THE GREED OF GEHAZI
2 KINGS 5:20-27
A few years ago in Boston, the bodies of two elderly women were discovered in their small apartment. They had died a few days earlier. An autopsy revealed malnutrition was the cause of death. But hidden in the mattresses and sewn up in pillows and draperies was nearly $200,000 in cash! The ladies died because they didn’t use what they had to meet their daily need for food. In reality the bottom line was greed killed them.
One cannot read the Bible without finding incidence after incidence where men wanted that which wasn’t their’s. In the Garden of Eden, Eve coveted the forbidden fruit and brought sin and death into the world. At Ai, Achen coveted some gold, silver and expensive garments and brought defeat to a nation and death to himself and his family. Ahab coveted Naboth’s vineyard and committed murder in his attempt to grab what belonged to another. David coveted Bathsheba, Uriah’s wife, and as a result brought the sword of God into his household for generations. Judas was motivated by a covetous heart. Annanias and Sapphira lied to the Holy Ghost because they were covetous. -Alan Carr
In this chapter, we see the little maid who was used of God in the healing of Naaman, and now in these verses, we see Gehazi who is trying to use God.
James Hastings wrote, “We might call him the Ananias of the Old Testament.
Rev. George Barlow wrote, “Gehazi was the Judas Iscariot of the Old Testament
This morning let us look at the things that Gehazi did that led to his awful punishment at the end of this chapter.
I-NOTICE THE DESIRE OF GEHAZI: 20
But Gehazi, the servant of Elisha the man of God, said, Behold, my master hath spared Naaman this Syrian, in not receiving at his hands that which he brought: but, as the LORD liveth, I will run after him, and take somewhat of him.
Naaman, a Syrian soldier, had many servants, and we read how wise and good they were, v. 13. Elisha, a holy prophet, a man of God, has but one servant, and he proves a base, lying fellow.
Elisha, his master refused Naaman’s treasures, but he coveted them, he desired them. v. 20. His heart (says bishop Hall) was packed up in Naaman’s chests, and he must run after him to fetch it.
ILLUSTRATION: Donald Trump said “you can’t be too greedy.” On the other hand Jesus Christ put Greed together with evil thoughts, sexual immorality, theft, murder, adultery, greed, wickedness, deceit, eagerness for lustful pleasure, envy, slander, pride, and foolishness.
ILLUSTRATION: Dr. Ken Trivette shares the following story. "On the night of November 16, 1930, Mrs. Henrietta Garret, a lonely 81 year old widow died in her home in Philadelphia, and, unwillingly, started the most fantastic case of inheritance litigation in history. She had failed to leave a will, or no will was found to her $17,000,000 estate; a mystery still unsolved. She had expertly handled her financial affairs since her husbands death in 1895 and therefore many felt that she must have realized that without an will, her fortune would become involved in legal battles. Although, Mrs. Garret, at the time of her death, had only one known relative, a second cousin, and less than a dozen friends; attempts to prove relationship to her and claim a part of her estate was made by more than 26,000 persons from 47 states and 29 foreign countries, represented by more than 3,000 lawyers. In their efforts to obtain her estate, there were those that committed perjury, faked family records, changed their own names, altered data in Family Bibles and concocted absurd tales of illegitimacy. As result, 12 were confined, 10 received jail sentences, 2 committed suicide, and 3 were murdered. I wonder how many would have admitted they were guilty of covetousness? Or greed.
II-NOTICE THE DECISION OF GEHAZI: 21A
So Gehazi followed after Naaman
Notice, that Gehazi’s covetousness caused him to ‘secretly’ follow after Naaman. His desire was to obtain or to take away from Naaman something that belonged to Naaman.
At first, he had a desire, a thought, now he decides to put it into action. Now he is rushing to Naaman to get his loot.
ILLUSTRATION: There is a painting of a gold coin rolling down a street and a huge crowd is running after it. Then you see a man on a horse coming up behind the crowd going full speed. His family is trying to hang on, then you notice he is pushing his wife away to lessen his lode so he can get more speed and get the coin. I wonder today are you living for the temporary or the eternal. (Knight Illustration)
Yet there are those who have made wise decisions concerning material things.
ILLUSTRATION: Lew Alcindor is one of the most brilliant college basketball players in history. He had just turned pro. . . he was a man who couldn’t miss. He had the height, the God-given talent, and the desire to win. A New York team offered him $3.25 million. Milwaukee had offered him $1.4 million. He had a choice. He went to Milwaukee for one reason. . . taking $1,850,000 less. because Lew Alcindor made this statement: "I gave them my word." It seemed to him just that simple! He’s the one we know today as Kareem Abdul Jabbar, one of the greatest basketball players in the history of the game but just because he’d given his word, he took $1,850,000 less
ILLUSTRATION: A couple of donkeys were in two fields separated by a barbed wire fence. The grass was equally lush and green in both pastures. Yet each donkey could be seen poking its head through the fence as far as possible to graze on the grass in the adjoining field. As the old saying goes, "The grass always looks greener on the other side of the fence."
We Christians often display that same tendency. Something that belongs to someone else, or some talent or ability that is beyond our reach, can seem so much more appealing than what we already possess. Yet the Lord wants us to be satisfied with what He has given to us.
III-NOTICE THE DECEPTION OF GEHAZI: 21B-22
And when Naaman saw him running after him, he lighted down from the chariot to meet him, and said, Is all well? . and he said, All is well. My master hath sent me, saying, Behold, even now there be come to me from mount Ephraim two young men of the sons of the prophets: give them, I pray thee, a talent of silver, and two changes of garments.
When Naaman, like a person of accomplished manners, lighted from his chariot to meet him (v. 21), he told him a deliberate lie, that his master sent him to him.
ILLUSTRATION: A little girl came very early one morning to her mother, saying: "Which is worse, Mamma, to tell a lie or to steal?" The mother replied that both were so sinful she could not tell which was the worse. "Well, Mamma," replied the little one, "I’ve been thinking a good deal about it, and I think it is ever so much worse to lie than to steal." "Why, my child?" asked the mother. "Well, you see, Mamma, it’s like this," said the little girl. "If you steal a thing you can take it back ’less you’ve eaten it; and if you’ve eaten it, you can pay for it. But" -- and there was a look of awe in her face -- "a lie is forever."
ILLUSTRATON: A PEDDLER drove his Ass to the seashore to buy salt. His road home lay across a stream into which his Ass, making a false step, fell by accident and rose up again with his load considerably lighter, as the water melted the sack. The Peddler retraced his steps and refilled his panniers with a larger quantity of salt than before. When he came again to the stream, the Ass fell down on purpose in the same spot, and, regaining his feet with the weight of his load much diminished, brayed triumphantly as if he had obtained what he desired. The Peddler saw through his trick and drove him for the third time to the coast, where he bought a cargo of sponges instead of salt. The Ass, again playing the fool, fell down on purpose when he reached the stream, but the sponges became swollen with water, greatly increasing his load. And thus his trick recoiled on him, for he now carried on his back a double burden.
You may successfully deceive others, but you cannot deceive God
IV-NOTICE THE DECREE OF NAAMAN: 23
And Naaman said, Be content, take two talents. And he urged him, and bound two talents of silver in two bags, with two changes of garments, and laid them upon two of his servants; and they bare them before him.
His story of the two sons of the prophets was as silly as it was false; if he would have begged a token for two young scholars, surely less than a talent of silver might serve them.
But Captain Naaman was gracious for what the Prophet of God had done for him thus he didn’t question the need.
ILLUSTRATION: During World War II, a fighter pilot bailed out into occupied France. His life was saved by the courageous French people who sheltered him and helped him escape. After the war was over, the pilot took all the money he could scrape together and went back to Normandy to look for the people who had helped him. Of the twenty people who had risked their lives for him, he found nineteen. One had been killed in the final fighting. The pilot brought food and clothing which these people sorely needed and did everything he possibly could to show them his gratitude for saving his life
V-NOTICE THE DEMAND OF ELISHA: 24-25
And when he came to the tower, he took them from their hand, and bestowed them in the house: and he let the men go, and they departed. But he went in, and stood before his master. And Elisha said unto him, Whence comest thou, Gehazi? And he said, Thy servant went no whither.
Then, after receiving the treasure, he has to hide it by getting rid of Naaman’s servants while on the other side of the hill. In a house, behind a hill, where Elisha could not see him, he hid the money and wardrobes Naaman had given him. He would secretly return for the loot later on.
Lest his absence should be noticed, Gehazi hastened, without being called, to appear before his master. In the East it is usual for servants to remain most of the day in their lord’s presence, only quitting it when given some order to execute.
His master asked him where he had been, "Nowhere, sir" (said he), "out of the house." Note, One lie commonly begets another: the way of that sin is down-hill.
ILLUSTRATION: A ten-year-old boy was walking with his parents on Elm Street in downtown Dallas. Spying a movie theater, the youngster ran off.
His frantic mother found him inside the theater thirty minutes later. Outside, she said to him, “Whatever possessed you go to in that place? You know that our pastor teaches that it’s wrong to go to movies.” “Mama,” he said, “I just couldn’t help myself. I smelled that popcorn, and it smelled so good that I had to buy some. And then the floor of that movie house was so slick I just slid inside.”
Gehazi hadn’t been spiritually alert and because he hadn’t, it had caused him to do evil.
VI-NOTICE THE DECLARATON OF ELISHA: 26
And he said unto him, Went not mine heart with thee, when the man turned again from his chariot to meet thee? Is it a time to receive money, and to receive garments, and oliveyards, and vineyards, and sheep, and oxen, and menservants, and maidservants?
Had Gehazi yet to learn that prophets had spiritual eyes? or could he think to hide any thing from a seer, from him with whom the secret of the Lord was?
it was foolish for Gehazi to attempt what he did. Sin blinds people to the real circumstances and consequences with which they have to deal. Above all, it destroys their power of sensing the presence of God.
What Gehazi assumed about Elisha, that is, that he would not find out, all sinners assume about Almighty God, that He will not discover anything. But God does find out, and lying always leads to disgrace.
ILLUSTRATION: It is related that a boy was going down to the river for a little swim. As he was leaving the house his father said, "Be careful, Herbert; the river looks fair and sparkling, but there is an ugly eddy beneath that may prove too much for you. I have tried it and know it is dangerous. It nearly overcame me. Be careful, Son; there is danger." Herbert went on and was careful for a time, but the river looked so smooth and peaceful he soon ventured out farther. His companions, who were in bathing with him, admonished him to be careful. But he called back and said, "I can swim; there is no danger." So he ventured out still farther. But soon he was heard calling for help. The undertow had him. He frantically cried for assistance, but all in vain. He went down. So it is with sin. It may look harmless, but there is the undertow. -William Moses Tidwell
VII-NOTICE THE DEFILEMENT OF GEHAZI: 27
The leprosy therefore of Naaman shall cleave unto thee, and unto thy seed for ever. And he went out from his presence a leper as white as snow.
Gehazi’s leprosy was an outward sign of an inward spiritual condition, the fact that Gehazi’s moral nature had been permanently damaged. Gehazi could never regain his integrity. He must carry leprosy with him to his grave:
And so Gehazi went to live with the lepers and to mourn for a lifetime the folly and the wickedness which led him to throw away the fellowship and confidence of so great a friend as Elisha.
ILLUSTRATION: When archeologists were unearthing the ancient city of Pompeii, where 20,000 died during the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, they uncovered the bodies of many of the dead. Among them, they found the well preserved bodies of people who were caught totally off guard by the explosion of this powerful volcano. People were found sitting at their dinner tables, their food still on their plates. Others were found in their beds sleeping. One woman, however, stands out from among all the victims of Pompeii. When the scientists uncovered her body, they found clutched in her hands 10’s of thousands of dollars worth of precious stones. It seems that as death rained down from the mountain above, she risked her life trying to save a couple of handfuls of her wealth.
Now, 2,000 years later, those things she tried so vainly to hold onto, are the property of another! So it is with the covetous person in our day! In the end, those things we deemed so valuable, will be absolutely worthless. Don’t allow a covetous spirit to dominate your life.-Alan Carr
CONCLUSION: It is said that the “Stop—Look—Listen” warning slogan was devised by Ralph R. Upton in 1912. He was a safety man for the Puget Sound Power Company of Seattle, Washington, and wished to improve the signs then in use at railroad crossings, which read: “Look Out for the Engine.”-Steve Shepherd
IF WE ARE WISE, WE WILL LOOK OUT FOR GREED, FOR IT WILL CAUSE US TROUBLE IN THE END.
