Well, this is Elisha. This is lesson
number 13 in the life and miracles of Elisha. Let's start in chapter
5, and like I said, verse 9. So Naamim, and obviously he's
the leper, came with his horses and with his chariots and stood
at the door of the house of Elisha. And Elisha sent a messenger unto
him, saying, Go and worship Jordan seven times, and thy flesh shall
come again to thee, and thou shalt be clean. But Naamim was
wroth and went away and said, Behold, I thought that he would
surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the Lord
his God and strike his hands over the place and recover the
leper. Are not Abana and Harfar rivers of Damascus better than
all the waters of Israel? May I not worship them and be
clean?" So he turned and went away in a rage. And his servants, that is, Nahum's
servants, came near and spake unto him and said, My father,
if the prophet had bid thee do some great thing, wouldst thou
not have done it? How much rather, then, when he
said to thee, Wash, and be clean." And this is where we'll pick
up. Verse 14, Then Nahum went down, and dipped himself seven
times in Jordan, according to the saying of the man of God.
And his flesh came again like unto the flesh of a little child,
and He was clean. Now we're going to read, I'm
going to do this probably like a verse at a time or something.
We'll read through verse 19, but we'll just stop there so
we can reestablish our thoughts. Matt, would you pray for us please? So we'll pick up our lesson here
at verse 14 and look at the actual miracle that Nehemiah was performed
on Nahum. And like I said, He went down
after He was persuaded by His servants. He stopped and He went
down. Now, if salvation is to be had,
these are kind of what things are going to happen. Now, I'm
not saying this is an order, but I'm saying God often works
this with man. The first thing we see is then
Nahum went down. He went down. We're going to
have to be emptied, because we're born thinking we're something.
We're born, and obviously what I read in the previous verses,
he thought that a prophet should have come out instead of sending
a servant, because he was somebody in command of armies and stuff
like that and different things. He was something in his own town,
his own village, his own country. But to the man of God, to the
Gospel preacher, and to the Lord Jesus Christ, which Elisha pictures
all these things, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. We're free from all men. The
only thing we're not free to do is to tell lies. We're commanded,
and woe is us if we preach not the Gospel, which is the same
thing to you who believe. That's what you're commanded.
We have no warrant to tell falsehoods about how God saves sinners.
So he thought he was something, just name him. But he was a leper. So that just strikes everything
down. But that's the first thing that
we see is that he went down. And we're going to be emptied
before we're filled. Turn to 1 Samuel 2. 1 Samuel. 1 Samuel
2. Verse 3 through 8. Talk no more exceeding proudly. Let not arrogance come out of
your mouth. For the Lord is a God of knowledge,
and by Him actions are weighed. The bows of the mighty men are
broken. They that stumble are girded with strength. They that
were full have hired out themselves for bread, and they that were
hungry ceased, so that the barren hath borne seven, and she hath
many children is waxed feeble. The Lord kills and makes alive,
He brings down to the grave, and He brings up. The Lord makes
poor and makes rich, He brings low and He lifts up. He raised
up the poor out of the dust, and lift up the beggar from the
dunghill to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the
throne of glory. For the pillars of the earth
are the Lord's, and He has set the world upon them." We're not
going to come to God thinking that we're something. The Scripture
says if a man thinks himself to be something, when he is nothing,
he deceives himself. So this is one of the first things
that the Lord does often with men. But look at the next thing.
He says back in our text, in 2 Kings 5, in verse 14, He went
down, dipped Himself seven times in Jordan, according to the saying
of the man of God, we will obey the man of God. We will obey
the man of God's choosing. We will obey what Christ says
in His Word. If the preacher is worth anything,
if he's telling us the truth about who God is, and who we
are, and how we can be reconciled to God, we will do the same thing. What must I do to be saved? What
must I do to be saved? But look at how it's worded.
He went down, according to the saying of the man of God." It's
repent or perish. These are things that God works
in man. It is simply obeying from now a new heart what our
Sovereign says for us to do. You see this time and time again.
Nebuchadnezzar, he thought he was something. The Lord humbled
him. He exalted the Lord God as the only God. We see this
in Zacharias. Zacharias, come down. I was talking to a pastor yesterday,
and he said, not only is our God sovereign, but that sycamore
tree that Zacharias was up there, the Lord had intention that that
was to be planted. He was going to be up in that
tree. There's nothing to help that by chance. Salvation is
by the free and sovereign grace of Christ. Look at the prodigal.
He thought he was something, give me what I deserve, what's
my inheritance? He leaves, loses it all, he's
emptied, and then it's like, well, what am I doing here? I'll
go back to my father. I'll go back to my father. What
we see here in verse 14 and all these other passages of Scripture
is Psalms 110 and verse 3, and you know this, He makes His people
willing in the day of His power. This is what we're seeing here.
Full-on method and full-on mode. This is what God does to sinners. We've got to be emptied. We've
got to be bankrupt. We've got to be unclothed. We've
got to be unclothed and then clothed with the righteousness
of Christ. That's the first thing. Look at the second thing. Then
He dips Himself, and His flesh came again like the flesh of
a little child, and He was clean. So that's the second thing, if
this picture is a salvation of sinners, there's no partial quickening
here. There is no incomplete cleansing
here. There is no divine and human
cooperation here. This is all done according to
the word of the prophet, the prophet. Or as one man says,
there's no Chinese checkers regeneration here. God makes a move and then
you make your move. That's not how God works. But
look at this. He dips. He's clean. And I think it's interesting
how it's the flesh of a little child. I think that shows not
only is His flesh as clean like it used to be when He was a little
child, but I think that's the attitude which we'll see He has.
The Lord has humbled this one, and now his skin is clean, he's
saved, he's redeemed, but I believe his attitude is like a little
child. Bless God in the person of Jesus Christ, now the loftiest
scholar, comes like a little child. He comes down and he humbles
himself. He comes down and he is humbled
or humbles himself. You know the phrase does not
mean that if we humble ourselves we've done something for God.
No, God has placed that new heart in us which is naturally thinks
more of God than it does of ourself. But the scholar is now like a
little child. Heal me, teach me, help me. We
hail the free and sovereign matchless grace found only in the crucified
Redeemer of sinners. Now the King takes His place
next to the lowly maidservants. These are just all illustrations.
Sing loudest praises. Now the once self-absorbed and
self-important seek fellowship with the humble and contrite,
the lepers clean. And this is what God does. He
brings us down. But the reason why I say that,
He has an attitude of a little child. Look at verse 15. Okay,
we'll compare that with verse 11 and 12. Elisha sends his servant
out to him back in verse 11 and verse 12. He's mad. It didn't
go how he wanted it to. Verse 12, it says he went away
in a rage. Now look at him. We have a full
confession. And he returned. Now, Nahum is
the seeker. He's not dominant here. He's
just a recipient of God's free and sovereign grace. And how
does he act? Well, like a little child. He
returns to the man of God, and he and all his company, public
confession, public confession. He's not ashamed of what happened.
Everybody sees it. He's not afraid to confess Christ
and be baptized. He came in His whole company
and came and stood before Him. And He said, Behold, now I know
that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel. Now, therefore,
I pray thee, take a blessing of thy servant." So here we have
full confession and respect for the prophet, God's ambassadors,
or whoever the Lord uses, is used by God's means of grace
to tell you the gospel, you have respect for them. But even more
so, the prophet. The Lord Jesus Christ, Elisha,
God is salvation. It's a picture of true conversion. He comes back and he's... I know
that there's no God. There's a confession. I didn't
know that before. Matter of fact, you said in verse
11, and you would call on the name of His God. Now it's your
God, my God. the beauty of the confession.
He left Elisha's house and he left in a rage, but grace always
wins the day. The lost sheep will be recovered
and secured. No, he comes back with all his
company to see and to know his confession, and he's thankful
And he says, behold, it's like a declaration. He acknowledges
the God of all grace, that God's over all. He's sovereign over
everything. And then the last thing, I think
an open heart leads to an open hand. He says, I pray thee, take
a blessing of thy servant. He brought that to buy salvation.
And he saw it was useless. It can't be bought. But now he's
like, Would you take something for the furtherance of the gospel?
Would you take something and perhaps, you know, you're around
the school of the prophets, maybe that, you know, all these different
things. It doesn't matter. He just, just, can I, can you
take a blessing? Because I've been blessed and
therefore I want to bless you. He desires to give to the furtherance
of the gospel or the ministry or to assist the prophets' needs,
whatever. These are now willing gifts, not to procure salvation,
but an attitude of gratefulness for life, a love offering or
gift, which all believers want to do. How can I help? Where do you need help? Where
do you need assistance? Bill's got to be paid here. We
do what we can. Now this last point, I'm going
to throw my hat in because this is over my head, higher my pay
grade. I'm throwing my hat in with what
most of the commentators say. Let's read verses 16-19. But Elisha said, as the Lord
liveth before whom I stand, I will receive none. Nahum urged the prophet to take
it, but he refused." And that just makes sense. That makes
sense from the prophet's standpoint. And from Christ's standpoint,
Christ needs none of what we have. He owns a cattle and a
thousand hills. But Nahum said, "'Shall there
not then, I pray thee, be given to thy servant, to me, two mules,
a burden of earth, For thy servant will henceforth offer neither
burnt offerings nor sacrifice unto other gods, but to the Lord."
This is not superstition. What he's saying is, I want to
take this earth, take it back to where I came from, and build
an altar. That's what I want to do. So
now, this is what a believer does. They worship God. Not another
god. but the true and living God.
So that's all He's saying. I'm going to take some earth,
and some folks say, oh, it has nothing to do with superstition.
No, it has nothing to do with superstition. He wanted to take that from Israel
and take it to His land and then worship there. Remember, this
is Old Testament and these are types. But now the latter part
is a little confusing in a sense. But I want to do this so I don't
offer burnt offerings or sacrifices to other gods but unto the Lord."
Now he says this, name them, "...in this thing the Lord pardoned
my servant, that when my master goeth into the house of Raman,"
to worship there, and he had leaned on my hand and bowed himself
in the house of Raman, "...when I bowed down myself in this house,
the Lord pardoned my servant in this thing. And Elisha said
unto him, Go in peace. So he departed from him." Now,
I'll throw my hat in with most commentators. What they're saying
is that he was speaking of things that he had done in the past.
I used to go into this house, used to bow to this God, and
we would make supplication. But he just got done confessing
that he knows, I know, we are persuaded, and he's able to keep
that which we've committed unto him against that day. We know that there's no God in
the earth but in Israel. So what most commentators, and
I will agree with this, is that he said, I'm not going to go
do this. Okay, I'm not going to hear the
Gospel and then go back to Catholicism. It doesn't bear any warrant in
Scripture anywhere. So he's saying, this is what
I used to do. I pray that I would continue
to worship and honor the Lord. And the second thing, why else
would Elisha say, go in peace? Elisha is not going to put his
stamp. on him going back to a false God. So, I say once the saints
of God are awakened, they cannot go back to Egypt. We see that
in the Old Testament. That's a picture of that. I think Tim said, even though
he's speaking in present tense, it's past tense in the original
or something. I don't know about that. I can't
determine that. But I know a lot of the writers
say, this is exactly what's going on. This is what I used to do.
But now I know that there's no God on all the earth but Thee
God. And another thing, why would
He take that soil with Him to set it up for an altar so He
would worship the Lord? I don't believe once a person
is saved that they can go back to free willism. Works founded
religion. If they can, we've seen it here,
they were never of us. They never of us. And He says,
and Christ says in the New Testament, My sheep, hear My voice, another
they will not follow." So, if we're looking to try to get out
of worshipping the true God, if we're looking to make excuses,
we need to check our heart. If we're using this instance
in the Scripture, and I suppose there's several like this, if
we're using an instance like this to go back to our old man-made
false idol, this God of women, If we're going to use that, then
I think we need to check our own self and see if we be of
the faith. Because yes, we have sinned,
and yes, we are full of sin, and we still sin, but the confession
is too strong, the type is too strong, the picture is too strong,
and the bottom line is that Elisha, why would he say, go in peace?
He wouldn't say if he was going to go worship another god. So
that's really all I have on this section But I believe, and again,
even if I stopped and didn't go from, I finished that verse
17 and just kind of skipped over, which sometimes I do, I don't
understand, I just skip over it. But I do believe, and we
know without a doubt, that God's sheep will be kept, and they will glorify and honor
Him at the end. So, Bruce, would you close us please? Oh, yeah.