[00:00:01] Speaker A: Hey, thanks so much for listening to this message. My name is Jason and I'm one of the ministers here at the Madison Church of Christ. It's our hope and prayer that the teaching from God's Word you hear today will bless your life and draw you closer to Him. If you're ever in the Madison, Alabama area, we'd love for you to worship with us on Sundays at 8:30 or 10:30am if you have any other questions about the Bible or want to know more about the Madison Church, find
[email protected] Be sure to also check out our Bible study podcast, Madison Church of Christ Bible Studies. Thanks again for stopping by.
[00:00:37] Speaker B: Good morning. If you've got your Bibles with you, turn to Second Kings, chapter five. Can y' all hear me? Okay, good. All right.
You remember last week Andrew talked to us about how we were beginning this two week series called Obscure, Secure and sure. And we are doing that right now.
Pull up.
There we go.
And what we're trying to do is maybe dig into some scriptures passages, maybe people, key figures in scriptures that are really popular that we know, that we're familiar with. But maybe finding out that there's some things significant in the background of those stories that are really helpful, maybe things that help underline the brilliance of that moment, maybe the thing that is in the background, but it drove the success of that story itself. And so we're going to be, we try to do that for the next, for these, for last week and then this week again, we're trying to do that. I'll see if I can illustrate it for you this way. My family enjoys playing cards.
Okay. We play Flip seven last night. We like to play spades. We like to play rook. We like to play Uno. But one of our favorite games that we play is Nerds. And Nerds is kind of like a community game. It's like a game of solitaire, but then there's a pile of people in the middle, pile of cards in the middle. And it's a real fast paced game, a lot of fun to play. But the thing about it is everybody has to have their own unique set of playing cards. Well, years ago, Cindy found a website that would take your family photos and put them on the back of decks of cards.
And so if you can imagine that going through your family photo albums and your list and looking to see all the different pictures that had like key memories or things that were just special in that moment. And so she did that. She went out and purchased like six or eight. I think it was Packs of those cards. And they're all unique and special in different ways. And there are specific things about each one of them that made them special. Well, here was one of those decks of cards, and it's a beautiful picture, I'm not disputing that, of Cindy and Kenzie. And we're in front of Logan's. We were eating dinner with my family over in Decatur celebrating somebody's birthday. And so we're outside and, you know, people started taking photos and everything. And it's great. And as beautiful as these ladies are, I want you to know it's not their fault.
They're not the star of the show, because I am in the background executing what I believe, a flawless creeper photobomb in the background. And so you know how hard that is to pull off. I mean, when everybody's got the cameras out and you kind of start creeping that way, like, no, no, no. Back out, you know, all that stuff.
But I did it just right. I got just at the right time, right? Face everything just at the right little part of the corner of the picture. And that is why it became a deck of cards. Not. I mean, not that they didn't have beautiful pictures here, but the reason it was there, because of the creeper in the background. You understand what I'm saying? Right?
Something was happening in the background that made this special. That's why they're referred to as the creeper cards when we play nerds together. Right.
Well, maybe you're not like me and you don't, you know, you're not crazy and a weirdo and in the background doing some crazy stuff, trying to get attention or whatever. Maybe you're not that person, but maybe you're a person who is in the background of life doing a lot of great things, quietly going about your business, and you're not looking for attention. We've got a lot of people in this church that I would say represent that they're just doing good things all the time. And they're not looking to put a social media post out there. They're not looking for accolades or even acknowledgement of what they're doing at all. They just like putting their head down and serving. And for those people, maybe this is not even the same thing, but there may be some folks out there who are going, hey, I try to do the right things.
I give my best every day. You know, I study my bible.
I read.
I try to do good things for other people.
And it may be that they may be thinking to themselves is what I do. In the background of life, does that really make a difference? Does that really matter?
Is it all that important? What happens in the background of life?
And specifically, you may be asking questions like this. Do my disciplines matter? Does the reality that I get up every day and I read my Bible and I pray to God and I have a specific prayer list that I go through, does that really matter in the long run? Does it have any kind of big impact in the world?
Are the things that I do, like the choices that I make? When I look at my life and I make the decision to do the next best thing, I. I survey the situation. I think about someone who needs some kindness, I get out of my comfort zone and I go do something for that person. But I want it to be very quiet in background. I don't want to, you know, tell everybody about it, those kinds of things. So those things matter.
And then you may even find yourself saying, does God even see those kinds of things?
And I think what I want to share with you this morning is the answer is absolutely. God sees these things.
In Matthew, chapter six, as Jesus is speaking in the Sermon on the Mount, One of the things that he does is he kind of zeroes in on those people who are doing a lot of things for eyes, for people to catch it, for people to see what they're doing. And so there's three different instances here where he talks about giving to the needy or helping the poor, serving somebody else, doing a good deed for someone.
There's the idea of praying, you know, that he even says, like, go into your closet to pray. And then fasting. Fasting is not one of those things that you do so everybody can see what you're doing. It's one of those things you do to bring discipline to your life. And so here's three examples where Jesus is saying, hey, those things that are maybe more important, those things that are internal, that shape who you are from inside, those things are not meant to be done out loud in front of everybody. But here's the encouraging part of that, is it says at the end of that conclusion of that little section of Scripture, Jesus says this, but the God who sees what is done in secret will himself reward you openly.
Now, how does that come about?
I don't know that I can express exactly how these things happen. God works in such powerful ways that are in the background in so many ways.
I don't know that I could explain it all, but I do know this. That promise is there, and it's secure.
It's certain.
There's no doubt about it, that God is blessing us. And so when I think about that, you may be asking yourself, is these little things that I'm doing in the background, do they matter?
Is that I am respectful to my husband, does that matter?
From a husband's perspective, does it matter that I speak to my wife kindly, that I show her honor just as the Bible says in First Peter Chapter 3, that I give her the honor that she's due as the weaker vessel and as a joint heir in my relationship with God, do I discipline my children in the background of life, do I do all these little things? And sometimes you may think to yourself, all these things and ways that I am trying to shape my child's life, do those things really matter down the road?
And what I want to tell you is I think God is saying to all of us that, yes, those things really matter.
And they may not be in the forefront of the picture, right, but they're very much in the background having an impact and creating a different approach for life.
So we're going to talk about this story of Naaman and not to get too deep into it right here, but in Second Kings, chapter 5, verse. I'll just read one verse. It says, naaman, commander of the army of the king of Syria, 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 I look at this story and one of the things that it talks about here is Naaman, who is a commander of the armies of Syria. So this is not an Israelite. This is a man from a different country, actually enemies of God at this time.
And he was well thought of, he was powerful, he was successful on the battlefield, and so much so that he was given praise and honor with the king. In fact, if you read a little bit about Naaman, you find out that he was held in super high regardless among all the people there, because one, they really believed that God had given him the victory on the field. And so he was courageous in battle. Let me take you to a passage. Keep your finger there in Second Kings chapter 5. Move back a few chapters to First Kings chapter 22. Want to hit one thing real quickly?
This passage does not name Naaman. Okay, I just want to be clear about that, but it gives us some interesting insight, I think, into a story that we're going to read here in Second Kings chapter five.
Let me tell you what's happening.
A prophet named Micaiah has come and told King Ahab, who is an evil king in Israel, that if he goes into battle at Ramoth Gilead, which is in Syria, he says, if you go into that battle, you're going to die on the field.
So Ahab, an evil guy, decides to include Judah and King Jehoshaphat in his attack of Syria, thinking that he can find a way to skirt around this prophecy that has come and that he can survive it. And the way he does that is he allows Jehoshaphat to wear his kingly robes and he himself dressed in regular attire. And so they're both going out there into the. Into the battle. And the Syrians were kind of really not even looking to get rid of the Israelites at this time. They just wanted to get rid of Ahab. They just didn't like him. And. And so the king of Syria gives them command. He says, go into the field, look for nobody. I'm not looking for you to battle anybody, but I want you to zero in on King Ahab. So they're looking, they see, and they see a guy with robes on and he's shouting out commands. And so they start to head over to King Jehoshaphat and they look at him and they realize this is not King Ahab.
And so what happens is they all turn back and go back. They escape, they leave the battle scene. But listen to what it says happens in that departure. Verse 34 says, But a certain man drew his bow at random and struck the king of Israel between the scale armor and the breastplate. So you get this idea that they're kind of going away and some guy just whoopee, woo, you know, just on his way out, like, and one more, you know, like that kind of thing. And he does, and it actually strikes King Ahab and it kills him, fulfilling the prophecy that was given about him.
So let's compare that to. We don't know who this person was. It just says a certain man. But if you look at history, and if you look at some of the Jewish historians, you're going to find out that they actually attribute a certain person to this. Here's what Josephus, one of their famous historians, says.
He says, and when they sought to kill Ahab alone but could not find him, there was a young nobleman belonging to King Benhadad, whose name was Naaman.
He drew his bow against the enemy and wounded the king through his breastplate and into his lungs.
So when you look at that, and then you go back to second kings 5. 1, which we just read, look what it says here says Naaman commander of the army of king of Syria, was a great man with his master and in high favor. Why?
Because by him the Lord had given victory to Syria.
And so this is fascinating to me because whether the Scriptures themselves name Naaman as the person, certainly from the perspective of the Jews, it was Naaman who shot that arrow. So they credited him with it. Okay, this is not there. This is not the Syrian history. This is the Israelites. So they assumed that it was Naaman who shot that arrow. So maybe indeed it was Naaman who shot that arrow and killed Ahab, fulfilling that prophecy.
But all of that would have put him in high esteem among his people in Syria.
But that last line of that verse is the thing that really changes everything, right?
Because he was a leper.
He was a leper. And in these times we understand how the Jews felt about it, right? They had very strict guidelines about how to deal with that. Lepers were supposed to be off in colonies by themselves, to stay away from people. They had to shout, unclean every time they came near someone. And certainly the Syrians felt similarly about lepers. They. But they were more embarrassed by them. They were more like, put off by them, like push them away, kind of shun them. And they, the lepers would still feel the same sense of isolation, maybe, like they didn't belong. And they'd still feel like they were separated from everybody. And so when you take that into consideration and you think about Nahuman, his place, you have to stop and go, hey, he must have been really something special, high quality guy for the king to say, let's keep him nearby and let's help take care of him.
So from his household you hear these words.
Would that my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria. He would cure him of his leprosy.
So from his household someone says, hey, there's a prophet in Samaria. We know that prophet to be the prophet Elisha.
If he could just get to him, then he will be healed. So Naaman went in and told his lord, and the king of Syria said, go now, and I will send a letter to the king of Israel. So the war is over, new king in place. I'll send a letter to the king to kind of welcome you and allow you to come into the area and find this prophet of God in Samaria.
So Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and he arrived at the door of Elisha. Now, I should mention here he was told to go to Elisha first. He did not go to Elisha first. He went to the King and then found his way back to Elisha to figure out where he needed to go. But he shows up on the scene. And to me, this is really interesting because it says that Elisha didn't come and greet him.
You know, here he is coming. Word has traveled to Elisha that this man is coming. He. He shows up on the scene, and Elisha really doesn't do anything. It's almost like you can imagine, like a door creeping open. Said he said to go wash in Jordan for seven times and you'll be clean, you know, and closes the door. It's like really sort of matter of fact. And if you're Naaman and you got all this, you know, clout, you got this position, you've got this honor and this thing, like, understand that he's saying, if you'll just do these things. But he didn't even come out to talk to you. He sent, like, a messenger to come in and share that with you.
Well, Naaman kind of thinks in his mind, like, you know, there's better places to do it than the Jordan. Jordan river had a little bit of a reputation for murky waters, kind of dirty a little bit. And in Damascus, you know, he pointed to a couple of rivers that he said, those are, like, far better. In fact, he says this, he says, are not Havana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel?
You know, could I not wash in them and be clean? And so he's upset about this, and he says, couldn't I just go to a better water source and do the same thing? Why is it that they're making me do it? So he's fed up and it says that he turns and he leaves in a rage. He's mad. He's steaming hot, okay? And so he's walking off. And I think probably what we need to do at this point is to just take a moment to understand Naaman. All right, There's a little bit of arrogance here, right? There's a little bit of pride involved as. As we heard in our scripture reading this morning. You know, he brought a lot of wealth with him. We didn't read this part, but he took hundreds of pounds of gold and silver as a way to pay for the, you know, cleansing of his leprosy. But his wealth was not going to be able to give him what he needed. You know, he came in with this status, with this, you know, this powerful knowledge of who he is, and he brought that with him. And maybe he respect. He expected a little bit more respect. Than what they were willing to give him.
But then also, it seems to me like he didn't really want to know exactly what he had to do. He wanted to do something that was convenient for him, that made sense to him, and, and all those kinds of things. And yet there was no shortcut to how this obedience was going to happen. This was all mandated by God and the prophet.
And so you have a little bit of problem here with Naaman, but in the middle of all this, what's interesting is his, his servants, and this is also kind of a part of the background as well, is his servants are going along with him, going, hey, you know, honestly, this is. It's not that bad. Like, what he said to do was really not that big a deal. Just go into the water, wash seven times, he said, you're going to be clean. I mean, he knew we were coming. He sent word. It's really not that big a deal. Why don't we do that? So they talk him into it. And Naaman, it says that 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.
So he did what he was told, he obeyed. And as he obeyed, the cleansing came.
That's beautiful, isn't it? He swallowed his pride a little bit and he did what he was supposed to do and he received the cleansing. But it wasn't just that he got freed up of leprosy. Listen to what happens next.
He returns to the man of God and he says to him, behold, I know that there is no God in all the earth, but in Israel.
Do you understand that? It changed him.
Not just the fact that he went from a leper to cleansed. It changed the idea about how he felt life should go. He had seen the power of God and it changed him. And so he gives his statement of faith right there that, that there is no other God but the God in Israel. So Naaman's change of heart, you know, brought about his obedience and that brought about his cleansing.
But in reality, there's some things that I kind of skipped over a little bit that are very much in the background that I think really and truly help illustrate how powerful this story really is.
Go with me to verse two. I didn't read this one. I skipped over it on purpose so we could come back to it here.
After finding out who Naaman is. Commander of the. Of the armies of Syria, a great man, respected, held in honor, you know, valiant on the field and all those things, he being a leper.
It says this 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.
So for just a moment, as you hear that, and all of us, especially who have children, who have small children, you know, one of the greatest fears we have probably, is that we would lose our child in some way or another.
They would be lost or taken from us.
That's a horrible thing to think about.
But from the girl's perspective, can you imagine being in your bed at night hearing the ruckus and the screaming and the cries and maybe some knife blades, maybe some clanging and bumping around, throwing things around, a lot of noise. And then an unfamiliar hand comes and grabs you and takes you off in this raid. And you don't know if your family's alive or dead. You don't know anything about that. You're.
You're distraught. You're traumatized in that moment. And next thing you know, you're riding with in some kind of way from one place to the next, and it's dark, and you don't know who these people are, and they're angry and they're in a hurry and all of these things. And you end up in a man's house. And not only do you not have your family, are you not at your home and all those things, but now you're asked and required to serve at the pleasure of the people who took you.
I mean, can you put yourself in those shoes a little bit?
What might you be feeling?
Would you feel anger?
Probably. Would you feel abandoned? Maybe? Would you feel like a little bit of bitterness toward God?
I mean, why is it that I am abandoned here? Why is it that I have been taken away? Why didn't God protect me? And I think sometimes we think that way, right?
When things are tough, we ask the question, where are you? And I think maybe even this little girl probably thought for just a moment, maybe I'm just insignificant, that God would not take the time to care for me in this moment. Why would he allow such atrocities to happen to me?
And yet I'll hear this. And I feel all of those things as I imagine being in her shoes.
But that's not what she did.
Second Kings, chapter 5, verse 3 says, One day the girl said to her mistress, I wish my master would go see the prophet in Samaria.
He would heal him of his leprosy. Now, this may be a little bit of commentary on Maybe Naaman, Naaman's wife had treated her kindly. That may be a part of this story.
But she has every right to be bitter, to be angry, to not want to do what they ask her to do and all those kinds of things. But in this moment, if we just pick apart this text and we break it down just phrase by phrase, I want you to see the attitude in the heart of this little girl.
First of all, she said, it means she moved into action. Listen, servants and slaves were not allowed really to talk. They were just to nod and to agree. They were to do what they were asked to do. They weren't really given the prominence and the opportunity of the voice, right? But she had something to share. She had something powerful that she needed to share with them. And she was willing to take that step, that boldness of moving into action. But then she says, I wish. And when I say, when we say I wish, I think, a lot of times what we think that means is something selfish, like, I wish for something for me. But when you consider that the object of her wishing was her master, you know, I want you to understand this little girl has the ability to take herself out of her circumstance and see someone else's need and think about them. That's hard for us as adults.
But imagine this little girl being willing to see that need and wanting to do something about it. She calls him my master, which is a sign of respect and submission to what he has said. She says, I want him to go to the prophet because she knows where he needs to seek that healing. So she's got it all in her mind. And then the last thing is the conviction that she shares when she says, he will be healed.
Do you hear all of this in the background of this story? This little girl who's been taken away from her family, and now she is looking on compassion to a master who is, you know, gonna die of leprosy. And she is willing to do whatever it takes to get him the help that he needs. I mean, how powerful is that? Let me take you not just to the background, but let me take you to the background of the background.
All I can think of when I read this and I hear this is, how in the world did this girl know to behave such a way?
How did she have the slightest clue how to be compassionate?
How did she know to be bold enough? How did she know to stand up for her faith? How did she know that there was a God who could save this master from his leprosy?
This is where the mom and the dad have to come into play, right? It just appears to me that there is something going on in the background of this child's life, teaching her key principles of life. Obedience to God, God's law, God's mercy, God's kindness, God's forgiveness, that allows her the ability inside to do what comes natural to her in that moment, which is trust in God. God.
So, moms and dads, let me just park for just a moment.
Every time you open up your Bible and read it in front of them, you're showing them the importance of faith in God to you.
Every time you draw a boundary for them and say, this is good for you, this is not good for you, every time you do that, it matters.
Every time you show a kindness, every time you get out of yourself for that moment and you abort all plans to go to someone else's need.
Every time you do those things, those are back in the background.
But your kids are learning.
Every time you talk kind to your wife, every time you respectfully address your husband, all of those things that the Bible teaches us, if we put those things into typical practice, those things resonate in the heart of a child.
And I'm blown away at what this young girl must have experienced in her life, that even through the tragedies and the trauma of what she's gone through, being faithful to God.
So Naaman told the king what the young girl from Israel had said.
Go and visit the prophet. Again. He was told to go to the prophet. Instead he goes to the king. But isn't this amazing? This little servant girl has given word to the mistress who's given it to the master, who now has gone to the king and now on their way to the prophet.
So when I look at this situation and if I can imagine for myself what a playing card would look like for this story, it might look something like this. Because reality is Naaman gets cleansed, right? He's in the forefront of the picture. And we read that story and we go, wow, how powerful for him to just step out and humble himself and obey. And because of that, he received the cleansing. And that's all.
But what I want you to understand is in the very background of that story is a little girl who spoke out with the information that he needed to know on how to be cleansed and healed.
Years ago in youth ministry, we were coming up with a retreat for our youth group. And what we wanted to do was try to find a way to help them understand influence.
And so we found, like, an image similar to the one that you See on the screen, a water droplet. The idea that the water is still. One drop happens, and then it creates a ripple that gets spread, and the entire body of water absorbs that rhythm and that ripple.
And I think about when I look at this story, it's like this one little girl with her voice of faith, with her voice of concern and compassion and love, how that one little voice created a ripple that started all of this change in Naaman's life. So though she was in the background, consider her that ripple of God's story, that thing that helped start the next part of this story.
And the reality is all of us are. That all of us have the ability to be that one thing that influences the next thing.
I was moved Wednesday night, and I was in the New day class.
And in that class, Haley, one of the missionaries from Zimbabwe, was in there sharing with us a few things that are going on in Zimbabwe.
And they made mention that over the last. I think it was 19 years or something like that, 150 wells had been dug.
And so he got into the details of that, and he was just talking about it, and at one point he just stopped because the whales were. We were talking about how the whales allow, like, the children to go to school and even the young girls who are typically told to go somewhere and, you know, a far distance and get pails of water, buckets of water to come back for their family.
It's treacherous. It's dangerous. There's wild animals everywhere, and they're going to do these kinds of things. But wells are being dug through Partners with Africa or Partners for Africa to dig these wells near communities that go deep into the ground and bring up fresh water. And it's transforming the lives not just of the people right there, but how it's changing people all over.
And so he talked about that, and it's like, man, that's great that they are digging wells. But then he stopped and he said, it's because of you, and it's because of every one of you. There's not one insignificant piece of this. There's not one part that's not important. He talked about whether it was a person who was praying about it or a person who contributed to it, or a person who helped deliver the supplies, or a person who helped deliver the news of the supplies, or a person who showed up on the scene to just work and to be there, the person who's watering the crops. He said, it doesn't matter who it is. Every single one of you are a part of that process.
And he was just saying, praise God for the little tiny things that lead up to the big things.
And I couldn't help but think about that in this situation. So here's Naaman. His transformation is pretty amazing, right? He goes from pride to humility, from a leper to cleansed.
And he goes from faithless to a faith in God, all because he had seen God's power at work, and he obeyed and did what he was asked to do.
But none of that happens without this maiden right in the middle of it.
What did she do?
Let's go back and reconsider all those things.
She was disciplined in those moments. She served, created a voice for herself through that service, right where she could be listened to.
She was kind and compassionate. She saw the need and boldly responded with not just an idea, but a conviction that said, this is where healing is.
And that faith, that confidence that God would bring the healing is the very thing that moved all of them into action.
You may say this was an insignificant servant girl, but she mattered.
So let's ask the question again. Do you ever wonder if the things you do in the background really matter?
You may feel small, like this little girl.
You may feel broken, you may feel insignificant. You may feel like you don't have much of a voice, but just like her, each of us carries a message of hope, and each of us is given a voice and an opportunity to share that.
I think about this story and this little girl, and it's the small things that led to this.
And it made me wonder if there may be people in our audience who are doing some of the small things. Like they're curious about their faith, they're maybe growing slowly, and they're doing some of these disciplines in the background. They're creating good habits for themselves. They're demonstrating a little bit of faith.
And they've been told some things. They've been told what they need to do to receive cleansing, and yet they haven't necessarily quite had the courage to jump forward and to do the thing that they need to do.
In Naaman's story, there's a cleansing that takes place. There's a washing and then a cleansing.
And we understand that to be sort of a foreshadowing of what takes place with us in Christ. Right?
That the waters of the Jordan didn't heal his sores. God in heaven healed him. Right? That was the cleansing that took place. Is God is the one who healed him.
In the same way, the waters in this baptistery up here are not. They're not so sacred and put with some kind of special element in them to cleanse all the filth from your body.
No, it's just water.
The cleansing takes place because of the blood of Jesus Christ.
Because he died for you. His blood was spilt. And because of that, the Bible tells us that when we are baptized into him, our sins are washed away in his blood.
That is the beautiful thing about baptism. But there's one passage in particular that I think about with regard to this one is we may think in terms of, oh, I just get up there and it's symbolic, and I just wash, wash, you know, wash in there. And then I get up and symbolically I'm clean. No, you know, 1st Peter 3, 21 says, this baptism now saves you.
Not the removal of the filth of the flesh, but the appeal of a clear conscience toward God by the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
See, the salvation comes and the cleansing comes from Jesus.
And for the promises that we have in him.
And just in the same way Naaman was required to act upon that word, we too are called to act on that as well.
If you've not been forgiven of your sins, I want you to understand that baptism is more than just a kerplunkin in the baptistry.
It's a response of your heart that says, I am filthy in sin, and I have no other course but to give my life to Jesus Christ for that cleansing.
If there's anyone here this morning who needs that, I hope you'll come. While together we stand sing.
