TEXT: 2 Kings
5:1-14
Simply Clean
One of the
few television shows I regularly make it a point to watch is Monk, the USA Network’s award winning
series about a brilliant detective with Obsessive Compulsive Disorder who, in
part because of his obsessiveness and in part in spite of it, is almost
mystically able to solve crimes. In a
recent episode, Monk was distressed about #7 – the usually flawless shirt
manufacturing inspector whose little “Inspected By” slip he has come to look
for before making a purchase. It drives
the sales staff crazy. When he notices
that #7 is suddenly failing to notice obvious flaws in the shirts that pass
under the inspection light, Monk knows that something is terribly wrong. Trust me, it’s a great show.
Watching
the show made me realize my own curiosity about those nameless faces behind
those annoying little slips that surprise us when we take the pins out of the
shirt just bought or tear the plastic off the newest package of underwear in
the drawer. “Inspected by #7.” People who, as far as I am concerned, are “in
the shadows”, somewhere along the manufacturing line, well out of the light.
We
have no idea who they are, or if “#7” is always the same #7, or if perhaps
numbers get retired like sports jerseys when a particularly effective inspector
retires. What I do know is that whoever
it is -- whoever they are -- they are subtly important people in my life. It’s not that they keep me healthy or provide
any encouragement or companionship. We don’t
exchange Christmas cards or keep up with each others’ kids. As I said, we don’t even know who they are or
where they live; whether they are black or white, female or male. Just their number, and their work: inspections.
To
be sure, it is one of those baseline jobs that isn’t very visible; completely
lacking in prestige and, I would guess, respect. But baseline jobs are first-line jobs. Nobody really notices Inspector #7 until he
or she isn’t there – when, as Monk noticed, there is a button missing from the
shirt or a waistband inadequately sewn.
Everything tends to depend on the baseline functions functioning
well. When they break down, everything
breaks down.
I
can go on vacation for a couple of weeks; get sick and lay in bed for a few
days or a few weeks and very little seems the worse because of my absence. But let the secretary’s office lie dormant
for a day or a week and suddenly everything screeches to a limp.
You
probably occupy at least one baseline job somewhere in your life. It may be the house cleaning; it may be the
cooking; it may be the lawn; it may be your job, like #7. Those responsibilities may not seem all that
important until the laundry piles up and you run out of socks. Others you seldom think about at all -- like
when you pour the breakfast cereal and later wash out the bowls; like when you
finish sweeping the clippings from the driveway. They seem so trivial; so mundane; so
little. Baseline jobs. But everything is built on the successful
completion of their work. And more than
that, we seldom know what comes out of the triviality of what we do.
In
the foreground of this almost comic story are some major players. There is Elisha, protégé of the legendary
prophet Elijah. And there is Namaan, a commander of the army of the king of
Unfortunately,
the great and favored commander has leprosy and is anxious for some help – even
if it means undertaking some non-traditional therapy. And “non-traditional” he finds in the person
of Elisha.
Now,
as most of us can attest, there are some times in your life when you want a few
fireworks. Crash! Spark!
Thunder! Shake! Things aren’t right. Life is maddeningly wrong and detestably
twisted out of shape and you want things put back right-side up. In those moments it isn’t enough for things
to simply work out. You want exclamation
points dotted with Wagnarian grandiosity.
You want a little drama!
Naaman
was in precisely such a moment.
Accustomed, perhaps, to the crashing cymbals and banging drums of war,
Naaman expected a little cannon-fire with his cure. So, Naaman, accompanied by all the evidence
of his wealth and importance, drew up to Elisha’s house and announced his
need. But the prophet didn’t even come
outside. As if to wonder, “What’s all
the fuss about?” he sent word by a messenger that the great Commander should go
take a bath in the Jordan River – in fact, seven baths. “That,” said Elisha, “should do the trick.”
Naaman was
incensed! “I thought for sure he would
come out, say some magic words, wave his magic wand over the spot, and call
down the healing lightening bolts of heaven.
How dare he offer such a simple cure!”
Naaman wanted a little drama.
But while he wanted drama, what he needed was cure, and finally, according
to the story, the great warrior followed Elisha’s instructions and the disease
was eradicated. Case closed. “Next?”
But the
part of the story I skipped over may well be the most important part: its equivalent of #7. She is an utterly anonymous figure in
scripture. We have no idea what her name
was; what tribe she was from. We have no
idea where she came from, let alone what ever became of her. As far as we know she is never referred to
again in all of scripture. She is simply
a “little maid from the
It
was this almost subliminal slave girl in the service of Naaman who offers to
her boss a suggestion. She was the one
who dropped Elisha’s name.
I want to
suggest that it is on people just like this little slave girl that God depends,
in circumstances no more glorious than this.
Here, in the trenches of life, the Realm of God will be furthered. The baseline work. If it does not happen here, it does not
happen at all. If these functions break down,
it all breaks down.
Churches
build all kinds of buildings for education and recreation and worship, and take
great pride in their mortar and brick.
We, ourselves, have reason to pride in that which surrounds us. But Christianity is not in the walls.
I
take great pride in the programs we are developing for ourselves and the
community -- LOGOS, Thresholds, the Farmer’s Market, and the rest. But Christianity is not made in the
programming.
Congregations
and denominations take pride in lifting up their great leaders. They go on television and radio, they
criss-cross the country in speaking engagements, and people flock to the
pews. But as important as the Elisha’s
may be, Christianity lives in the trenches, in the dry and dusty moments of
Tuesday afternoon and Thursday morning with the little slave girls of the
world, far more than the vibrant celebrative moments on Sunday with Elisha.
Christianity
is sustained in the trenches by the baseline workers. In the church those workers are, in part, ones
like those who, day in and day out, month by month, make sure the radiators are
working, the newsletter is folded and mailed, the phone is answered, the coffee
is made for fellowship time and the communion prepared for Sunday worship;
those who make sure the curriculum is ordered for the Sunday School classes,
the attendance forms collected and the welcome bread delivered.
But
there are trenches more far-reaching than those that support the church, and
more accessible to your fingers and days.
These are the trenches bearing great resemblance to the one of the text,
where the faith is lived, expressed, and shared. What happens for the work of God just by a
casual word? What is prevented from
happening simply because no word is spoken?
I’m not talking about leading crusades, and passing out tracts on the
street corner; nothing is being said here about blaring your beliefs like a
human bullhorn. But I am talking about evangelism at its most basic. Living your faith out of the very fiber of
your life; allowing what you genuinely believe to be true to see the light of
day -- everyday.
Someone once defined Evangelism as one beggar telling another beggar where to get bread. Or perhaps, as in the story, where to get healed. She was, by just about any estimation, an irrelevant character. No name, no identity. Only a vibrant faith that was not dimmed by the monotony of her work. She did not hide her faith, nor did she parade it. She simply lived it. Nothing that followed would have taken place had she remained silent -- no healing; no proclamation of faith. She made no public demonstration. Simply in the normal course of her affairs -- as a slave girl in a foreign land -- she made her witness. That’s where the reign of God will be born. In the trenches. Midwifed by ordinary people in ordinary moments point the way. I wonder what might come up in your conversations this week?