2 Kings 5: 1-15

Imagine a doctor accidentally stumbles upon a cure for a dreaded disease.  He’s excited about the prospect but then he says to himself.  It’s too much trouble to get this treatment approved by the Food and Drug administration.  And what if someone sues me?  So he keeps it to himself.

Sound a bit far-fetched?  Maybe.  Yet I know someone who knows the cure to something far worse than cancer or heart disease.  He knows where that cure is to be found.  He has experienced it himself and knows its joy.  Yet all too often, he keeps it to himself.  He remains silent when he finds himself with others in desperate need of that cure.  Do you know such a person?  You’re looking at one.

This morning we meet someone who spoke up.  She was a young girl whose name we don’t even know.  In some ways, she had plenty of reason to mind her own business, to remain silent, to avoid making trouble for herself. Yet  she passed on what she knew and believed in her heart.  For in more ways than one, she knew the cure to a terrible condition – and so do you.  So we say:

YOU KNOW THE CURE – PASS IT ON!

I.  It comes through a simple message.

II.  It produces remarkable results.

It was about 850 BC, almost 3000 years ago in a small country called  Aram just north of Israel.  Today we call it Syria.  Now Naaman was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded, because through him the Lord had given victory to Aram.

So things were going well for Naaman.  He was known for his bravery and probably richly rewarded by his king. But his world came crashing down in this one little word.  Leprosy.  Naaman had leprosy.

The Hebrew word for leprosy can mean a number of skin diseases including that one that is most feared.  So to find a patch of leprosy on yourself was a frightening thing – frightening for you and for those around you that feared catching it from you.  For there was no cure, no remedy for leprosy.

Of course today there are powerful antibiotics now used to treat leprosy.  The same can be said for many other diseases once thought to be incurable.  We have been blessed to find so many cures.

But there is one dreadful disease which no work of man has ever been able to cure.  It’s inherited and not just by some, but by all. And sooner or later this disease puts us in the grave, every last one of us.

Well by now you guessed what I am talking about.  Sin.  The sin that clings to us from birth.  The sin that enslaved my heart and caused me to enter this life not as God’s friend, but at odds with him.  And even now, we see this disease show itself in so many ways.  The selfishness, the anger, the impatience, the lack of self control that pulls so hard against my godly desires.

Well left untreated, unforgiven, this disease will do something far worse than the leprosy which causes toes and fingers to fall off.  Left untreated, it will cause God to say to us one day, Depart from me.

Naaman, had no place to turn.  No pagan priest, no physician, could offer him any hope of a cure. But there was this young girl. Her name is not recorded.  We know very little about her but that she served the Lord in a small, yet wonderful way.  And here its amazing how the Lord worked. A raiding party from Aram had taken  this young girl captive from Israel.  They took her away from the loving arms of her family and made her a slave. So imagine how she must have felt with her life so changed.

But the Lord was at work even here.  He was at work as he is in all of our lives.  He had taken this daughter of Israel and brought here to this time and place in Naaman’s household. For unlike so many in the Israel of her day, this young girl knew the LORD. She knew what the Lord had done through his prophet Elisha.  So when she heard about Naaman’s dreadful disease, she approached his wife and told her:  “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.”

You and I can learn a lot from this young girl.  She recognized a need for the Lord’s help. She was confident that with the Lord there was a cure.  And notice something.  Here she gave no sermon.  She spoke only a few sentences, a simple message that expressed her faith. But it was a simple message God would use to make all the difference in Naaman’s life and later on in the lives of others.

Well God has used a simple message in our lives too.  We call it the gospel, the good news. But that simple message pointed us to more than a prophet. It pointed us to Jesus, the Son of God. It pointed us to Jesus who brought us the cure for our dreadful disease of sin. He didn’t discover it in a laboratory.  He won it for us on a cross of grief and shame. The cure for our sin.  The only cure — God’s forgiveness.

So think about it. Think about this young girl with her simple message. Don’t you have the same?  God has given you a simple message that points people to a cure found nowhere else.  It points people to Jesus.  So we say: – You know the cure- pass it on.

You can see what a highly regarded commander  Naaman was in the eyes of the king he served. When Naaman requested leave to seek the prophet’s help, the king said:  By all means, go! And more than that, look what the King sent along to promote Naaman’s cause. He sent a letter to the king of Israel with gifts equaling 750 pounds of silver and 150 pounds of gold.

So off Naaman went.  Directed by a simple message of a slave girl, he set off to find a cure for his leprosy. Think about that.  Isn’t that the case with us.  A simple message has directed us to the cure.   A simple message of a cure that produces remarkable results.

Of course, here we see what often happens.  That message of a cure is met with unbelief. Start with  the King of Israel who should have known better. He read the letter and became suspicious. His heart lacked the simple trust that servant girl had in the Lord and his prophet Elisha.  So the king tore his robes in anger and sent Naaman away.

But also look at Naaman.  When Elisha heard what had happened, he sent for Naaman:  ⁹ So Naaman went with his horses and chariots and stopped at the door of Elisha’s house. ¹⁰ Elisha sent a messenger to say to him, “Go, wash yourself seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh will be restored and you will be cleansed.”

So Naaman jumped right in the river, right?  No, he went away angry.  What!  You send me your messenger!  I’m mighty Naaman.  You tell me to wash in that measly Jordan river when we have the rivers of Damascus.

Naaman refused to believe that such a simple thing could produce such remarkable results.  And you know, that’s how the world is.

You see, the Lord has chosen to come to us in simple unimpressive ways.  He came in a manger, a feedbox for animals, born our brother, of a poor virgin.  He came as a poor wandering Jewish rabbi.  Then he came to a terrible end on a Roman cross.  That’s how God came to us.

And what about now?  He comes to you this morning through the preaching of a weak imperfect pastor.  He comes to you today in a small piece of bread and a little bit of wine.  Yet in that message of a crucified and risen Christ is God’s power to save us.  And with that little bit of bread and wine, Jesus gives you histrue  body and blood with pledge of God’s forgiveness.

Yet  what does the world see?  It sees something so simple, unimpressive.  And so like Naaman, people often go away disappointed with the cure.  Go to a prophet who then tells you to wash seven times in the river.  Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved? The world often goes away like Naaman.  Unimpressed.

But witness the remarkable results. Thankfully Naaman’s servants calm him down.  They convince him to do what the prophet said.  ¹⁴ 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.  And that was just his body.  Witness the remarkable results in his heart.  He went back to Elisha and told him.  “Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel.  But hold on for the rest of the story.

In 1887, some tablets of stone were discovered in Egypt.  We know them as the Amarna letters.  There we learn that the right hand man of a certain Pharaoh was Naaman who returned to Egypt after being cured.  Now here’s the amazing thing.  Every other Pharaoh believed in many gods.  But this Pharaoh worshipped only one, Aton.  That’s the Egyptian name for what the Hebrews called the Lord.

How did this Pharoah come to know the Lord?  It’s obvious.  Naaman must have told him.  And just think of where it all started.  That young slave girl. That simple message of a cure that she was willing to share.  Such remarkable results.

This day some of us have special reason to thank God for a cure.  My wife had an amazing procedure which restored her heart from a dangerous heartbeat that could have given her a stroke.  Some of you have had eye surgery where the cloud of cataracts has given way to seeing once more and sometimes like a teenager.  Remarkable results.  Remarkable answers to our prayers.

Yet as wonderful the skill of the surgeons or the power of our medicine to bring healing, it is nothing compared to the CURE that Jesus has brought to our lives. Where there was guilt, there is now forgiveness.  Where there was terrible distance between us and God, we enjoy peace and the promise of his enduring love.  And where there was a dreadful dead end, there is life, the bright shining prospect life with God.

That’s the cure we have in Jesus.  And you know it.  You know Him.    You know the cure.  So like the servant girl, pass it on. Pass it on dear friends while there still is time. Amen.

Text:  Isaiah 55: 10-13

We were at the Minnesota State fair.  It’s a great fair if you ever get to go.  We were in a building where you see people selling all kinds of things.  I usually avoid buying but have fun listening.  But one fellow caught my eye.  He was demonstrating some special kind of cleaning tool.  See how well it does the job.  It gets everything and today if you buy it I’m including one of these also.  I took out my wallet and bought one. Couldn’t wait to try it out.

Well you can guess what happened when I did. Not much.  It didn’t get it done like I hoped it would.

Well today we are gathered around this book, this Word, and it’s message.  Yet as we do, we might look out from here at the spiritual landscape of America.   It’s not encouraging.  Many have turned away from the Christian faith of their fathers and mothers.  Sure we may see many people filling big  mega churches, but overall the Christian church in our land has lost ground.

So maybe we’re tempted to wonder.  Has the gospel of Jesus Christ lost it’s clout, it’s meaning for people today?  Maybe we should be spending less time talking about Christ and more time talking about other things like getting out of debt or better relationships.  Maybe we need to be more of an emotional support group to make people feel better about themselves.  After all, the gospel doesn’t seem to be getting much traction these days.

This Word of God puts that to rest.  It assures us:

God’s Word Gets It Done!
I.  His purpose
II.  For You
III. To His glory

¹⁰As the rain and the snow come down from heaven,

and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater… I’ve noticed something about our church lawn.  There comes a time when it turns brown and no amount of well water from our sprinklers can make it green up again.  But then comes the fall rain and it’s amazing.  How quickly it greens up. The rain gets it done.

You see, our God has designed an amazing hydrologic system.  We don’t realize how amazing until we have a drought.  Then we pay close attention to the rainfall and the snow pack up in the mountains. We rely on the rains, even the snow, and when they come good things usually happen.  They water the earth so that seeds sprout, plants grow, vines get heavy with grapes and we get to enjoy the bounty God gives.  The rain and the snow get it done.  Our Father in heaven has designed it that way.

But God didn’t send Isaiah to teach agriculture here  God wants us his people to see something about his Word.  It’s like that rain and snow.  It goes out from God and does not come back empty-handed.  Listen.  As the rain and snow come down… ¹¹so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.

Many people see this book and the preaching of this book as just so many words.  It seems so weak and foolish.  Martin Luther said it this way:  How can it be believed that all the power, victory and triumph of God are in the word that comes from a feeble human mouth? How?  A faithful prophet or preacher does not bring you human words.  The words you read in this book are not the result of someone’s imagination. The gospel we share with a friend is not just another religious opinion.  They are the Word of God almighty.  And this He promises.  His word can and will accomplish his purpose.

The apostle Paul believed that:  ¹⁶ I am not ashamed of the  gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes… That’s God’s purpose for his Word.  To save sinners like you and me who had no right to hope for anything good from God.  You and I were dead in our sins and trespasses. But through the gospel God brings people into a faith relationship with Jesus.  He brings us to trust in Jesus, his cross and his empty tomb of victory over death.  He doesn’t force us.  He wins us with his love.   In the gospel, God gives us to see that love we were blind to before.  He gives us to see how he did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all.  There’s power there.  Power that gets it done – his purpose. Power to change hearts to trust and believe in the Lord Jesus and be saved.

But not everyone believes.  God extends his gracious hand to everyone in the gospel.  He holds out his forgiveness for every sin with the hope that because Jesus lives, we too shall live with God.  But some push that gospel invitation away.  They reject God’s Word as foolishness.

Well even then this Word accomplishes his purpose.  A purpose that God takes no pleasure in.   Jesus who died for all said it this way in the gospel of John:  There is a judge for the one who rejects me and does not accept my words; that very word which I spoke will condemn him at the last day.

So this is our task as Christians.  To proclaim God’s Word, to hold up Jesus Christ in the gospel.   And then trust His promise that his Word will not return empty.  It doesn’t always seem like it.  It can be so discouraging when people turn away time and again.   But know this:  God’s Word gets it done. His purpose. And sometimes God lets us see  that saving purpose take root in someone’s life.

It’s taken root in yours, hasn’t it?  Your life testifies to this fact:  God’s Word gets it done – For you. It has and it will.

He  paints us this picture:  ¹² You will go out in joy

and be led forth in peace;  Think of the ancient Israelites on the other side of the Red Sea.  God had led them out of a miserable life of slavery.  When Pharaoh’s army was in hot pursuit bent on cutting them down, God brought the waters down on them and led his people to safety.  . The people of Israel must have stepped out that day with a newfound joy and peace.  That God would do even that for us!

Well think about that dear friends.  You and I may not have stood on the other side of the Red Sea that God parted to save us.  But we stand on the other side of a cross where God gave his own dear Son to save us.  We stand on the other side of a cross where God laid on Jesus the guilt of us all. And now we get to go forth in joy and be led forth in peace.  We are free.  Forgiven.   And God’s word makes that freedom our own.  It gets it done- for you. A freedom that is yours right now.  A freedom yet to come.

We live in a world that constantly reminds us of the tragedy of sin.  We drive past the mortuary but the time comes when we must drive in to see a friend or loved one.  And there is so much evil in our world, even in our own hearts.  We have to teach our children like we were taught to resist our natural desires to be selfish and ugly.  And even nature bears the ugly effects of sin.  We may backpack to enjoy God’s creation.  We may go out on our boat to enjoy a day on the water.  But we are wise to be careful out in the woods.  We are wise to watch the weather reports for that approaching storm.  We live in a fallen world where danger, trouble and heartbreak come our way.

But freedom is coming.  Freedom for you.  Freedom in Christ.  We can’t imagine it so God paints us this glorious picture in his Word.  the mountains and hills will burst into song before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands. ¹³Instead of the thornbush will grow the pine tree, and instead of briers the myrtle will grow.

Well God’s Word made that freedom your own. It brought you to Christ.   It got it done – for you. So remember what it means.  Remember when life gets hard.  Remember when your heart gets broken.  Remember when the doctor tells you something you don’t want to hear.  Remember when the evil of this world gets you down.  Remember this.  Remember what is to come.  Then say to yourself. I’m just passing through.  Passing through to that day when you and I will go out in joy and be led forth in peace.

This will be for the Lord’s renown, for an everlasting sign, which will not be destroyed.” When Kings won a battle against an opposing army they would sometimes put up some kind of monument, a sign .They did it so that people would not forget how great they were.  Of course it sometimes happened that another king came along who then defeated that king.  You can guess what he did to the monument.  Sometimes they rubbed out the name. Other times they just tore it down and put up their own.  The glory of that victory was short-lived.

Not so, the name of the Lord.  Not so, his Word that proclaims his name.  Here is that everlasting sign.  Governments may try to tear it down and confiscate this Word..  Satan may try to rub his name out of the world’s memory.   It won’t happen.  God won’t allow it.   For salvation is found in no one else.  There is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved. The name of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior.  And God’s Word gets it done.  It shows us God’s amazing love for us in Christ.  –  to his glory.  Amen.