ICS Daily Devotions
Faith Is An Action
2 Kings 7:3-7 Now there were four leprous men at the entrance of the gate; and they said to one another, “Why are we sitting here until we die? If we say, ‘We will enter the city,’ the famine is in the city, and we shall die there. And if we sit here, we die also. Now therefore, come, let us surrender to the army of the Syrians. If they keep us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall only die.” And they rose at twilight to go to the camp of the Syrians; and when they had come to the outskirts of the Syrian camp, to their surprise no one was there. For the Lord had caused the army of the Syrians to hear the noise of chariots and the noise of horses—the noise of a great army; so they said to one another, “Look, the king of Israel has hired against us the kings of the Hittites and the kings of the Egyptians to attack us!” Therefore they arose and fled at twilight, and left the camp intact—their tents, their horses, and their donkeys—and they fled for their lives.
God always uses the lowly to bring out His wisdom. In the Old Testament, lepers were considered outcasts. The four lepers used to station themselves outside the city wall to pick up food thrown out by the city dwellers. During the famine, there was no extra food for them.
They might have heard about Elisha’s prophetic utterance: “Thus says the Lord: ‘Tomorrow about this time a seah of fine flour shall be sold for a shekel, and two seahs of barley for a shekel, at the gate of Samaria.’ ” (2 Kings 7:1). Since there was no cure for leprosy, they had nothing to lose in terms of trusting what they have heard.
The difference between the four lepers and the king was this critical question:
“Why are we sitting here until we die?” The king was waiting to die on his throne and the lepers would also die if they continued to wait at the gate. Faith is an action — acting on what we believe! As the lepers walked towards the enemies’ camp, Lord caused the army of the Syrians to hear the noise of a great army, and so they fled.
God responded to the lepers’ act of faith as they walked out in faith according to Elisha’s utterance, thus the promise was fulfilled. Would you take the step of faith to believe when you have heard from the Lord in the midst of a crisis, or will you choose to be passive and wait?
Sermon Series: The Four Lepers, The Officer And The King
