The Last Thing To Go

The Last Thing To Go 2 Kings 5.1-14 September 22, 2013

Chester FBC Chester, IL Dr. Mike Fogerson, Speaker

A The prophet Elisha, who was Elijha’s apprentice, is only mentioned one time in the New Testament. (Elijah is mentioned 29 times!) Luke 4.27,

Luke 4:27 (NASB) "And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian."

1 Primarily because Elisha had healed a Gentile/Syrian general named Naaman in 2 Kings 5 in the 9th century BC. (Naaman served under King Ben-Hadad II, King of Aram/Modern day Syria)

a 2 Kings 5:1-14 (NASB) 1 Now Naaman, captain of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man with his master, and highly respected, because by him the LORD had given victory to Aram. The man was also a valiant warrior, but he was a leper. 2 Now the Arameans had gone out in bands and had taken captive a little girl from the land of Israel; and she waited on Naaman's wife. 3 She said to her mistress, "I wish that my master were with the prophet who is in Samaria! Then he would cure him of his leprosy." 4 Naaman went in and told his master, saying, "Thus and thus spoke the girl who is from the land of Israel." 5 Then the king of Aram said, "Go now, and I will send a letter to the king of Israel." He departed and took with him ten talents of silver and six thousand shekels of gold and ten changes of clothes. 6 He brought the letter to the king of Israel, saying, "And now as this letter comes to you, behold, I have sent Naaman my servant to you, that you may cure him of his leprosy." 7 When the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, "Am I God, to kill and to make alive, that this man is sending word to me to cure a man of his leprosy? But consider now, and see how he is seeking a quarrel against me." 8 It happened when Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, that he sent word to the king, saying, "Why have you torn your clothes? Now let him come to me, and he shall know that there is a prophet in Israel." 9 So Naaman came with his horses and his chariots and stood at the doorway of the house of Elisha. 10 Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, "Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh will be restored to you and you will be clean." 11 But Naaman was furious and went away and said, "Behold, I thought, 'He will surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the LORD his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper.' 12 "Are not Abanah and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?" So he turned and went away in a rage. 13 Then his servants came near and spoke to him and said, "My father, had the prophet told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more then, when he says to you, 'Wash, and be clean'?" 14 So 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.

b In the 9th Century two kingdoms were fighting one another called the Syro-Assyrian wars. (Sometimes their battles bleed into Israel.)

aa Israel refused to pick a side or get involved.

bb The Arameans wanted Israel in the fight & would occasionally raid towns/villages to provoke them.

cc During one such raid into Israel, a teenage Israelite girl had fallen into the hands of King Ben-Hadad’s field marshall, Naaman.

b In 2 Kings 6, an all out assault on Israel did happen, but we the account in our message takes places before the nations are engaged in full out war.

2 In April of 2003, the Defense Intelligence Agency & U.S. Central Command in Iraq issued a deck of playing cards to our troops in Iraq. (http://www.militaryspot.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=593&size=big)

a Each card a picture of one of 52 most wanted Iraqi personalities: Most famous was Ace of Spades: Saddam Hussain. (Ace of Diamonds: Presidential Secretary/ Abid Hamid Mallmud Al-Tikriti)

b If there were an ancient deck of “Most Wanted” cards for the Syrian Army, Naaman would have been the Ace of Diamonds, seconds only behind the King of Syria, Ben-Hadad II.