I want you to open your Bibles
today to the book of 2 Kings. We're going to be reading from
2 Kings, the 5th chapter, and I'll read 9-12, verses 9-12 of
2 Kings 5. I'll be speaking to you in a
few moments on the subject, My Point of Rebellion. My Point of Rebellion. But while you're finding the
scriptures, let me make an announcement. The Lord willing, tonight at
7 o'clock, I'll be speaking at the Calvary Baptist Church in
Mabscot, West Virginia. That's down in the Beckley area. I think it's just right on the
outskirts of the city of Beckley, West Virginia. And I invite you
to the services this week. I'll speak tonight and every
night through Wednesday night at the Calvary Baptist Church
in Mabscot, West Virginia. Now let's read from 2 Kings 5,
beginning with verse 9. So Naaman came with his horses
and with his chariots, and he stood at the door of the prophet
Elisha. Now every word is significant. Naaman came with his gold and
silver and horses and chariots, and he stood at the door of the
prophet Elisha. And Elisha sent a messenger unto
him, saying, Go and wash in the river Jordan seven times, and
thy flesh shall come again unto thee, and thou shalt be clean. But Naaman was angry, and he
went away, and he said, Behold, I thought, 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 plates and recover my
leprosy. Are not Abana and Farfa, rivers
of Damascus, better than all the rivers of Israel? May I not
wash in them and be clean?" So he turned away and left in a
rage. And my friend Nahum, the man
about whom we just read, was a great man. He was somebody. Nehemen was somebody in Syria. First of all, he was captain
of the king's army. Secondly, he was a successful
soldier. He was a man who was popular
with the king, famous in the eyes of the people, and very
wealthy. He was a man of great honor.
He was an honorable man, the scripture says, and he was a
bold, courageous man. He was a leper. Naaman was a
dying man. Now Syria had made war on Israel,
Naaman and the country of Syria, and they'd gone down into Israel
and taken spoil, and they'd taken many captives. And one of the
captives which they had taken from Israel was a young girl
who served in Naaman's household. She was a servant to Naaman's
wife. Knowing her master's sickness,
knowing that he was a leper, one day the little Israelite
girl said to her mistress, If my master Naaman was in Israel,
he could go to the prophet of God, Elisha, and he would be
healed. She knew about this disease,
and she knew that God was able to heal. She knew that the prophet
of God could heal Naaman. So Naaman came to see Elisha. Naaman came to see the Prophet
of God, but he came bringing his gold and silver and many
changes of raiment he believed that he could purchase healing. We see him in this great processional,
all of his horses and chariots and his gold and his silver and
all of his changes of raiment, and the proud captain of the
host of Syria came to the humble dwelling of the Prophet of God,
Elisha, and he stood outside and sent for Elisha to come to
him. The prophet of God did not come
out. The prophet of God did not appear. But rather he sent a
servant to say to Naaman, Naaman, go wash in the river Jordan and
your flesh will come to you and you shall be clean. Naaman was
so angry, how angry he was. He was angry, first of all, at
the suggestion that he take off his clothes and humble himself. He was angry because the Prophet
of God did not come out to him and show unto him special attention. He was angry because the Prophet
of God did not recognize his gifts of gold and silver and
treated them with contempt. The Prophet of God was not interested
in what he had to give. And he was angry because the
Prophet told him to wash in that despised muddy river Jordan. And he said, I thought, I thought
he would come to me. I thought he would strike his
hand over my leprosy and call on his God and say a few words
of mumbo-jumbo and my leprosy would disappear. So he went away
in a rage. Now two burning questions come
forth from this scripture. First of all, can the River Jordan
heal leprosy? And the answer is, absolutely
not. If that river could have healed
leprosy, they would have been lined up and down the bank. Naaman
would have had a hard time getting down to the river. The river
would have been full of lepers. But the River Jordan had no power
whatsoever in itself to wash away leprosy. Now here's the
second question. Could Naaman be healed without
going down into the Jordan River? And the answer to that question
is absolutely not. The prophet of God said, would
you be made whole, would you be healed? Go to the river Jordan
and dip seven times. And we know that he did. He took
off his clothes and he humbled himself and the scripture says
he went down into the river and he came forth as clean and pure
and without that disease as when he was born. Now, could the river
Jordan, could the waters of that river put away the disease of
leprosy? No, sir. Could Naaman be healed
without going down into those waters? No, sir. Then what have
we here? What is this scripture teaching
us? I'll tell you what this scripture is teaching us. It's teaching
us that God Almighty is breaking the proud human heart. God is
bringing the proud sinner down. Naaman had contempt for Israel.
Naaman had contempt for Israel's God. Naaman had contempt for
Israel's rivers. Naaman had contempt for Israel's
prophets. Naaman had nothing but contempt
for Israel, the people of God, and his human thought and human
pride had to be destroyed before God Almighty, because pride goeth
before destruction and a haughty spirit before a fall. Listen
to the Scripture. Proverbs 6, 16. Six things doth
the Lord hate. Six things. That ought to catch
your attention. That ought to make everybody prick up their
ears and listen carefully. You mean there's six things that
God hates? What's number one? Would you want to guess? What's
number one? Number one is a proud look. Six
things God hates. Number one, a proud look. Listen
to James 4.6. God resisted the proud. He gave grace to the humble.
Listen to Obadiah 3.4. The pride of your heart. hath
deceived you, you that sayeth in your heart, Who shall bring
me down? Though you exalt yourself as
an eagle, I'll bring you down, saith the Lord. I'll bring you
down. And, my friends, what I'm saying
is this. Before man will ever be an object of mercy, God will
bring him down. Before God ever gives grace and
mercy and forgiveness to a sinner, He'll bring him down. Before
God ever saves and pardons and justifies and cleanses a sinner,
he'll bring him down. Nahum was proud. He was arrogant. He was self-sufficient. He was
self-righteous. He was a rebel who had to be
broken. And you and I are made out of
the same material. We're dug out of the same pit.
We're possessors of the same flesh. We're going to have to
be broken before God in humility and contrition. And God met Nahum
at his point of rebellion. His point of rebellion was pride.
His point of rebellion was a haughty spirit, a proud spirit. Can't
you just see this man in all of his splendor and glory and
in all of his uniforms and medals as he comes with his gold and
silver and horses and chariots and stands proudly before the
humble cottage or tent of the prophet of God, waiting on God
to come to him, waiting on God's servant to minister to him, waiting
to buy his way into the favor of God? And the servant of God,
first of all, showed contempt for Naaman's gold and silver
by not even coming out to meet him. He sent a servant out to
see him. And he said to him, Thus saith the Lord, go wash
in the river Jordan, and you'll be clean. And Naaman stomped
around in anger and wrath, and he said, I will not. I will not. Now, let me ask you some questions.
Did all lepers have to wash in the Jordan River to be healed?
Did all of them? The answer is no. No, they did
not. But Naaman did. But Naaman did. He would have never been healed.
There was no way for him to be healed without doing what God
said, without following that humble course that the prophet
of God laid down. He could not be healed because
that was his point of rebellion. That's where God made him. That's
where he had to be dealt with. That's where he had to be broken.
God will meet every proud sinner at his point of rebellion and
he'll deal with him till he surrenders He'll deal but you know Naaman's
servant gave him some good advice He said my master if the prophet
had told you something hard to do you would have done it wouldn't
you he said why certainly He said well, why not do what he
did tell you to do? See, that's our pride God crosses
our proud will he's going to break They can't two wills cannot
exist God's will in your way one's got to be broken And you
can't break God's will. He doeth according to his will
in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of this earth.
He worketh all things after the counsel of his own will. He's
going to break your will, or he'll send you to hell. Let me
ask you another question. Now listen, think a little bit.
Did all rich men have to sell their goods and give them to
the poor to be saved? Well, the answer is no. Abraham
was a wealthy man. David was a wealthy man. Solomon
was a wealthy man. All wealthy men, Joseph of Arimathea
was a wealthy man. All wealthy men did not have
to sell all their goods and give them to the poor, but the rich
young ruler did, because that was his point of rebellion. That's
where our Lord met him. That's where our Lord Jesus dealt
with him. He said, you love your riches, you love your luxury,
you love all of your possessions, you go sell it and take up your
cross and follow me. And that's where God met him,
but he wouldn't be broken. He turned and walked away. Sorrowful,
but he walked away. It doesn't matter how you walk
away. Sorrowful or happy or rebellious or cursing or whatever. The bad
part is walking away, but God will meet you where you are.
He knows your point of rebellion. He knows where your pride lives.
He knows where your love is. He knows where your affection
is. And that's where God will meet you, and that's where he'll
deal with you. He doesn't deal with everybody just alike. This
mass evangelism and mass psychology and masses walking the aisle,
everybody doing the same thing and saying the same words is
foolishness because we're different. We're different people and different
personalities, and God deals with us differently. He didn't
have the rich young ruler dipping the River Jordan, but Naaman
had to. And he didn't have Naaman sell
his possessions and give them to the poor. In fact, when Naaman
offered these possessions to Elijah, he turned them down.
Now, let me ask you another question. Did all men have to be baptized
of John in the River Jordan to be saved? No, sir. But the Pharisees
did. That's right. You read it in
the Bible. The Pharisees, it said they rejected
the counsel of God within themselves. Would not be baptized of John
in the River Jordan. They wouldn't do it They would
not bend and bow and submit to the baptism of repentance. They
would not go down They would not admit they were sinners.
They would not admit they needed a Redeemer They would not admit
that they need to be baptized in a baptism of repentance and
faith. And this is the thing They never
be saved till they do never They rejected and resisted and despised
the baptism of John. Let me ask you another question.
Did all men have to put away their wives of a second marriage
in order to be saved? No, sir. No, sir, not at all. But Herod did. Herod did. No way Herod could know God.
No way Herod could come under the mercies of God till he did
what John told him. John the Baptist said, Herod.
He came to hear John the Baptist. He was a regular attender. at
the services of John the Baptist. And John the Baptist leveled
his finger at him one day and said, it's not lawful for you
to have your brother's wife. You better do something about
it. And that's when trouble began. He hit his point of rebellion.
He hit his point of pride. He hit his point of resistance. And God will break the proud
heart, mine, yours, or anybody else's. He'll deal with us at
that point where pride reigns and where we insist having our
own way. Now listen to the Bible, Psalms
34 18, the Lord is known to them that are of a broken heart and
saveth such as be of a contrite spirit. You hear those two words?
Broken and contrite. God is known to them of a broken
heart and a contrite spirit. God will break a man Because,
you see, we're not going to fall at his knees and fall at his
feet in worship and repentance and adoration until we're broken.
Pride's got to go. That's the reason he treated
Saul of Tarsus like he did. Saul riding his proud white horse
on his way to Damascus to kill Christians, in all of his arrogance
and haughtiness, and God brought him into them. God made him bite
the dust. God humbled him and blinded him
and had that proud Pharisee led away. by the hand of an ordinary
Roman soldier. Listen to Psalm 51, 17. The sacrifices
of God are a broken spirit. A broken and a contrite heart,
O God, thou wilt not despise. Now, preachers can go up and
down this country preaching you're supposed to be satisfied with
yourself and think a lot of yourself and praise yourself, but that's
not what God's Word says. God's Word says we're to have
a broken heart and a contrite spirit. God's Word says we're
to have a humble spirit. God's Word says we're not to
look upon our own things but on the things of another. God's
Word tells us that a man truly convicted of sin will grieve
over sin and mourn over sin and weep over sin and look to God
for his mercy. So Naaman, proud, arrogant, full
of ego, he finally went down. That's what Scripture says, then
went he down. That's four most beautiful words
that can be uttered. Then went he down. And I'll tell you, when a man
goes down, he's going to come up. He's not going to be exalted
until he's abased. He's not going to be lifted up
until he's brought down. At the command of God, Naaman
was stripped, he was broken, he was humble, and he did exactly
what he said he'd never do. He went down into the River Jordan. He went down into the River Jordan. Now, it wasn't the waters of
the river. This is what so many people mistake the means for
the end. The waters of Jordan had no power
to put away his leprosy. But God could do it, and God
will only deal with a man when he breaks him. I don't know what
your point of rebellion is. I don't know the place where
your pride reigns and where your will resists the will of God.
Perhaps you know. Perhaps you don't know. But God
knows. God knows. And God will reveal
it to you, and there God will deal with you. He'll deal with
you, and he'll deal with me, because we must be obedient to
his will. We've got to bend. We've got
to break. We've got to bow. We've got to submit. We've got
to surrender. Surrender. Unconditional surrender. We've got to stack our arms.
and haul down our flags and turn our swords around and hand them
to God, panel first. Now, I want to ask you some questions.
I want you to listen to me a little while, and let's just visit a
little bit on this point of rebellion thing. Now, we've seen this picture. This is what this is saying.
This is the reason so much faith is given in the Word of God to
Naaman. God is dealing with Naaman, but this is an example for you
and me. He met Naaman at his point of rebellion. God healed
him. God cleansed him. But he came God's way, and he
came in humility. He came in submission with a
broken heart and a contrite spirit. Let me ask you some questions.
Can a man be saved and not understand the truth of divine sovereignty
and covenant and elective grace? Can a man be saved and not believe
in divine sovereignty and not understand it and election? Absolutely. You see, my friend,
salvation is not in a doctrine. It's in a person. It is not faith
in sovereignty that saves, or faith in a covenant that saves,
or faith in election that saves, but faith in Christ alone. The
Bible says this is the record. God hath given us eternal life.
This life's in his Son. He that hath the Son hath life.
He that hath not the Son of God hath not life. God so loved the
world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth
in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. You don't
arrive at Christ through doctrine. You arrive at doctrine through
Christ. You come to know Christ and you learn the doctrine. But,
now the question is this, can a man or a woman not understand
divine sovereignty and not understand elective grace and still be saved?
Yes, sir. But, if divine sovereignty becomes
an issue and elective grace becomes an issue with you, and you read
it in God's Word, and every one of you know the Bible's full
of God's sovereignty and God's elective grace. Old Nebuchadnezzar
bragged on his power and his strength. He said, it's not this
great Babylon that my hands have built. And God said, buddy, let
me tell you something. He said, you'll be driven from
men, and you'll dwell with the beast of the field, and you'll
eat grass like an ox till you know that the Most High God rules
in the kingdom of men and giveth it to whom he will. And he sent
him out to eat grass like an ox and like a beast for seven
months or years or however long it was. So he understood that
God reigns. Now, this becomes an issue with
you. If you read in the Bible where it says God's on the throne
in creation, providence, salvation, that God elected a people and
gave them to Christ, you say, I won't have it. You will have
it, too, because it's God's word. And that's when it becomes an
issue, is when God's will meets your will and your will won't
bend to God's will, and that's when you'll bow. You're going
to receive the word just like it is. All right? Can a man be
saved and not understand the doctrine of original sin? The
Baptists and Lutherans and Presbyterians and the Episcopals all were built
on this doctrine. All of these prominent evangelical
denominations have it in their articles of faith and in their
confessions of faith. It's there, the original sin
and Adam's fall. But can a man be saved and not
understand this and not enter into it? Yes, sir, absolutely.
My sins are ever before me, David said. I'm not under the condemnation
of God for Adam's sin. I'm under the condemnation of
God for my sin. Adam's sin is where it started.
Adam's sin is the source of it. Adam's sin is the mouth of the
river. But I'm guilty, and I'm accountable
and responsible for my own sin. What did the thief on the cross
know about original sin? What did he know about Adam's
fault? He just knew he was a sinner. He said, I'm getting what I deserve,
and I'd like to have mercy. Lord, I'd like you to remember
me when you come into your kingdom." What did the publican know about
original sin? He smote on his breast and cried,
God be merciful to me, the sinner. Not Adam, the sinner, me, the
sinner. But, let me tell you this, if a man becomes proud
and puffed up in his free will, and puffed up in his self-righteousness,
and puffed up in his own merit, God Almighty will break him.
He won't say you're just doing where the nature of sin reigns
and the principle of sin within You're gonna realize that it
was God that saved you and God that loved you. Listen, who maketh
thee to differ? What do you have that you did
not receive? Listen to the scripture you were dead in trespasses and
sin, but God who is rich in mercy quickened you with Christ Our
Lord Jesus Christ said no man can come to me except my father
which sent me draw him. Here's what I'm saying A man
can be saved and not understand some of these great old bedrock
foundation fundamental doctrines. But when he learns them, and
when he encounters them, and when the Holy Spirit brings them
to his attention, if he's God's child, if his heart's been sufficiently
broken, he'll say, let God be true and every man alive. Let
God be true. What God says, I believe. Can
a man be saved and not be baptized? Why, absolutely. Water cannot
wash sin away. Water cannot put away guilt.
It's the blood of Christ that cleanses. The blood of Christ
cleanseth us from all sin. The blood of Christ atones. The
blood of Christ pardons. The blood of Christ puts away
guilt. We have an example in the word of God of a man who
never washed, who never worked, who never walked. And that was
a thief on the cross. But let me say this to you. If
the commandment to follow our Lord in baptism becomes a point
of rebellion, God will break you just like he did me. or God
will damn you. Now, you can just rest assured
of that. It's the Spirit. You see, this thing of salvation
is a heart work. It's a work in the will. It's
God's will. It's not of him that will it,
nor of him that runs it, but of God that shows mercy. And God's going
to meet us and conquer us and bring us submissively and humbly
to Christ, or he'll have to judge us. Acts 2 38 says repent and
be baptized every one of you in the name of the Lord Jesus
Christ for the remission of sin Acts 22 15 16 Paul was told by
Ananias to arise and be baptized and wash away your sin Our Lord
sent his disciples out and he said which the gospel every creature
he that believeth and is baptized shall be saved now you make an
issue of a commandment of Christ you make an issue of of appointing
God's word, you reveal one thing, you're still a rebel. You see,
Naaman came to the prophet of God with a need, and he was going
to dictate the terms on which he would accept forgiveness or
cleansing. He came to the prophet of God
with a handful of gold that he was going to purchase the favor
of God. My friends, we come to God empty,
stripped, broken, without one thing to pay. In my hands, no
price I bring, simply the cross of Christ I claim. The grace
of God is a gift. The mercy of God is just that
mercy. So who am I to dictate the terms
and conditions of God's covenant? And what I'm saying is that you
may not have to be baptized, you may not have to have these
different things, knowledge of different doctrines, but when
you meet them, and when they're presented to you from God's Word
in black and white, rebels resist and believers bow. That's just
the way it is. Rebels resist and believers.
Let me ask you a few other questions Can a man be saved not be affiliate
affiliated with a local church and identified with the people
of God in his area? I'm sure of it. But remember
our Lord has no secret disciples. He said if you ashamed of me,
I'll be ashamed of you Shamed of Christ of his church of his
ordinance of his people fear of public opinion is absence
of faith every time Can a woman be saved not submit to the authority
of her husband? He can till he learns God's will
about it. Can a person be saved and not
love other people? He can till he learns God's will
about it. Can a person be saved and not forgive someone else? Can a person be saved and not
give? He can as long as he's obeying Christ and doesn't meet
this particular issue in God's will. But when you meet the issue,
my sheep hear my voice and they follow me. My point of rebellion.