If you will, let's turn to 2
Kings chapter 5. 2 Kings chapter 5. Recently we've looked at King
Nebuchadnezzar. How the Lord brought him down.
Did a work in him. Looked at King Uzziah. He was
lifted up in pride and the Lord touched him. Looked at King Ahab. Elijah come to him with a message
and it ended up destroying 850 of his prophets. It took all
day long just so Elijah could preach to him, tell him who Christ
was. Today we're going to look at General Naaman. Easily thought
as a king, this was a general. He's the head general over all
the Syrian army. Syria, the right hand man to
the king. is a great and mighty general. And I was just thinking,
if someone's never heard about Naaman, I get to tell them. That's something precious. If
you've never heard this, I get to tell you. And if you've heard
this and heard this and heard this, oh, that we could get to
hear it like we've never heard it before. Wouldn't that be something?
Hear it with fresh ears, brand new ears. Here in 2 Kings chapter
5 verse 1, Now Naaman, captain of the host of the king of Syria,
was a great man with his master and honorable, because by him
the Lord had given deliverance unto Syria. He was also a mighty
man in valor, but he was a leper. And the Syrians had gone out
by companies and had brought away captive out of the land
of Israel a little maid. And she waited on Naaman's wife. And she said unto her mistress,
Would God, my Lord, were with the prophet that is in Samaria,
for he would recover him of his leprosy. And one went in and
told his lord, saying, Thus and thus said the maid that is of
the land of Israel. And the king of Syria said, Go
to, go, and I will send a letter unto the king of Israel. And
he departed and took with him ten talents of silver, and six
thousand pieces of gold, and ten changes of raiment. And he
brought the letter to the king of Israel, saying, Now, when
this letter has come unto thee, behold, I have therewith set
Naaman my servant to thee, that thou mayest recover him of his
leprosy. And it came to pass, when the king of Israel had read
the letter, that he rent his clothes, and said, Am I God? to kill and to make alive, that
this man doth send unto me to recover a man of his leprosy.
No one can do that but God. No one can. You know better.
A child knows that. Wherefore consider, I pray you,
and see how he seeketh a quarrel against me. I think I'm set up. This is so ridiculous. I think
they're just picking at me and they're trying to start a war.
This is ludicrous. Verse 8, And it was so, when
Elisha, the man of God, had heard that the king of Israel had rent
his clothes, he sent unto the king, saying, Wherefore hast
thou rent thy clothes? Let him come now to me, and he
shall know that there is a prophet in Israel. So Naaman came with
his horses, with his chariot, and stood at the door of the
house of Elisha. And Elisha sent a messenger unto
him, saying, and washing the Jordan seven times. And thy flesh
shall come again to thee, and thou shalt be clean.' But Naaman
was wroth, and went away, and said, Behold, I thought he will
surely come out to me, and stand, and call on the name of the Lord
his God, and strike his hand over the
place, and recover the leper." Are not Abana and Farfa, rivers
of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? May I not
wash in them and be clean? And he turned and went away in
a rage. And his servants came near and
spake unto him and said, My father, if the prophet had bid thee to
do some great thing, wouldst thou not have done it? How much
rather then, when he saith to thee, Wash and be clean? Then he went down. Then went
he down and dipped himself seven times in the Jordan, according
to the saying of the man of God. His flesh came again like unto
the flesh of a little child, and he was clean. And he returned
to the man of God, he and all his company, and came and stood
before him and 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." We know the story is a true story. Did you know that? I have proof
this is a true story. It's authentic. I know it's genuine
because my Lord referred to it in Luke chapter 4. The Lord Jesus
went down to Nazareth to preach, to declare the sovereign mercy
of God. And he said to those legalists,
those Sabbath-keeping ceremonial Israelites, he said, there were
many widows in the land of Israel in the day of the prophet, and
God did not feed any of them. He fed a Gentile. What an insult to them, huh?
But he went on, and he said, and there were many lepers in
the land of Israel in the days of Elisha, and God didn't heal
any of them. He healed Naaman, a Gentile. The Lord Jesus Christ used this
message right here Himself. This very story. So it's authentic. This is real. It's happened.
We ought to pay attention. I also know that this is not
to instruct lepers to go to the River Jordan to be healed of
leprosy. You can go wade in that water
if you want to. That water ain't gonna do you
no good. I know that. I know a leper can't be healed
by dipping seven times in that river. The River Jordan doesn't
have any power to cure leprosy. None whatsoever. But I know this. Naaman could never have been
healed of his leprosy if he hadn't gone into that River Jordan.
He must go down. He had to. So who is this Naaman? this Naaman character. He was
a vessel of honor before time. This was one of God's sheep,
one of his children, put in Christ before the world ever was. The
Father purposed to save Naaman. Put him in Christ. Christ became
his surety. He was plumb saved. He's just
waiting on the Holy Spirit to come to him. Tell him about it.
To announce it in his heart. Let him rejoice. Let him see
for the first time. Let him hear for the first time.
That's who this man was. Didn't look like it, did he?
I didn't either. And I don't now. How sad. He was a vessel of honor though.
But he hadn't been made to bow to Christ yet. Didn't know who
he was. Can't bow to somebody you don't know. And he wasn't
a Jew. He was a Gentile. God had used
this pagan Gentile general to bring deliverance to Syria, to
bless a nation. Look here, verse 1. Now Naaman,
captain of the host of the king of Syria, was a great man with
his master and honorable, because by him the Lord had given deliverance
unto Syria. He was also a mighty man in valor
and bore, but he was a leper. He was a great man. He had so
many accolades. Honorable. Mighty. Mighty man
in valor. A good general. But, he was a
leper. That's every one of us. That's
me, you, and everybody. There appear to be some honorable
qualities, don't there? You got a job. Oh, they're a
firefighter. They're a police officer. They're
in the military. They help people. That's a good thing, isn't it?
They're a mommy and a daddy. They have children. Oh, they're
a good husband. They're a good wife. They're
a good brother. Oh, that's a sweet sister. So kind of their sister.
They work hard at it too, don't they? Workers and friends and
teachers. Every one of us have a disease. We may have a lot
of good things on the outside looking good. We have a disease.
It's called sin. Plagues every man born Adam.
Sin. We can be as upstanding and as
moral outwardly as you want to be and you're a leper. You're
a leper. Something's going to have to
change. for Naaman and for us. If the Lord's going to save somebody,
he's going to have to be made to see he is a leper who happens
to be mighty and honorable and all these other things. He thinks
he's all those things and I just happen to be, that's a little
bit tacked on to the end. I'm a little bit of a leper.
No, no, you ain't nothing but a leper. The Lord just happened
to give you an office, happened to give you a job, happened to
give you something and he blessed it. The baseline's a leper. Leprosy, this outward disease,
it's always been a picture and a type of sin in the scriptures.
That's what we are by nature. We try to cover it up. We try
to put our uniforms over it, put our medals over it, put our
big ol' hats. Cover it up. Don't let nobody
see it. We try to mask it with cologne. Perfumes. Oh, don't want to smell. You
know, if you forget to put the oven on today, the only person
that doesn't offend is you. It ain't nowhere near as bad
to use it as anybody else, right? I just, I don't stink that bad.
That's us. Try to cover it up. Each of us
are plagued in our natural bodies with sin, and it's incurable. And it starts out small, doesn't
it? It's just one little spot. Oh, and it grows. It's internal.
And it grows to the outside until it covers us. It covers. There's
nothing we can do about it. We can't fix ourselves, and no
other man can help us. Scripture says there's none good,
no, not one. There's none that understandeth.
There's none that seeketh after God. All we, like sheep, have
gone astray. We've turned everyone to his
own way. Your sins have separated you from God. It's separated
me from God. Lepers, in themselves, they have
no hope and they have no ability. But God is able. But God. How is it that this mighty man
who appears to be a leper, who happens to be a leper, is going
to be made whole? How is that going to happen?
He's going to have to go down. down. He's going to have to be
humbled. He's going to have to willfully
repent, willfully and earnestly beg for mercy. Nebuchadnezzar
said God is able to abase the proud. What made him say that? He knew it. He was proud and
he was abased. That could just be forced submission.
What about this general willingly submitting? How do we know it's
going to be willing? The Lord said, my people will
be made willing in the day of my power. Willing. How will Naaman
learn these things? How is anybody going to learn
these things? Someone has to tell you where the Lord has preached
in truth. You have to be sent to his messenger,
to his prophet, his preacher, and then they have to preach
to you. That's how it works. Nothing was different for Naaman.
Naaman and any other sinner saved by God's grace is going to have
to be pointed to Christ. Is that a fancy job being the
one to point them? Is that for distinguished believers
only? God used an unnamed little servant
girl. Look here in verse 2. And the
Syrians had gone out by companies and had brought away captive
out of the land of Israel a little maid. Probably some 13-year-old
girl. young little servant, little
maid, and she waited on Naaman's wife. She was her help around
the house. And she said unto her mistress,
would God, my Lord, were with the prophet that was in Samaria,
for he would recover him of his leprosy. She didn't know Elisha,
but she knew of him. She knew that was God's prophet.
And she told her mistress, that fellow servant, there's that
back there washing dishes, folding clothes, Oh, that's when we pray. Maybe,
maybe not. That's when you lay your heart
and cast all your cares on Christ when somebody's folding clothes.
When you're washing dishes. And you say, my Lord, wash me.
Crying, going out to check a mailbox. They were back there and she
told a fellow servant of hers, she says, if it pleases God.
Oh, she knows something, don't she? If it pleases God, Naaman
could be recovered. This one that the Lord put over
me, he could be recovered. He's going to have to be under
the gospel, and the Lord's going to have to be pleased to do it,
but that's his only hope. Oh, and that's a sure hope. That's
not wishy. That's an expected end. She knew. She knew. I don't know much,
but I know what. If you've got any hope, it's going to be in
Christ. You've got to come to it. It ain't complicated. It
ain't complex. You've got to come to Him. And
there's an expected outcome. It'll be mercy. Mercy. I know it. I've been there. I've
walked that road, ain't I? And it says, therefore He would.
For He would. That's prophet. That's prophets
willing to show mercy. That's prophets willing to help
in time of need. It says in verse 3, And she said
unto her mistress, Would God My Lord were with the prophet
that is in Samaria, for he would recover him of his leprosy. And
one went in." Somebody heard this. He told his Lord, told
Naaman, saying, Thus and thus said the maid that is of the
land of Israel. This little maid girl, And so
Israelites, you got in here, here's what she said. I heard
this and I'm telling you what I heard. This word was sent to
Naaman and he was with the king, king of Syria. They might've
been planning their next battle. They might've been organizing
some training for them troops and figuring out how this is
going to feed them. But here comes a servant with good news.
Good tidings were published. There's hope in Israel. There's
a prophet. God's got a man down here. It
says in verse 5, And the king of Syria heard this. Naaman heard
it. The king of Syria was sitting
right next to him. He heard it. And he said, Go to... Go! I will send a letter unto the
king of Israel. And he departed and took with
him ten talents of silver and six thousand pieces of gold and
ten changes of raiment. The king heard this and he said,
You better go. You better go. Go right now.
But old Naaman took with him all these things. He's starting
out wrong, isn't he? He started taking silver and
gold and fine clothes, these changes of raiment, all to trade
for healing. You can't buy the remission of
sins. It can't be purchased. You can't buy God's preacher.
You can't buy his prophet. That message he gives, it's the
fire that burns in their bones and it can't stop. You ain't
going to change them. It must come out because the
Lord sustains them. The Lord hedges them about. Same with
all his sheep. One ain't different from another.
You can't hear blasphemies and lies on your God. That's my God. I don't think I'm a hateful,
mean-natured person, but all of a sudden I'm getting pretty
upset, ain't I? Duck Peter, I'm going to lop
somebody's ear off. Peter told us, for as much as
you know that you were not redeemed with corruptible things as silver
and gold from your vain conversations received by traditions from your
fathers, our ideas, man, there's a way in his heart that he thinks
right. Ain't the way of the Lord. But with the precious blood of
Christ, that's what redeems people. That's how somebody can be redeemed.
How's a leper going to be cleansed? It's going to take the blood
of Christ to do it. As of a lamb without blemish and without spot.
Naaman was trying to bring gold. He was trying to bring silver.
He was trying to cover up his good works. Oh, I'm going to
put this robe on. I'm going to dress up. If people
don't know me, they won't know the difference. I can cover these
things. Naaman wanted to be healed. He
knew he was a leper. He knew what was wrong with him.
But he brought the wrong payment and he went to the wrong person.
He went to the wrong person. Look at verse 6. 2 Kings 5, verse
6. And he brought the letter to
the king of Israel. He didn't go to his prophet.
He went to the king of Israel, saying, Now when this letter
is come unto thee, behold, I have therewith sent Naaman my servant
to thee, that thou mayest recover him of his leprosy. And it came
to pass that the king of Israel had read the letter that he rent
his clothes and said, Am I God? To kill and to make alive? that
this man doth send unto me to recover a man to the leprosy."
He was going to the king. When we go to a king, it ain't
gonna help. He had to go to a prophet. He
had to go to the Lord's man. Now, Elisha was not the prophet. He typified the prophet. He was
God's prophet. He was the prophet in that day,
but he wasn't the prophet. The one that could do something.
Moses said, God will raise up that prophet and him you shall
hear. Let's go ahead. And he shall
speak my words and everyone that hears my prophet will be blessed.
And those that will not hear my prophet, I will require of
them. What a frightening thing. Who
is that prophet that Moses spoke of? Christ is that prophet. He
is our prophet, our priest, and our king. He is that prophet. Scriptures say, God spoke to
our fathers by the prophets. He hath in these last days spoken
to us by His Son. That's our prophet. That's the
needed one. Naaman went to the wrong place. He didn't go to
the prophet. And we today, men and women,
all over this nation, all over this world, they're going to
the wrong place. They're going to the wrong person and they're
going with the wrong payment. And nothing was said to Naaman
about going to the king of Israel, was it? Did that servant girl
say, you go to the king of Israel? The Syrian king just said, I'm
writing a letter. Maybe that's like a passport. He didn't say,
you go up there. He said, I'm going to write a
letter for you. Give you safe travels in that country. No one
told him to do that. And nothing said to us in these
scriptures. Nowhere does it tell us about
going to the front of the church, about going to the altar, about
going to Mary for salvation, for help, about going to the
law for salvation, for help, going to the baptismal pool,
or going to the sacraments, or going to the preacher. It says
you go to Christ. You go to Him, the Prophet. Come
to Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I'll give
you rest. Come unto Me. He says, I am the Way, the Truth,
and the Life. And no man comes to the Father
but by Me. We go to Him. That's what our
Scriptures tell us. That's what our Lord tells us.
But word got to Elisha. It says there in verse 8, And
it was so, when Elisha, the man of God, Christ is the God-man. Elisha was God's man. The man
of God had heard that the king of Israel had rent his clothes.
He said unto the king, saying, Wherefore hast thou rent thy
clothes? Why are you worried about this? This ain't your business.
Let him come now to me, and he shall know that there is a prophet
in Israel. He's going to learn right quick
you ain't what he needs. So Naaman came with his horses
and with his chariot He stood at the door of the house of Elijah. That's like an hour a day rolling
up with a Bentley or a stretch limo. That was one chariot with
multiple horses. He showed up with some flair
and he stood in the door of Elisha, of God's prophet. You just think
about that. I don't think Elisha had a pretty fancy house. It
was probably something simple. Small place. Not much things
in it. He said, well, maybe it's just
a drape over the door. And here comes this great general, the
Syrian general, on his chariots and his horses and just does
a superman pose right in front of his door, waiting for him.
He's finally in the right place. He's finally in the presence
of the right person, but his attitude was wrong. He was standing
at the door. This general stood at the door
and he wanted to be treated like a great warrior who just happened
to be a leper. Reality was he was a leper who
happened to be a great warrior. Elijah knew this pride. He knew
his arrogance and he wouldn't come out to meet him. He wasn't
going to cater to him. And so he sent his servant out.
You know it wasn't a big building. It's smaller than this room,
probably. You can get up and walk over there. You can probably
reach it. He sent his servant to this great
and mighty general. You talk about a valiant thing.
The Lord's prophets go get these kings and these mighty men of
war. They don't even get up out of
their easy chair. You can go talk to them. Liza knew his pride. He knew
the man's problem. He knew that man needed to be
broken. That's what he needed. He wants his leprosy cured. He
needs to be broken in the heart. That's what's needful. There's
one thing needful. Mercy is at the feet of Christ.
That's where an adulterous woman fell and she kissed his feet
and bathed him with tears. Wiped his feet off with her hair.
Mercy is found at the feet of Christ. And that's where humble
sinners fall. We come to Him. That's where
mercy can be found. And this proud, arrogant general had to
be brought down. Down. And you and I, we have
to be brought all the way down to Christ's feet. The only way
you can look up to Him is to be below Him. We have to be brought
down to Him. And that way, He gets all the
glory. He gets all preeminence. He gets all praise. All thanks
go to Him. That's where we have to be. Says in verse 10, and Elisha
sent a messenger out to him saying, here's a 20 word sermon by an
unnamed servant. Who was this man? I don't know.
Who was that little girl? I don't know. Don't matter, does
it? He said, go and wash in the Jordan seven times and thy flesh
shall come again to thee and thou shalt be clean. That's it.
But Naaman was wroth, and went away, and said, Behold, I thought,
notice those commas there, Behold, comma, I thought, comma, there's
a problem. Every time I get in trouble,
I had a good idea. That's worldly and anything else. If I start
dreaming something up, it's rough. He said, Behold, I thought, he
will surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of
the Lord his God. Sort of like coming in to get
his oil changed, isn't it? That's what you do for a living.
I'm just here to get what I want and get out of here. That's his
goal. And strike his hand over the place. He can come out and
touch me and recover the leper. That's modern religion, isn't
it? They chase people out in parking lots. Oh, don't go. Oh, what you doing? Here's this
big general that just come to town. Man, you've got a lot of
power and pull and fame. Oh, we could pack the seats.
You've got a bunch of money and stuff. That would really help
us grow our church, wouldn't it? Doesn't that just make logical sense?
Lord sent him to her. He must be here. Let's roll out
the red carpet. All those people left the Lord.
He said, oh, please stay. He said, you going to go too?
Peter, to whom? To whom? Not to what, not to
where. To whom shall we go? You have
the words of eternal life. We're standing right here with
you. You are life. If the President was to come,
if the Queen of England was to come, if the mightiest person
we can think of in our minds in our age was to come to hear
from God, to find mercy, you know what they're going to have
to do? They're going to have to sit in a pew. They're going to be saved. They're
going to have to sit in a pew and have some sinner stand up
here and tell them who God is. That's the means He's chose.
And they're going to have to take their rightful place bowing
to Christ, just like anybody else. Ain't no difference, is
there? But he was mad. He says in verse 12, Are not
Abana and Farpar rivers of Damascus better than all these waters
of Israel? Back home, we got rivers and they're cleaner than
this river. May I not wash in them be clean? So he turned and
went away in a rage. Oh, he was so mad. I come all
the way down here to Israel and you want me to get in this dirty
River Jordan? You want me to go to a church where there's
sinners that ain't getting better every week? You've got to be
kidding me. I'm in a rage. All these other
churches. Look how many churches there are close to home. That's
right down the road. They've got bushes out front.
They've got steeples and they've got stained glass windows and
it's clean and they've got lots of seats and air conditioning.
Why would a guy stand up there behind a podium with a Bible
and says words out of it? Why would I go somewhere else?
Some nasty old river. He went away in a rage. I'm gonna
go down there to that other place. They don't call me a sinner.
I happen to be a little bit of a leper. They don't tell me about
it. They just put some makeup on it. Try to cut it off. The Lord's going to use another
unnamed servant to reason with Naaman. Isn't that nice? The
Lord says, come, let us reason together. Look, do you think
of the condescension to that? You don't reason with God. He
commands and we do. But in love, I mean in tenderness,
He comes to the hearts of His people and says, just as a child,
don't come in screaming and kicking things and thundering. He comes
in power, but He says, come, let's reason together. Come,
sit down. I'm going to talk to you. It's all just tender, long-suffering,
meek, to the hearts of His people. It says in verse 13, And His
servants came near and spake unto Him, and said, My Father,
if the Prophet had bid Thee to do some great thing, wouldst
Thou not have done it? How much rather then, when He
saith to Thee, Wash and be clean. You just go get in a creek. It's
right there. Look and live. Believe on Christ. If I said, if I told somebody,
all you have to do to be saved is go out and rotate my tires.
They'd rotate every tire of every car in that parking lot, wouldn't
they? They'd change all of them for good measure. If I said,
you've got to build a building. You've got to build a church.
I've got two cinder blocks at the house I know of. We can dig
up some more. How many cinder blocks have you got? We'll get
this thing done by next week, won't we? You've got to conquer a large
city. You've got to save up a lot of
money. You'd have done that. Naaman. But what did they tell
you? Humble yourself and believe God. Humble yourself and believe God.
And you know what? That mighty man who was just
in a fit, just in a rage and so mad he could just spit nails,
the Lord made him willing. Look here in verse 14. And he
went down. Then he went down and dipped himself seven times
in the Jordan according to the saying of the man of God. And
his flesh came out like into the flesh of a little child.
He had the obedience of a little child. He had the submission
of a little child. What do I got to do? Go get in that water.
Humble yourself before God. Believe on Him. Okay. Yes, sir. We'll go right now. And his flesh
was like a little child and he was clean. You know what happened
for him to go wash in that river? He had to be stripped. All his
medals, you got to take them off. You got a big fancy hat
with feathers all in it, take it off. Can't have it. You got
a robe hiding that leprosy, you might get naked. You have to
be fully exposed, not partially exposed, not committing a little
bit, not repenting a little bit, and not being a little bit convicted
of sin, fully. Take it off. All your robes of
righteousness, all your works, nothing. No robes, no pomp, no
circumstance. You just come here and you plunge.
Plunge in the river. Plunge in the water. You put
your whole self in it. God saved that leper. He came
out of that water and he believed God. He knew God and he believed
God. There's just one God in Israel. Look at verse 15. Here's where
he went. Where did he go after the Lord did this? He came out
of the water and spanned with the leper for years. He went
to the closest believer he could find. Look at verse 15, and he
returned to the man of God, he and all his company, and came
and stood before him and said, Behold, now I know that there
is no God in all the earth but in Israel. There's a God of his
people, his spiritual Israel. And my God is the God. I know him now. Didn't know him
before. He knew me. Oh, but I know him now. Now,
therefore, I pray thee, take a blessing of thy servant." He
went straight to the Lord's house, to his people, his body, his
church, and he says, I want to give a blessing of this old servant. Here's this great general saying,
I'm a servant. I'm going to minister, and I'm
going to give you, I got a whole boatload of gold and silver and
fancy clothes. You can take them down and sell
them at the market. What do you need, Elisha? You're in this
little shack. We can fix this place up. That
gold means nothing to me. I know the Lord. That silver
means nothing. All them arraignments I have, them fancy suits, whatever,
means nothing. You take it. You use it. The
Lord gave it to me. The Lord will take it away. And if you
need it, it's yours. You take it. It says in verse 16, but he said,
Elijah said to him, as the Lord liveth before whom I stand, I
will receive none. And he urged him to take it,
but he refused. Elijah said, I don't want your
offering. My brother, my family. He was mad at me earlier. He
was in a rage. Boy, something happened real
quick, didn't it? Now we're family. Now we love one another. And
he said, I'm just thankful the Lord worked in you. You know
what my payment was? I got to watch it. I got to watch God
work in the heart of a sinner. I don't need no gold. That shack's
just fine. I got water and I got a little
bit of bread. I don't need nothing." He told him in verse 19. And
he said unto him, go in peace. So he departed from him a little
way. This work of humbling and converting
sinners, how God saves sinners, it's bringing down. There's a
stripping. A man that's never been lost
has never been found. A man who's never been stripped
has never been clothed by God. A man who's never been dead has
never been raised. And a man who's never been blind
never had their sight restored. That's what comes first. This
has got to take place in the heart of this proud general for
him to know God, to know who he is. And it has to take place
in every sinner that God redeems. What does the Scripture say?
God resisteth the proud and He gives grace to the humble. Is
He going to be willing that His children should perish in their
pride? Oh, no. He's able to abase, as Nebuchadnezzar
said. He knows just how to do it. He
said in Isaiah 45, I have sworn by myself, the words has gone
out of my mouth and righteousness, it shall not return unto me void.
Every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that He's Lord,
that Jesus Christ is Lord. That's going to happen as we
look recently. That's either going to be a forced submission.
Everybody is going to bow. It'll be after this life's over.
It's going to happen. Or it's going to be a willing
submission that's the workmanship of God in the hearts of His people.
And we willingly. You know who He is and you know
what you are. Boy, I'll bow right now. I'd be happy to. I'll be
a servant. Just like that big general. Take a blessing from
your servant. What's the difference in those
two? That forced submission and that willing submission? It's
the attitude. What stems the attitude? The
heart. If we've been born again, if we've had that flesh of a
little child put in us, now we're humble, now we're meek, now we're
lowly. Why? Because we're like our Lord that's
meek and lowly and long-suffering. This has to take place. You see,
if you miss conviction of sin, you have no repentance. If you
don't have any repentance, if you miss repentance, then you
don't have faith of someone that can forgive. And if you don't
have faith, you don't have Christ. And if you don't have Christ,
you don't have life. That's it. He's got to bring us down. We
must be brought off our lofty, prideful feet of standing before
the God and bow to Him, worshiping Him, casting all of our crowns,
all of our fancy medals, everything we've ever done to Him. And you
know what happens when we do that? We stand up like a little
baby. Brand new skin. Newborn. Because
there's a new birth. That's what takes place. That's
how the Lord does it. I hope that's a blessing to you.