06/03/2015 Sitting To Death
2 Kings 7:3-8 Now there were four lepers sitting outside the city gates. “Why sit here until we die” they asked each other. “We will starve if we stay here and we will starve if we go back into the city; so we might as well go out and surrender to the Syrian army. If they let us live, so much the better, but if they kill us, we would have died anyway.” So that evening they went out to the camp of the Syrians, but there was no one there.
For the Lord had made the whole Syrian army hear the clatter of speeding chariots and the sounds of a great army approaching.…So they panicked and fled into the night, abandoning their tents, horses, donkeys, and everything else. When the lepers arrived at the edge of the camp they went into one tent after another, eating, drinking wine, and carrying out silver and gold and clothing and hiding it. [Living Bible translation]
Summary:
In Biblical times leprosy was a terrible thing. It was incurable. And, it was contagious. It forced its victims into social isolation, far outside the city gates. Lepers were not allowed to attend “church.” The religious leaders wanted nothing to do with them because they were considered ritually “unclean.” In fact, persons with leprosy were required to yell out “unclean, unclean” wherever they went, so that others could avoid contact with them. Lepers often had to rely on the charity of others for food and water.
In 2 Kings, four lepers, who had banded together outside the gates of their city, found themselves in what seemed to be a hopeless situation. Not only were they lepers with a dreaded disease but their city was in the midst of a famine. Moreover, an enemy army, the Syrians, was camped nearby. As the men sat, they considered their alternatives. However, each one seemed to lead to death. They reasoned that if they went into the city, which they were forbidden to enter, they would die from the famine like the other city inhabitants. If they stayed where they were, sitting by the gate, they would also starve to death. If they went and surrendered to the Syrian army, they could be killed.
The men could have contemplated their situation forever. They could have done nothing and just continued to sit and wait. They could have just “given up” and waited for death. They could have cried, felt sorry for each other, cursed, screamed at each other or complained about “their lot in life” and numerous other things as they just sat. But, instead of just sitting, they decided to act. They decided to take a walk over to the enemies’ camp. They decided to step out on faith. They concluded that even walking into the enemies’ camp would be better than just sitting, because just sitting and doing nothing was certain death. So, the lepers got up and got moving.
When they started moving they discovered that GOD had not forgotten them and that just as HE promised in Psalm 23:5—GOD “prepared a table before [them] in the presence of [their] enemies.”
GOD frightened the Syrian soldiers into thinking they were being pursued. When the soldiers panicked, they abandon everything --their food, their clothing and their wealth. The Syrian army heard all the noise that GOD created and just fled. When the Lepers walked into the Syrian camp, there was no one there---only evidence of the goodness of GOD. By just walking and stepping out on faith, the lepers discovered GOD’s blessing.