2 Kings 5:1-4
Now Naaman, captain of the host of the king of Syria, was a great man with his master, and honourable, because by him the LORD had given deliverance unto Syria: he was also a mighty man in valour, but he was a leper. And the Syrians had gone out by companies, and had brought away captive out of the land of Israel a little maid; and she waited on Naaman’s wife. And she said unto her mistress, Would God my lord were with the prophet that is in Samaria! for he would recover him of his leprosy.
And one went in, and told his lord, saying, Thus and thus said the maid that is of the land of Israel.
MATTHEW HENRY (1662-1714): This maid was, by birth, an Israelite, providentially carried captive into Syria, and there preferred into Naaman’s family, where she published Elisha’s fame to the honour of Israel and Israel’s God.
ADAM CLARKE (1760-1832): A little maid who, it appears, had pious parents, who brought her up in the knowledge of the true God―“And she waited on Naaman’s wife.” Her decent orderly behavior, the consequence of her sober and pious education, entitled her to this place of distinction; in which her servitude was at least easy, and her person safe.
ROBERT HAWKER (1753-1827): Was there not an overruling providence in the captivity of this Israelitish damsel? Reader! look at the subject as it really is. The Lord had a mercy in store for Naaman. He causes, therefore, this daughter of His people to be taken into captivity. She tells of Israel’s prophet, and the wonders he had wrought. And at length, for the better accomplishment of God’s purpose, she is taken into Naaman’s family.
J. R. MILLER (1840-1912): The smallest links in a chain are often quite as important as the greatest links. We are apt to overlook the minor actors in Scripture stories in our absorbed interest in the prominent ones. Yet often these lesser people are just as important in their own place, and their service is just as essential to the final success of the whole as the greater ones. The little girl in the story of Naaman the leper is scarcely seen among the splendours of the Syrian court; but without her part, we would never have had the story at all. The young lad with the basket is hardly ever thought of when we read the account of the miracle, John 6:9; but they were his loaves with which the Master fed all those hungry thousands that day on the green grass.
GEORGE WHITEFIELD (1714-1770): God loves to do things by weak instruments, that the power may be of God and not of man.
ROBERT HAWKER: How often doth the Lord do this in spreading the savour of His grace, and making His salvation known!
ADAM CLARKE: God delights to manifest Himself in the little as well as in the great.
JOHN TRAPP (1601-1699): The captivity of this poor Hebrew girl is a means to make Naaman, the greatest lord of Syria, a subject to God.
ROBERT HAWKER: The early knowledge this little maid had of Elisha and his miracles, may serve to give parents a profitable lesson by the way, how very speedily they ought to bring them acquainted with Jesus and His great salvation. Parents know not how soon their children may be sent out into life, or they themselves taken from them.
JOHN TRAPP: It is good to acquaint our children with the works of God, with the praises of His prophets. Little do we know how they may improve the knowledge, and whither they may carry it; perhaps the remotest nations may light their candle at their coal. Nicephorus tells of a Christian maid carried captive into Spain, that by her piety and prayers she gained many there to Christ.
MARY WINSLOW (1774-1854): How necessary it is to bring up children in the nurture and fear of the Lord!
J. W. ALEXANDER (1804-1859): No man knows what God has made him for. Some men, for all we know, may be sent into the world chiefly to form other men. The grand act of a servant of Christ, for which God has been preparing him for many years, may be to give an impulse to some other man, and this may be accomplished in a moment, and when neither of the two suspects it. No man knows when the great act of his life takes place. No man knows when he is doing the greatest good. The old monk who directed young Martin Luther, possible did nothing so important in his life. Sometimes it is a child―How do we know but the chief purpose for which God has spared our lives is, that we may form an instrument for His work in our family?
WILLIAM JAY (1769-1853): How much does even the religious public owe to the mothers from whom the churches have derived such able ministers. To Hannah we owe a Samuel, 1 Samuel 27,28, and to Lois and Eunice, his mother and grandmother, we owe a Timothy, 2 Timothy 1:5.
JOHN WESLEY (1703-1791): I learned more about Christianity from my mother than from all the theologians of England.
C. H. SPURGEON (1834-1892): There may come under your training hand, my sister, a future father in Israel.
MATTHEW HENRY: Timothy from a child had known the holy Scriptures, 2 Timothy 3:15; and who should teach him but his mother and grandmother?
C. H. SPURGEON: I remember well, in my early days, seeing upon my grandmother’s mantel-shelf an apple contained in a phial. This was a great wonder to me, and I tried to investigate it. My question was, “How came the apple to get inside so small a bottle?” The apple was as big around as the phial; by what means was it placed within it? Though it was treason to touch the treasures on the mantel-piece, I took down the bottle, and convinced my youthful mind that the apple never passed through its neck; and by an attempt to unscrew the bottom, I became equally certain that the apple did not enter from below. I held to the notion that by some occult means the bottle had been made in two pieces, and afterwards united in so careful a manner that no trace of the joint remained. I was hardly satisfied with the theory―but I let the matter rest. One day, the next summer, I chanced to see upon an apple tree bough, another phial within which was growing a little apple which had been passed through the neck of the bottle while it was extremely small. This discovery of my juvenile days shall serve for an illustration at the present moment. Let us get the apples into the bottle while they are little.
J. R. MILLER: And perhaps our lowly part may some day prove to have been as essential as the great deeds which all men praise. We may at least help some others in doing the great things that they are set to do in this world.
