets of Baal and four hundred prophets of Asherah who thought
they could bend the will of divinity to suit the will of men. If you know the
story, you know those prophets of Baal were slaughtered on Mount Carmel by Elijah
and the prophets of Asherah were pursued into hiding and slaughtered by
Jehoshaphat, king of Judah.
Jehoram learned by observation that he couldn’t make divine
promises or force God’s will to his own service. He didn’t dare to go find a
prophet of Baal or Asherah and make promises to Naaman; he had learned those
false gods were not covenantal gods and were awful at fulfilling their promises.
After all, if an idol could have healed Naaman, he might as well have stayed in
Damascus and sought help from the statue of Rimmon. I don’t think anyone would
be surprised if we learned that Naaman had already tried that.
We can learn a lot from Jehoram when he admits his own
shortcomings and doesn’t promise things he cannot deliver. This may sound instinctive,
but there is real humility here; many kings in history have elevated themselves
to some state of deity or at least a super-human position and/or title. It was
not uncommon for Caesars to accept worship, Nebuchadnezzar declared “Is not
this great Babylon, which I have built by my mighty power as a royal residence
and for the glory of my majesty?” (Daniel 4:30). Indeed, less than two hundred
years later the people of Israel are seeking salvation from the king of
Assyria: “When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah his wound, then Ephraim went
to Assyria, and sent to the great king. But he is not able to cure you or heal
your wound” (Hosea 5:13). Perhaps the most recent example was when Douglas
MacArthur was closing the chapter on World War Two and required Emperor
Hirohito of Japan to explicitly renounce his claim to divinity and declare his
humanity.
We declare today, “Jesus is Lord” in direct defiance to the
earlier declaration, “Caesar is Lord.” We have to give King Jehoram some credit
that he admitted he was not God and could not do the things of God. I know some
god wannabes who could learn a thing or two from him.
I was privileged a few years ago to train medical
missionaries to share the gospel. There was a moment where they jokingly said
that the best doctors in the world come in two sorts: 1) those that think they
are God and 2) those who know they are not God.
Those that think they are God use their talents and energy
to learn and apply as much as they absolutely can, and those who know they are
not God do likewise with the addition that they rely on God’s wisdom and power
through prayer rather than trusting and hoping in themselves. Ironically, the
outcome on earth can be the same: skillfully healed people. But their outcomes
in heaven are exactly opposite. The person healed by a doctor who has deified
himself will be tempted to put their trust in the doctor and thereby preclude
their hope from being in the living God. Martin Lloyd-Jones, a doctor turned
preacher, observed that medical healing merely prolonged physical life,
allowing people to go right back to sinning, and that the true need was an
eternal healing of the soul, to put their trust in God rather than a doctor.
For all of the ways that Jehoram failed, he did not set
himself up as the savior of Naaman.
As a chaplain, I once had a young man approach me who knew I
put a great emphasis on salvation. He was at the lowest point of his life–not
knowing that an even lower point was on the horizon–when he came to me in great
despair. His question shocked me, “Chaplain, will you save me?”
I desperately want everyone to be saved; in fact while
writing this I’m deep into a fast for the salvation of multiple loved ones, but
I am utterly incapable of saving anyone. To paraphrase Paul, I can plant and I
can water, but it is God who gives the growth. This is why God is everything
and I am nothing (1 Corinthians 3:6–9), why Christ must increase and I must
decrease (John 3:30).
Not a Glory Seeker
Had Jehoram desired the glory there are multiple ways he
could have lied and taken the glory in this story. Jehoram could have assumed
the role of prophet and waved his hand over the spot and declared the leper to
be healed!
When Naaman invariably was not healed, Jehoram could have
played the prosperity preacher and declared that the problem was not God or
Jehoram, the problem was that Naaman did not have enough faith to be healed! Or
his offering of the wealth of Ben-Hadad was not enough; he needed to bring more
to sow the seed of faith that would lead to his healing. Or Jehoram could have
declared that hidden sin in Naaman’s life was keeping him from receiving
healing. The horrendous fact accusing someone of “hidden sin” is that the
prophet need not have any inclination of what the sin is, he only has to
declare that it’s there!
Jehoram could have also promised all sorts of different
cures, he could have gone to his local Pharmacist/Sorcerer and brought back a
powder or a pill that claimed supernatural healing power. He could have called
it an essential oil. He could have funded research into Hansen’s disease. He
could have come up with a fanciful mud-bath or ritual cleansing or detox. He
could have told Naaman he needed to eat more organic food and less dairy.
Would it have worked? No–but that’s beyond the point–giving
false hope and generating superstition is as effective at turning sinners from
the hope of the gospel as is claiming yourself to be the God who makes alive.
Jehoram could have also brokered the healing. There is a small
chance that Elisha would have come if Jehoram had summoned him; and Jehoram should
have known that Elisha was able to heal Naaman in the same way he had rescued
Jehoram’s army in the desert by God’s intervention. If Jehoram had called Elisha
and he had healed Naaman, then Jehoram could have claimed that he was a
significant part in Naaman’s healing. Can you think of any priests or peddlers
who claim that if you come through them that you can receive God’s blessings?
And we must not diminish the fact that kings are able to overstep
their roles in the absence of a prophet. Earlier, Saul lost his kingdom for
making a sacrifice in the stead of Samuel (1 Samuel 13:8–14). Later Uzziah
would be struck by leprosy in the very act of thinking he could be a priest and
a king (2 Chronicles 26:16–21).
We previously considered the saying, “I am not, but I know I
AM.” I am not a healer, I am not a king, I am not a savior. I am glad I’m not a
savior or a hope for anyone, but as a priest I can point people to the one who
can save their souls. I’m just a nobody, trying to tell everybody, about
somebody, who can save anybody.
If I could have saved that young man–mentioned earlier–who
approached me, would I have? If I had, I would have cut him off from the true
Saviour, I would have set myself upon a pedestal that I have no business being
on, and I would diminish the joy I have in seeing my disciples walking in the
truth. I am not the way, the truth, or the life, and if I think for a moment
that I am any of those things, or that people can come to the Father through
me, then I have set myself in a very precarious place because God will not
share his glory with anyone.
Thank God that Jehoram left the door open for Jesus of
Nazareth–the perfect prophet, priest, and king–to be the way, the truth, and
the life, and to prove that no one comes to the Father except through him (John
14:6). Truly Pontius Pilate unwittingly did us a great service when he nailed
“Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews” to the cross to identify the man who
would die to bring us healing and reconciliation with God, and thus secure his
title as our Lord, our Saviour,
and the King of kings.
Not a Hindrance to Salvation
To this living God did Naaman need to go, and Jehoram did
not stand in the way. We have to see that Jehoram was willing to “let him come
to [Elisha], that he may know that there is a prophet in Israel” (2 Kings 5:8).
Jehoram could have stood in the way of salvation by denouncing Elisha to Naaman,
declaring him to be the troubler of Israel and Syria. Or Jehoram could have
kept the message a secret so that Naaman would have returned to Syria dejected
and doomed. Or Jehoram could have stated that God only saves Israelites and
that a Syrian enemy was beyond redemption. Or he could have invoked the law,
that leprosy had utterly cut Naaman off from any hope of every being healed.
Beloved, please see that Jehoram didn’t do any of that: he
allowed Naaman to go to Elisha. If Jehoram had refused, would God would have
gotten Naaman where he needed to go? Probably, but by the grace of God in their
lives we don’t have to wonder about middle knowledge in this case, because
Jehoram did the right thing.
Doing the right thing to get someone to hope may also seem
intuitive, but as of the writing of this book there are about fifty countries
that have standing laws forbidding non-Christians from seeking Christ. We’ll
consider more about the prophet Jonah later, but for now consider that he’d
rather flee than have any chance of bringing God’s salvation and blessings to
his enemies. Consider even Peter had to be rebuked for adding to the grace of
God’s salvation (Galatians 2:14).
Jehoram could have hindered Naaman in all sorts of ways at
this point. But, for all of his failures, Jehoram did not stand in the way of Naaman
seeking a cure.
Beloved, I hope you’ll never set yourself up as the savior
or stand in the way of anyone’s salvation. Point to Jesus, declare “Behold the
Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29), make your
message one of declaring that there is salvation in no one else, for there is
no other name given under heaven by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12)! Be like
John the Baptist who confessed, and did not deny, but confessed, “I am Not the Christ” (John 1:20). Never
consider that your writing or preaching or wisdom has more power than the Word
of God to make people wise for salvation in Christ Jesus. There is great
rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents and returns to the Father
through the Son.
I have seen several evangelistic efforts reach fruition when
someone other than myself has led a person to Christ after I had planted and
watered and tilled and sweated and strove over seeds for weeks and months. It
was exhausting, and yet someone else was privileged to lead them to Christ.
Initially I was bitter that I was not the mid-wife in the
rebirthing process at the moment that the Spirit quickened a dead soul and
transferred them from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light. But in
retrospect I rejoice that I was just a messenger and that my Living Saviour
gets all of the glory for his saving work! Truly, he must increase and I must
decrease.
Just a week before writing this chapter a new convert told
me that I was the only one who could make God’s Word make sense to him. Heaven
forbid! It is the Spirit who gives life, the flesh is no help at all! It is the
Spirit who makes the Bible discernible to everyone to whom he chooses to reveal
the truth. I hope he uses me to save many more lost souls, but I desperately
hope that none of those sinners ever thinks I was anything special other than a
faithful instrument in my master’s hand.
Declare with George Whitefield,
Let the name of Whitefield
perish, but Christ be glorified. Let my name die everywhere, let even my
friends forget me, if by that means the cause of the blessed Jesus may be
promoted.
Declare with Jehoram,
I am not God, I cannot heal or
make alive!
But dear one! You have this advantage over Jehoram:
You know the God who can!
[1]
Not to be confused with
Jehoram the king of Judah who reigned concurrently.
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