Behold, I Thought Text: Background:

Transcription

1 Behold, I Thought Text: But Naaman was angry and went away, saying, "Behold, I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call upon the name of the LORD his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper. - 2 Kings 5:11 Background: This man, Naaman, was a commander of the army of the king of Syria, and he was a great man in this foreign country to the Israelites for by him, the Bible says, the LORD had given victory to Syria. He was a mighty man of valor, but he was a leper. He had a contagious and dreadful disease. No matter how great a man is by worldly standards and measures, he can still get sick, have cancer, and yes, even die. Leprosy was and is a disease not peculiar to not so great men. Now the Syrians on one of their raids had carried off a little girl from the land of Israel, and she worked as a servant for Naaman's wife. One day, she said to her mistress, Would that my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy. So Naaman told his master what the girl had said and he let him go to check it out. So Naaman went with his horses and chariots and gifts and stopped at the door of Elisha s house. Elisha sent a messenger out to him saying, Go, wash yourself seven times in the Jordan River, and your flesh will be restored and you will be cleansed. But Naaman went away angry and said, Behold, I Thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, wave his hand over the spot and cure me of my leprosy. Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn t I wash in them and be cleansed? So he turned and went off in a rage.

2 Naaman s servants went to him and said, If the prophet had told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more, then, when he tells you, Wash and be cleansed! So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy. The Lesson: Naaman came to Elisha wanting to be healed. But the remedy offended him and he left in anger. Naaman got irked and went away, and said, Behold, I thought, he will surely come out to me, and call upon the name of the LORD his God, and strike his hand over the place, and recover the leprosy. Naaman thought that the man of God would put on a big show and make it spectacular. He thought that washing in the dirty Jordan to cleanse leprosy was a ridiculous act. And if there is going to be any dipping in rivers, He thought that the rivers of Syria were better than those of Israel. He may even have thought that seven times were needlessly too many. His main problem is that HE thought. He thought too much. He had advance ideas. He was prejudiced. Naaman finally listened to his servants, decided to surrender his stubborn will, and went down, and dipped himself seven times in Jordan, and his flesh came again like unto the flesh of a little child; and he was clean. When Naaman did exactly as he was told, his leprosy left him and he was cleansed. "Behold, I thought..." These words reveal possibly the principle reason why many folks fail to listen to God's wisdom in other things, too. Jesus gives us the remedy for sin, hear the gospel, believe the gospel, repent of your sins, confess with your mouth Him as Lord and be immersed in water for

3 forgiveness of all past sins, and into the church of Christ. But it seems foolish to many and so they walk away from the Lord saying, "Behold, I thought " God reveals his plan for the church, that men are to be the leaders, and those leaders are elders and deacons, and that the memorial supper is to be observed each Lord s day, and singing is only singing, and collections are Sunday freewill offerings only, and such like, but that was back then, this is now and they turn away thinking "Behold, I thought that this church might be the one, but they are stuck in the 1st century. The bible says marriage is one man one woman for life, and divorce is not to happen, and should it happen, unless it be for fornication, if you remarry you commit adultery. But, Behold, I thought. You get the idea? Many rejected Jesus because He was not as they expected him to be. Could this be the Messiah? John 7:25-27 Some of the people of Jerusalem therefore said, Is not this the man whom they seek to kill? And here he is, speaking openly, and they say nothing to him! Can it be that the authorities really know that this is the Christ? But we know where this man comes from, and when the Christ appears, no one will know where he comes from When they heard these words, some of the people said, This really is the Prophet. Others said, This is the Christ. But some said, Is the Christ to come from Galilee? Has not the Scripture said that the Christ comes from the offspring of David, and comes from Bethlehem, the village where David was?

4 These verses show well this problem of Behold, I thought. The Jews of Jesus day were so prejudged as to what the messianic king would be and what the kingdom he would establish would be like, that they generally speaking, wholesale stumbled over him in rejection. He would be an earthly king, dwelling in earthly Jerusalem, with an army that would fight against His enemies. Well, that was not the way it was He was a king ruling from heaven, sitting at the right hand of God, with an army, but not one that coerces and physically fights, and a kingdom that is not observable with human eyes. Many are the so-called Christians of Appleton today who are making the same mistake. Our prejudices often get in the way of accepting truth. I recall many years ago a man became a Christian here and later his wife attended a time or two, and so I asked about her prospects for the gospel and he said she probably will not because she sees we don t have women leaders in the church. She had been raised in the feminist era and it is old school to still say women can t be preachers. Her prejudices were getting in the way. Story: A man was trapped in his house during a flood. He began praying to God to rescue him. He had a vision in his head of God s hand reaching down from heaven and lifting him to safety. The water started to rise in his house. His neighbor urged him to leave and offered him a ride to safety. The man yelled back, I am waiting for God to save me. The neighbor drove off in his pick-up truck. The man continued to pray and hold on to his vision. As the water began rising in his house, he had to climb up to the roof. A boat came by with some people heading for safe ground. They yelled at the man to grab a rope they were ready to throw and take him to safety. He told them that he was waiting for God to save him. They shook their heads and moved on.

5 The man continued to pray, believing with all his heart that he would be saved by God. The flood waters continued to rise. A helicopter flew by and a voice came over a loudspeaker offering to lower a ladder and take him off the roof. The man waved the helicopter away, shouting back that he was waiting for God to save him. The helicopter left. The flooding water came over the roof and caught him up and swept him away. He drowned. When he reached heaven and asked, God, why did you not save me? I believed in you with all my heart. Why did you let me drown? God replied, I sent you a pickup truck, a boat and a helicopter! (end of story) In Wisconsin not many years ago, a family believed God would save their child without medical attention and he or she died. Behold, I thought God said in the bible he would heal our diseases, but that is not without qualification. The devil likes to get us to play one part of scripture against another. He tried to get Jesus to jump off a temple pinnacle once because the bible said that angels would save him. And some folks read a passage about healing us of sicknesses, but don t read where he says see a doctor, or drink a little wine for your chronic stomach ailments. There are other bible examples Paul speaking of his previous faith before Christ says in Acts 26:9 I myself was convinced that I ought to do many things in opposing the name of Jesus of Nazareth. So this is not just for weak minded folks, who we think are crazy because they take up poisonous snakes in church, get bit and die. No, this is the future apostle Paul when Saul of Tarsus. A mighty man in the Word of God. And his thinking was off stride with that of God. Today many folks think I just can't imagine God not saving me due to not being baptized. The thief on the cross was not baptized (something they can t be sure

6 of) baptism is a work that nullifies the salvation being of grace or if a man can t make it to water, you telling me God is sending him to hell. However it sounds, or whatever is said, it is Behold, I thought but your thought is wrong. Many today think God is too loving to allow those lost in sin to suffer in hell eternally. And where did you get that from behold I thought. God didn t say that. You said that. And with that said, are you going to get saved or not? Many folks think God wants me to be happy and in so saying are claiming my act or lack of obedience, even if technically is unscripturally, is gonna be ok, because God wants me to be happy. Behold I thought God wants me to be happy. But, is it happiness as He defines or as you define? One thing is for certain, it is not happy if it involves sinning that God is thinking. Wrapping up: Study the Bible with an open mind. In Acts 17:11 we hear Luke say that it is a noble thing with God that when folks here something said about their soul, they go home and check their bibles for themselves to see if it is true. Avoid prejudice as much as possible. I know it is hard to dismiss all previous input into your thinking caps about God, but try try hard to not go into it with your mind already made up or even slanted a certain direction. Do not try to make the Bible prove you right for you just might succeed! And that would be disastrous. Stop looking for ways the bible will uphold my thought going in for you might succeed and come out lost. Your personal Bible reading and study should be identified as inductive, which means you engage yourself personally with the text, careful to let the text determine what you believe, teach and practice. The opposite of this is, to blindly accept the deductions of men and impose those into the text of Scripture. If you

7 simply submit to what others tell you the Bible says, then read and study with those assumptions, your approach is not inductive and independent. If you decide (out of tradition, family or peer influence) what you want to believe, teach and practice first, and then read the Bible in search of passages that sound like they confirm what you have already decided, that is not inductive and not objective. And this is risky business to say the least. Conclusion: What Naaman thought did not matter with God; nor is He interested in what you and I think. For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways, says the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts (Isaiah 55:8-9). Let us try our best not to make the mistake of Behold, I Thought.