Read
2 Kings 7:3-11 (better yet, read 2 Kings chapters 6 and 7 to get the full context).
Now there were four men with leprosya at the entrance of the city gate. They said to each other, “Why stay here until we die? If we say, ‘We’ll go into the city’—the famine is there, and we will die. And if we stay here, we will die. So let’s go over to the camp of the Arameans and surrender. If they spare us, we live; if they kill us, then we die.”
At dusk they got up and went to the camp of the Arameans. When they reached the edge of the camp, not a man was there, for the Lord had caused the Arameans to hear the sound of chariots and horses and a great army, so that they said to one another, “Look, the king of Israel has hired the Hittite and Egyptian kings to attack us!” So they got up and fled in the dusk and abandoned their tents and their horses and donkeys. They left the camp as it was and ran for their lives.
The men who had leprosy reached the edge of the camp and entered one of the tents. They ate and drank, and carried away silver, gold and clothes, and went off and hid them. They returned and entered another tent and took some things from it and hid them also.
Then they said to each other, “We’re not doing right. This is a day of good news and we are keeping it to ourselves. If we wait until daylight, punishment will overtake us. Let’s go at once and report this to the royal palace.”
So they went and called out to the city gatekeepers and told them, “We went into the Aramean camp and not a man was there—not a sound of anyone—only tethered horses and donkeys, and the tents left just as they were.” The gatekeepers shouted the news, and it was reported within the palace.
Teaching Point No. 1
In the midst of bad things …
Things were bad in Samaria as the Arameans’ siege of the city wore on. With no way to transport goods and food between the city and the farmers, food prices were unreachable, for what food there was in the city. So people starved. Some resorted to cannibalism. (
2 Kings 6:26-31)
Still there was hope. Even as the prophet Elisha was being ridiculed by King Joram, who really wanted his head on a pole, Elisha foretold that in 24 hours, food prices would drop, there would be plenty for everyone. He didn’t say how it would happen – just that it would (
2 Kings 7:1). And as an officer for the king questioned Elisha (
2 Kings 7:2), expressing his deep skepticism, Elisha prophesized that officer’s demise for his unbelief.
Pick up in
verse 3 of chapter 7, and it was still looking bad. So bad that four
lepers –
four outcasts – decided to bolt from Samaria and put themselves at the mercy of the enemy for food. For them, it was either a slow death in the city, or life – or a quick death – at the hands of the enemy.
At dusk, they set out for the camp of the Arameans, and when they got there, the tents were empty.
Verses 5-6 say “not a man was there, for the
LORD HAD CAUSED the Arameans to hear the sound of chariots and horses and a great army” which frightened them and cause them to flee.
God defeated the enemy.
Application of Teaching Point No. 1
In the midst of bad things … wait on God, because He’ll cause something to happen.
It looked bad in Samaria. People ate their own. Some gave up hope in God. Some figured it would be better to be with the enemy than to keep suffering.
But God caused something to happen that delivered the city of Samaria. And it was in His timing, not Elisha’s timing, nor because King Joram wore sackcloth in repentance (
2 Kings 6:30). Elisha, being a prophet of the Lord, would not have said anything unless the Lord instructed him to do so (
2 Peter 1:20)
In your darkest of times, hasn’t God caused something in your life to happen? For you singles, it could have been a break up with someone you were dating; for you married couples, it could have been a really bad disagreement that left you considering a divorce; for some of you, a severe illness; for some of you, the loss of a job; an opportunity that you thought was yours, but was not; or some sort of economic hardship; for some of you, a betrayal by someone you thought to be a trusted friend.
Many of you have testimonies – good news – of how you waited on God, and He came through.
The biggest of these, though, happened nearly 2,000 years ago, when Jesus hung on a cross, and a movement that had grown and surrounded him seemed to end with His death. All but one of his trusted followers abandoned Him. Then three days later, he rose from the grave … and a band of misfits and cowards, of people most of society then looked down on, became the biggest messengers of the greatest news ever.
You who follow Jesus, who call Him Lord and Savior, also have that good news.
Teaching Point No. 2
The messenger of good news sometimes is the least likely person.
It was four lepers who were the first witnesses to the empty camp of the enemy. Think on that. It wasn’t a band of soldiers. It wasn’t the king or anyone in his court. It wasn’t the elders of the city of Samaria.
It was four
lepers – outcasts of society, considered unclean and kept out of view because of their hideous appearance.
Yet God engineered it so the least likely people, the outcast, the people no one wanted to be around, would be the bearer of good news.
Fast forward to the birth of Jesus. In the gospel of Luke, who was first told and who was it that spread the good news given to them by the angels? Was it the religious elite? Was it the rich and powerful? Was it the teaching rabbis of the day?
And there were shepherds living out in the fields nearby, keeping watch over their flocks at night. An angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were terrified. But the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord.
And after seeing the Christ child (
verse 20):
The shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen, which were just as they had been told.
The common shepherd was the bearer of the good news that the Savior of the world had come.
In the gospel of John, an unlikely person was picked by Jesus Himself to tell people about Him. We know of
John chapter 4 as the encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well (two strikes there … Samaritans were shunned by Jews, and she wasn’t exactly a social role model either). We know this more for Jesus saying that the Father seeks those to worship Him in spirit and in truth. What we miss is that Jesus used a rather sinful person to bear the good news to her village about Him.
Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, “Come, see a man who told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Christ?” They came out of the town and made their way toward him. ...
Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman’s testimony, “He told me everything I ever did.” So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words many more became believers. They said to the woman, “We no longer believe just because of what you said; now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the Savior of the world.”
Application of Teaching Point No. 2
The messenger of good news sometimes is the least likely person … and that person is YOU.
Some people have left it all up to the pastors and the elders to tell people of the gospel. And when this church hasn’t grown, the pastors and elders got the blame.
But it is ALL our responsibility. The pastors and church leaders equip, and we also do our part. At the same time, YOU also are called to share the good news of God’s love through Jesus. The Great Commission is not for church leaders only. Read it, re-read it, and re-read it again, and tell me if I’m wrong.
God uses every believer in His Son to get the word out, regardless of intellect or educational background, regardless of your occupation, regardless of your skin color or ethnicity, regardless of your age, regardless of your gender, regardless of your (blood-washed) past, regardless of your ____________________ (you can fill in the blank).
Brothers, think of what you were when you were called. Not many of you were wise by human standards; not many were influential; not many were of noble birth. But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to sham
e the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him. It is because of him that you are in Christ Jesus, who has become for us wisdom from God—that is, our righteousness, holiness and redemption. 31 Therefore, as it is written: “Let him who boasts boast in the Lord.”
Each person who has surrendered his or her life to Jesus, who says he or she loves the Lord, should have no problem obeying His command to tell the world about Him.
Teaching Point No. 3
Keeping all the good stuff to ourselves is just wrong.
So the four lepers enjoyed the spoils of the stuff the enemy left behind. In
verse 8 it says:
The men who had leprosy reached the edge of the camp and entered one of the tents. They ate and drank, and carried away silver, gold and clothes, and went off and hid them. They returned and entered another tent and took some things from it and hid them also.
Don’t we sometimes as Christians get eat and drink and hoard Biblical knowledge? Don’t we take this knowledge and hide it, then come back to church and Bible study or listen to KWVE, and hide more of those Biblical gems? OK, maybe we share it with each other … and that has some benefit … It’s great that we can share with each other what God has revealed to us in His word.
But if it never leaves this building, if it never leaves our circle of friends and family here at CICF, what good is it? What good is all that information?
Seriously.
Instead, when we go out into the world, we share of how God blessed us with a job, a car, a spouse, personally), good grades, acceptance to the college we’ve always wanted to attend -- whatever it may be. And, yes, we should share such things.
This past week, God blessed Kevin, Christine, Maya, me and the rest of my family with the good news that “baby No. 2” – who is heading into 19 weeks in the womb – is a boy. That’s great! I’m happy for my daughter, son-in-law, grand-daughter and the rest of my family.
But like a praise for God because we got a car or whatever, how is that kind of news going to have a lasting impact outside of my immediate family, while I hide or hoard the real good news of a new life in Jesus?
The answer is -- as wonderful as that news is -- it doesn’t. Me having a grandson has no immediate, lasting impact on the lives of people outside my family -– unless the Lord makes him a pastor (maybe).
Again, think on this:
A praise for God because we got a car or whatever … how is that kind of news going to have a lasting impact outside of our immediate family, our immediate church family, while we hide or hoard the real good news of a new life in Jesus?
I possess, YOU possess, the greatest news ever, news that will change lives – after all, if you are a follower of Jesus, it did CHANGE your life for the better, didn’t it?
What needs to happen is that conviction from the Holy Spirit. And just like in
verse 9 in 2 Kings 7, we need to come to this realization:
“We’re not doing right. This is a day of good news and we are keeping it to ourselves. ... ”
It’s NOT RIGHT to have the good news of salvation in Jesus and just enjoy the spoils and benefits of it all to ourselves. To do is selfish of us:
Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.
To keep the good news of salvation, after Jesus said to tell people about salvation through Him, is a sin. There is no way around that:
“But if you fail to do this (obey the Lord’s commands), you will be sinning against the LORD; and you may be sure that your sin will find you out.”
Application of Teaching Point No. 3
Keeping all the good stuff to yourself is just wrong. So do right and tell people, because God has told you to, and He’s given you the tools you need to do so. Really, we have no excuses.
Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age."
Jesus gave us His teachings in the gospels and in the letters through Paul, Peter, Jude, James and John. We have the material. And He is with us, always.
But wait, there is more …
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight.
The Bible is very clear: We who believe in Jesus as Savior and call Him Lord have the gift of Holy Spirit, the third person in the Trinity, living in us. We have the same power that raised Jesus from the grave living IN US.
We are equipped with His word, we have the support of each other through our discipleship groups and the church community as a whole, and we have the Lord’s Spirit in us.
If we just hangout here in our comfortable little church group, and not tell anyone about the saving grace and mercy and love of God through His Son Jesus, surely we are doing wrong.
So let’s ALL bring a smile to the face of the Father, let’s make our love for Him and our love for people more than a word, more than an emotion. Let’s love people the way God loves us, by sharing His Son with those who don’t yet know Him.
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