Leprosy Of The Heart

Image by Daniel Bishop on ChatGPT

“Whatcha doin’?” I asked Ella, my sixteen-year-old daughter. I had strolled into the kitchen and she had her Bible open on the kitchen table and was reading something on her laptop.

“Looking up Leprosy.”

“Why are you doing that?”

“I was reading the story of Naaman in Second Kings and wanted to find out more about Leprosy.”

“What did you find out?” I sat down at the table with her.

I was happy she was studying her Bible. She’d never really shown any desire to read it, let it alone study it.

“It’s caused by a bacterium and there are three types of it. One is mild because the person’s immune system has a suitable response to it and they only get a few sores. The second one is when the person has a poor immune response and they get a bunch of sores and lesions affecting their nerves, skin and organs. The third is a combination of the two. I guess they have a middle of the road immune response.”

“That’s very interesting. I’d never looked it up.”

“Well,” she sat back in her seat and looked at me. “Something occurred to me while I was reading the story.”

“It did?”  

“Naaman went to Elisha bearing a lot of gifts to give to Elisha in exchange for healing him and expecting Elisha to talk to him. Naaman was a general and used to people showing him great respect, and when Elisha didn’t even speak to him and sent his servant out, Naaman took great offense. Then when he was told to dip in the Jordan River, that offended him too. The commentary at the bottom of the page says the Jordan River was a small insignificant river and Naaman felt it was beneath him to use that river.” She paused and took a deep breath.

“What I realized is before Naaman could get his physical leprosy healed, he had to get his spiritual leprosy healed.”

I smiled and sat up a little in my chair, curious about where she was going with this.

“Pride is spiritual leprosy,” she said. “Naaman couldn’t get his physical leprosy healed until he humbled himself. Then I thought about how we come to God like Naaman came to Elisha. He came bearing gifts to pay for his healing and that’s kind of like us coming to God expecting our good works to pay for our salvation or God’s blessings. We’re full of pride in what we’ve done, but none of that means anything to God.” She pursed her lips and chewed on her bottom one for a few seconds.

“I was too proud to read the Bible,” she confessed. “Didn’t think I needed it. Thought I was good without it, but,” she sighed. “I see how much God can speak to me through His Word.”

My smile grew even bigger. My baby girl was making her old man proud. I know, I know, but it was a good pride.

“What’s the big smile for?” she asked.

“I’m really proud of you.”