The Works of God

This account of God’s work in 2 Kings 5 has been a huge encouragement for me as a dad with a boy with multiple disabilities and a wife with cancer.  I pray it will be for you as well.

As I wrote yesterday, I want to tell the story of Naaman as it really is laid out in the Bible.  So, while I’m on vacation (and not able to read or respond to comments) we’ll walk through this account verse by verse.

2 Kings 5:1

Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master and in high favor, because by him the Lord had given victory to Syria. He was a mighty man of valor, but he was a leper.

Here’s what I see in this first verse:

• The disease comes last.  It does not define who he is; it is a physical characteristic which is important to Naaman’s story.  But it is not all that he is, unlike how American culture wants to define our kids as being exclusively their disabilities.

• He is powerful.  His disease has not discounted his other gifts of leadership.

• He is in positive relationships with others.  The king himself considered him a ‘great man.’

• He is a mighty man of valor.  His disease is a descriptor of his physical state that did not diminish or define his character – which is marked by valor.

• God takes credit for giving an enemy of Israel success!

That last point is breathtaking!  God himself takes credit, not for ‘allowing’ Naaman to have victory, but for GIVING victory to Syria by Naaman.  God is not a passive actor in this account, right from the first verse.

Combine this with Exodus 4:11:

Then the Lord said to him, “Who has made man’s mouth? Who makes him mute, or deaf, or seeing, or blind? Is it not I, the Lord?”

The result: we have a God who intentionally makes people with disabilities and who purposefully gives enemies victory.  Without shame, and without feeling the need to explain himself.  He gave Naaman victory, and he gave Naaman leprosy.

And that is very good news for us as parents.  If you don’t feel it yet, there’s much more to 2 Kings 5.  More tomorrow.