Down to Earth But Heavenly Minded

“Go in Peace”

How the healed one finds assurance.

“And he returned to the man of God, he and all his company, and came, and stood before him: and he said, Behold, now I know that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel; now therefore, I pray thee, take a blessing of thy servant. But he said, As the Lord lives, before whom I stand, I will receive none. And he urged him to take it, but he refused. And Naaman said, Shall there not then, I pray thee, be given to thy servant two mules’ burden of earth? for thy servant will henceforth offer neither burnt offering not sacrifice to other gods, but to the Lord. In this thing the Lord pardon thy servant, that when my master goes into the house of Rimmon to worship there, and he leans on my hand, and I bow down myself in the house of Rimmon: when I bow down myself in the house of Rimmon, the Lord pardon thy servant in this thing. And he said to him, Go in peace. So he departed from him a little way” (2 Kings 5:15-19).

The leper was cleansed, and he returned to God’s prophet a humbled and grateful man. There is nothing humbles a man like grace, for grace simply means, what God is for us in Christ, and not what we are for Him; it is what He can do for us, and not what we can do for Him, and it was this lesson that the thankful Syrian had now to learn. He had abandoned his own false thoughts, and he spoke as a man speaks out of whose mind all doubts had been cast. “Behold, now I know that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel.” The word “know” is a great and triumphant word in the Christian’s vocabulary, and he has a right to use it, for God Himself puts it into his mouth. When the light of the Gospel breaks into a man’s heart, all agnosticism and doubts are driven out, and a full assurance takes possession of it that finds its expression in an unwavering confidence in God and the Word of His grace. Looking upon the past, he can say, “One thing I know, that whereas I was blind, now I see.” Thinking of the present, he can read with rejoicing, “These things have I written to you that believe on the Name of the Son of God; that ye may know that ye have eternal life” (1 John 5:13). And if thoughts arise in the mind as to those sins that stained his soul, he can get assurance as to that matter from the same infallible Word: “Ye know that He was manifested to take away our sins; and in Him was no sin” (1 John 3:5). And again, “I write to you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for His Name’s sake” (1 John 2:12). And as to the future, what triumphant confidence rings in the words: “We know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens” (2 Corinthians 5:1); and, more glorious even than that, “We know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is” (1 John 3:2).

How different is this Christian language to the wail of the agnostic as he gropes his darkened way to the grave. He says:
“Is there beyond the silent night a day?
 Is death a door that leads to light?
   We cannot say.
 The tongueless secret locked in fate,
   We do not know,
   We hope and wait.”

And this confidence is not presumption, any more than was Naaman’s. He had proved in his own happy experience what the God of Israel could do for a hopeless leper who would obey Him, and every man who has believed the Gospel of God’s salvation, the Good News concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, knows the delivering, peace-giving power of God, and can speak with confidence about it. Yet this confidence does not rest in his experience, blessed as that may have been, but upon the Word of the living God, Who cannot lie. We thank God for the Holy Bible, His sure and unchanging Word. It is there that the Christian finds reliable authority on which to base his confidence. And all the blessing that he enjoys and the peace of true Christian knowledge lie in great facts that other statements of that same Word reveal to us. “We know that the Son of God is come” (1 John 5:20). “We have known and believed the love that God has to us: GOD IS LOVE” (1 John 4:16). The blessing that Naaman got through Elisha revealed to him the true God, the blessing that we have received through Jesus our Saviour has revealed to us that God is love. “For herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins” (1 John 4:10).

It was natural that Naaman should wish to recompense his benefactor, for, being what he was, he could not understand receiving a great blessing, without money and without price. He felt that he was able to pay for it, and he would do so handsomely. He had to learn that God would not sell His blessing. He was convinced as to the power of God. He had now to learn what His grace was. How emphatic were the words of Elisha: “As the Lord lives, before Whom I stand, I will receive none.” This is a hard lesson for a proud man to learn. “How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the Kingdom of God” (Mark 10:23); whether those riches be in money, or fame, or self-righteousness. Are these of no value? asks their possessor. Well, Naaman possessed an abundance of these sorts of wealth, but they did not and could not cure his leprosy. And it is certain that they cannot atone for a sinner’s sins, they cannot save his soul. I am sure that Naaman learnt the great lesson as he stood before Elisha, that God will not sell His blessing, and for two reasons: Naaman, with all his wealth, was too poor to buy it, and God was too rich to sell it. It was all of grace, the free giving of God to one who could not merit His gift. There is no more needed lesson than that for any man to learn.

But let no one suppose that this grace that pardons the sinner and justifies him from all things means that sin is a small thing, and that God can pass over it lightly. No, He cannot do that, and here I quote some invaluable words. “Grace supposes sin to be so horribly bad that God cannot tolerate it. Were it in the power of man, after being unrighteous and evil, to patch up his ways and mend himself so as to stand before God, there would be no need of grace. The very fact of the Lord being gracious shows sin to be so evil a thing, that man, being a sinner, his state is utterly ruined and hopeless, and that nothing but free grace will do for him — it only can meet his need. … The moment I understand that I am a sinful man, and yet that it was because the Lord knew the full extent of my sin, and what its hatefulness was, that He came to me, I understand what grace is. Faith makes me see that God is greater than my sin, and not that my sin is greater than God.” Grace is God’s intervention in love on behalf of those who had no power to save themselves, and who were His enemies.

I have no doubt that that great soldier, whose leprous flesh had become like that of a little child, now bowed in a childlike spirit before the man of God, realising that the benefit he had received was beyond all price, and yet that it claimed him henceforward. He most surely belonged to the God Who had given him this new life, and this he must own in the dark land to which he had to return. And so he asks, “Shall there not then, I pray thee, be given to thy servant two mules’ burden of earth? For thy servant will henceforth offer neither burnt offering nor sacrifice to other gods, but to the Lord.” He would raise his altar to God, and confess His Name and worship Him alone. Nothing other than that could be right, and Naaman’s vow indicates where lies the Christian’s true life and privilege. He has a sacrifice to offer, not for his salvation for by the offering of Jesus Christ once for all he has been perfected for ever, as Hebrews 10 tells us, and because of that perfect offering his sins and iniquities are to be remembered no more — but because he is saved and belongs to his Saviour. Clear and blessed are the words of Romans 12: “I beseech, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service;” and the one who is saved by grace and knows it will answer such an appeal with a glad response.

Yet Naaman had a fear as he looked into the future. He would be expected to conform to the practices of his idolatrous king and country. “In this thing,” he pleaded, “the Lord pardon His servant.” The prophet’s answer was a very brief one. “Go in peace,” was all that he had to say. Did this mean that a confessor of the true God could compromise with idolatry, and be conformed to the world? Surely not. It means, Leave that with God. The God Who has healed you can keep you. Leave your future in His hands, go in peace. “For God is faithful, Who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way of escape, that ye may be able to bear it” (1 Corinthians 10:13). It may be that there is one among my readers who is trembling on the very threshold of the Christian life, feeling that a whole-hearted yielding of his life is the only right answer to the grace so rich and free that has saved him, yet fearing the consequences, and most of all his own weakness in circumstances that seem too difficult for him. Here are great words and comforting for him: “Be careful for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God which passes all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus” (Philippians 4:6-7). With words like these in the heart, the saved and happy, trusting soul may “Go in peace.”