The Seed in this Pomegranate

Date: 2022-04-03

Audience: Seattle White Center

Title: The Seed in this Pomegranate

Text: 2 Kings 5

Proposition: Maybe God isn’t as worried about some things as we are

Purpose: Worship God wherever you are

Grace and peace to you!

I am Captain Roger, which I know sounds a lot like a pirate name, but I am actually just the officer of the Grass Valley Corps in Northern California. I’m sorry – I know that makes me immediately less interesting.

That’s okay, though, because I’m not here to tell you about me. Instead, I want to talk about my favorite book, or at least a piece of it. Would anyone care to guess what my favorite book is? Yeah, it’s the Bible. If you’re surprised by that, today is probably your first day in church. If that’s you, please make sure to speak to Captains Hector or Yasmin after the service. They’d like to meet you and reassure you that I’m not usually the guy here so you’ll know it’s safe to come back next week.

I love the Bible because it is a book filled with just about everything you could care to read about.

Fencing. Fighting. Torture. Revenge. Giants. Monsters. Chases. Escapes. True love. Miracles.

There are stories, and history, and poems, and advice, and romance, and instructions, and car chases, and explosions.

There’s even a helpful passage which explains that if two men get in a fight and the wife of one tries to rescue her husband by grabbing the other man by his… let's call it his oompa-loompas, her hand needs to be cut off immediately and without mercy (Deut 25:11-12). Really.

This book has EVERYTHING!

Today I’m going to run you through a story from the Hebrew Bible – we Christians tend to call it the Old Testament. It’s a pretty common story. If you grew up in the church you probably heard it about once every two years in Sunday school as a kid or about once every three in the adult service.

It’s a good story and absolutely no one dies in it, which is different from a lot of OT stories. I’m going to tell you the whole story and point out a couple of things about it on the way through, but what interests me most is a little part towards the end which tends to get missed, ignored, or just plain left out by most teachers and preachers. What is that? We’ll get there! Relax already!

Grab your Bible and open it up to 2 Kings. For those of you who aren’t clicking through an app to get there, let me remind you that there is a special, God-ordained page at the beginning of the Bible called the Table of Contents. You can use it to find those books in the Bible you don’t know where they are, which, lets face it, is probably most of them. I’m a professional Christian who spends several hours a day studying the Bible and I probably couldn’t put my finger on 2 Kings on the first try. It’s right after 1 Kings, if that helps… If you’re in Genesis, you need to go farther in. If you’re in Revelation, you’ve gone just a bit too far to the back.

The story we’re looking for in 2 Kings is in chapter 5. While you’re finding it, how many of you ever eat pomegranates?

I don’t but let me tell you why. It’s because I don’t understand them. What’s with the seeds? Are you supposed to eat them or spit them out? [get answers]

Spitting them out seems like a lot of work, no matter how sweet the fruit around them is. But crunching them up to eat them is a lot of work too, and I don’t remember them tasting very good.

But research has shown that we should be chomping them down instead of rejecting them because the seeds of a pomegranate are chock full of vitamin C and potassium and fiber and antioxidants, and eating them is actually good for us. So in the center of this sweetness, there is a hard, bitter lump which we need to chew on to get down, but which is actually the best part of the fruit.

This story in 2 Kings 5 is the same way. Today, we’re going to try to eat a seed from our scripture.

I’m using the New International Version Bible, so if you’re reading from a different version the words may be different, but the meaning behind them should be the same.

Now Naaman (naw-mon)was commander of the army of the king of Aram. He was a great man in the sight of his master and highly regarded, because through him the Lord had given victory to Aram. He was a valiant soldier, but he had leprosy. f [1]

Let me stop for a second and make sure we are all hearing the same things in this passage.

First, Naaman. He’s the top general over all the military forces in Syria. Aram is a name they were called for a time, but we’re talking about Syria.

Syria’s military in those days tended to make their living by raiding their weaker neighbors. Like Israel. And they won. Why? Well, ancient story-tellers weren’t usually believers in free-will like we modern-day Salvationists are. Their explanation for why Syria would win and Israel would lose is because God ordained it to be that way. It’s kind of their way of saying, “We could have won, if we’d wanted to, but God told us not to.” Mmm hmm. They do acknowledge that maybe this Naaman guy was good at his job with this bit about him being a valiant warrior. Then they tell us he’s got leprosy.

That word, leprosy, used to mean something more than it does now. Now we think of leprosy being this thing called Hansen’s Disease, which is a kind of bacterial infection that kills your nerves and leave you open to injuring yourself without realizing it. It also makes you particularly susceptible to other kinds of infection, like gangrene, so we think of lepers as people who develop sores and their bodies rot away.

Hansen's was a thing back then too, but when we read about leprosy in the Bible it actually meant any kind of infectious or unknown skin disorder. It didn’t have to be human skin either. There’s a section in Leviticus about dealing with leprosy infecting your house so you'll know when you need to burn it down.

People weren’t burned down, but they were quarantined. And sent to live away from healthy people.

It was hard to lead an army from quarantine. Naaman wanted to get well.

2 Now bands of raiders from Aram had gone out and had taken captive a young girl from Israel, and she served Naaman’s wife. 3 She said to her mistress, “If only my master would see the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of his leprosy.” [2]

Naaman was apparently loved by his people, since even this slave in his household wanted to see him get well. Or maybe she just didn’t want to live in a house with someone who was sick.

Samaria was the name of a province inside of Israel and the prophet the girl was referring to was this guy named Elisha (ellie-shah) who was from there.

Elisha was Elijah’s successor and is the prophet with the most miracles attested to him outside of Moses. The man did some crazy cool things with the power God gave him.

He’s the guy who, when a street gang started making fun of his bald head, cursed them and sent two angry bears to shred 42 members of their club. Another time there was a kid who had a brain aneurism and died but Elisha prayed and gave him Divine CPR and he was restored to life.

Pretty awesome stuff.

To make an already long story just marginally shorter, the girl told Naaman’s wife about Elisha, she told Naaman, he told the king of Syria, and the king of Syria sent a note to the kind of Israel that said, “Hey, one of my guys is coming to Israel to be cured of leprosy. Make it happen.”

Then Naaman and a small army came rolling into town, bringing with them 750 pounds of silver, 150 pounds of gold, and ten really nice sets of clothes, including some new Levis and a really sweet pair of Jordans. I’m guessing a bit on that last thing.

Protocol would have been to send someone out to meet the procession on it’s way in.

Elisha didn’t do that.

Someone should at least have come out to acknowledge the fact that an army just set up on the front lawn.

Nope, Elisha didn’t do that.

Once the general of all the forces of Syria was posted up on his doorstep, Elisha should have come out and had some kind of formal greeting ceremony.

But Elisha didn’t.

Elisha let him get all the way to the door and wait before he did this:

10 Elisha sent a messenger to say to him, “Go, wash yourself seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh will be restored and you will be cleansed.”[3]

He didn’t even come talk to him.

It’s like the first time I showed up the house of this one girl I liked and her mom answered the door. Which was awkward enough, but just before the door opened I’d heard the girl say, “Tell him I’m not here!”

So I know exactly how Naaman felt, right?

Well, maybe not exactly, because where I was sad, Naaman was pissed.

Can I say that here? Maybe I should just say he was angry. Because he was. He was cartoon-character, smoke blowing out his ears angry. He stormed off. Look at verse 11:

11 But Naaman went away angry and said, “I thought that he would surely come out to me and stand and call on the name of the Lord his God, wave his hand over the spot and cure me of my leprosy. 12 Are not Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters of Israel? Couldn’t I wash in them and be cleansed?” So he turned and went off in a rage. [4]

Now, to be clear, the instructions Elisha sent were that he should dunk himself in the water seven times. As in, take himself down and plunge into the water seven times. It’s like with shampoo when you read the directions and they say you need to lather, rinse, and repeat and you’re all like, “Why are they trying to get me to waste shampoo? I’m just going to lather and rinse and that’s it!”

What, just me?

So Naaman’s instructions are essentially to lather, rinse, and repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat, repeat. In the Jordan, which is a pretty small, muddy, nasty river compared to the two he’s got out by his house back in Syria. He tells the army to pack up the gold and the Jordans, they’re heading home.

Fortunately for him, his guys talk him down.

“Look,” they tell him. “If the prophet had asked you to do something big and crazy and hard to do, you’d have been all over it in a heartbeat. He’s just asking you to take a dip. Well, seven of them. But that’s a little thing, so how about you just do it?”

And we aren’t told this, but I bet at least one of them added, “And if he’s just messing with you, we can come back and burn this little redneck village to the ground afterwards.”

Right.

What he’s been asked to do is a Hebrew religious ritual called a mikvah. It’s water immersion. There is no fancy words to say. No particular way you need to do it. No one comes and helps you – you go into the water alone, sink yourself down under the surface, and then stand up, cleansed. It isn’t magic and it isn’t a process. It’s an act of faith. It’s about declaring your trust in God before witnesses. And it’s what Naaman needed to do. Seven times.

And verse 14 tells us:

14 So he went down and dipped himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had told him, and his flesh was restored and became clean like that of a young boy.[5]

This is one of those weird miracles that we don’t usually think about hard enough.

I mean, yeah, his leprosy was cured, but that seems like such a little thing! Here’s this battle-hardened old warrior. He goes alone out into the cold waters of the Jordan river and slides beneath the waters once, twice, a third time. His army is watching him.

Four, five… The people who talked him into doing this are concerned – has anything changed? His mottled, diseased appearance is the same.

Six.

What is Naaman thinking? One more time and then I’m going back to find that prophet and make him cure me the right way before I give him a quick death. Or a slow one, if he fails…

Seven.

The general goes beneath the water and stands up quickly, ready to get out and go back to deal with Elisha.

But as he wades towards shore there is a ripple among his people and he pauses to check his arms and legs and belly as he walks.

And something looks wrong.

His skin, weathered and darkened from years on the road in service to his king, is smooth instead of calloused. Scars from a thousand small cuts taken over the years in training and in battle are gone. The white and red patches of disease have vanished, but so have the lines where his armor straps sat, the wrinkles of age that had been etched into his flesh, the dark freckles and protruding moles which are part of all our lives as we grow old in our limited bodies. His skin seems so smooth and sensitive and he feels a chill that isn’t just the breeze evaporating the river’s water from his body.

He’s cleansed, but somehow he’s more than that. He’s not just healed, he is restored to… to… There aren’t even words for it! It’s like his skin has been replaced.

In awe of what just happened, he gets dressed and heads immediately back to Elisha.

15 Then Naaman and all his attendants went back to the man of God. He stood before him and said, “Now I know that there is no God in all the world except in Israel. So please accept a gift from your servant.”

16 The prophet answered, “As surely as the Lord lives, whom I serve, I will not accept a thing.” And even though Naaman urged him, he refused. [6]

Elisha wanted to make sure that this man understood that the point wasn’t God’s blessing being bought by his wealth or power. It’s about God’s grace. Naaman acted in faith – it may or may not have been a great faith, but it was enough faith to do what had been asked of him. Enough faith to do this simple, easy thing that God asked. And in exchange he received blessing beyond anything he could have imagined.

Y’all still with me?

Because if you don’t get how AMAZING this is and how utterly desperate Naaman is to show his gratitude, the rest of this story isn’t going to make any sense. Especially not this next little piece, which gives me holy ghost bumps whenever I read it.

You know those, right? That tingling of your skin when you know that you’re in the presence of the Holy Spirit and he’s talking to you? I get that from these next two verses.

17 “If you will not,” said Naaman, “please let me, your servant, be given as much earth as a pair of mules can carry, for your servant will never again make burnt offerings and sacrifices to any other god but the LORD.[7]

There was a thing, in those days, where people believed that each god had a specific area to be in charge of. When a god was stronger, it had a larger piece of ground. When it was weaker, it had a smaller one. When you went from your home territory to another region, the god you worshipped at home may have no sway and no power there. When your nation took over land from another nation, it was thought to be your god pushing the lesser god aside.

Some people think that Naaman was asking for Israel’s soil because he somehow thought that bringing Israel’s land would also transport Israel’s God.

Naaman has just said that he recognizes there is no other God than Israel’s God. He doesn’t need land to bolster his faith. If he ever has doubts, he could just look down at his own body and remember that moment of renewal.

But he still wanted the dirt – a lot of it! – to bring home and build his altar on. A symbol of his accepting that the God of Israel is his God as well. A place for him to plant something that would be meaningful to his new faith. An altar to the One True God.

But there was still one thing he thought might be a problem.

18 But may the Lord forgive your servant for this one thing: When my master enters the temple of Rimmon to bow down and he is leaning on my arm and I have to bow there also—when I bow down in the temple of Rimmon, may the Lord forgive your servant for this.” [8]

There are actually two things about this which catch my attention. First, Naaman is asking God for permission to bow to another god – the false god worshipped by the Syrians at this time. He’s saying, “Well, my king is going to go worship the idol and I’m the one who has to help him do it, so I’m going to just keep doing that, okay? I know you’re the only God that matters, but please don’t be mad at me while I help the old man worship our home god, okay?”

What?! That’s OUTRAGEOUS! There’s no way that God will allow that kind of nonsense, is there?

Is there?

19 “Go in peace,” Elisha said. [9]

Wait…

But we have those commandments, right? About not taking any god before the LORD and about not making idols and all that? And what about Exodus 22:20, which says 20 “Whoever sacrifices to any god other than the Lord must be destroyed. v [10]

So Elisha should be saying, “NO!” or “You’re doing it wrong!” or “You need to worship the same way that I do,” right?

Isn’t that what we hear sometimes in church or from televangelists or from people trying their best to defend the faith? If we don’t all worship the same way, if we don’t all believe and do the same things, then someone has to be wrong, right? And that person obviously gets to go to hell!

Except…

19 “Go in peace,” Elisha said. [11]

There’s more that happens after this. Elisha’s assistant tries to sneak off and get some of the gold and a pair of Jordans for himself, but Elisha knows what he does and inflicts Naaman’s leprosy on his assistant. But I’ll leave all that for the Sunday school teachers, because they love that story.

I’m stuck on this idea that God seems to be okay with Naaman worshipping him wrong.

Because it means that maybe we haven’t understood what God really wants from us.

The ancient rabbis struggled with this passage too, until they hit on a solution.

They decided that what matters is that we put our faith in the LORD, wherever we are, whatever we are doing.

And also that the laws God set up were part of a specific covenant he made for a specific people at a specific time and in a specific place. They pointed out that Naaman was Syrian, not Israelite. So those rules that existed for Israel didn’t apply to him.

In essence, they said that maybe God isn’t as worried about some things as we are. And maybe we apply too much effort and legalism on things that don’t matter.

Maybe we just need to take our eyes off of our neighbor and put them back on God.

Which is what Naaman is doing, isn't it?

This thing about worshipping with his king is him saying, “Even if I have to kneel next to the king in front of this idol, I’m only going to worship you, LORD.”

And the thing with the dirt, that's him taking the LORD with him wherever he goes, isn’t it?

And what was it God said to him through Elisha again?

Go in peace.

Peace=shalom=wholeness

People of the time thought anyone with leprosy was cursed by God.

No reason for that. Not in scripture.

The people of God in those days rejected those who weren’t part of their own tribe or nation.

No reason for that. Not in scripture.

What IS in scripture?

This story. A guy who was okay realized he was better with God than without. He realized that what God asked of him wasn’t the burden he thought it would be. His decision to trust led to his life being changed, so he said he was going to acknowledge the LORD for the rest of his life. So he took some of the ground from the place that happened and he took it with him to help him remember. From that point on, every time he would go by or even see the place he put that dirt, he would remember.

I wonder how many of us would be willing to do a thing like that?

[Altar call]

People didn’t like this story.

A guy, even a Gentile, worshipping is a way they thought was wrong? It made them angry. So they did this thing…

Rimmon not right.

The Syrian thunder god was called Ramman.

Rimmon means “pomegranate”.

Some early scribes thought they’d work in an insult to let us know what they thought of the idea that God might be bigger than their idea of worship.

Worship God where you’re at, in the ways you can. Embrace the seeds in your pomegranate and don’t forget how sweet the fruit around them is.

You with me?

Grace and peace to you.

[1] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:1. [2] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:2–3. [3] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:10. [4] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:11–12. [5] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:14. [6] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:15–16. [7] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:17. [8] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:18. [9] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:19. [10] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), Ex 22:20. [11] The New International Version (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan, 2011), 2 Ki 5:19.