Go In Peace

II Kings 5:1-3, 7-15

Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man and in high favor with his master, because by him the Lord had given victory to Aram. The man, though a mighty warrior, suffered from leprosy. Now the Arameans on one of their raids had taken a young girl captive from the land of Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife. She said to her mistress, “If only my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.” When the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, “Am I God, to give death or life, that this man sends word to me to cure a man of his leprosy?Just look and see how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me.” But when Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, he sent a message 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.” So Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and halted at the entrance of Elisha’s house. Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, “Go, wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored and you shall be clean.” But Naaman became angry and went away, saying, “I thought that 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?” He turned and went away in a rage. But his servants approached and said to him, “Father, if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not have done it? How much more, when all he said to you was, ‘Wash, and be clean’?” So he went down and immersed himself seven times 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. Then he returned to the man of God, he and all his company; he came and stood before him and said, “Now I know that there is no God in all the earth except in Israel; please accept a present from your servant.”

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We all know the old saying, "Pride comes before the fall." Or in the situation we find ourselves in this morning, "Pride comes before our humble restoration." Pride keeps us from many things. It keeps us from relationships, it keeps us from new experiences, and it keeps us from risking our time and resources in the pursuit of things God is calling us to do. Pride is a very powerful and influential force.

Naaman, a commander of the army of the king of Aram, is one such example of pride. We probably know people like Naaman, or maybe if we are self-aware, see a little bit of Naaman in ourselves. He isn't timid about his status in society. On the one hand, we have a modest persona in the person of Elisha, and in the other, we have Naaman, who comes riding in with his chariots and all his other displays of wealth and power. 

That act of flashiness might have been enough to impress someone like you are me, but it doesn't have an impact on Elisha, who tells Naaman that he just has to go and wash himself seven times in the River Jordan. The River Jordan was dirty, and it was a place where people would bathe, do laundry, it was not what you would describe as a crystal clear river. I guess if you had to compare it to something today, it would have been like the Hudson River before they started their intensive cleanup. 

If you were seeking healing from a skin related ailment, I don't think you would take to kindly to being told to bathe in the Hudson River. But it's down at the riverside, its when we gather at the river that we discover that the waters of the Jordan River represent more than just a dirty river. It's when we gather at the river, and we come to understand that God does not care about our social status, our wealth, our education, and our accomplishments,  but somehow our pride or our human nature seems to get in the way of that understanding of such freely given grace. 

Yet the thing about pride is that it is easily undone and can bring us to our knees. The fact that Naaman was inflicted by leprosy means that he was on the verge of becoming an outcast. Even with his power and might, there was nothing that could hide the fact that he was unclean or touched by a disease that would eventually kill him. And as we have talked about those tight places in our lives, Naaman's pride brings him to a place of marginalization as he comes face to face with his new reality. 

We can relate to that as well. We can relate to what it is like to be forced into places that only encourage pain instead of bringing about growth. It's that kind of dark force that drives people to seek life-saving prescription drugs on the back market because their insurance won't cover it. It's the kind of force rooted in desperation that systematically prey on financially vulnerable and those who are alone. It's a kind of hard place, a type of distress that sheds like on what is truly important and what is not essential. 

There's a lot we can learn from Naaman's turn around. A man who was in a position of power brought low by a deadly disease was able to find the humility necessary to seek out healing in new places. Disorienting experiences can be bad for many reasons, but at the same time, those experiences might be a catalyst for something new. Out of the chaos of Naaman's plight, we discover that there is healing, there is restoration, in what God has to offer if we are willing to try unconventional things. 

I feel like I'm running the risk of sounding like a bad TV commercial. You know the commercials that offer you a chance to change your life if you are willing to try this or that magic pill. There's one for weight loss, hair growth, intelligence, and relief from whatever ailment you find you have.  But there is one thing that those magic pills can't offer, and that is peace in knowing that whatever problem you're trying to overcome, there is a fount of peace that comes from God when life gets hard. 

But there's something at the end of this story that wasn't included in this morning's reading. After Naaman is healed, he comes back to Elish with gifts and tries to offer him something in return, but Elisha refuses. As someone who has pledged themselves to God, Naaman then asks one more thing of Elisha. You see, Naaman is going to return to his homeland, where he will be expected to participate in acts of worship to another God. Naaman is in a tough position. He feels as though he has found a joyous truth, but must return to a life where his new core values will be placed at odds with his old life. 

I'm sure that we can relate to that tension, that anxiety. If we took the time to assess our core values, we might find that there are things in our work or daily lives that do not match up accordingly. So what do we do? What choices do we have at our fingertips, if any? Well, the good news is that, of course, there are options, and of course, these are all rooted in the love and grace of God. And when we worry that what we do is not true to ourselves in those instances, we may find that we too hear the words of Elisha, who said to Naaman, "Go in peace." 

You see, Elisha could have taken a hardliner position. Elisha could have drawn a line in the sand and told Naaman that he had to choose one or the other. But Elisha knew that was not his responsibility. Elisha knew that only God was familiar with Naaman's heart, and so trusting in the compassion of God, he tells Naaman, "Go in peace." We like to draw lines in the sand, and we want to know who are friends are and who our enemies are as well. However, the truth is that the world is much more complex and that God knows the complexities that we face daily. 

Naaman may have thought that he was only coming to visit Elisha for a healing session, yet he walked away with much more. Naaman walked away with what we seek, that being peace in our lives, and forgiveness for the things that we know are wrong, and reassurance that we have the strength and spiritual energy we need to do the tasks we have been given. We don't have anything to be proud of if we aren't able to see the world through the renewed lens of what life looks like from the outside. And I think that Naaman knew that as well. 

The world needs more of us who are like Naaman. Not the pre-encounter with Elisha Naaman, but the Naaman who goes away humbled and full in spirit. And the world needs more people who are like Elisha. People who are not holy because they are on a soapbox all the time, but people who are righteous because they do not cast the first stone. Elisha was judge, prosecutor, and defender, that wasn't Elisha's job. No instead, Elisha was a vessel that reminded Naaman that he already possessed what he was looking for, which was God's reassuring presence. 

When our lives seem topsy turvy, when who we are doesn't feel connected with what we do, and when we aren't sure we can make the changes we want to make, we hear God say, "Go in peace." So let us go into the world filled with the peace of God, a peace that permeates every fiber of our being and peace that restores our souls when they are weary and downtrodden. May we, dare I say shall we, go in peace, because it is what our Lord commands. 

So let us gather at the river, the river of life. And may we find that the waters there cleanse us not of any filth, but wash away fears, judgments, and anything else we may be holding onto. That way, when we finish, and we come out of the water, we will, like Naaman, find the healing peace that we needed all along. Amen.