The lion was proud of his mastery of the animal kingdom. One day he decided to make sure all the other animals knew he was the king of the jungle. He was so confident that he by-passed the smaller animals and went straight to the bear. “Who is the king of the jungle?” the lion asked. The replied, “Why you are, of course”. The lion gave a mighty roar of approval. Next he asked the tiger, “Who is the king of the jungle?” The tiger quickly responded, “Everyone knows that you are mighty lion”. Next on the list was the elephant. The lion faced the elephant and addressed his question, “Who is the king of the jungle?” The elephant immediately grabbed the lion with his trunk, whirled him around the air five or six times and slammed him into a tree. Then he pounded him on the ground several times, dunked him under water in the nearby watering hole, and finally dumped him on the shore. The lion—beaten, bruised and battered—struggled to his feet. He looked at the elephant through sad and bloody eyes and said, “Hey, look just because you don’t know the answer is no reason to get mean about it.”
This is where we meet Naaman. He is the subject of our Old Testament reading that Madge read us today. Naaman was a very important man, the commander of the army of Aram. He was everything that was successful; powerful, important, well looked upon by his king and the people of his land. He was as proud and sure of himself as the lion. But Naaman met up with an elephant of his own. The elephant of leprosy.
Leprosy was and still is a horrendous disease. Modern leprosy is also known as Hansen’s disease. At the beginning of 2002 the number of leprosy patients in the world was six hundred thirty five thousand as reported by 106 countries.
In the book of Leviticus, chapters 13 and 14 there are detailed laws of diagnoses, classifications, treatment and action, in addition to cleansing rituals.
In the NIV version they use the politically correct term of infectious skin disease, in the King James Version they call it a plague. No matter which term we deem to use it was a horrible disease with great social stigma attached to it. Sounds like some of our modern diseases today, doesn’t it?
The lepers had to separate themselves form society; they had to exhibit signs of mourning—tearing of their clothes, covering their lower face with the hem of their robes and warning people that they approached with the cry of, “Unclean, unclean” and they were required to live outside of the city.
If and when they were cured, they had to go through ritualistic purifications. Not to cleanse them of the leprosy but to remove the residue of residual impurity. Of course, these were the laws of the Jewish people.
We do not know how Naaman got leprosy and we do not know why if he had it was he still surrounded by servants. We just know that Naaman was not a happy soldier.
His servant girl was a Jew and knew of the miracles of Elisha. So she told her master and the king of Aram wrote a letter to the king of the Israelites asking for him to heal Naaman. The king of Israel not being a trusting soul thinks it is a trick. And the old boy is a bit panicky and afraid that he is being set up for failure. Then Elisha comes to the rescuer and steps up and tells Naaman how he can be healed. But not in person; no Elisha sends a messenger. The prophet didn’t come to the great Naaman, a messenger is sent with the instructions.
Now remember that we have determined that Naaman is a proud man. Proud and strong like our lion. And Naaman doesn’t understand the instructions. First off he probably wasn’t too happy that a messenger came to speak to him and not the prophet himself. Why would one river be different than another, they had rivers where he came from? And why in the world seven dunkings? Naaman gets into a bit of a snit. We can probably safely say that our friend Naaman might have been getting grouchy and childish, like some men get when they are sick. I won’t name any names, though a few do come to mind. But finally he agrees and goes down to the Jordon and does as instructed. He is cured. He was not defeated by his elephant. But he was not a prideful lion now either. He understood that the God of the Israelites had caused a miracle to happen.
Now jump ahead with me to the book of Mark. We have seen in our previous weeks that Jesus’ ministry is intensifying. He is performing miracles and they aren’t your run of the mill miracles. They are miracles that give you that shiver up the back of your neck. They are ones that are fulfilling the prophesies of the Old Testament of the Messiah.
The leper came to Jesus. Wait a minute. Did you hear that, the leper came to Jesus? Did you hear it read anywhere that he came proclaiming himself unclean? No, the leper had heard of the miracles that Jesus was doing. And he came with the faith that Jesus could heal him. And he did not demand he be healed, he asks, “if you choose, you can make me clean”. Sometimes in our lives we demand a miracle don’t we, we forget that it’s not our will but his will. “If you choose, you can make me clean.”
Jesus looks at him and is moved some translations say by pity, some by compassion. But the word that is there that jumps out at me is Jesus was moved. There was something about the man that caused Jesus to care. And Jesus reaches out his hand and touches the man and says to him, “I do choose. Be made clean.”
Wait a minute, Jesus touched the man. He touched the unclean. He according to Jewish law and what is outlined in Leviticus is unclean. He touched the untouchable. And the man is healed.
Jesus then tells the man to tell no one but the priest who will take him through the cleansing ceremony. Aww, but our dear friend is too excited. He is clean, he is whole and he is bursting to share it. I probably would have done the same thing. I would have had to shout it from the rafters and tell everyone I came across. There would have been shouting and rejoicing and a huge old party.
And Jesus could not be out in the town openly because so many were coming to him for healing of physical elements.
I at times feel like those lepers. Not that I am physically dirty and soiled and I certainly don’t walk around shouting “Unclean” about myself, now about my house is a different matter.
But at times there are things in my life that I feel stand out as spots to my belief or my disbelief. And that is when I too ask Jesus, if you choose will you make me clean. He has yet to ever say no to me.
Elisha told Naaman how to be healed and Jesus healed this nameless man. There were 400 years between these tow healings and Jesus even refers to Naaman’s healing in Luke as he talks about the repentance of the Gentiles.
Healing is a concept that some of us don’t understand. We read of the magnificent miracles in Jesus time and we catch glimpses of crusades of Benny Hinn and other evangelist on TV and I admit that I at times feel a disbelief watching those miracles on television because I don’t understand why those people have miracles in their lives and people whom I have known and know now aren’t having miracles in their lives today.
Joni Eareckson Tada, paralyzed from the neck down in a swimming accident, wrote a best selling book about her experiences. Afterward she received many calls and letters telling her that God had both the power and the desire to heal her. She became convinced of it, and in a little oak chapel near her home, several elders and ordained ministers anointed her head with olive oil and offered fervent, believing prayers for her healing. She fully expected God to hear her.
“A week went by,” she wrote, “then another, then another. My body still hadn’t gotten the message that I was healed. Fingers and toes still did not respond to the mental command…You can imagine the questions that began popping into my mind. Is there some sin in my life? Had we done things right? Did I have enough faith? “
Joni spent the next six years searching in the Bible for answers for divine healing, finally coming to the conclusion:
“God certainly can, and sometimes does, heal people in miraculous ways today. But the Bible does not teach that He will always heal those who come to Him in faith. He sovereignly reserves the right to heal or not to heal as He sees fit.”
Joni continues, “From time to time God, in his mercy, may grant us healing from disease as a gracious glimpse, a sneak preview of what is to come. It is my opinion that He sometimes does. But, in view of the fact that the kingdom has not yet come in its fullness, we are not to automatically expect it.”
Joni is an author, a painter and a motivational speaker. In one interview when pressed again about the idea of healing and miracles, she said these words, “Sometimes the miracle comes from inside out and not the outside in.”
I want to believe in miracles myself. I want to believe the best. And there are times in our lives where we need to see the everyday miracles and not just the over the top miracles. I want the miracles where a hungry child is fed, where an abused child in not afraid of a hug. I want the miracles where the elderly woman is helped off the floor by a neighbor who worried about her because she had not come out of her room for a day. I want the miracles where when a person is hurting so deeply inside that a hug from a friend begins a healing inside. I want my miracles to be inside out miracles.
At times we all have the leper complex. Where we feel dirty and spotted and in our own minds we are calling out “unclean, unclean”. And we want someone to help us, we want someone to reach out to us and at times when we do we slap them away because they didn’t know the answer we wanted hear. So like our lion friend we walk away bruised and defeated. Still crying inside, “unclean, unclean.” We carry this burden upon ourselves, letting it drag us down. Not doing the one thing we should do. We should cry out to Jesus, “if you choose, make me clean.” And my friends he will touch you. No matter how dirty, ucky, scarred and wounded we are; he will touch us.
One of the most famous violinists of the nineteenth century was a self taught Norwegian violinist named Ole Bull. He was a composer and artist of amazing skill who toured Europe and America with enormous success. During his lifetime, he was the world’s most celebrated violinist.
But he wasn’t known by everyone. While traveling in the forests of Europe, he became lost and in the dark of the night stumbled along a log hut, the home of a hermit. The old man took him in, fed and warmed him, and after supper they sat in front of a blazing fireplace and the old hermit picked some crude tunes on his screechy battered violin.
“Do you think I could play on that?” asked Ole Bull.
“I don’t think so,” replied the hermit. “It took me years to learn.”
Ole Bull replied “Let me try”. Taking the old marred violin, he drew the bow across the strings and suddenly the hermit’s hut was filled with music so beautiful the hermit sobbed like a child.
We, you and I my friends, are the battered instruments; life’s strings have been snapping; life’s bow has been bent. Yet, if we will only let Him take us and touch us; from this old battered, broken, shattered, marred instruments, He will bring forth music fit for the angels.
Just as he touched the leper, so he can touch us.
What more can we ask than that the touch of the master’s hand.
In our song of invitation these words are sung in the 2nd verse, “Just as I am—though tossed about, with many a conflict, many a doubt, fighting fears within, without—O lamb of God, I come, I come.
These words touch me and I hope they touch you also. Do you understand? He will take you just as you are, spotted inside or out. Clean or unclean; just as you are. I invite you to come forward if you feel the master’s touch, if you feel moved by his compassion or if you desire to join our fellowship by transfer or to re-dedicate your life—please come forward during the singing of hymn #339. Please stand.
