“THE IMPACT OF THE SUPER BOWL” 2 Kings 7:3-11
INTRO – Today in New Orleans, there are thousands & thousands of people who have gathered there to watch 2 football teams, the Baltimore Ravens & the SF 49ers battle it out for the NFL national championship. Millions of dollars have been spent on advertising…millions of dollars paid to players & coaches…millions of dollars will be spent on tickets, hotel rooms, food, beer, & anything & everything else that goes w/ that event. It’s an annual event that has been going on since 1967 & has become a national holiday of sorts. “Super Bowl Sunday” is the 2nd largest food-consumption day of the year, surpassed only by Thanksgiving Day. It also is the most watched TV broadcast in the US each year, & Super Bowl 35 in 2011 had the largest TV viewing audience in US history w/ over 111 million viewers. The TV commercials have become a huge part of the Super Bowl experience, as well as the halftime show w/ celebrities & top-name musicians participating every year.
And within the shadow of the Mercedes Benz Superdome where the Super Bowl will be played, there are thousands of people living in poverty. With a homeless population of nearly 7,000 people, New Orleans has the 2nd largest homeless population in the nation. There are tons & tons of needy, broken, lost people in this city. It is full of immorality, decadence, voodoo, demonic cultic & occultic activity. It is crime-ridden, corruption-ridden, & craziness-ridden! It led the nation in murders last year, which was the 6th year in a row that it has done so, & has recently had the title of “Murder City.” It is known for wild partying & uninhibited depravity, especially during Mardi Gras. It’s a desperately needy, desperately dark place.
But New Orleans isn’t the only place that is desperately needy & desperately dark. It isn’t the only place where there are multitudes of lost & hurting people. They’re right here in Byram…Jackson…Raymond…Terry…Clinton…Florence. The level of pain & misery in people’s lives seems to be at epidemic proportions these days. The depth of heartache is deeper than anyone has ever seen before. The lostness of our communities & nation is so huge. People all around us are looking for answers & direction for their lives. The emptiness of their hearts is staggering & the eternity they are facing is terrifying. Without Jesus, there is no hope, no healing, no heaven. Without the Gospel, there is no purpose, no plan, no power. There is no salvation apart from Jesus Christ & Him alone. The government can’t save them…schools can’t save them…Wall Street can’t save them…their families can’t save them…even the church can’t save them. Many of them are angry…many of them are bitter…many of them have been beaten down by life circumstances & are scared, sad, & sick of the hypocrisy they see in the lives of many Christians & churches. Here’s a little snapshot of these folks: “Listen: Jesus” video
So, what does our Scripture passage have to do w/ this? At first glance, you may think that the 4 guys would represent the needy people that we’ve been talking about. After all, they have leprosy, have been cast out of society, are considered religiously unclean, & are dying. Sounds a lot like the homeless folks in New Orleans or inner-city Jackson, doesn’t it?
But, the truth is, they represent US! Let’s consider how they represent us & how their experience can impact us so we can impact others.
THEY WERE IN A HOPELESS STATE – v. 3-4 – There was a terrible famine in Samaria due to a siege that had been established by Ben-Hadad, king of Aram – 6:24-25. Ben-Hadad didn’t barge in w/ all of his soldier in a direct, full attack. Instead, he threw up an impenetrable military barricade around the city & began to starve the inhabitants to death. The siege was so long & so bad that people had to resort to eating their donkeys’ heads, dove’s dung (ESV, NASB), & even their kids – 6:26-29. These were incredibly terrible times! Starvation…death…sickness…disease…it couldn’t get much worse or much more hopeless. The people were under the judgment of God for turning away from Him. They had begun worshiping false gods instead of worshiping Him. The result of that was God’s hand of discipline & judgment coming against them in the form of this horrendous siege by Ben-Hadad & the Arameans.
It is in these horrible conditions that we find these 4 lepers. Not only were they starving to death b/c the garbage that was normally lowered or thrown over the city walls to them had stopped, they were suffering from the ravages of the disease of leprosy. So, not only were they banished from the city b/c of their disease, already having to live a pitiful life, now they were doing to die from starvation if they just stayed there.
This is a good picture of the pitiful condition of someone who does not know Christ as their Savior. They are under the judgment of God for their sin…they are dying of spiritual hunger…are afflicted w/ a deadly disease called sin…completely hopeless, helpless, & hell-bound. They’ll do anything to try to find some kind of meaning for their lives…do anything to try & find some kind of “food” to satisfy their spiritual hunger…that’s one of the main reasons that the bars & strip clubs on Bourbon Street will be filled to capacity tonight (in Byram & Jackson, too!)…one of the reasons that young women will sell their bodies tonight in New Orleans as they struggle to find some kind of meaning, acceptance, & love as their life is under siege…one of the reasons that businessmen will work 7 days a week, sacrificing their marriages, their kids, & their health to try & make another dollar…one of the reasons that gangs in the inner-cities are so enticing to vulnerable, lost young men who have no purpose for their lives. It’s a horrible place to be, a horrible condition to suffer, a horrible life to live. Lester Roloff: “You are not going to be lost when you get to hell. If you are without Christ, you are lost right now. Your trial is already over. You've already been sentenced. You're just waiting for execution morning to roll around.”
THEY FOUND AN UNBELIEVABLE STASH – v. 5-8 – Since these guys had nothing to lose – “If we stay here, we die…If they kill us, then we die” (v. 4), they got up to go to the camp of the Arameans to surrender, hoping they the enemy would let them live & maybe feed them something. Their desperation drove them to take action. And when they got there, they found that the Arameans had fled b/c God had caused them to think that they were about to be attacked. Look at v. 7. So the same God that had brought about the judgment through the siege had gotten rid of the army & was about to provide these men w/ more food than they could eat, more riches than they could spend, & more clothes than they could wear. They found an unbelievable stash, a treasure like they had never seen before. These 4 sick, pitiful, starving, begging lepers were just FREELY GIVEN this huge, priceless treasure!
Do you know what you call that? GRACE! It’s God giving us what we don’t deserve. It’s what the prophet Isaiah was talking about in Isa. 55:1 – “Come, all you who are thirsty, come to the waters; & you who have no money, come, buy & eat! Come, buy wine & milk w/out money & w/out cost!” It’s God showing us His unconditional love for the whole world by sending His one & only Son into this sin-sick world to be our Savior, to pay the price for our salvation, to give us the unbelievable, undeserved, unmerited opportunity to be saved, to have abundant life here on earth, & to know that, one day we are going to heaven & not to hell! M.R. Dehaan: “Why God should choose the meanest, basest, most unworthy individuals with absolutely nothing to commend them at all to God, except their miserable, lost condition, and then exalt them to become the sons of God, members of the divine family, and use them for His glory, is beyond all reason and human understanding. Yet that is grace.” Hallelujah! What a Savior! What a treasure!
THEY EXPERIENCED AN EYE-OPENING SHIFT OF FOCUS – v. 9 – “We can’t keep this to ourselves! Just a short distance away from here, people are still dying, still starving, still w/out hope. They don’t know that the enemy is gone, that the siege is over, & that there is food enough for everyone. We can’t keep this to ourselves! We’ve got to go tell them! We have the answer to their needs, the solution to their problems, the provision for their hunger! We’ve got to go tell them!”
Do you know what is one of the worst sins that Christians commit? It’s the sin of silence. We are the lepers who have been given the most wonderful treasure in the universe!
- We know where a spiritually hungry person needs to go to be fed forever!
- We know where a spiritually dead person needs to go to be given eternal life!
- We know where a spiritually thirsty person needs to go to have their thirst quenched for all eternity!
- We know where a spiritually destitute person needs to go to find unlimited riches!
And yet, how many of us never tell anyone about this treasure, this food & water, this life, these riches?
CONCLUSION – Sometime later tonight, there will be a bunch of players & coaches of either the Ravens or the 49er’s who will make a bunch of money when they win the game. Each of the players on the winning team will get at least $88,000 just for this game. There will be a bunch of players, coaches, & fans who will be celebrating a victory. There will be a city that will welcome home their victorious team.
But, after all the hype is gone, after the Super Dome is cleaned up & locked up, after the commercials have stopped running, not much will change as a result of this game. Most of us will probably not remember who was in this game in a few months.
But, if you & I will take this opportunity today on Super Bowl Sunday to make a new commitment to Christ to share His love w/ those who are lost, lives will be forever changed. His impact will truly happen through our lives, through His Church.
