The kingdom methodology

Let's go to the Word of the Lord in Second Kings, chapter 5, the story of Naaman. How many have heard of Naaman from the distinguished military general of the kingdom of Syria, Naaman? and he is one of my favorite characters too, one of the outstanding men of Scripture, one of the most interesting and revealing characters of Scripture, and he teaches us many things.

I want to join, join this meditation on this moment in the history of the Hebrew people and the people of God throughout history, even because these things are written for our edification and instruction and imitation, I want to join this meditation with the sermon that I preached two years ago Sundays about healing and then I couldn't continue on this topic because Meche and I were away last Sunday but I think also Pastor Gregory Bishop preaching to us about this call to the nations as well and having a comprehensive, ambitious mentality for the Lord I believe that it also kind of united this element of God who wants to move with power in the midst of His Church.

And I believe that this meditation on Naaman and his relationship with the prophet Elisha is a way of uniting those two themes. The theme of healing that we are now going to see in action, what I used as a theoretical theological teaching about healing, you are going to see now in action exemplified here in the encounter between Elisha and Naaman.

But also, as you know, this year we have been meditating on Evangelism and the call of God to His Church at this time to share the Word of the Lord, to be evangelistic in our behavior, to be contagious people and to be evangelistic people, a missionary Church, a Church that uses the gift that God has given us and as the apostle Paul says to Timothy: "I advise you to fan the fire of the gift of God that is in you."

God has put us here in the city of Boston as salt, as divine leaven. How many believe that, amen? and God has imparted a gift to us not because we deserve it but because it pleases Him to do so, now we have to use the gift. Paul tells Timothy: "For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, of love, and of a sound mind."

Amen God gives you the gift but it is not for you to hide it like the unfaithful servant under the table. It is not for you to say: oh people are too harsh, we are in a post-Christian world may the Lord rebuke that devil's lie, we are not in a post-Christian world at least we are in a pre-Christian world, it is not for us to be shy, it is not so that under a supposed sense of respect for privacy; Do you know that the devil has placed a false respect for the privacy and rights of others? I'm not saying that we don't have to respect that, but there are many people who want to hear the Word of God and we are the ones who put up barriers, not them.

I have found that if one shares the Gospel in a respectful way and discerning God's timing, people are willing to listen and one gets many surprises sometimes from people who one did not expect to receive the Word and when one speaks to them they come to the Lord and receive the Lord. And so God doesn't want us to keep our talent, as a Church God has given us a calling in this city, God put us here in the epicenter of Boston and we came here originally precisely because it was a "bad" place so to speak; it was a place of corruption, high crime, decay and look what God has done in the fifteen years or so that we've been here, how God has changed.

Not necessarily for us, just because I know that there are many churches that pray, but for the glory of God our coming coincided with a move of God and this city is improving every day and this neighborhood, there is a great blessing, right? Because many people would have said: no, this Church is crazy to come from Cambridge here to this place full of crime and violence and leave a temple that they had that they had given to build one for themselves, but God prospered us and blessed us and we have seen His blessing.

Because when one dares like Abraham as Gregory preached, right? God tells you: I am going to take you from your land, from your relatives, from what is comfortable for you and if you are willing to bother yourself and take risks in My Name I am going to bless you and I am going to give you a family and I am going to make you king and leader and you are going to bless the nations, and you are going to use My gifts and I am going to put you as My representative in the nations. That is what God wants to do with His Church, when God's people believe God can use you if we dare.

And so God is moving in this time, that is why this year we have been meditating over and over again about how to be an evangelistic people and we have been studying different dynamics of how God moves evangelistically in the world. That is why the healing that comes to be a representative of the gifts of the Spirit, because the Bible speaks of such gifts of healing but also speaks of gifts of knowledge, of faith, different types of gifts and signs that God gives.

But to be powerful in Evangelism we have to move in the supernatural power of God. How many believe that, amen? We can't do it just oh, teaching people theory and theology, people need more than that. He needs the warmth of God's power, he needs God's fire in our lives. That is why the Lord told the disciples: do not leave Jerusalem to preach the Gospel until you have received power from on high, I am going to baptize you with My Spirit, I am going to impart gifts and then you are going to move in the Power of My Spirit to carry out the work that I have entrusted to you through the Great Commission.

So we see here the gifts of healing on the one hand, the power of the supernatural move of God and also the call to evangelize the nations and be ambitious in what God can do. These themes come together in this text in the story of Naaman and Elisha, it's very long to read the whole text, it's 27 pretty fat verses each so I'm going to just read a few verses and I'm going to be visiting this story that many of you they already know for themselves.

But let's start in verse 1, it says: "Naaman, general of the army of the King of Syria, was a great man before his Lord" in other words he was a very important man, highly appreciated, very valuable to the king of Syria. He was a general, not just any general if he was like a 5-star general, he was like the supreme military man who led the army of the king of Syria and this man enjoyed the trust and appreciation of his king, his lord.

And this man held him in high esteem because through this man Jehovah had given salvation to Syria. I have here, I do not know when I put this in my Bible because I have read this text many times here in my Bible that is well worked, I put an exclamation point next to that statement there. Why did I put an exclamation point next to that statement? I don't want us to overlook that.

Look, it says that God through Naaman had given Syria salvation. Wow I find this interesting because Syria was an enemy nation of Israel. We see the Syrians many times through Scripture at war and in oppression against Israel, it was an enemy nation, it was a pagan nation that did not know the living God. I always love when I see those ways in which God moves in the world beyond our limited schemes.

I say that when we get to heaven we are going to meet people we would never have thought would get there. Even if we weren't glorified we'd be lamenting: oh my God I have to spend eternity with this guy I liked so fat down there.

God moves in strange ways in the world and in the nations and in this case he says that God had used Naaman to give him salvation, don't ask me what God was doing with that nation at that moment but we see it many times with Ninibe when Jonah He preaches to Ninibe and says that God loves those people who can't tell their right hand from their left hand. And so, brothers, I tell you: one of the things we need to cultivate in order to be truly evangelistic people is a heart of mercy that loves people.

I believe that there are many Christians who want God to send fire and judgment and punishment to the world. They would be disappointed if God did not send an earthquake that would kill 150,000 people in the next two or three months here in the world, and yet God calls us to love the unsaved, to love people who do not know God, to want that the nations be saved and to believe that God moves strangely and that God moves with whom he wants as he wants.

And that I believe that at this time in history God wants to do something great in the nations and I am not yet ready to turn the world over to Satan and we have to be ambitious and believe: no, God still wants to save nations, God still He wants to save this city. God wants to save the gangsters, God wants to save the tecatos who are taking drugs right now; God wants to save homosexual people, God wants to save adulterers, God wants to save alcoholics, God wants to save the resentful and the vengeful and the violent.

The Lord Jesus Christ said: I have come to seek what has been lost. In one passage it says that the disciples when the Lord was going to pass through Samaria to go to Jerusalem the disciples the Lord sent His disciples to a Samaritan village to announce to them that He was going to pass through there, they were certainly not Jews and perhaps He wanted to ask permission respecting the authorities and the Samaritans when they saw that Jesus was a Jew they forbade him to pass through that village.

And the disciples came to the Lord rubbing their hands: Lord, do you want us to send fire to destroy them as Elijah destroyed the soldiers who came looking for him? The Lord said: You do not know what spirit you suffer from, I have not come to destroy man, I have come to save him" God wanted to save those Samaritans, right?

So we have to ask the Lord to give us a compassionate, merciful heart, a heart that does not limit you. I ask you: Lord fill my heart with compassion for those who oppose You and fill my heart with courage to believe that You can even move in these times in places that are apparently closed to You as God was moving strangely in Syria.

And that's why I believe that God put it in my heart to put that question mark there because God moves strangely. He is moving in Syria because He wanted something glorious to take place there, for His Word and His Name to be magnified in that enemy city and for there to be a testimony of the power of God there.

Because that is also another thing, brother. Do you know that Evangelism is spiritual warfare? The Syrians served a strange god, it was not Jehovah and they looked to that strange god for their physical prosperity, the cultivation of their lands and their crops and all this kind of thing, their food, their victory over a foreign god and God wanted to try : no, that god is not the true God, I am the true God, the God who can heal this man who represents his nation. Then God was hatching a plan to provoke an implicit confrontation of powers between that strange God and the true God who was Jehovah.

So it says here that: "This man was extremely brave but he had a problem: he was a leper" how God sometimes uses diseases, life's problems to glorify and exalt himself. Naaman did not know it, but Naaman was going to be a blessing and inspiration to countless generations through the centuries, he was even going to be a testimony to his nation, but it all began with a great crisis in his life: a great, shameful, terrible disease. .

Imagine a military man accustomed to wearing his general's uniform, God knows how many decorations he had, I don't know if they used medals in those days but I am sure that when Naaman was a young soldier and in the prime of his life, of his health he He walked the streets representing the strength and courage of a military martial man. So this man with all his glory, with all his triumphs and decorations, had everything he needed: money, influence, prestige, the esteem of his lord and yet a leper, the most terrible and disfiguring and alienating disease because a person leper was an outcast and no one wanted to touch or go near a leper.

I don't know how he negotiated all that in his military life, the fact is that God was preparing his suffering for Him to be glorified and for Naaman to experience the glory of seeing the living God working in his life. Let's never throw in the towel brothers, let's know that God still wants to use the suffering of our life for His Glory. You don't know who might be watching you while you suffer from something and always give glory to God and maintain your attitude of service to the Lord and seeking Him and praying and serving Him can be an inspiration to many.

Then it says that: "Armed bands had come out of Syria and had taken captive from the land of Israel a girl who served Naaman's wife." Another character is introduced into the story: a young slave girl who had been taken captive in a raid, a military attack, an incursion by the Syrian army, they were like guerillas that entered the territory of Israel and took whoever they could and kidnapped and they sold into slavery.

This young lady had been torn from her family and taken to Naaman's house. How many believe that God put her there to be a witness as he put Joseph? you see? It's that God moves in mysterious ways. One of the things that we have to ask the Lord: Lord, open my eyes so that I can discern Your movement in the different circumstances of my life.

This young woman had been taken and kidnapped, I think in a sense for a moment in Cairos, a pregnant moment that God had to continue advancing with the plan, the drama that He had elaborated. Then this young woman one day says to her mistress Naaman's wife: lady, do you know that in Israel where I come from there is a prophet who can heal your husband? wow. I stop here for a moment before the importance that we bear witness to the God that we know brothers wherever we are and that we find reason to redeem any circumstance in which we find ourselves.

When something happens in our lives that is negative and terrible, do you know what the trend is? as Job's wife used to say, curse God and ask him to kill us or die and deny God, this girl used her opportunity, used her tragedy to testify of the God she knew. If God has worked in your life in any way, if you have seen the power of God in your life testify of it. If God has healed you, if God has freed you, if God has done something in your heart, communicate it to others and let them know: look, I know a place where there is power for your need.

People come to our Church from many different backgrounds. I could give many stories of how sick people come here, with problems with their marriages, in depression, with serious spiritual problems and for the glory of the Lord they have found liberation, healing, hope, advice for their lives in this place for the glory of Him. The Church has to be a place of power brothers, the Church has to be a place of transformation.

That is why we have to dedicate time to cultivating the power of the Holy Spirit, it takes time, it takes effort. It is not a question of a little service here for half an hour and let's all go home, we must cultivate the sense of the Presence of the Lord as we did this morning. How good when we come with the batteries set to worship the Lord and glorify him. Have to work.

When you leave here at 2 or 3 in the afternoon on Sunday you are burnt out like a matchstick because it's work, it's hard, it's not a matter of bringing a sermon and reading it here for 20 minutes and no, people here work hard every day. that serve here you have to make an effort. On Friday we were here until 11:30 p.m. and our worship group did not stop adoring for a single moment from 7 p.m. practically, it is a lot of work.

And people often come and say: why not these people? Look, half an hour is enough for adoration. God wants us to cultivate His Presence because in that cultivation of His Presence God the power of God is released and God does things, we sing "when the people praise God he does things" but we don't know what we are saying many times but is it what we believe? amen?

The Church, your life has to be a repository of the power of God so that the people who need to come in contact with that power by touching your life in some way come in contact with the power of God. People are not going to come: "oh look, in that Church there is an incredible theology, oh in that Church they have a very good teaching" no, people want a solution for their lives, they want encouragement, they want something that tells them: yes God It's alive, it's real, there's hope for my life.

And that is why we have to, this young woman did not say to him: look, go over there to Israel because they have a tremendous seminary where they preach a lot of theology, where you are going to learn the names of all the prophets and this and that, no. He told her: there is a prophet there who has the power of God and he can heal your husband.

Glory to the Lord, brother, I ask that our Church every day be more and more a place where people can receive what they need for their lives and our Churches have to be that and we have to exemplify this and our lives have to be lives of power That is why we have to take time to pray, to fast, sanctify ourselves, study the Word, arrange our lives so that the power of God can manifest itself through us because that is what is going to change people, it is not No other thing.

Then she says to him: well, go there, our Lord Naaman, there he can receive. "She said to her mistress: if I prayed for my lord to the prophet who is in Samaria, he would heal him of his leprosy." So this man, neither slow nor lazy, when he found out what this girl had said, look: Naaman must have been very desperate to have taken the advice of a poor servant, but Naaman said: well, let's go there, I've already tried everything that I could, nothing has turned out who knows.

And then it says that: "He entered the king's compound and reported to him saying" thus, thus said a girl who is from the land of Israel and the king of Syria said to her: go and see and I will send letters to the king of Israel. I will send letters. It wasn't a little letter: Dear King of Israel, how are you? Nice to meet you. Would you do me a big favor? no, it was a letter of authority. Syria was a very strong kingdom, it was a power in that region and the king of Israel was afraid of the king of Syria.

It says here that: "Then Naaman left taking with him 10 talents of silver, 6,000 pieces of gold, 10 changes of clothes" the man was equipped for what because look, this is the mentality of the world in operation. The Holy Spirit directs the writer of Kings to give us these details because He wants to teach us something too. When God is moving in the world evangelistically, when the power of God is descending and that is what is going to happen in the nations, what happens when a Church moves in Evangelism and people begin to arrive.

People come to us and they come to the Church and they always have. Wherever God's powerful evangelistic move occurs, we are always going to see something and that is that the world is going to come to us but it is going to come with its mentality and its system of values, with its expectations, with its preconceptions, with its worldview, their worldview and they will come to the Church seeking healing, seeking healing, seeking the solution to their problem but they come contaminated with the worldview believing that we also function the way they function.

And then when they come to the Church there has to be a power clash between the values of the Kingdom of God and the values of the world. If the Church gives in to its values and allows itself to be intimidated by the world, it loses the fight. But if the Church remains firm in its values, the world has to lower its head and enter into the vision of the Church. And my heart bleeds every day seeing so many churches at this time here in Boston and in many countries where the Gospel is weak and disadvantaged in a sense, many churches giving up their weapons to the world so that people will come and visit us.

And we believe that if we preach the Gospel as Christ declared it, as the Word declares, they will not come, they will visit us and we remove a number of passages from the Bible, teachings from Scripture because we do not want to scandalize people. The Church has to stand firm in its position and there has to be a power clash and when the Church stands firm then the Lord does what He promises He is going to do, but if we give up the towel first, we say: oh how good that The professor came, how good that the engineer came, oh how good that the banker came, he's going to give us the money we need to build the temple so I'm not going to say anything that offends him, we lost the battle.

We won it in one sense but we lost it in the end because God always wants us to prove that we believe He is the one doing the work, not us with our techniques and our human reasoning. Why do I say that? because Naaman prepares himself with everything he thinks he has to pay the prophet to do what he wants him to do. He thinks that this prophet is going to charge him: ok, what do you want? Well, if you want me to heal you from a headache, that's going to be three garments and four talents of silver. Now if it is a question of a leg that is limping, well, that is going to cost you more.

Leprosy! forget boy what do you have in the house? give me the credit card. Then Naaman says: well I don't know how much this one is going to charge me because everything in the world costs. So he fills up with money and supplies and shows up in Israel. Their mentality is a mentality of power, of money, of influence because that is how the world thinks, the world has its values and thinks that the Church works that way but the Kingdom of God is counter-intuitive and counter-cultural and puts world values upside down.

And when people come in, you have to show them: look, I'm so sorry, you're going to have to walk very short because you have to act like a child, you have to learn everything all over again because the values of the Kingdom of God are very different from what you're used to, I don't care if you are a philosophy professor or a great scientist, the Kingdom of God works far beyond science, far beyond philosophy, far beyond reason, far beyond art, it is a Kingdom that judge everything.

Then he took 6,000 pieces of gold, six changes of clothing and also took letters for the king of Israel, letters of authority that said: when these letters reach you, know by them that I am sending my servant Naaman to you so that you can heal him. his leprosy, period. How do governments write when they are going to send the car tax to your house, for example, when the X-size tax arrives from your car to your house, do you know how it says? something like: the city of Watertown demands that you pay them $93 dollars with $0.50 of taxes.

So they say, they demand. Those letters are truly hateful to me when they arrive like this because that's how the world is used to giving orders. The policemen there at Logan Airport when you are taking a second to wait for your loved one to arrive they yell at you: get out of there, ok sir, ok, insult yourself. They want to exemplify authority, they don't want to give you even a moment's doubt of their authority because if they cast a little bit of doubt then you take advantage of that so they are cutting, blunt and to the point.

That is the world, the world of power, the world that comes with that authority wanting to govern, wanting to control, wanting to impose itself but they have a need, eh? And if you let yourself go, they're going to ride on you. We have to be convinced of what we believe, what God has told us, the way we operate, the way the Kingdom of God moves.

Then he sends him a document in these letters: heal my servant or you already know what is going to happen to you. After the king of Israel read the letters, he tore his clothes, the man was desperate. In the Hebrew culture, tearing clothes was a sign of mourning, of mourning, disaster is coming to my nation, if I do not heal this man, I am going to face the king of Syria.

Then in his desperation he says: "Am I God who kills and gives life so that he sends me to cure a man of his leprosy? Look now how he seeks an occasion against me" what he wants is to declare war on me and for that reason he gives an impossible assignment so that when I don't do it then they have an excuse to come with their army to invade Israel, despair. I see something here, it is the impotent Church.

When people arrive at our campuses and a direct intervention from God is needed and we don't have power and we don't know what to do, we are biting our knuckles and we don't have the solution to our problem and so unfortunately there are many people in the Gospel, in the Kingdom of God. God needs places, he needs people anointed with the power of the Holy Spirit who know what has to be done.

The king manifested his desperation in a public way, it seems, and perhaps someone there realized what had happened and the news reached the prophet Elisha. It says that when the man of God heard that the king of Israel had torn his clothes, he sent to say to the king: why have you torn your clothes? boy that is too expensive that suit that you just tore. "Come now to me and you will know that there is a prophet in Israel."

Wow. I think if someone spoke like that in our world we would say: oh how conceited, how proud. God's people have authority. When the power of God is in a place, there is no need to walk with false humility.

I have learned that and it is that God's people speak properly and we know that everything is by grace, everything is by mercy, not because we deserve it, but we have to know that there is power and we have to ask the Lord: Lord, give me self-esteem great not to be apologizing for the Gospel that you have entrusted to me and that you have given us; we have to walk safely, God is with us.

God does not want false humility but neither does he want pride or arrogance, right? He wants you to know that: yes, God is with you, he is in you and that it is by the grace and mercy of God that he is in you, but one thing and the other have to be in balance. The Church has to know that the power of God is there and we have the solution to humanity's problems, we don't have to be apologizing for ourselves with a false humility because what it does is annoys God more than pleases him .

So he calls: tell him to come, to come here to my house. You know the story, it says that Naaman came with his horses and with his chariot, all this is designed to show us the conflict of mentalities. Imagine a television or movie screen and Naaman arrives there making noise, you can hear his coming from four blocks away because he comes with all his entourage, his horses, his chariots, the load of wealth he brings, a man accustomed to walking with many bodyguards, many things.

And he goes there hoping that all this is going to impress the prophet and that he is going to force him to do what he wants him to do, right? It says: "Then Elisha sent him a messenger" he didn't even let him get to his house, here is the power clash right? Elisha has the prophetic spirit and discerns the mentality of this man and he knows that Jehovah cannot be forced to do anything. He knows that this man needs to be confronted, he needs to be broken.

Brothers, for God to do something in our life, he first has to break us and make us new. If we say, remember what I told you last Sunday that God heals when he wants, how he wants, whom he wants because He is God? He heals in different ways; sometimes it heals instantly, sometimes it takes time, sometimes it heals through a prayer, sometimes it heals through the laying on of hands, hundreds of ways and what we have to do is submit to His Will and do what He want and make us like children.

That's why I really like Pastor Machado who was with us on Friday, right? because you see him and he seems homeless sometimes, right? I love John because he is a humble and simple-hearted man, I do say this with great respect and with great thanks to God that he is not here and that he does not speak Spanish, two good things (laughs). I'm not saying it to honor him, rather, you know? Because many people see these people with their long hair and a little shaggy and they think, can something good come from, where is it from Bethlehem or from Nazareth?

But I have learned that Jesus uses humble and simple vessels. He doesn't care if you have a doctorate in theology, if you dress in a three-piece suit, if you put on a little Pierre Cardin cologne, He doesn't care about that, He cares what's in your heart and He cares. delights in using the little things in the world.

Never look at yourself: oh I have no education I am a housewife, don't look: you can testify to your boss for whom you clean the house, God can use you and I want our Church to be a simple Church, humble of heart Wherever the anointing of God is, there we go and if God wants us to stand upside down we will all stand upside down, if God wants us to look crazy, if He wants we will do it because it is for His Glory. Now it's not like if we're crazy that's going to make God work, right? There are people who believe, no. If it's from God, right? but I have learned not to hinder the Lord.

One of the themes that runs through this text is God working through the little ones. He works through the servant and also works through Naaman's servant. When Naaman goes to Elisha's house, Elisha sends him a servant, a servant. The first thing I imagine when Naaman stood up would have said: but why are they stopping me? I want to get home, I want to talk to the prophet himself. This man is used to being treated with deference, he always wants to go there to the cocoroco, right?

He does not want to speak with a subordinate, with an intermediary, with the secretary of the secretary of the deputy, he wants to speak with the boss. But Elisha, discerning the state of this man's heart so that he can be healed, the first thing he has to do is break before God. And that is why many times churches can serve as prophetic places where sometimes when we see ourselves in certain ways people come who are not used to those things; shouts of praise, adoration a little longer, to people who fall, people who laugh in the Spirit, people who are crying at the screams of a demon possessed person or in a state of emotional crisis because God has caused a move powerful in his soul.

People who come from abroad who are used to another style of worship and when they come here they still don't know how we worship and so they incorporate their way of worship in other places and sometimes it can shock us as well. So one is always worrying: wow, look at these people, look at how well dressed so-and-so is coming, he looks like a well-educated person, let's behave well so that he doesn't leave us. Many times God wants something to happen at that moment that scandalizes that person to see if they are deserving of the Grace of the Lord in their life.

It has happened to me many times, when I want people to behave better is when strange things happen here, little brothers start doing things that they shouldn't and I say: well Father, amen, I close my eyes and say: Father, you know what you do. People say: Pastor, how come you keep not gaining weight? you help me in the way you behave here, I lose pounds sometimes sitting there suffering.

I have learned that we have, sometimes you have to shock people's pride and expectations and you have to confront them. Do you know that Christ is a scandalous stone? says the Bible, it is a stone of scandal and causes the proud to stumble. I believe that sometimes for the power of God to be given our rational pride has to be humbled, our expectations of how things should be done, that is why I am never going to change the way we are so that people, no people need to be confronted, people need to be shocked sometimes to say, you know what? We will continue, I will continue.

A woman came a few weeks ago from the United States, I'm not going to say her nationality, she doesn't even speak Spanish, European in fact, and she came on a Wednesday night. On Wednesdays you know that the service is a little more humble, simpler and this sister invited you. I don't know if the sister who invited you is here because I said. I thought to myself: it would have been much better if they invited her on a Sunday where there is a service in English, a more appropriate service because this is a foreign person, she has not been evangelized or cultivated or anything, she comes from a foreign country but she is Sister brought her and God moves as He pleases and uses humble and simple people, I respect humble people, brother.

If someone tells you that León de Judá is for elegant people, well rebuke the devil because that is not true, our Church loves it. Here there are no preferences, I declare that as a value in our Church. So this sister came here, God touched her, God moved that night, there was a situation in her life and since then this sister has not stopped coming to Church every Sunday as well and not only that but there was a situation, her husband was here on Friday too; They don't even speak Spanish but they were moved, touched by God's strange move and with great respect they saw and I know because I had the opportunity to talk with them how God is working in their lives and impacting them because they are seeking the Lord.

Because it is that God is the one who does things, where the anointing of the Lord is, where the Presence of God is, what people are looking for is an internal experience. The spirit speaks to the spirit bypasses, it goes over reason and reaches directly to the emotion, to the heart, to the mind, to the need and people feel that God is speaking to them. Where the power of God is, things happen.

So we don't have to apologize. Of course we also have to be sensitive and this is long to explain. But certainly what God tells me today to communicate to you is this: we have to be daring, we have to be confident and secure in the methodology of the Kingdom of God even if it is scandalous to reason because Elisha first wanted to humiliate this man and show him: look if you want to be healed you have to first leave your arrogance at the door so I'm going to scandalize you; I am going to send my servant first, my servant to take care of you, I am not going to let you come to my house, I am not going to welcome you, I am not going to take care of you as you are used to and not only that but I will I am going to send you to bathe in a dirty place that is the Jordan River and in fact it still is, a little stream, one hears the Jordan River and when it goes to Jerusalem it is a little stream.

The fact is that: and that you bathe seven times, that you put on a bathing suit that you, the great general, look ridiculous and not just once but seven so that every time you get into the water you are looking to see if YouTube is going to appear, your photo on Facebook: look at the great general Naaman letting himself be carried away by an evangelist, a crazy televangelist there who told him to bathe seven times in a third-class ritual there.

And when Naaman receives the commandment from Elisha, he is scandalized and looks at how interesting the mind of the world is being confronted by the mind of the Kingdom, he says that Naaman said: "Behold" verse 11 "Naaman left angry saying: behold, I said to me: he will come out later and standing up, he will call on the name of the Lord his God and will raise his hand and touch the place and heal the leprosy" he had a whole scene like this type of Hollywood visualized; angels would come out, heavenly choirs would play, television cameras would be there to express this image through all the international channels.

And Naaman has to go away like a wet chick, not yet wet, he says: "Avana and Farfar river of Damascus, aren't they better than all the waters of Israel? Are there no better rivers than those in my country?" Why did I have to come here for a small stream to wash myself there, dirty, insignificant? "If I wash in them, will I not also be clean?" the mind of man, human reason wandering and thinking in its rational way.

And he turned and left angrily, he was going to catch the plane again at the airport. But he says: "But his servants" do you see the ministry of humble and simple people? because it is one of the themes of this text, it is the humble mind that God uses, the mind that discerns. The people have wisdom. I want those Pentecostal old ladies in my Church because they are a blessing. I want the people of the Earth to always be around me and this Church, blessing us with a simple anointing and with their passion for the Kingdom of God.

"Then his servants approached him and spoke to him saying: my father, if the prophet commanded you to do something, would you not do it? How much more saying to you: wash yourself and you will be clean?" how simple is the reasoning of the people. If he had asked you to give him 10 million dollars, wouldn't you give him 10 million dollars to save you from leprosy? Well, he is telling you to go and bathe in that blessed river and you will be healed, so do it.

"He then descended" there is the moment, there is the crisis point of this whole story when Naaman humbles himself and one can almost feel his head breaking, his proud neck breaking "and he descended" do you know what it is for us to descend so that the Glory of God manifest in our life? whoever exalts himself will be humbled, whoever humbles himself will be exalted, says the Lord.

He humbled himself, he humbled himself to the methodology of the Kingdom "and then he dived seven times" they told him: dive seven times he dived seven times, you have to be obedient, you have to be submissive, you have to obey the commandments of the Lord, not It's how we want it, it's how God wants it. The world has its ways of defining justice, defining human rights, defining the laws of the world, thinking rationally; it has its scientific forms, its artistic reasoning, it has its system of values but it is God's system that works, it is God's reason, it is God's methodology and we have to learn to respect that and guide ourselves from that. If we are guided by that God will raise our head.

We have to let God be God, we cannot improve on God's plans and purposes and methodologies, we have to be guided by them. It says that: "He plunged seven times into the Jordan according to the Word of the man of God and his flesh became like the flesh of a child and he was clean" not even Ivory soap does that brothers. His flesh was clean as a baby. The dirty river washed him clean like a baby because that's how God works.

And we know the rest of the story: Naaman turns to the Lord, acknowledges that Jehovah is God, humbles himself, bows his head, and returns home transformed knowing that from now on he has to serve only one God, the God of Israel, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

And I know that this is what God is going to do in our time I don't know for how long before Christ comes but I believe that God wants to convert nations, God wants people like Naaman to convert and recognize that He is the King of kings, He is God of gods, He has the solution to the problems of nations and individuals and needs a clear Church, convinced and sure of what has been given and that once given to men announce the Gospel the Gospel that we believe and build ourselves thinking: this is better, this is a more advanced model than the one God gave us.

It is the Gospel that God entrusted to us through His Word. If we announce that Gospel, people will convert, God will move, His Power will flow, we will see the Glory of God and the nations will be impacted by what God wants to do in this time. God is moving as he is moving in Syria, God is preparing the stage for a great evangelistic movement so that the nations come to the Church of Jesus Christ before the end comes, that is going to have to happen and we have to be prepared with the right attitude, the right methodology, the right resolution, the right determination. We are not going to let the world change us; we are going to change the world.

We have the solution that they need, if they want to be healed and saved, they should go through the short door and enter the Kingdom of God with humility and simplicity of heart. And if you want God to move in your life you have to do the same, you have to humble yourself, you have to lower your head, you have to make yourself simple; you have to say: Lord You know the best and I humble myself to You. May the Lord want our Church to be an Elisha-type Church full of the Power of God, convinced of the divine message we have received, willing to pay the price and with great love for the lost souls in its heart.

Let's lower our heads brother for a moment now and we are going to receive, I want to receive from the Lord the anointing that is in His Word. I want God to touch my life with what I myself have proclaimed this morning and that this spirit that is in that story of Second Kings chapter 5 wash over me, wash over me first and wash over our Congregation as well and I say May everything that that Word says be exemplified here in our Church and may the Glory of the Lord descend upon us so that we can be useful to the Kingdom of God.