Grace is Free - The Sin of Gehazi
2 Kings 5v19b-27
27th September 2024
This is our third and final study of 2 Kings Chapter 5. We've seen how God acted to heal Naaman the Syrian and bring him to faith in the true God. This involved humbling him in a number of ways, including refusing the generous financial offering he made to the prophet Elisha. God was demonstrating that His grace is free, and that it's available to Gentiles as well as Israelites. Elisha's servant, Gehazi, didn't like this, and he didn't understand it:
2 Kings 5v19b-23
After Naaman had travelled some distance,
Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the man of God, said to himself, "My master was
too easy on Naaman, this Aramean, by not accepting from him what he brought. As
surely as the Lord lives, I will run after him and get something from him."
So Gehazi hurried after Naaman. When Naaman saw him running toward him, he got
down from the chariot to meet him. "Is everything all right?" he asked.
"Everything is all right," Gehazi answered. "My master sent me to say, 'Two
young men from the company of the prophets have just come to me from the hill
country of Ephraim. Please give them a talent of silver and two sets of clothing.'"
"By all means, take two talents," said Naaman. He urged Gehazi to accept them,
and then tied up the two talents of silver in two bags, with two sets of clothing.
He gave them to two of his servants, and they carried them ahead of Gehazi.
Gehazi didn't understand that God was teaching Naaman about free grace. He thought Naaman, a rich man and a foreigner, should pay for what he'd received. Perhaps, like many today, Gehazi resented rich people. Perhaps he also resented foreigners. Perhaps he resented God's generosity being shown to men and women who were not yet God's people.
A modern-day Gehazi thinks the church and its activities should be fair (whatever "fair" means). He wants everybody to pay their fair share, and do their fair share. He's reluctant to spend church money reaching out to the community around us. But Jesus said:
Luke 6v35
… love your enemies. Do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get
anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will sons of the Most
High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked.
God has generously given us His love, grace and mercy. We should generously pass them on to others, whether they pay their fair share or not, because that generosity speaks about God's free grace. One of the most powerful elements of the Alpha course run by many churches is than we provide a free meal to anybody who comes, and never ask for a contribution. That speaks about the kingdom of God just as eloquently as the words we use. We believers in the God of grace are called to give generously, and not to look for "fairness”.
Elisha was the greatest prophet of his generation. But Gehazi thought he knew better. He decided to ignore what the prophet had said. Today, we have the Bible. Every word of it is inspired by God. It's absolutely trustworthy. I hope we never consider think we know better than the Bible and ignore what it says. Who do we think we are? And be very careful if you try to re-interpret the Bible. The church has been studying the Bible for 2,000 years. If you think you've got a new understanding of it, you're probably wrong. If you think you can ignore parts of it, you're definitely wrong.
Gehazi was sure that giving away God's love, grace and mercy was somehow "unfair". He was prepared to commit sin to achieve what he thought of as justice. That is, of course, a contradiction. Sin cannot be justice. And we have no right to invent our own ideas about justice. Justice is what God says it is, in the pages of Scripture. We don't know better than God.
Gehazi broke three of the Ten Commandments. He broke the Tenth Commandment by coveting Naaman's money. He broke the Third Commandment by swearing, "As surely as the Lord lives", using the Lord's Name in an oath to commit sin. He broke the ninth commandment by lying to Naaman, deceiving him into giving him a gift, making up a story about two young prophets needing money and clothes, and claiming Elisha had asked for this gift.
Whatever's happening, may we never succumb to the temptation to ignore God's word, or misinterpret it. May we never abuse God's Name, or lie, or commit any other sin, to get what we want, or what we think is best, or "fair".
2 Kings 5v24-25
When Gehazi came to the hill, he took the things from the servants and put them
away in the house. He sent the men away and they left.
Then he went in and stood before his master Elisha.
"Where have you been, Gehazi?" Elisha asked.
"Your servant didn't go anywhere," Gehazi answered.
When Gehazi got home, Elisha asked him where he'd been. He lied again, saying he hadn't been anywhere. One sin soon brings on another. One act of deception often leads to another.
2 Kings 5v26-27
But Elisha said to him, "Was not my spirit with you when the man got down
from his chariot to meet you? Is this the time to take money or to accept
clothes, or olive groves, vineyards, flocks, herds, or manservants and
maidservants?
Naaman's leprosy will cling to you and to your descendants forever." Then
Gehazi went from Elisha's presence and he was leprous, as white as snow.
You can fool people, but you can't fool God. God sees everything. He knew what Gehazi had done, and He knew his heart, and He told Elisha. Elisha explained to Gehazi that this wasn't the time to accept a gift. God wanted Naaman to understand that God's grace is free. As a result of Gehazi's misunderstanding, and his selfishness, he'd unwittingly done all he could to undermine God's message.
When we ignore or distort God's word, as Gehazi did, it doesn't just affect ourselves and our church, it damages our mission to save the lost. In particular, when we speak or act in a way that denies or obscures God's free grace, we do great harm. This is the Gospel: God's love is a free gift. Salvation is a free gift, through faith in Jesus's redeeming sacrifice on the cross. We who love and serve Jesus Christ, who believe in His atoning sacrifice on the cross, have a responsibility never to distort the Gospel. Paul took this very seriously. He wrote:
Galatians 1v9
… If anybody is preaching to you a gospel other than what you accepted, let
them be under God's curse!
God loved Gehazi, so he gave him the same lesson he gave Naaman. But He did it in a different way: Gehazi and his descendants would have leprosy. It was a tough lesson, but we all need to fully understand that God's grace is free. It can't be bought and sold. God doesn't love us because of what we do, or how much we pay, but because He is the God of love. We can't earn God's love, we can't pay for it, we can only receive it with gratitude and try to help others to find it.
May God grant that we fully understand this truth. If we will accept it from God's word, by faith, then we won't need to suffer in order to grasp it, as Gehazi did.
I hope we understand that the church exists both to worship God and to reach out into the community around us with free grace. Let us be generous to others. Let us not demand fairness. We serve a generous God, let us be a generous people. We must give love, freely, in God's name, not only to each other but also to those who are not yet saved.
May we welcome anybody who comes to us for help; a foreigner, and a rather arrogant man, like Naaman; a poor widow or a bereaved mother, like the ones in Chapter 4; a careless prophet like the one in Chapter 6; the blind, the deaf, the crippled, as we see in the Gospels; the tax collectors and prostitutes. The Good News of Jesus is for all who will receive it, free of charge. May we never forget:
Ephesians 2v4-5
… because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive
with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions. It is by grace you have
been saved.
God doesn't love us because we're good. We become good people gradually, over time, because God loves us. You and I are called to love people before they become what we think of as respectable, to represent in our words and actions the love and grace of God, as best we can, to all, so that they may receive by faith the same saving and sanctifying grace of God that we have received.