There is not a person I know, or you know that escapes problems! The person you have an issue with, has problems. The person who’s success has made you bitter or envious that you’ve become jealous of them because you think they are living the life that you want to live and they got away clean without going through what you are going through…

The truth is they may not be going through what you’re going through but I guarantee they are going through something in their life.

Everyone Has Problems! The rich, poor, old, young, you name them they have their share of problems. The single person is wishing they had someone to share their bed, life with and the married person is saying if I could just get this person out of my bed, out of my life. We have a tendency of being envious of something we don’t even understand.

But with all that said, let me tell you this word from the most-high God. Your life has a purpose. Your problem has a purpose. If God allowed it to happen to you, he is going to work that situation for your good.

Let’s take a look at 2Kings 5: 1-2

Now Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Syria, was a great and honorable man in the eyes of his master, because by him the Lord had given victory to Syria. He was also a mighty man of valor, but a leper. And the Syrians had gone out on[a] raids, and had brought back captive a young girl from the land of Israel. She [waited on Naaman’s wife.

The bible says Naaman was a great and honorable man and also a mighty man of valor but with that said, the bible says he was a leper. So with all the good that is mentioned, he still had a problem, an issue. I would bet that if he could have his lepercy removed in return for being a great and honorable man, he would ask to have the issue removed.

The king of Syria was indebted to Naaman. He was a person to be revered and respected. But Naaman was a leper. Not detected by the masses but still relevant in his life.

How many of us look so good. Smell so nice. As pretty as can be but deep down what are we hiding under our armor? Naaman came home to deal with matters no one knew. The people we live with. The people we work with. The people we worship with have no clue what you have to deal with behind closed doors.

What’s so awesome about God is that he is there with us in public and in secret. We don’t need a God that is there making us look good before people, we need a God that is there dealing with us in the cryptic, toxic places that exist behind closed doors. The things we have no power or authority over.

You must sometimes wonder how things could be going so good yet so bad at the same time. How can we be at the pinnacle of our career and come home and unbandage our wombs.

How can Naaman fight an army, change the destiny of a nation but yet can’t fix himself. Give such good advice to others, and be totally unable to fix his own problems.

If the people only knew he was a leper. He could lose his position. Back then they out casted lepers. They were excommunicated from society. If the people knew, he would lose everything.

It was not enough to have the disease but could you imagine the stress of hiding it. By the grace of God he was able to survive the nostrils of his comrades smelling his rotting flesh, the visibility of his friends seeing it ooze from under his armor and only when he got home at night did he reveal to anyone that beneath his shiny armor he was a vulnerable as the people he was leading. The only person that saw his issue was the Israelite maiden he had taken captive.

Naaman didn’t mind because to him she was nobody. What Naaman failed to realize is that inspite of society’s view of who you are when God has blessed you with a gift, you’re blessed anyhow. You may not be able to see it in your job, your status or how your seen but in the maiden’s own way, had more power than Naaman. Naaman was great because of what he did but the maiden was great because of whom she knew.

Who you know will always take precedent over what you know.

The maiden was taken from her friends, family and country. She could have been bitter and let Naaman rot but a person’s true test of character is not what you do in weakness but what do you do when you have the advantage.

Naaman was at the mercy of a woman, an Israelite woman at that. God allowed this maiden to be captured who was the cure to his crisis.

The cure to the crisis in our life is somewhere within our arms reach. God will use something within our reach. Even if it’s a jawbone of an Ass. God will let the Ass die at the very spot so you can pickup that jawbone when you need it in your fight.

This maiden was held captive by divine assignment. She didn’t need to struggle to get lose because her problem served a purpose. The Syrians thought they took her against her will, and maybe they did but not against God’s will because it served a purpose.

Is God your God in the good times or is he your God in the bad times too? What’s interesting is that Naaman and the young girl have something in common. They are both held captive by something.

When Naaman undressed the maiden had to decide would she help Naaman the man that has her captive. That is a decision we must all make.

Will I help the one that holds me captive or will I sit back and let them die?

But the problem with holding back what you can do is God will hold back on what he can do because you are no more deserving of the blessing you seek than the blessing you withhold from the person you hate. Remember it rains on both the just and the unjust.

Unless you learn to be merciful, you’ll never be mighty! Your greatest test may be how you handle the person you hate.

The maiden tells Naaman there is a prophet in Israel and if you went to him, he would set you free. But this means entering into the country you just conquered. You must be willing to deal with people you’ve been killing. Sometimes the person were killing has the cure to our crisis. The real test for Naaman is, how bad does he want to be cured. We saw how bad the woman with the issue of blood wanted to be cured.

Are you ready to leave your comfort zone and go into the unknown? Leave where you are loved and work where you are hated?

Would you go to Israel to get well? So Naaman talks to the king of Syria and the king of Syria writes a letter to the king of Israel. These two countries were in conflict and now in a state of peace. The king of Syria writes a letter and gives it to Naaman and tells him to give the letter to the king of Israel. The letter almost caused a national revolt because the letter asked the king of Israel to handle something beyond his scope. Now the king of Israel is outraged at what he is being asked. The king of Israel ripped his clothing because he knew what he was being asked was out of his control.

Elijah, the prophet of God heard about the issue and told the king don’t worry I will take care of it. What Naaman seeks is not found in the prestige of palatial borders. The constant message that God keeps trying to teach Naaman is that your healing is in your humility. God will heal him if he will humble himself. God will do it if you take the advice of the maiden you captured. I’ll do it if you go into a country that you feel is beneath you.

Naaman keeps trying to go up while God is trying to take him down. Get healing amongst kings but God has put his healing among prophets and maids. The way out is not always in the direction you thought. There you are in a palace that can’t heal you. Wearing clothes that can’t fix you. Driving a car that can’t solve the problem. The truth is God put your deliverance in a place that you will have to humble yourself. God didn’t promise to heal you in your neighborhood. Or set you free by people that share your culture. You may have to willing to cross some lines to get what you need. So the question is How bad do you really want it.

Many will say the leprosy is an attack of Satan but not all troubles in your life are of the devil. This was a sovereign maneuver of God to bring Naaman into a sovereign place of destiny. He needed to be afflicted in order to find the door to what God wanted to do. The door was humility and humility only works when the mighty stoop to it.

Remember the woman that committed adultery? Jesus only heels her when he stooped down. Even God himself stoops down for us.

When God needed to redeem the world he could not do it as king of kings, Lord of Lords. He needed to take on human flesh because whenever the mighty humble them selves God is about to do something in their life.

God used this problem to get Naaman to submit. How do you teach a soldier to submit? Not by talking to the king of Syria but talking to a little maiden girl because there are some problems in our life that will bring us down to our knees.

If something you love gets sick enough, you will go or do anything to fix the problem and sometimes God has to bring us to that level to get our attention.

So Naaman goes to Israel, to the prophet’s house and knocks on the door and guess what, The prophet won’t come to the door. Naaman is flabbergasted that people travel for miles to see him and this prophet won’t come to the door. Does he know who I am says Naaman.

Elijah the prophet sent his servant. The servant told Naaman to go down to the river of Israel and dip into the filthy water of Israel to get his healing.

If you’re willing to go down low enough, God will heal that issue in your life because humility is always the way to exaltation. God says if you exalt yourself, I’ll humble you but if you humble yourself I’ll exalt you. The quickest way to go up is to go down. The quickest way for a seed to go up is to go down.

If the devil had realized this he would have never of crucified Jesus.

So what is God trying to wash out of Naaman? Is the leprosy on the outside only a reflection of what is eating at him on the inside. Whatever God is trying to get out of him, he hadn’t gone low enough to get it. And you know this is so because when he was told to dip himself in the dirty water, Naaman said forget it! And would have walked away if it weren’t for one of his servants said to him if the man asked you to do something difficult, would you not have done it?

Because he was asked to humble himself, his pride was standing in the way of his destiny. Naaman cared more about his image than he did about his deliverance. God is determined to wash every bit of it out of his life.

Finally Naaman goes down into the dirty water to be cleaned. He went into filth to be righteous. He humbled himself to become obedient. Saul on the road to Damascus humbled himself to become obedient. If they had to humble themselves, why are we still sitting on our high horse?

As I said, 2020 will be the beginning of blessings and we will see events happen that we never thought we would ever see in our lifetime. This is only March and we are seeing events that are taking affect on a global scale. God is telling the world we all need to get down from our high horse and humble ourselves so we can receive the blessings he has prepared for us in 2020.