This text from 2nd Kings is challenging for me. I mean when I first read it, I thought to myself, well good that greedy Gehazi got what he deserved, reaped what he had sown, etc. But then as I thought, wait the good news is that we don't get what we deserve, we get what we NEED! (Salvation aka eternal life through Christ!). Because in truth we deserve hell (separation from God) but we get Christ which as I said is exactly what we need! So I see some traits in Gehazi that are so representative of all of us!
First he thinks he knows best. Forget what God wants, forget what Elisha wants, he knows best. His feelings are made clear when he thinks "My master has let that Aramean Naaman off too lightly by not accepting from him what he offered. As the Lord lives, I will run after him and get something out of him." See he is deciding what is best. He speaks of his master, but clearly, his only true master is himself. And so here is a trait I see in myself and others around me, we each decide that we are our own masters. The people we have relationships with, and the relationship we have with God may influence our decisions, but ultimately we are our own masters we make our own destiny. Certainly dangerous thinking at best!
And then the other trait so clearly expressed by our friend Gehazi...GREED. When I first read this passage, I kind of booed G-man in my head. But then I got to thinking about it...wait a second, would I be so very different in the situation?! I'd like to think so, and I'm sure you would too. I mean think about it for a second, Naaman has already offered gifts to Elisha for the healing of his leprosy, but Elisha refused them. So it's not like Naaman is being robbed here. Gehazi is just cashing in on something that was already offered. If a gift was offered in our midst, would we be quick to say no thanks, glorifying God and healing someone was gift enough? It's a gift being offered completely freely! So while I'd like to seperate myself from Gehazi, I'm not so sure I could...sadly. Perhpas you'll come up better than I.
So we have these two shall we say vices, thinking of ourselves as master, and greed. These seem like on the scale of things not that bad of sins...but wait there we go again ranking sins when we know that really sin is sin. It's like saying I only drowned a little.
This brings me around to greed. Greed is a dangerous thing because there's so much invovled. It's trying to get what we want (not what we need) and it usually brings about coveting. We want what we don't have. And it brings to my mind a few chain letter emails I have recently recieved. Now both emails were from people who are very faithful and great people and the chain letters were religious in nature and actually pretty tolerable as far as chain letters go. But then they both included the same prayer and it went like this:
Father, God bless all my friends in whatever it is that You know they may need this day! And may their life be full of your peace, prosperity, and power as he/she seeks to have a closer relationship with you.
Amen.
Now that prayer is a pretty good one I think except one part, the "be full of your ... prosperity". Now that sounds good but I wanted the official definition for prosperity so I looked it up. And according to merriamwebster.com prosperity is the condition of being successful or thriving; especially : economic well-being. I thought it usually had an economic implication attached to it. And really if I am praying for someone to have God's prosperity wouldn't that be realisitcally unlimited wealth. Now here's the thing. I know God has given us unlimited wealth, the wealth of himself, Jesus Christ his son, but that has nothing to do with money or ecnomic wealth. I certainly don't want my friends to be poor, or anyone for that matter, we have the word of Christ which tells us we will have the poor always. We as humans won't ever be able to eliminate all of poverty, not when Christ tells us in black and white we will have the poor always. I mean I look at my salary sometimes and think, man that has to be close to poverty and I could sure use some of that prosperity, but then it's a relative thing. When I compare my salary to those who make a dollar a day (over a billion people) I have prosperity to share!
I digress. Back to the Bible ( a great place to return). Our poor friend Gehazi. He is a reminder to us of the message that Jesus bears in every gospel. You see Gehazi was the embodyment of Christ's message that blessed are the poor because their reward is heaven, but the rich already have thier reward on earth. Gehazi had gotten his instant reward and was rich in earthly terms but was instantly stricken with leprosy which would prevent him from ever fully enjoying his new found wealth as he would be surely outcast from his community and not allowed to enter the gates or be around his friends and family. So he was very poor internally. In a sense he had his reward but couldn't take it with him since he couldn't spend it wherever he went. If we use our brains to calculate how we can store up earthly treasure, but ignore our hearts and don't love Jesus we can't take that earthly treasure after we leave this earth.
So let Gehazi be a lesson to all of us. It is easy to think of ourselves as own master, (and even in this story it seems that Gehazi is not his own master, but that greed is the one he serves) and it is easy to let greed into our lives and take over, but if we allow these things, we forget our one true Master, Jesus Christ, who by his example gave his everything for everyone.
And so we pray,
Dear Jesus, come into our hearts so that there might be love of only you and our neighbors. Keep us in our humility and know that we serve you. You bless us with not with all that we want, but all that we need, which is your precious blood. Stay with us this day and always, walk with us on our path and keep us steady. In your Holy name we pray,
Amen.
PS-for another great devotion of this reading be sure to check out this site:
http://sites.google.com/site/familyofgodpa/PastorKelly/daily-devotion
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