A Little Girl & A Valiant Warrior

When the Syrian army crossed into Israeli land, they took her.  We know nothing more than what we are told - she was a little girl and she now waited on the warrior's wife.

He, the warrior, we know a bit more.  He is a supreme commander in the Syrian Army giving him not only a big job, but much prominence and wealth.  Not many are described as "valiant warrior" and yet, he is.  He is loved, respected and adored.

How do we know this?   Because the nameless little girl taken as a slave cares so deeply for him she wishes him healed.  You see, the valiant warrior suffers from leprosy.  An incurable disease which will take everything from him; his status, his wealth, his prominence.  He stood to lose it all.

Perhaps his bravery and valiance rubs off on her for she finds the courage to speak to his wife.  "I wish that my master were with the prophet who is in Samaria!  Then he would cure him of his leprosy."  This nameless little girl isn't dismissed as speaking nonsense.  The big important and prominent people in society listened to her.  The Syrian king granted the warrior's wish to find the prophet and writes a letter to the King of Israel.

A little girl spoke and warriors and kings listened.  This little girl had the courage to speak.

Receiving the King of Syria's letter stating his highest ranking officer was coming to be healed, the King of Israel became distraught and tore his clothes.  He held no power to heal him.  

The king was distraught.
The prophet was not.

Elisha told the king,"Why have you torn your clothes? Now let him come to me, and he shall know that there is a prophet in Israel."  Elisha had the courage to speak up to the king.

Naaman, the valiant warrior, arrives with his horses, his men and his chariots to Elisha's house.   It is evident a man of importance stands in the doorway.  

Elisha does not meet him.  Instead Elisha sends his messenger to the valiant warrior and says, "Go and wash in the Jordan 7 times, and your flesh will be restored to you and you will be clean."

Go and wash?  Go and wash??  This is what he says to do?  The valiant warrior is angry at such simplicity.   
He has successfully waged war on enemies.  
He successfully created war campaigns that captured kingdoms.  
The entire Syrian army was at his command.  

Simple was not in his vocabulary.  Simple would not do.

His men question him.  If he were asked to do something great would he not do it?  How much more then if all he is asked is to go and wash?

The men had courage to speak up to their commander.

Naaman washes.
His skin becomes clean.
He is healed.

The valiant warrior's healing came when others had the courage to speak up to those in authority over them.  Dare we say, the healing came because of the courage of a nameless little slave girl?  Had she not spoken of Elisha, the valiant warrior would not be washing in the river.

In a time when the world we know has been turned upside down, may we all find the courage of this nameless little girl.  The courage to speak of hope and healing.

God used a nameless little girl to show a valiant warrior who He is. 
He can use you too.


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2 Kings 5:1-16
Now Naaman, captain of the army of the king of Aram, was a great man with his master, and highly respected, because by him the Lord had given victory to Aram. The man was also a valiant warrior, but he was a leper. ² Now the Arameans had gone out in bands and had taken captive a little girl from the land of Israel; and she waited on Naaman’s wife. ³ She said to her mistress, “I wish that my master were with the prophet who is in Samaria! Then he would cure him of his leprosy.” ⁴Naaman went in and told his master, saying, “Thus and thus spoke the girl who is from the land of Israel.” ⁵ Then the king of Aram said, “Go now, and I will send a letter to the king of Israel.” He departed and took with him ten talents of silver and six thousand shekels of gold and ten changes of clothes.
⁶ He brought the letter to the king of Israel, saying, “And now as this letter comes to you, behold, I have sent Naaman my servant to you, that you may cure him of his leprosy.” ⁷ When the king of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, “Am I God, to kill and to make alive, that this man is sending word to me to cure a man of his leprosy? But consider now, and see how he is seeking a quarrel against me.”
⁸ It happened when Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, that he sent word to the king, saying, “Why have you torn your clothes? Now let him come to me, and he shall know that there is a prophet in Israel.” ⁹ So Naaman came with his horses and his chariots and stood at the doorway of the house of Elisha. ¹⁰ Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, “Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh will be restored to you and you will be clean.” ¹¹ But Naaman was furious and went away and said, “Behold, I hhought, ‘He will surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, and wave his hand over the place and cure the leper.’ ¹² Are not Abanah and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Could I not wash in them and be clean?” So he turned and went away in a rage. ¹³ Then his servants came near and spoke to him and said, “My father, had the prophet told you to do some great thing, would you not have done it? How much more then, when he says to you, ‘Wash, and be clean’?” ¹⁴ So he went down and dipped himself seven times in the Jordan, according to the word of the man of God; and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child and he was clean.
¹⁵ When he returned to the man of God with all his company, and came and stood before him, he said, “Behold now, I know that there is no God in all the earth, but in Israel; so please take a present from your servant now.” ¹⁶ But he said, “As the Lord lives, before whom I stand, I will take nothing.”

Something out of Clay

"Then I went down to the potter's house, and there he was, making something on the wheel."  Jeremiah 18:3 (NASB)

Jeremiah stood outside the potter's house and he watched.  The potter sat at the wheel creating something.  Unhappy with what was on the wheel,  the potter takes the spoiled object and makes it into another vessel - a different vessel - one that pleased the potter.

God uses the imagery as a tool in conveying to Jeremiah that He too will take what is spoiled and make it into something pleasing to Himself.

While this is a powerful message of hope and transformation, I find myself staring at the word "something".

"..and there he was, making something on the wheel."

Something.

Jeremiah makes no mention of what is being made - a cup? A plate? A jar?  Can Jeremiah even determine what it is?

God asked him to go down to the potter's house. Jeremiah did, and he watched.  

And waited.

Jeremiah watched from the sidelines as the clay was poked, prodded, molded, spun and watered.  He was asked only to watch.  Jeremiah wasn't the one creating the pottery piece, he was there to watch it happen.

Do you find yourself on the sidelines watching someone you love be molded?
Are you standing outside of the potter's wheel while they are being transformed?
You find yourself only being able to watch.  And it is hard.
Yours is a broken heart, a tired heart, a helpless heart begging for something beautiful to come from the clay yet unable to do anything about it.  You can merely watch.
You aren't the potter.

Take encouragement my friends.

Jeremiah wasn't given the reason why he was there until after he watched the clay be transformed.  The purpose of his sideline was given after the Something was made into Something Else and the Potter was pleased.

The sideline may seem overwhelming.
The sideline may be the hardest place to stand.
Yet, the sideline is also the front row to watching Something being made that pleases the Potter.
It is a hard earned blessing that comes with many cuts, scratches and bruises.

And just like Jeremiah, after standing outside the potter's wheel, after the completion of Something, vs 5 tells us, " Then the word of the Lord came to me..."

God spoke.

He spoke to Jeremiah and He will speak to you.

The sideline is tough.
It is also the place where He meets you.


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The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord saying, ² “Arise and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will announce My words to you.” ³ Then I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was, making something on the wheel. ⁴ But the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter; so he remade it into another vessel, as it pleased the potter to make. Jeremiah 18:1-4, NASB

The Bumper Sticker

It's just before 7 a.m. and I am driving to work.  The sun is peaking from behind the mountains.  My car stops behind a pick up truck at the intersection.  I wait to turn right.  I am third in line.

I read the bumper sticker on the back of the the tailgate -"Defeat DIPG".  It takes but a moment to realize I am behind my neighbor. 

How many people have followed behind him unaware of the meaning behind the bumper sticker?  How many have thought it was nothing more than a $1 purchase slapped onto the back of a tailgate?

Maybe it cost a dollar, but the adhesive in which it sticks to the tailgate came at the cost of his 6 1/2 year old daughter.  A bright, beautiful light snuffed out by an incurable and cruel disease.

It wasn't just a bumper sticker.
It was a proclamation of the wounds he bore.

I think about the wound losing a child brings.  A pain so sharp, the wound is that of a bleeding gash in which you do everything to stop the bleeding.  Eventually, slowly, the wound begins to heal.  The pain shows itself as a cut.  Yet a single word, a smell, a memory opens  the wound wide and once again all energy is devoted to stop the bleeding.

Those are the dark days.  The days you wonder if you'll ever see a sunrise again.

I glance to my left at the mountains and the still rising sun.  The sky is alive with color.

There were many days I had wondered if the sun was rising.
It was. I just couldn't see it.
The wounds from those days are scars now; never gone but a very near reminder. 

Not a single one of us doesn't have a cut in need of healing.  
Maybe it's a wound bleeding uncontrollably.
Maybe it's a scar.

But it's there.

You know what else is there?  The sunrise.
There may be days the clouds are so thick, you can't see it.
But it's there.

It just may be tomorrow before you can see the colors the sunrise brings.