1. What are you looking at with physical eyes only that you need to see with “spiritual eyes?” This is hard because spiritual realities are invisible. They take spiritual wisdom and insight. We get that from walking close to Christ and His Word. List any ways you can start seeing more with your spiritual eyes.
2. Can you think of any answers to prayer that have come, but you haven’t seen them as answers? Or you haven’t seen them as from God at all (i.e. blessings, but they are!)?
3. Where do you see “fires” burning in our culture? Your world? Who comes most to your attention as calling for help (whether they realize it or not)? How have you responded to these calls for help? How do you think the Lord is calling you to respond?
4. What do you think will make you more willing to share the resources God has given you to get the Good News out, to love those in need?
I. Just in the past two weeks I’ve had a sexual abuse survivor and someone who’s cancer is in remission tell me those were experiences they would not trade away. Those experiences have helped them fight for others who have been victims; to be more tenderhearted toward the hurting, downcast, & oppressed. And to live every day to the fullest. It’s not those experiences themselves were good, but those painful experiences brought good outcomes in their lives (a la Rom 8:28).
II. One of the biggest challenges we face as Christians is to see spiritual realities vs. physical appearances; what God is doing behind the scenes vs. just what appears on the surface, in front of the curtain. Those of you in theater understand.
A. Why else would Jesus constantly admonish his disciples about them and others as “having eyes, but not being able to see” (Mt 13:13-17; 23:19, 26)?
B. The powerful, miracle working prophet, Elisha, had just helped his servant with this in (6:16-17, PB context brief).
C. In the next scene the king of Israel was told by the prophet, Elisha, that there would come an end to the terrible military siege they were under from the Arameans, which was making a worthless piece of meat sell in their capital city for an outrageous price (6:25, it did NOT taste like chicken, 80 shekels = 2 lbs. silver, marginal ref vs. 7:1-2 where 7 qts wheat sells for 1 shekel vs 80).
1. But the king does not believe it. Why do we have such a terrible time believing God’s good news? Why do we have a hard time seeing our own answers to prayer.
2. This king had seen the ravages of this war so much it made mothers resort to cannibalism (6:27-30). Don’t you think this drove him and Elisha to their knees in prayer for deliverance, for a miracle? Yet when the miracle came, the answer to prayer came, what did the king say and do (7:10-12)?
3. What did the early church do when the miraculous answer came to their prayers for Peter’s release from prison (Call to Wors)?
4. I know a guy who was wrongly accused of causing a traffic accident. He went to court loaded for bear w/ all kinds of evidence the victim and witness were lying. But neither the witness nor the victim showed up. So that gets the case thrown out. But he was mad because he didn’t get to use all his ammo. He also got a parking ticket while in court. So instead of seeing God’s hand in getting his case thrown out, saving him hundreds in court costs, insurance rate hikes, points on his license, etc, he focused on the ticket, how those guys wasted his time, & how he didn’t get to play lawyer in court, etc.
5. Why do we refuse to see God’s answers? Why are we so stingy with praise and thanksgiving? It’s a good season to think about that. God does something big for us and it wasn’t big enough, good enough, didn’t go far enough, or long enough. Instead of It’s: “Man I was sick for three weeks, down in bed, missed work…blah, blah, blah.” How about trying this on for size: “Hey, I’m better! Praise God!” “Once I was blind, but now I see…”
6. How many are thrilled that your pension fund has not gone below zero? (I didn’t think so.) Hey, if it gets much worse, you could owe them! I’m kidding, but there are even silver linings to these clouds. The history of revivals shows people turn to God and the church more in times of economic turmoil than prosperity.
7. The man who created the whole “Veggie Tales” series, Phil Vischer tells how 1/3 of American households w/ small children at one time owned at least one Veggie Tales video. They had the record at that time for most direct from film to video sales. On youtube he tells about losing it all, but in so gaining back his heart & soul. “God didn’t let it fall apart because He did’t love me. He let it fall apart because he loved me so much.” Friends, that’s seeing spiritual realities behind the curtain of what everyone else sees.
8. QUESTION #1 FROM BULLETIN HERE.
III. Enter from behind the curtain, four “extras” in this play; no name lepers. They are the most outcast, rejected members of that society.
A. Being a leper, or even contact with a leper, disqualified you from going to worship at the Temple, and most other kinds of social contact. So their isolation was social and spiritual.
B. These lepers were starving like everyone else, so they figured: “What have we got to lose?” If we stay here we’ll surely starve. If we surrender to the Arameans they’ll likely kill us. What’s the diff (7:3-4)?
C. So they headed out to the Aramean camp and found the enemy soldiers had been frightened off by some disturbance miraculously created by God. The entire army had run for their lives not taking time to gather any of their food and supplies (vs. 5-7).
1. Doesn’t this remind you of all the places in the Bible where God says: “The battle is the Lord’s…Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the Lord will bring you today…The Lord will fight for you. You need only to be still” (I Sam. 17:47; Ex. 14:13-14).
2. Are you battle weary this morning? Are there battles that you’re just tired of fighting? It could be physical, financial, emotional, relational. Might the Lord be telling you “The battle is MINE. Stand and see what I will do”?
D. What were the lepers tempted to do with this fantastic find? Stash it. Hide & hoard. BUT they quickly were convicted that was wrong! So many were hungry. So many needed food and were dying when there was plenty for all: “We’re not doing right. This is a day of good news and we are keeping it to ourselves” (vs. 8-9).
E. Have you heard the GOOD NEWS [GOSPEL HERE]?
IV. This quartet wasn’t the first to keep quiet and sit on the blessings and Good news of God.
A. The nation of Israel did this. Abraham and His family/nation were “blessed to be a blessing.” But we don’t find a lot of sharing those blessings or Good News w/ the rest of the world.
B. We see that attitude in some of God’s best prophets, like Jonah: “Ninevah is enemy; they are trying to kill us. Why should we share God’s goodness with them (3:10-4:3, 11).
C. The “Abraham attitude” seemed to spread through the nation of Israel so that by the time of Jesus the Temple leaders wanted to keep all but Jewish men from fully entering into the blessings of God involved w/ Temple worship, restricting access to this great place of prayer by turning it into a “den of thieves” (Mark 11:17).
D. You ask how could they keep the marvelous blessings of God to themselves, and we see three fingers pointed at us.
1. “Fire Station Failure” video (2 minutes HERE – PROJECT). How are we/you like these firefighters? How are church/you unlike them? The parallels are painfully clear.
2. One way we are like them is when we keep too many of our resources, including both time & talents for ourselves instead of making it available for getting the Good News out, i.e. Faith Promise, volunteering, answering the call of Nom Comm, bulletin, etc.
V. A big question is: What will make us change? Holy Spirit conviction (or fear of God), like came over these lepers, with how good God is, now generous, good and gracious He is.
A. I’m not sure what else will make us change. It may be hard things like the cancer victim or abuse victim who had tragedies tenderize them for those who needed good news; for those who needed their love and God’s.
B. What will change you?
