Grace Presbyterian Church
July 3, 2016, Pentecost 7C
2 Kings 5:1-19a; Luke 10:1-11, 16-20
Remember Whose You Are First
One thing you are
taught in your preaching classes at seminary is that an effective sermon
focuses on one scriptural passage.
“Passage” here refers to a block of scripture that is “complete” in some way –
it tells a full story or some block of it, contains a unit of teaching that is
coherent and well-rounded, or somehow can be understood as a whole. That’s not
how preachers have always been taught; at one time the emphasis seems to have
been on preaching a single verse of
scripture, a process I find impossible to imagine. Anyway, the idea is that you
pick one such unit of scripture (a “pericope” if you want to know the fancy
seminary word) and concentrate on it in your sermon. Normally that’s what I do
in a sermon. While I might briefly refer to other scriptures as a way of
supporting or drawing a contrast to the principal reading, there is one primary
scripture that is the focus of the sermon.
I can’t do this
week, though. Two passages are demanding my attention, and neither one will
give way to the other. And yet, oddly enough, both of these readings are
telling me the same thing.
We were introduced
to Elisha last week, as he doggedly held on to Elijah until the very last,
taking up Elijah’s prophetic mantle in the process. As we come to him this week
he has been in that role for a while now, and aside from one angry cursing at a
group of young boys who taunted him over his baldness, his prophetic term has
been rather calmer than his predecessor’s. He has his quirks; when a trio of
kings came to him for an oracle in 2 Kings 3, he refused to speak until a
musician was provided to play – perhaps making Elisha the first beat-poet
prophet.
In today’s reading
from 2 Kings, Elisha remains almost a background character, only appearing in
person at its close but deeply involved in events nonetheless. While a powerful
army commander and multiple kings are involved in the story, some of the most
important roles in the story are played by people who are anonymous to us, and
of least significance in the social strata of the time; the servants of the
general Naaman and his wife.
Take the young
servant girl who served Naaman’s wife, for instance. She had apparently been
taken captive from her home in Israel, presumably during one of many military
battles between Israel and Aram. She would have been well aware both of
Naaman’s military prowess and of the skin condition that threatened his
stature, no matter how successful he was in the field. It would have been easy
for her to say nothing. It would have been easy for her to rejoice in Naaman’s
potential downfall; after all, he had led an army that defeated her homeland. How the mighty hath fallen and all that,
you know.
But this servant
girl remembered who she was, or whose she was. Such gloating, or even simple
refusal to offer help in that time of suffering simply was not reconcilable
with what she knew of Israel’s God. Yahweh was a God who heals, and she
remembered the prophet in her homeland who healed others. Because of whose she
was, she spoke up to her mistress, telling her about that prophet in the region
of Samaria, which set in motion the events of today’s story.
Elisha himself
also shows us what it is to remember whose we are. By reaching out to Israel’s
king at a moment when that king was apparently forgetting whose he was, Elisha
helps avert a potential disaster between Israel and Aram, and incidentally
reminds that king that there is indeed a prophet of the one true God in the
land. Later in the story Elisha will also demonstrate whose he really is as
well, refusing Naaman’s very generous offers of reward for his healing.
For Naaman,
though, first he has to learn whose
he is. He was a man of power and accustomed to wielding authority over others
even as he also served his king. The humiliating spectre of his disease
threatened all that. Being brought so low as to take the advice of a foreign
servant girl was bad enough, but to get shuffled off from the king to some
prophet out in the backwoods, only to be handled by some messenger boy was
almost too much. Fortunately, more of those anonymous servants appear on the
scene to save the day, persuading Naaman that it only made sense do the simple
thing that the prophet asked of him. Finally he takes his Jordan River bath and
is “over-healed”, his skin being made like that of a young boy.
It seems that a
lot of people overlook an important point in this story: Naaman converts! He
declares his profession of faith in verse 15 – “there is no God in all the earth except in Israel.” He’s still a
little confused about some things, not realizing that that same God would be
with him even in Aram and wanting to take along some Israelite dirt, but it’s a
start. After Elisha rebuffs his attempts to pay, Naaman confesses his dilemma;
his job required him to support his master, who still worshiped that foreign
non-god, and seeks pardon of Yahweh through Elisha, who sends him on his way in
peace. Whatever else he may have had to learn, Naaman had picked up one
important thing: he knew whose he was, he knew the Lord who held not only his
healing but his very life in his hands, and that this Lord would still be whose he was, first and foremost.
The reading from
the gospel of Luke for today seems different on its face, but that same idea
runs through this story like a fierce undertow out at the beach. Jesus is commissioning seventy of his
followers to go out into the towns and cities that were ahead on his own
itinerary. Luke doesn’t go into much detail about exactly what Jesus is
commissioning these seventy to do, but we get little snippets – extend peace to
the houses they enter; be good guests, eating what they’re provided even if
it’s not kosher; cure the sick; proclaim the nearness of the kingdom of God; if
a town doesn’t receive you, move on – but not before you proclaim that the
kingdom of God is near.
The challenging
part, though, is the way Jesus sends them out. Jesus himself describes it as
sending them out “like lambs into the midst
of wolves.” No bag, no sandals, no provisions of any sort. They are being
sent out vulnerable and at the mercy of others. They are totally reliant on the
goodwill of those to whom they are sent.
So they are sent,
and it seems that things go well. The seventy are excitedly reporting that “even the demons submitted to us!” and
Jesus is celebrating right with them.
Note that ending,
though:
Nevertheless, do not rejoice at this, that the spirits submit to you,
but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.
Remember whose you are first.
It isn’t about
doing end-zone dances over fallen demons. It isn’t about tossing power around
as though you’re drunk with it. It isn’t even about shaking the dust off your
feet and telling a town where to go if they don’t receive your message.
Remember whose you are first.
It isn’t about
being Warriors for Christ or members of the Power Team, or any of the ways
Christians have tended to want to gloat over the centuries. It isn’t about
anything that we do, in the end. It
is, for the servant girl or Elisha or Naaman or the seventy, about whose we are first.
We claim a lot of
different identities. We identify ourselves by our careers or vocations, by
membership in this club or that group, by our hobbies or activities, our circle
of friends, by how we vote or what music we listen to or goodness knows how
many different ways. There’s nothing wrong
with these things, but remember whose you
are first.
You are God’s own.
You are called and commissioned and sent out by Jesus. Your name is written in heaven. You are a servant of God
before you are anybody else’s servant.
Remember whose you are first.
Thanks be to God. Amen.
Hymns:
#331 God
of the Ages, Whose Almighty Hand
#8 Eternal
Father, Strong to Save
#500 Be
Known to Us In Breaking Bread
#719 Come,
Labor On
Cure of Naaman in the River Jordan, 1150 (British Museum collection)
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