God Helps Everyone

Scripture: 2 Kings 5.1-14; Mark 1.40-45

What does the average Christian look like? For us, the “average Christian” is the one we’re are used to seeing- white, middle class, American. In other words, someone that looks like us.

But Philip Jenkins notes that over the past century that center of gravity in the Christian world has shifted southward to Africa, Asia, and South America. “Already today,” Jenkins writes, “The largest Christian communities on the planet are found in Africa and Latin America. If we want to visualize a typical contemporary Christian, we should think of a woman living in a village in Nigeria or in a Brazilian favela. This trend is only going to continue over the next century.”

It’s interesting and a little bit funny too, that some American religious writers have written in the past decade that Christianity Must Change Or Die (the title of a book by John Spong, retired Episcopal Bishop). Well, some expressions of Christianity in the U.S. might be in trouble, but Christianity around the world is doing just fine, thank you.

This might tell us a few things. The first thing it tells us is that God helps everyone, not just folks that look like us or have the same cultural traditions as we do.

Philip Yancey wrote, “As I travel, I have observed a pattern, a strange historical phenomenon of God “moving” geographically from the Middle East, to Europe to North America to the developing world. My theory is this: God goes where he’s wanted.”

God goes where he’s wanted. When people are hungry for God, God shows up, no matter the culture, the tradition, the religious background.

In the 2 Kings passage we are introduced to Naaman, a commander in the Aramite army. The Aramites are a semitic, near-Eastern people. Think Palestinian. They have their own traditions and culture in many ways quite unlike the Israelites. They have their own gods and their own religions. Naaman is a man of some standing with the King of Aram. Naaman is a warrior, but he is fighting an enemy he can’t defeat. The enemy is leprosy.

It just so happens that there is in Naaman’s household, a slave girl from Israel captured in a raid. The Israelite girl tells her mistress, Naaman’s wife, that there is a prophet in Samaria who can cure leprosy. So Naaman gets permission from the King of Aram to go to Israel to seek healing. And after some backdoor political moves, Naaman gets to see a prophet by the name of Elisha. And Elisha immediately agrees to help.

Note again, that Naaman is not an Israelite and has little if any knowledge of Israel’s faith. But Naaman does have a need and puts that need in the hands of Israel’s prophet and Israel’s God. For his part, Elisha doesn’t treat this foreigner as unworthy of God’s help. In fact, it is a source of pride for Elisha that God will help this man, “and he will know there is a prophet in Israel.”

Elisha shows us that God helps all peoples.


In the 17th century Catholic Jesuit missionaries had so successfully preached the gospel in the Far East that the Emperor of China, Kang Xi, arguably the most powerful ruler in the world at the time with a kingdom of 150 million people, declared an edict of toleration for Christianity and Christians across his kingdom. There were at least 200,000 Catholics in China, many of them of some influence. The success of the Jesuit mission can be traced to their willingness to allow the Gospel to take local cultural customs and forms without sacrificing Gospel integrity. The Vatican at that time asked quite perceptibly, “What could be more absurd than to transport France, Spain, or Italy to China? Do not introduce all that to them but only the faith.” ( The Vatican, 1659) Sadly, the faith did not continue to grow in China and the East because subsequent Popes and missionaries failed to follow this wise policy and method.

Our church today would do well to heed that lesson, even in our own country, our own region, and our own neighborhood. More and more our backyards will reflect diversity in background, traditions, and culture. We have to ask ourselves, “Is our job to make converts that look like us, or is it our commission to make converts who look like Jesus?” We are not called to transform cultures. We are called to make transformed disciples in all cultures.
This means a continued openness to change. Change is going to happen anyway. Will we be poised to use change as a tool for the Kingdom of God. Openness to change begins with small things.

God helps those who are faithful in small things.

When Naaman seeks out Elisha, he is met by the prophet’s messenger who tells Naaman to go wash himself in the Jordan River seven times. This angers Naaman. He wants to know why he has to do this. He wonders what’s so special about the Jordan. He wants the healing done the way he expects.

Think of a kid you’ve been around, who won’t listen to instructions. You know the kid I’m talking about. You say quiet and they shout back. You say speak and they won’t offer a word. You say sit down and they stand up. Every day is opposite day with this kid. It’s a problem for the immediate situation, but there is a greater problem looming that the kid who won’t listen to instructions may, I say may, turn into the adult who want take instruction. All of us probably have a little bit of that rebellious child in us. It expresses itself in a resistance to serve when we can’t be in charge and do it our way. It expresses itself in us when we are asked to try something a little new, like singing a new song or praying in a different way. We won’t. We don’t like it and nobody can make us. And with unbended knees and clenched fists we maintain the lordship of self.

And Jesus says, “Whoever is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much; and whoever is dishonest in a very little is dishonest in much.” (Luke 16.10)

Lack of faith is dishonesty – the dishonesty is the pretence that we are in control and that we know what we’re doing. The dishonesty is that we are pretending we cause the sun to rise on our day and the corn to grow in the field.


God helps those with hands out.

Cinderella Man is a film about boxer James J. Braddock, who was the top heavyweight contender in 1928. Braddock lost his house and savings in the Stock Market Crash in ’29. Because of injuries he couldn’t box and couldn’t get other steady work early in the Depression. He and his wife and kids are living in a tenement apartment with almost nothing to eat and wear. When he can’t pay the bills, they shut off the heat and lights, and this in the middle of winter. Braddock is going to have to send his kids away to relatives if they’re going to survive, something he promised them he would not do. Things are about as bad as they can get. And this humble, honest warrior humbles himself a little more, and with hat in hand, goes to see his old boxing promoters.


It’s a club in Madison Garden. Most of the men in the room are well-to-do, even wealthy. They are the lucky few whom the Depression has not touched. And in walks this destitute man. In walks Jimmy Braddock. And the rich men look at him like he’s got leprosy. Some of them are compassionate enough or shamed enough to give Braddock what he needs to get the heat back on and his kids back home. But that’s not really the moral or miracle here. The moral is that the humble warrior lives to fight another day. God gives him another opportunity and in an improbable comeback he upsets Max Baer, the heavyweight champion of the world.

When our hands are clenched in pride, they are closed. We can’t receive anything. The complete title of this sermon is God Helps Everyone. . .Who Wants to Be Helped.

Remember, God goes where He’s wanted. Like the man with leprosy we must come before Jesus in faith and say, “Lord, if you are willing you can help me.”

What does Jesus say to that? I am willing.