2 Kings 5:10

"And Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, "Go and wash in the Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored to you, and you shall be clean" 2 Kings 5:10

Naaman was furious. This stupid prophet of this stupid God who demanded sole allegiance wanted HIM to go take seven stupid baths in the filthy stupid Jordan river. Who did he think he was? Didn't he know that Naaman was one of the most powerful men in the Syrian army? And to top it all off, he didn't have the courtesy to come himself - he sent a slave! Indeed Naaman was upset. He stormed off. He wouldn't do it! No way! No time! No how! He was heading back to Damascus. He should never have come in the first place!

Indeed, what God asked of Naaman didn't make sense. Wash in the Jordan? It WAS a muddy creek of a river. It WAS humiliating. It DID seem stupid. But eventually Naaman was persuaded to try it. He dipped once. Nothing. Twice, still the white tissue of the leper's trademark. Three. Four. Five. This was ridiculous. Six. Outrageous! Seven. He looked and - nothing! No dead skin! No dying tissue. No numb feeling in his fingers. NOTHING but pure white soft skin - like a baby's.

Sometimes God asks us to do things that defies explanation - that flies in the face of every sound human reason. The Bible is full of them. Noah. Elijah. Elisha. Nehemiah. Jonah. Peter (a gold coin in a fish's mouth! Come on, get real!) Ananias. John. Even history has it's share of strange events. Luther defying the Catholic Church. Guttenberg inventing the printing press - so he could print Bibles in an unauthorized language!

Yet, in all of His unorthodoxness, God makes the end come out right. All He asks of us is obedience. Call it blind if you want too. But if you know God at all, you understand that His ways are not our ways. But they are the best ways. Sometimes our obedience must be blind - but it should always be tempered with the understanding of Who is asking - the one and only God of the universe. The One who created it all. The one who arranged our salvation. The one who worked all of human history so that you and I might meet today, right now, and touch each others lives. When God says something, it always makes sense. Hallelujah, Amen and Amen.