We Must Bear Witness to Our God Wherever We Are

God had used Naaman’s leprosy and was using his painful situation to bring him to a glorious encounter with the Lord and bring him to a glorious encounter with the Lord, and to use him as an instrument and a testimony to His Glory and His restoring Power among the nations, including his own nation.

The passage we are discussing tells us that there was another person with whom God was also dealing, and that God was using this person as an instrument to communicate God’s plan for Naaman’s life. The Word says that “armed bands had gone out from Syria” and entered Israel, hadn’t they? “And they had taken captive from the land of Israel a young girl, who served Naaman’s wife.” And this young slave, who had been taken captive and dragged from Israel to the nation of Syria, said to her mistress, “If only my master would appeal to the prophet who is in Samaria, he would heal him of his leprosy.”

I am interested in this slave, this young girl who had also experienced a terrible tragedy in her life. Imagine a young girl—we do not know how old she was—when an armed band came, seemingly a group of terrorists, let’s say, sent by Syria. They had entered the land of Israel, taken this young girl captive, dragged her away from her homeland, perhaps from her loved ones, and taken her captive to Syria. How many years might this young girl have spent captive in Syria and separated from her nation?

And yet we see that God had a purpose for this young girl, who appears only once in the entire story. If this girl had remained in Israel all her life, no one would ever have known of her existence. She would have lived the anonymous, inconsequential life of any other person of her time.

Yet this girl has a moment of glory, as it were, that Scripture records, and throughout the centuries this young girl, though we do not know her name, has a moment of prominence because God uses her to testify to Naaman’s wife about the solution to his terrible situation.

That is, God was keeping this young girl for an important role in the process we see recorded here in this Book. And she does not hesitate to let Naaman’s wife know that there is a solution to his problem, and that this solution is found in the God of Israel, Jehovah of Hosts, the Almighty God, to whom Naaman’s leprosy means absolutely nothing.

So I see two things here: again, God often uses times of tragedy in our lives to do extraordinary things. God would redeem this young girl’s tragedy by using her as a witness so that Naaman could hear that, by going to Israel, he would find the solution to his problem there.

So the first thing we see here is that we must always be asking ourselves: What are You doing? What possible reason is there for what is happening in my life amid difficulties and trials? Someone has said that we should not ask the Lord, “Why am I going through this?” but “What am I going through this for?” And God is a God who attends to details, and everything that happens in our lives has a purpose. As the Lord Jesus Christ says, “Let the one who has eyes to see, see.”

Often our problem is that we do not look or inquire. Instead, we automatically reject unpleasant situations in our lives and assume they are the work of the devil, or of circumstances, or of God’s unfaithfulness, rather than saying: Lord, I know that You are faithful. I know that You are in control of my life. I know that nothing happens beyond the control of Your Will. Teach me what You are doing through this painful situation I am going through, what You want me to learn, and how You want to use me to bless others around me through this situation I am going through.

The second thing, besides God’s using a tragic situation to bless others, that strikes me about this picture of a young captive slave is that instead of turning away from God and railing against Him, and saying, “God allowed this to happen to me, and I want nothing more to do with God, because if He had been with me, this terrible tragedy of being dragged away from my homeland and sold as a slave would not have happened to me,” she, instead of renouncing her faith and putting her faith in God away in a drawer, does not hesitate to testify to the Lord.

And in her place of slavery, she does not resent the people who have her as a servant but forgives them in a sense, doesn’t she? How important it is that we, too, forgive and not fill ourselves with bitterness over the things that happen around us. Above all, she does not disavow her faith, and she tells her, “I know where the solution to his problem lies: the Almighty God, the God of Israel, can heal my master Naaman and restore his health.”

It is important that wherever we find ourselves, we bear witness to our God. Sometimes, when we are going through tribulations and trials, we fall silent and stop serving the Lord, stop doing good, stop testifying and worshiping and helping others. And I believe that one of the most powerful things we can do in times of difficulty and trial is to do the opposite of what our flesh wants us to do: worship with greater fervor, go to church more faithfully, read the Word of the Lord more attentively, cry out and fast, present our cause to the Lord, serve others, and bless others—as a prophetic act that, by doing the opposite of what our unredeemed flesh urges us to do, may unleash the power and movement of God in our lives.

Thank God that this young girl did not keep her faith to herself or put it away in a drawer, but in the midst of her painful situation testified to Naaman’s wife and to her master that the God of Israel had the solution to his problem. Even when we face difficulties and painful situations in our lives, let us not stop doing good, the Word says. Let us not grow weary of doing good, for if we do it, in due time we will receive our reward. That is our faith.

Do not stop serving the Lord wherever you find yourself, whatever your situation may be. Do not put your life of service to the Lord and worship of the Lord on hold; keep marching through difficulties and deserts until you see the salvation of Jehovah. God will undoubtedly use you, and you will glorify the Lord in trials and also in times of harvest. God bless you, and until our next meditation.