Man’s Fall Into Hopelessness

Sin Left Alone Will Decay & Rot

-The change from Fresh - To Rotted is gradual

- Fruit abandoned will decay & rot over time

- Bacteria all around us does it’s work

- They need to be feed to survive.

- They grow on and in the food causing it to decay or rot.

- To be fresh & useable

- Fruit needs to have it’s environment changed

❶ A Respectable Life

- Had almost all a man could wish - v.1 & 5

- Position – Captain (Commander)

- Trained, Disciplined, Leader

- Top of his profession

- Greatness – Fame, Influence

- v. 5 King sent a reference for him

◆ Honorable – Fairness, People liked him

◆ Successful – Delivered Syria

◆ Mighty man of valor – Brave, man of action

◆ Wealthy

- Price for silver = $17.65 oz.

- 750 lbs of silver = $211,800

- Price for gold = $1,237.27 oz.

- 150 lbs of gold = $2,969,448

- Average good suit price $200

- Oxxford or Hickey Freeman all over $500

- Armani suit is over $1,500

- Gucci suit = $2,000

10 new suits = $10,000

Total worth = $3,191,248 ($3.1/4 million)

❷. A Contaminated Life

- “BUT” – He was a leper

- LEPROSY - Latin meaning defilement

- "Hansen's disease" - (Gerhard Armauer Hansen – Norway)

- Putrid smell of rotting ulcerous sores

Begins as small, red spots on the skin. And spreds over the body turning white

- Hair begins to fall out - first from the head, then from the eyebrows.

Can’t stand themselves

- As it worsens, finger nails and toenails become loose; they start to rot and eventually fall off.

- The joints of the fingers and the toes begin to rot and fall off one piece at a time.

- Gums begin to shrink and they can’t hold the teeth anymore, so each of them is lost.

- Leprosy keeps eating away at the leper’s face until literally the nose, the palate, and even the eyes rot - and the victim wastes away until death.

- Sin is compared to Leprosy a living disease

- Seeping crawling poisoning destroying

- Very few people plan to mess their lives up with sin.

- They begin by wandering away from God and step by step they fall into disobedience

- Sin starts off small and finishes big

- We choose – Our choices change us

- It has a dominating power

- Proverbs 23:7KJV

7 For as he thinketh in his heart, so is he: Eat and drink, saith he to thee; but his heart is not with thee.

- The lovers of are lorded over by it

- All who are not save from it are under the curse of it

Galatians 3:10KJV

10 For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse: for it is written, Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them.

--- Deut 27:26

- Those under grace have escaped its bondage

❸. A Desperate Life

- Naaman = Pleasant, Delight

- We are created in the image of God

- Sin has made us putrid, loathsome & vile

- v. 3 - Message needs to be given

- v. 5-6 – Our solutions will be of no avail

- v. 7 – Leading to total frustration & helplessness

- Fear

❹. A Solution for Life

◆ v. 11-12 - Abandon Pride

- v. Rivers at Damascus

- River Abana = Life

- River Pharpar = Swift

◆ v. 13- Be Obedient

◆ v. 14 - Act in faith

◆ v. 15 – Give Praise to the Lord

1 John 1:7 …. the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.

2 Corinthians 5:17KJV

17 Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new.