A Journey to Wholeness

The Gospel According to Naaman's Slave Girl

Mark Belz

• Publisher: P Publishing
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781629950648
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Studies

Is the gospel of reconciliation prefigured in the Old Testament? Mark Belz examines how a Jewish slave girl's simple testimony helped to bring about the salvation of her Syrian master.

CHAPTER ONE

THE STORY

OVERVIEW

This is a story, recorded in 2 Kings chapter 5, of the prophet Elisha healing a Syrian general of leprosy. It is a story, and I will refer to it as such as we progress through it. But like many stories, it is also history, a true story. It’s not a parable, although it has many similarities to the parables that Jesus preached. The characters are real people. The nations involved were real nations at a particular time in world history, more than eight hundred years before the birth of Jesus. It’s reliable as a historical record because it was written by good historians and by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

We know that the Lord has preserved this event in the written Word because, like all Scripture, it is profitable for us—“for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness” (2 Tim. 3:16). It illustrates, in real lives, the truth, principles, and dynamics of the gospel. It shows God’s sovereign interest and power in salvation and in making the gospel available to everyone, long before New Testament times. The story is about God’s overarching grace in the gospel, bridging the chasms between slave and owner, Jew and Gentile, prophet and pagan, God and man.

THEME AND FOCUS

The theme of this writing is the ministry of reconciliation, which the apostle Paul claimed as his own in 2 Corinthians 5, and the focus is the Syrian general’s little Jewish slave girl. She is sometimes forgotten as this story is recounted, perhaps because she is mentioned only once. But in fact, she is the protagonist. Without this unnamed child’s testimony to her mistress, there would have been no healing and no story.

The story comprises the whole of 2 Kings 5. As one reads that chapter, the author’s compact style is immediately evident. There is a wonderful economy of language that begs to be “unpacked.” And we know it was meant to be unpacked because Jesus himself unpacked some of it in Luke 4. That is, its meaning, its application, and its prophetic nature go far beyond the story itself. For the person even passably acquainted with the rest of Scripture, one reading of Naaman’s story will conjure up all kinds of thoughts regarding what he or she already knows about the gospel. The story resonates.

JORDAN RIVER

The Jordan River is central to the event because it is where Naaman’s healing occurred. The river is important throughout Scripture, and to this day is associated with cleansing, healing, and crossing over. John the Baptist preached in the wilderness, commanding his hearers to repent of their sins, and he baptized those who listened and obeyed in the Jordan River. Jesus himself was baptized by John the Baptist in the Jordan. For us, water baptism signifies, among other things, cleansing from sin, and the Jordan has always carried this meaning. Ricky Skaggs, a contemporary Kentucky bluegrass singer, characterized the Jordan’s cleansing power like this: “I’m going down to the River of Jordan/And let the cool waters cleanse my soul,” and noting that Naaman saw that “the cool waters made him whole.”¹

The river also conveys a “crossing over”—its meaning from the fifteenth century B.C. forward, when the Israelites crossed as a nation into Canaan. This landmark in Jewish history became a symbol for all believers, representing not only death—crossing over from this earthly life to heaven—but the new birth as well, experienced in this life and at death. This is the “crossing over” that Jesus talked about when he said:

Very truly I tell you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be judged but has crossed over from death to life. Very truly I tell you, a time is coming and has now come when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God and those who hear will live. (John 5:24–25)

The river sometimes represents healing, although it was a surprise to me, as I studied this story, that Naaman’s is the only scriptural record of physical healing in the Jordan River. In fact, Naaman’s healing there is one reason that thousands of people have made pilgrimages to the river even to this day, hoping they, too, will receive healing. To Christians, the river has become a symbol of spiritual healing and transformation, and as we “cross over,” we are cleansed and made fit for entrance into the kingdom:

When I tread the verge of Jordan,
Bid my anxious fears subside;
Death of death and hell’s Destruction,
Land me safe on Canaan’s side.²

All three of these symbolic aspects of the Jordan River—cleansing, crossing over, and healing—are relevant to the story of Naaman the Syrian. In this episode of God’s supernatural action, Naaman was cleansed of his sin, crossed over from death to life (John 5:24), and was healed. He received every blessing of God’s salvation in Christ.

TEXT

This story is just a sliver of Jewish history. It records an unusual occurrence in Israel—the northern kingdom—about two hundred years after Solomon’s magnificent kingdom had collapsed and been divided. It’s a story about disease and healing, riches and poverty, unbelief and faith, smallness and greatness, weakness and strength, allies and enemies, slavery and freedom, lies and truth, worship and sacrilege, the common and the holy—even church discipline. Though written compactly, it is a wonderful and riveting story. Whether you have read it or not, please read 2 Kings 5 through again (or for the first time) before you read this book; I’ve included the entire chapter below. And if time doesn’t permit you to read this book, skip it!—and just ponder the story itself.

Imagine this as a play. The story begins with a mighty Syrian military officer, an enemy of Israel, afflicted with leprosy, a dread disease. The proud but diseased enemy officer enters from stage left. During the story, this mighty Syrian is healed. At the end of the play, when the final curtain descends, the military officer exits stage right, now humbled, healed physically, and—astonishingly—a member of the family of God. He had been an enemy of that family but was now fully reconciled to them and to their God.

The story is a powerful example of the gospel of reconciliation. As the story develops, we will see the gospel light shining brighter and brighter until we can see an Old Testament example of what the prophet Isaiah was referring to when he said:

The people walking in darkness
have seen a great light;

on those living in the land of deep darkness
a light has dawned. (Isa. 9:2)

We will see this truth in action here: God’s saving grace is extended to a Gentile. It’s a foreshadowing of the great opening of the gospel to the Gentiles recorded in the book of Acts. It becomes evident that when the apostle Paul said that “God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting people’s sins against them” (2 Cor. 5:19), he was not referring exclusively to the era following the death and resurrection of Christ. It is God’s eternal purpose to reconcile the world—both Jew and Gentile—to himself and to one another, and here we find that he was doing so eight hundred years before Jesus came to earth.

For ready reference as we begin the discussion of this story, here is the text:

2 KINGS 5

¹ 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. He was a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy.

² Now bands of raiders from Aram had gone out and had taken captive a young girl from Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife. ³ She said to her mistress, “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.”

⁴ Naaman went to his master and told him what the girl from Israel had said. ⁵ “By all means, go,” the king of Aram replied. “I will send a letter to the king of Israel.” So Naaman left, taking with him ten talents of silver, six thousand shekels of gold and ten sets of clothing. ⁶ The letter that he took to the king of Israel read: “With this letter I am sending my servant Naaman to you so that you may cure him of his leprosy.”

⁷ As soon as the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his robes and said, “Am I God? Can I kill and bring back to life? Why does this fellow send someone to me to be cured of his leprosy? See how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me!”

⁸ When Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his robes, he sent him this message: “Why have you torn your robes? Have the man come to me and he will know that there is a prophet in Israel.” 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.”

¹¹ But Naaman went away angry and said, “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. ¹² 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.

¹³ Naaman’s servants went to him and said, “My father, 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’!” 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.

¹⁵ Then Naaman and all his attendants went back to the man of God. He stood before him and said, “Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel. So please accept a gift from your servant.”

¹⁶ The prophet answered, “As surely as the LORD lives, whom I serve, I will not accept a thing.” And even though Naaman urged him, he refused.

¹⁷ “If you will not,” said Naaman, “please let me, your servant, be given as much earth as a pair of mules can carry, for your servant will never again make burnt offerings and sacrifices to any other god but the LORD. ¹⁸ But may the LORD forgive your servant for this one thing: When my master enters the temple of Rimmon to bow down and he is leaning on my arm and I have to bow there also—when I bow down in the temple of Rimmon, may the LORD forgive your servant for this.”

¹⁹ “Go in peace,” Elisha said.

After Naaman had traveled some distance, ²⁰ Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the man of God, said to himself, “My master was too easy on Naaman, this Aramean, by not accepting from him what he brought. As surely as the LORD lives, I will run after him and get something from him.”

²¹ So Gehazi hurried after Naaman. When Naaman saw him running toward him, he got down from the chariot to meet him. “Is everything all right?” he asked.

²² “Everything is all right,” Gehazi answered. “My master sent me to say, ‘Two young men from the company of the prophets have just come to me from the hill country of Ephraim. Please give them a talent of silver and two sets of clothing.’ ”

²³ “By all means, take two talents,” said Naaman. He urged Gehazi to accept them, and then tied up the two talents of silver in two bags, with two sets of clothing. He gave them to two of his servants, and they carried them ahead of Gehazi. ²⁴ When Gehazi came to the hill, he took the things from the servants and put them away in the ...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Series Foreword
• Foreword By Robert S. Rayburn
• Preface
• Acknowledgments
• 1. The Story
• 2. The General
• 3. Slave Girl
• 4. Naaman Steps Out
• 5. Elisha, Part 1
• 6. Healed
• 7. Elisha, Part 2
• 8. Gehazi and Naaman
• 9. Gehazi and Elisha
• 10. Elisha Ends the Raids
• 11. Jesus and Naaman
• 12. The Look of Reconciliation
• 13. Glorious Expectations
• Notes
• Index of Scripture
• Index of Subjects and Names