Namaan was one of those people you have to work really hard to like.  What really made him irritating wasn’t the fact that he was rich and powerful. What really made him irritating was the fact that he wanted everyone to know that he was rich and powerful.  You see, Namaan was a Syrian who took himself a little too seriously. Namaan was really full of himself.  Maybe you know someone like that. 

Because Namaan was so full of himself he was expecting a lot of attention, when he went to Elisha to be cured of his leprosy. He was expecting a lot of compassion and kindness.  That’s not what God gave him though. 

If you want to know what Namaan got from God that day, consider if you will the conversation that a football coach had a number of years ago with one of his former players. The conversation took place when Shug Jordan was the football coach at Auburn University. One day Jordan asked Mike Kollin, a linebacker for the Miami Dolphins, to do a little recruiting for him.  Kollin was glad to help him out. “What kind of player are you looking for?” he asked. “Well,” the coach said, “you know there’s that guy, you knock him down and he stays down?”  Kollin nodded his head and said very confidently, “That’s not the guy we want, right coach?” “That’s right,” the coach replied.  “We don’t want him. Then there’s the guy, you knock him down but he gets back up. So, you knock him down again and he stays down.”  Once again Kollin nodded his head and said very confidently, “We don’t want him either, right coach?”  “That’s right,” the coach replied. “We don’t want him either. Then there’s the guy, you knock him down but he gets back up. So, you knock him down again and he gets back up.  You knock him down again and he gets back up.” Once again Kollin nodded his head and said very confidently, “That’s the guy we want right coach?”  “No,” the coach replied. “We don’t want him either.  What I want you to do is find me the guy who’s knocking everyone down.  That’s the guy we want.”

Namaan went to Elisha looking for a God who was going to surround him with kindness and compassion. What he got though was a God who knocked him down a little.  Now the idea of a God who knocks you down a little every now and then may be a little disconcerting, but that’s exactly the God that Namaan needed.

Don’t get me wrong now. When life is difficult God is always going to be there for you. If you’re sick God is going to be there for you. If you’re stressed out God is going to be there for you.  If you’re sad God is going to be there for you.  That’s because God doesn’t want to see anyone in the same predicament a couple of cows found themselves in one day.  The cows were grazing along the side of a road when a milk truck went by.  On the side of the truck were the words, “Pasteurized, homogenized, standardized, and fortified with Vitamins A, D, and B and extra calcium.” After the truck went by one of the cows turned to the other one and sighed, “Makes you feel kind of inadequate, doesn’t it?”

When life is difficult God is always there to pick you up with a little kindness and compassion. God can’t do that though if you’re full of yourself.  That’s why you can be sure if you’re a little too full of yourself that God is going to knock you down a little first.  Just ask Namaan.

Namaan was a Syrian who took himself a little too seriously.  He was incredibly full of himself.  That’s obvious when you look at what Namaan did to get ready for his journey to see Elisha.  Namaan wanted everyone in Israel to know that he was a very rich and powerful man.  That’s why he eventually showed up at Elisha’s door with ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold and those ten garments. By the way, I guarantee you that Namaan didn’t go to K-Mart and buy those garments off the rack.  Namaan also showed up with an official letter from the king of Syria instructing Elisha to make sure that Namaan got the best medical treatment available.

Namaan was a military man who was used to giving orders and being treated with the utmost respect. That’s not what he got though from the God of Israel. Through the prophet Elisha God’s barely gave Namaan the time of day. In fact, when Namaan showed up with all of that self-righteous rigmarole Elisha didn’t even go out to meet him.  Instead Elisha sent his servant out to tell Namaan what he needed to do to be cured of his leprosy.  It was the lowly servant told Namaan to go and wash seven times in the Jordan River.

Well, that snub didn’t set very well with Namaan.  He was clearly disgusted and down right indignant. That’s why Namaan says very scornfully, “I thought that for me (for me) he would surely come out, and stand and call on the name of the LORD his God, and would wave his hand over the spot, and cure the leprosy! Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them, and be clean?”

Namaan, the military man who was used to giving orders finds himself being told what to do by a lowly servant. Namaan also gets knocked down a little when Elisha refuses to take his money after he’s cured of his leprosy. You see, everything that happens here is designed to break Namaan of his pompous pride and you know what? It works.  Namaan starts off doing everything he can to show Elisha that he’s a rich and powerful man.  By the time everything is said and done though Namaan is on his knees declaring to Elisha that “there is no God in all the earth except in Israel…” 

That, my friends, is how you experience God’s goodness and grace. You experience it when you humble yourself before God. Unfortunately, that’s not the way people generally live their lives these day. These days people walk around with a chip on their shoulder. They do everything they can to convince you that they’ve got it all together. These days the prevailing attitude is one that says, “I don’t you. I don’t need anything from anyone!”

Now you can live your life that way if that’s what you want to do.  If you choose to live your life that way though, don’t expect to experience many grace filled moments. You see God can’t bless you if you’re so full of yourself that you don’t think you need any help or if you only want God to help you if it’s on your terms.

Namaan didn’t experience God’s grace when he was like that. Namaan only experienced God’s grace when he was completely honest and humble before the LORD. That’s when you experience God’s grace. You experience it when you admit that you don’t have it all together and you don’t have all the answers. You experience it when you admit your faults and your failures. You experience it when you do what a little boy did one day.  It all started when his Sunday School teacher gave each of the children a passage in the Bible to memorize. Little Timmy’s assignment was to memorize the 23^rd Psalm. Unfortunately, he wasn’t very good when it came to memorizing things.  That was obvious when the time came for him to recite his Bible passage in front of the entire congregation.  Little Timmy went to the microphone, nervously cleared his throat and then after a long pause quickly announced, “The Lord is my Shepherd…and that’s all I need to know.”

It may not be the entire psalm but that little boy certainly knew what he was talking about.  The Lord is your shepherd and that’s all you need to know.  It’s an attitude that says, “Okay LORD. I admit it.  I may have fooled the people around me and I may have even fooled myself, but I’m not fooling you.  I’ve tried to live my life my way and it just hasn’t worked. So, I’m going to surrender to Your wisdom and live my life Your way now.  Thank You LORD for being patient with me and for giving me the strength now to walk into a future that will be defined not by what I want but what You know is best.  Amen.”

Rev. Dr. Richard A. Hughes

February 12, 2006