II Kings 5:1-14
July 28
David A. Davis
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This story of Naaman was the first piece of scripture I had to stand up and read before a speech class at Princeton Seminary in the fall of 1984. If you are talking to a seminary graduate from the 70’s, 80’s, and probably 90’s and you find way to drop “Naaman was a mighty man” into the conversation, the seminary alum will no doubt quickly respond “BUT he was a leper”. Everyone started with this passage back then in the Revised Standard Version of the bible. “Naaman was a mighty man, BUT he was a leper.”
As you just heard and read, Naaman was the commander of the army of the king of Aram. That is Syria. As the writer of II Kings tells it, Naaman was a great man held in highest esteem by the king. He was a mighty warrior who brought victory to the kingdom of Aram. Or as scripture puts it, “by Naaman the Lord had given victory to Aram”. Naaman seemly had everything going for him. BUT he was a leper.
In one of their military conquests, the Arameans capture a young girl and forced her into service of Naaman’s wife. The young servant foreign to Naaman’s land and household is never given a name in the story. She is no one from nowhere. Knowing that the mighty man suffered from leprosy, one day the young girl dared to say to Naaman’s wife, “If only my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria. He would cure him from leprosy.” She was speaking of Elisha the prophet. If Naaman would go and present himself to Elisha, he could be healed. Naaman went to the King of Aram and told him what the young girl has said. The king of course, knew that Naaman was a mighty many of valor, BUT he was a leper.” So the king wrote a letter to the king of Israel on Naaman’s behalf and sent him off with it. Naaman, a man of much accumulated wealth, power, and privilege could buy or trade or conquer just about anybody or anything. Expecting to barter for being made well, he loaded up for the trip with silver, gold, and the finest clothes. He was prepared to pay the king and an extravagant sum for the services of the Hebrew prophet.
As the story unfolds the two kings do what kings always do. They do what people with so much wealth, power and privilege often do. They both try to make it all about them instead of the man trying to find healing. The king of Aram wrote, “When this letter reaches you, know that I have sent to you my servant Naaman, that you might cure him of his leprosy.” No mention of the servant girl from another country. No mention of Elisha the prophet. No mention of the God of Israel. The medical referral to the king of Israel was not well received. When the king of Israel read the letter, he threw a tantrum as people with so much wealth, power, and privilege can do. His first reaction was to think the other king was looking to pick a fight with him, to embarrass him, asking him to do something that was clearly impossible. Not thinking of Elisha the prophet of God, he knew that the request was beyond the reach of his power. Or perhaps cynicism, self-interest, gridlock or the inability to get anything done already defined his reign. The king of Israel was angry enough to tear his own clothes, voice his own uselessness, and grant God alone the power of healing, life, and death.
Amid the self-absorbed royal drama, Elisha heard of the king’s meltdown. He sent word to the king, “Why have you torn your clothes? Let him come to me, that he may learn that there is a prophet in Israel.” In order to save face or at least get Naaman out of his hair, the king told him were to find the prophet. The street in front of Elisha’s house had to have been crowded with all the horses and chariots and the load of wealth they were carrying. In a bit of a puzzling twist, the prophet of God had no response to the display lined up outside the house. He must not have been impressed by all the wealth. Elisha didn’t even come to the door. Instead he sent someone else, another nameless, faceless person with a message for Naaman. “Go, wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored and you shall be clean.”
Now Naaman was the one to lose his temper. Here is the gist of his reaction to the perceived snub, slight, insult at the hands of the prophet: “Does he know who I am?! Someone like me deserves for him to at least come out of the house. For me, he should have come out and called on his God. I would think for me he would wave his hands, touch the spot, do all his hocus pocus prophet-like thing. For me. I am a mighty man of valor BUT I am a leper. If getting in the river is all it takes, I will go home and jump in there. The water there is better than any of the water in Israel.” “Naaman turned and went away in a rage.” People with so much wealth, power, and privilege….and rage.
Once again, the nameless and the lowly, people with no power and usually silenced, speak into the story. Naaman’s servants point out that if the prophet had asked him to do something difficult, give something significant, he would have gladly done it, given in exchanged for being made well. “What do you have to lose? All the prophet said was go and wash in the river” “So” that last verse I read to you starts. That’s big “so”. That’s a “so” crying out for more; more meaning, more explanation, more telling of Naaman’s change of heart. But “so” is all we get. “So Naaman went down and immersed himself in the Jordan according to the word of the man of God; his flesh was restored like the flesh of a young boy, and he was clean.” Skin as soft as a baby’s bottom. Naaman was restored. He was like a young boy. A young, nameless, faceless boy. Restored by the power of God spoken proclaimed by the prophet through the unnamed servant at the door and through the lowly servant voices forever silenced by humankind.
For students of the bible, it is easy for the condition of leprosy to be somewhat stereotyped. A disease of biblical proportion. In the gospels, lepers were those who Jesus dared to touch to heal. People Jesus broke all kind of boundaries and religious rules to care for. Lepers were ritually unclean, outcasts, shunned, ignored, rounded up in interments, left to live only with their own kind. When it comes to Naaman here in the Hebrew bible, his affliction seems hardly apocalyptic. Was it life threatening? Apparently not. Was he shunned? Obviously not. Was he an outcast? Hardly. Was he weakened by his condition? No. Was he ritually unclean? Maybe. But the description of his cleansing and restoration comes with no mention of now being right with God or “go and sin no more” or “your faith has made you well”.
Naaman was might many of valor, BUT he was a leper. What if leprosy in scripture is less an historic medical diagnosis and more a sign, a metaphor of brokenness. It seems or Naaman, his condition was a persistent, visible reminder, if only to him, of his brokenness and need for healing. Need for restoration. This man of such wealth, power, and privilege actually didn’t’ have it all and he knew it. He was missing something of what God intended him to be and somewhere deep down he knew it. And his pride was threatening the possibility of his healing. His pride, self-centered expectation and anger threatening God’s gift of wholeness in his life.
Several weeks ago there was an opinion piece in the New York Times by David French entitled “The Day My Old Church Canceled Me Was a Very Sad Day”. It was a very sad essay to read. French identifies as a conservative and he wrote in the piece about how badly he and his family were treated in their congregation in 2015 when he wrote for the National Review. He was writing about his concerns leading up to the 2016 presidential election. Many in the congregation took such exception that they began to confront him and also his wife especially when he was traveling for work. One person even confronted him at the communion table after worship. The only way to name his description of the behavior of those church folks was rage. The last phrase of the essay” “I am no longer welcomed in the church I loved”. You and I know that pride, self-centered expectation, and rage isn’t reserved for one side of the political divide. It is deep-seated in the human condition.
Naaman’s response outside Elisha’s house was so utterly human. To expect God to work in the ways that we demand and benefit us. That’s Naaman’s pride. To think that God’s favor can be bartered with silver and gold. Naaman’s pride. To conclude somewhere deep within that all that you have and have been given is God’s light shining on you and therefore must not be shining on those who have so little. Naaman’s pride. To assumed that everybody’s experience of faith has to be just so, that everyone in the community of faith has to agree and think the same, which means of they all will think like me. Naaman’s pride. To have this anger burst forth when you find others might disagree with you about important things, even the things of God. Naaman’s pride. To believe that wealth, power and privilege brings you to the front of the line in God’s view. Naaman’s pride. Expecting, defining, restricting the healing presence of God in the world. To stubbornly miss the wholeness God intends and the servanthood to which God calls because the life of discipleship in the gospels doesn’t look or feel or sound or playout like you want it to. Naaman’s pride.
Naaman was a might man of valor, BUT he was a leper. His pride threatened his receiving all God intended for him. Wealth, power, privilege, and rage can threaten God’s call to the nameless, faceless, cross-bearing, least of these, servant of all walk of faith that we are called to by Christ himself. Christ alone. For Jesus Christ continues to call the body of Christ that is Nassau Presbyterian Church to be a community humble enough in our life together and bold enough in our conviction to announce that it is not about us, its about Christ who lives in us, and the life we now live together, the live we live together here and together out in the world, we live by the faithfulness of Jesus Christ who loves us, who saves us, who calls us, who sends us.