The big picture
Naaman's healing begins with a contradiction the chapter refuses to flatten: he is Syria's honored commander, a man through whom the LORD has given victory, and he is also afflicted with leprosy. The person who knows where help can be found is a captive Israelite girl in his household. Royal channels then misroute that knowledge into a diplomatic crisis before Elisha brings Naaman to his own door and refuses to perform the ceremony the commander has imagined. Servants persuade Naaman to do the simple thing, and the man who arrived in rank and rage returns cleansed and confessing the God of Israel. Elisha refuses payment, leaving Naaman to name the complications of returning to Syrian service. Gehazi then reverses the chapter's movement. He secretly collects what Elisha rejected, lies about it, and walks out bearing the affliction that had left Naaman. The foreign commander is cleansed; the prophet's servant ends diseased.
Central truth
Through Elisha, the Lord preserves a prophetic community’s food and restores a borrowed tool, while Naaman’s intervening healing exposes the difference between receiving and exploiting grace. The Lord heals Naaman through the word he nearly rejects, while Gehazi’s secret pursuit of payment brings upon him the disease Naaman leaves behind.
The study notes have a page of their own
The movement by movement analysis, the words to trace, the verse by verse notes and where readers differ are written for someone studying alone. They are on the Deep Personal Reflections page for this chapter. This page is the lesson.
A chapter-specific teaching brief
These anchors come from this chapter itself. They help a teacher use the Level 1 overview, the Level 2 study, and the Scripture text as one lesson.
Open with the chapter’s first image
2 Kings 5:1: “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…”
Slow down at the turning point
2 Kings 5:14: “Then went he down, and dipped himself seven times in Jordan, according to the saying of the man of God: and his flesh came again like unto the flesh of a…”
Keep this word trail visible
Naaman, Israel, LORD, servant, king, Elisha
What to explain, in order
Teach the passage in this order. Each step names the verses it rests on, so every point can be shown in the text before it is applied.
2 Kings 4:38–6:7
2 Kings 4:38-41
Death in the pot, and meal
Set the scene first: Gilgal, "a dearth in the land", and the sons of the prophets sitting before Elisha as students before a teacher. Explain "dearth" as famine and "seethe pottage" as boil a stew. In a famine people gather what grows wild, and one man brings back wild gourds no one recognises. Then the cry and the remedy: Elisha throws in meal, and "there was no harm in the pot". Teach this first because it shows the prophet caring for his community in the ordinary business of a shared meal, and it pairs naturally with the healed water of 2:21.
2 Kings 4:42-44
Twenty loaves for a hundred
A man from Baal-shalisha brings "bread of the firstfruits, twenty loaves of barley, and full ears of corn in the husk thereof". Explain that firstfruits were normally brought to the LORD and his servants; here they go to feed the hungry company. Barley loaves were small, coarse bread. The servant's objection is reasonable, and the LORD's word answers it in advance. Place this step here because it moves from removing harm to supplying enough, and because learners will recognise the shape from John 6:9-13, where barley loaves and leftovers appear again.
2 Kings 5:1-19
A Syrian healed in Israel's river
This unit includes chapter 5, but the next unit studies Naaman closely, so give it one step here and keep it brief. Read 5:1 for who Naaman is and 5:14-16 for what happens: he dips seven times in the Jordan, his flesh comes again "like unto the flesh of a little child", and he confesses that there is no God in all the earth but in Israel. Elisha will not be paid. Teach it at this point because it widens the circle: the same God who feeds the prophets heals an enemy commander, and Jesus will point to this in Luke 4:27.
2 Kings 5:20-27
The servant who ran after the gifts
Again, keep this short and leave the detail for the next unit. Gehazi decides his master has let Naaman off too lightly, runs after him, invents a request for two visiting prophets, and hides the silver and clothing at the tower. Elisha asks where he has been, and he lies. The leprosy of Naaman then clings to him. Teach it here as the contrast to everything else in the unit: the prophets receive what they need as gifts, and the one who grasps at more than he needs loses far more.
2 Kings 6:1-7
The iron that swam
Finish with the building project. The prophets say "the place where we dwell with thee is too strait for us", meaning too cramped. Explain that they go to the Jordan to cut beams and that Elisha comes because one asks him to. Read the loss in 6:5 and the man's cry. Then the miracle, in Elisha's own sequence: where fell it, a stick cast in, the iron floating, and the command to take it up. End here because it is the smallest miracle in the book and that is its point: the LORD cares about a borrowed tool and a worried worker.
2 Kings 5:1–27
2 Kings 5:1
A great man with one word against him
Read 5:1 phrase by phrase, because the verse is built to end on its last word. Naaman is captain of the host, great with his master, honourable, a man through whom "the LORD had given deliverance unto Syria", a mighty man in valour, "but he was a leper". Explain that the LORD gave victory to Israel's enemy, which tells the class at once that this God rules more than one nation. Explain too that the Hebrew word translated leprosy covers several skin diseases and is not a precise modern diagnosis. Teach this first so that learners see both the greatness and the need.
2 Kings 5:2-8
A captive girl and a frightened king
Move from the top of Syrian society to the bottom. The girl taken from Israel speaks up for her master, and her word travels to the king of Syria, who sends a letter and a fortune, ten talents of silver, six thousand pieces of gold, ten changes of clothes. Explain that the letter goes to the wrong person. The king of Israel tears his clothes, and Elisha sends to him: "let him come now to me, and he shall know that there is a prophet in Israel." Teach these verses together to show how far the word of a girl reaches, and how a king can forget the LORD's prophet.
2 Kings 5:9-12
The door, the messenger and the rage
Naaman arrives "with his horses and with his chariot" and stands at Elisha's door, and Elisha does not come out. A messenger tells him to wash seven times in the Jordan. Read his angry speech in 5:11-12 slowly; he had imagined the whole ceremony in advance. Explain Abana and Pharpar as the rivers of Damascus, clear mountain streams compared with the muddy Jordan. The point here is that grace comes on God's terms, through a humble means, and a proud man has to decide whether he will accept it that way.
2 Kings 5:13-19
Seven times, and a new confession
Give the servants their moment, because their gentle argument turns him round. Then read 5:14: he goes down, dips seven times, and his flesh comes again "like unto the flesh of a little child". The great man ends with the skin of a child. Then the confession of 5:15, the refused gift of 5:16, the two mules' burden of earth and the request about Rimmon. Explain that he takes Israel's soil home so that he can worship the LORD in Syria. Teach the Rimmon request honestly: Elisha says "Go in peace" and gives no further ruling, so do not supply one.
2 Kings 5:20-27
The servant who would not let grace stay free
End with Gehazi, and teach him as part of the same account, not an appendix. He thinks Elisha has "spared Naaman this Syrian" and swears by the LORD to get something. Show how his greed requires deception at every step: a false message, a hidden store at the tower, a lie to his master. Then read Elisha's question in 5:26, which lists everything Gehazi meant to buy, and the sentence of 5:27. The man healed from outside Israel goes home clean; the servant inside Elisha's house goes out a leper. Let the class feel that reversal.
Where learners get stuck
The misreadings this passage tends to produce, and how to answer each from the text.
2 Kings 4:38–6:7
"The prophets were testing God by eating something poisonous."
The text says the opposite: the gourds went into the pot because "they knew them not" (4:39). It was an honest mistake in a famine, discovered while eating. Elisha's response is to remedy it with meal so that "there was no harm in the pot" (4:41). Do not let this passage be used to encourage anyone to take risks with dangerous substances as a show of faith; it teaches care for people who made a mistake.
"Elisha's flour had some special ingredient that cured the poison."
Meal is ordinary ground grain, and the text gives it no hidden property. As with the salt of 2:20-22, the sign is simple and the result is the LORD's doing through his prophet. If anything, ordinary flour stirred into a pot shows how little the remedy depends on the material. Keep learners from building a natural explanation or a recipe on the verse.
"Gehazi was only taking what Naaman wanted to give."
Naaman did want to give it, but Elisha had refused it publicly with an oath, "As the LORD liveth, before whom I stand, I will receive none" (5:16). Gehazi had to lie to get the gifts (5:22), hide them (5:24) and lie again to his master (5:25). Elisha's question in 5:26, "Is it a time to receive money", shows that the refusal was part of the message to a foreigner: the LORD's healing cannot be bought.
"The axe head floating shows that God will fix any mistake we make if we ask."
The passage records one restored tool for one anxious man and shows the LORD's care for small things. It does not promise that every loss will be undone. Notice too that the man had to show the place and reach out his own hand (6:6-7). Teach care and confidence in prayer, and keep it honest: God is not a guarantee against all consequences.
2 Kings 5:1–27
"Naaman was healed because the Jordan is a holy river."
Naaman himself thought the rivers of Damascus were "better than all the waters of Israel" (5:12), and the text never argues with him about water. He was healed "according to the saying of the man of God" (5:14). What mattered was obeying the word he was given, in the humble form it came. Avoid any suggestion that the Jordan or any place has power apart from God.
"God only cared about Israel in the Old Testament."
The unit says the opposite. The LORD had given Naaman's victories (5:1), healed him, and received his worship (5:15-17). Jesus used exactly this account in Luke 4:27 to make the same point, and his hearers were furious. Teach that the LORD chose Israel to make himself known to the nations, and that Naaman is one of the first fruits of that purpose.
"Elisha let Naaman worship idols when he said Go in peace."
Naaman asks pardon in advance for bowing in the house of Rimmon when he supports his master (5:18), and Elisha replies "Go in peace" (5:19). Readers have taken this in different ways: as a blessing on his new faith without answering the question, or as permission for the outward act alone. The text does not explain. What is clear is that Naaman has vowed to sacrifice to no god but the LORD (5:17). Let the question stand.
"Gehazi's punishment was too harsh for taking a gift Naaman wanted to give."
Elisha had refused the gift with an oath before the LORD (5:16), so that Naaman would know the healing was free. Gehazi lied to a new believer in his master's name, hid what he took and lied to the prophet's face (5:22-25). He turned God's free grace into a sale. Elisha's words in 5:26 show the scale of what he intended to buy. The judgement is severe, but the Book of 2 Kings presents it as the fitting end of that choice.
Learning objectives
- Identify the danger in the cooking pot.
- Compare twenty loaves with one hundred diners.
- Explain the significance of leftover food.
- Place Naaman’s healing within the wider passage.
- Identify why the lost axe head matters.
- Distinguish divine provision from magical objects.
- Trace the captive girl’s role in Naaman’s journey.
- Contrast royal power with prophetic authority.
- Explain Naaman’s anger at the instructions.
- Identify the change in Naaman’s confession.
- Describe Gehazi’s linked deceptions.
- Qualify conclusions about earth, Rimmon, and healing.
Teacher preparation
- Read 4:38–6:7 in full, including chapter 5; reserve its detailed character study for the separate Naaman unit.
- Explain dearth as famine, seethe as boil, and strait as cramped.
- Keep barley loaves distinct from modern sandwich loaves; do not invent their size.
- Prepare a safe tool photograph rather than an axe demonstration beside water.
- Mark each ordinary resource: meal, bread, water, clothing, wood, and borrowed iron.
- Read 5:1–27 as one reversal, not a healing account with Gehazi as an optional appendix.
- Explain Syria as the KJV’s designation here; retain the captive girl’s involuntary situation.
- Clarify that leprosy in this text is not a precise modern diagnosis.
- Mark Naaman’s expected ceremony in 5:11 against the messenger’s simple instruction in 5:10.
- Prepare to discuss the earth and Rimmon request without pretending Elisha supplies a complete ruling.
Evidence and interpretation checks
Explicit
Read 4:41–44 and 6:5–7: the food becomes harmless, a hundred eat with leftovers, and the borrower retrieves the iron. Read 5:14–16, 25–27: Naaman washes, is cleansed, confesses the Lord, and finds payment refused; Gehazi lies and leaves diseased.
Scripture-supported
Link 4:44 and 5:14 through their emphasis on fulfillment according to the prophetic word; neither scene credits the material used as independent power. Set Luke 4:27 beside 5:1–3 and 14–15; the foreign recipient is an explicit biblical emphasis, not an incidental travel detail.
Strong inference
Infer the borrower’s concern for another person’s property from his immediate explanation in 6:5; do not assign a price or replacement debt. Infer from 5:20–26 that Gehazi’s scheme threatens the meaning of Elisha’s refusal; he uses his master’s name to obtain what was rejected.
Possible or traditional reading
Present the stick in 6:6 as sometimes given a symbolic Christian reading; identify that as a later interpretation, not the explanation supplied here. Present baptismal readings of the Jordan washing in 5:14 as Christian typological interpretations; distinguish them from Naaman’s stated instructions and confession.
Limit
Acknowledge that 4:39–41 does not identify the plant or describe a detoxification recipe; 6:6 gives no physical mechanism for floating iron. Do not turn 'Go in peace' in 5:19 into unlimited approval of idol worship; 5:17–18 records a difficult request without explaining its future resolution.
Discussion with answer guidance
1. Why does the Book of 2 Kings mention that the gourds were unknown?
What a good answer contains
Because the danger was hidden, not chosen. One man "found a wild vine, and gathered thereof wild gourds his lap full, and came and shred them into the pot of pottage: for they knew them not" (4:39). The company eats in good faith and then cries, "O thou man of God, there is death in the pot" (4:40). A good answer notes the famine that made people gather wild food, and the innocent mistake. A weak answer turns it into a test of faith in which the prophets eat poison on purpose.
Show teacher guidance
Use 4:39–40: the gatherer introduces an unrecognized danger. Correct any claim that the company deliberately eats poison to demonstrate faith.
2. What objection does the servant raise about the twenty loaves?
What a good answer contains
The servant counts and protests: "What, should I set this before an hundred men?" (4:43). Twenty barley loaves and some fresh ears of grain against a hundred hungry men is plainly not enough. A good answer keeps the shortfall in view before the promise, because the objection is honest arithmetic. Elisha does not dispute the numbers; he repeats the command and gives the reason, "for thus saith the LORD, They shall eat, and shall leave thereof". A weak answer mocks the servant.
Show teacher guidance
Find the hundred men in 4:43; keep the numerical mismatch visible before reading the promise of enough and more.
3. Why include the leftovers rather than merely say everyone ate?
What a good answer contains
Because the LORD's word named two things, eating and leaving some over, and both happen: "they did eat, and left thereof, according to the word of the LORD" (4:44). The leftovers are the proof that the word was kept exactly. A good answer links the promise of 4:43 to the result of 4:44, and may note that the Gospels record the same pattern in the feeding of the five thousand. A weak answer reduces the leftovers to a lesson about not wasting food.
Show teacher guidance
Connect 4:43 and 4:44: the remaining food fulfills the particular word spoken, not a general lesson about portion control.
4. How does Naaman’s chapter interrupt any idea that help is for insiders only?
What a good answer contains
It puts a foreign army commander at the centre. Naaman serves the king of Syria, Israel's enemy, and 5:1 says "by him the LORD had given deliverance unto Syria". He is healed and Elisha refuses his gifts: "I will receive none" (5:16). Then Gehazi runs after the gifts and comes back a leper (5:20-27). A good answer sees grace given across the border, and the insider ruined by greed. A weak answer passes over chapter 5 as though the unit were only about the prophets' meals and tools.
Show teacher guidance
Use 5:1, 14–16: a Syrian commander is healed and payment refused; contrast Gehazi’s acquisition in 5:20–27.
5. Why is 'it was borrowed' the cry that explains the fallen iron?
What a good answer contains
Because the iron was not his to lose. He cries out "for it was borrowed" (6:5), and his alarm is for the owner as much as for himself; an iron axe head was costly. A good answer sees the honesty and responsibility in the cry, and the LORD's care for a small, practical loss. A weak answer invents who owned it, what it cost, or what penalty he faced, none of which the Book of 2 Kings says.
Show teacher guidance
Read 6:1–5: cooperative building uses someone else’s tool. Accept concern about responsibility, but not invented information about ownership or cost.
6. What part remains for the borrower after the iron rises?
What a good answer contains
He has to reach for it. Elisha asks "Where fell it?", throws in a stick, "and the iron did swim" (6:6); then he says, "Take it up to thee. And he put out his hand, and took it" (6:7). The man did not make the iron float, but he showed the place and then took up what was restored. A good answer keeps both: God acts, and the man responds. A weak answer gives him credit for the miracle or forgets that he had to act at all.
Show teacher guidance
Notice the command and his reaching hand in 6:7; distinguish receiving the restored tool from producing the miracle.
7. Who first points Naaman toward help, and what has happened to her?
What a good answer contains
A young girl from Israel, "brought away captive out of the land of Israel a little maid; and she waited on Naaman's wife" (5:2). She has been taken in a raid and is now a servant in her captor's house, yet she says, "Would God my lord were with the prophet that is in Samaria", because "he would recover him of his leprosy" (5:3). A good answer honours her courage and her knowledge of God's prophet. A weak answer praises the raid or calls her captivity a blessing, which the text never does.
Show teacher guidance
Use 5:2–3: a girl taken captive from Israel speaks. Honor her contribution without praising the raid or calling captivity fortunate.
8. Why does Israel’s king tear his clothes over the letter?
What a good answer contains
Because he cannot do what the letter asks and suspects a trap: "Am I God, to kill and to make alive, that this man doth send unto me to recover a man of his leprosy?" and "see how he seeketh a quarrel against me" (5:7). The king of Syria sent his request to the king, not to the prophet. A good answer sees that the king is right that only God can heal, and wrong to forget there is a prophet in Israel, as Elisha's reply in 5:8 reminds him. A weak answer makes the king simply rude.
Show teacher guidance
Read 5:6–8: he cannot heal and suspects a provocation; distinguish the royal recipient from the prophet Naaman actually needs.
9. What does Naaman’s 'I thought' reveal about his anger?
What a good answer contains
That he had already scripted his own healing. "Behold, I thought, He will surely come out to me, and stand, and call on the name of the LORD his God, and strike his hand over the place, and recover the leper" (5:11). Instead he got a messenger at the door and a command to wash in a foreign river. A good answer names the problem as pride of status: a great man expected a great ceremony. A weak answer treats his anger as reasonable disappointment and misses that the remedy is not his to design.
Show teacher guidance
Contrast his imagined personal ceremony in 5:11 with the messenger and Jordan command in 5:10–12; status cannot dictate the remedy.
10. How do the servants help Naaman reconsider?
What a good answer contains
They reason from greater to lesser, and they speak tenderly: "My father, if the prophet had bid thee do some great thing, wouldest thou not have done it? how much rather then, when he saith to thee, Wash, and be clean?" (5:13). He would have done something hard; why refuse something easy. Then "went he down, and dipped himself seven times in Jordan, according to the saying of the man of God" (5:14). A good answer credits the servants and the word. A weak answer claims the Jordan had healing properties his own rivers lacked.
Show teacher guidance
Follow their greater-to-lesser reasoning in 5:13 and his action in 5:14; avoid claiming the river has medicinal superiority.
11. What changes between Naaman’s arrival and his return to Elisha?
What a good answer contains
He arrives angry and leaves confessing. He "went away in a rage" (5:12), and after his healing he returns to stand before Elisha and says, "Behold, now I know that there is no God in all the earth, but in Israel" (5:15). He asks for earth to worship the LORD alone, and asks pardon for bowing in the house of Rimmon with his master (5:17-18). A good answer traces this change and notes Elisha's "Go in peace". A weak answer invents the rest of Naaman's life or claims his question was fully resolved.
Show teacher guidance
Compare 5:9–12 with 5:15–19: anger gives way to confession and a difficult worship question; do not invent a complete later biography.
12. How do Gehazi’s words to Naaman and Elisha expose his scheme?
What a good answer contains
Gehazi lies twice. To Naaman he says "My master hath sent me" and invents two young prophets from mount Ephraim (5:22); to Elisha he says "Thy servant went no whither" (5:25). Elisha answers that his heart went with him, and asks "Is it a time to receive money, and to receive garments" (5:26). The end is "a leper as white as snow" (5:27). A good answer joins the two lies and the judgement. A weak answer stops at the silver, as though Gehazi got away with something.
Show teacher guidance
Join the fabricated request in 5:22 to the denial in 5:25; finish with 5:27 so that wealth is not mistaken for success.
Responsible application
Heart and habits
Ask learners to draft a truthful response for a fictional borrower who damages a tool; use the immediate acknowledgment in 6:5.
Relationships and community
Plan how a group could share food and equipment responsibly, using the communal needs in 4:38–44 and 6:1–5.
Care without a price tag
Compare Elisha’s refusal in 5:16 with Gehazi’s scheme; evaluate a fictional demand for payment in exchange for promised spiritual help.
Integrity in receiving gifts
Evaluate a fictional representative who solicits an unauthorized gift in a supervisor’s name; compare 5:16 and 5:22–26.
Session plans
Two timings of the same lesson. The shorter keeps the reading, the central discussion and one response; the longer gives the confusions and the application their own time.
2 Kings 4:38–6:7
45 minutes
Famine at Gilgal
Read 4:38-41. Ask question one and take confusion one.
Loaves and leftovers
Read 4:42-44. Ask questions two and three. Draw twenty loaves and a hundred places on the board.
The Syrian and the servant
Read 5:1, 5:14-16 and 5:25-27. Ask question four and take confusion three.
The borrowed axe head
Read 6:1-7. Ask questions five and six, then take confusion four.
The thread
Ask what the four accounts share: an ordinary need, a word, and the LORD's care.
Handout
Read the key verse together and hand out the sheet. Close in prayer.
90 minutes
Ordinary needs
Ask the group to list ordinary needs in their week: food, tools, a place to live. Keep the list visible.
The pot
Read 4:38-41. Ask question one and take confusions one and two. Compare 2:19-22.
The loaves
Read 4:42-44 and then John 6:5-13. Ask questions two and three. Note the barley loaves and the leftovers in both.
Naaman and Gehazi
Read 5:1-16 and 5:20-27 quickly. Ask question four and take confusion three. Mention Luke 4:27.
The axe head
Read 6:1-7. Ask questions five and six. Take confusion four.
Back to the list
Return to the opening list. Which of these do learners bring to God, and which do they think too small.
Response and handout
Each learner writes one small need to pray about this week. Read the key verse and close.
2 Kings 5:1–27
45 minutes
A great man, but
Read 5:1 and write every honour on the board, then the last word.
The girl and the letter
Read 5:2-8. Ask questions one and two.
Rage at the door
Read 5:9-12. Ask question three. Take confusion one.
Seven times
Read 5:13-19. Ask questions four and five. Take confusion three briefly.
Gehazi
Read 5:20-27. Ask question six and take confusion four.
Handout
Read the key verse together and give out the sheet. Pray.
90 minutes
Opening
Ask how people expect to be treated when they are important. Read 5:1.
The voice from below
Read 5:2-4. Ask question one. Talk about the girl's situation honestly and what it means that she spoke.
Two kings, one letter
Read 5:5-8. Ask question two.
What Naaman thought
Read 5:9-12. Ask question three. Take confusion one and compare the rivers on a map.
Washed and changed
Read 5:13-16. Ask question four. Read Luke 4:24-28 and take confusion two.
Earth and Rimmon
Read 5:17-19. Ask question five and give confusion three its time.
The servant
Read 5:20-27. Ask question six and take confusion four.
Response and handout
Ask each learner to name one way they might be telling God how he should help them. Read the key verse and pray.
Adapting the lesson
2 Kings 4:38–6:7
Children
Set out twenty paper loaves and a hundred dots for people, and let children see that it does not look like enough. Then tell how everyone ate and some was left over. Use a picture of an axe, not a real one, and tell how the borrowed iron floated. Mention Naaman only briefly: a sick soldier from another country whom God healed. Keep the focus on God caring for ordinary needs.
Youth
Start with the borrowed axe head: ask about a time they borrowed and broke something, using a made-up example if they prefer. Then read 4:43 and talk about honest doubt, the servant doing the maths. Bring in Gehazi as the person who grabbed more when he already had enough, and ask what made his choice so serious when the other accounts are about need.
Adults
Look at the community of prophets as a picture of shared life: common meals, shared bread, cramped housing, a building project, borrowed tools. Discuss how a church today carries the needs of its members. Then use Naaman and Gehazi to talk about money and ministry: what it means that Elisha would not be paid. Keep examples general and avoid naming particular ministries or people.
One to one
Ask which of the four accounts is closest to their life this week: a hidden danger, not enough, a gift abused, or something borrowed and lost. Read that one together and stay with it. If they think their needs too small to pray about, read 6:5-7 twice. Help them name one ordinary need and pray about it with them.
2 Kings 5:1–27
Children
Use message cards passed hand to hand: the girl tells her mistress, the mistress tells Naaman, Naaman tells the king, the king writes a letter. Explain that the girl had been taken from her home, gently and without acting out a raid. Let the children count seven dips in a bowl of water. Tell Gehazi's part simply: he lied to get money and was punished.
Youth
Ask what it would be like to be very important and be told to do something embarrassing. Read 5:11-12 and let them hear Naaman's I thought. Talk about pride without making fun of illness. Then set the girl and Gehazi side by side: one with nothing who gave a word of hope, one with a place in the prophet's house who took what was not his.
Adults
Give time to the international frame: Syria's victories credited to the LORD, a foreign commander healed, and Jesus' use of this in Luke 4. Then discuss Gehazi and the danger of turning ministry into gain. Let the Rimmon question be discussed openly; many believers live in settings where faith and duty to an employer pull against each other, and the text does not answer every case.
One to one
Ask whether they have ever wanted God to help them in a particular way and been offended when help came differently. Read 5:10-14 together. If they are too proud or too ashamed to accept something simple, let the servants' question in 5:13 be the gentle push. If money is an issue between them and God, read 5:26 and talk honestly.
Song and video learning lab
A song or video may interpret, compress, or dramatize the text. Its value becomes clearer when its choices are compared with Scripture.
- Before the media: the exact passage and its central movement.
- During the media: the words, people, events, and emotions the artist emphasizes.
- After the media: what it clarifies, what it leaves out, and what belongs back in the biblical text.
Handout
One page for learners to take home. The print button prints this section alone.
2 Kings 4:38–6:7
The passage in brief
During a famine the prophets at Gilgal cook a stew with wild gourds no one knew were harmful; Elisha adds meal and the stew is safe. A man brings twenty barley loaves, and by the LORD's word they feed a hundred men with some left over. A Syrian commander, Naaman, is healed in the Jordan, but Elisha's servant Gehazi lies to get his gifts and is struck with Naaman's leprosy. Then a prophet loses a borrowed axe head in the river, and the LORD makes the iron float.
A verse to keep
And his servitor said, What, should I set this before an hundred men? He said again, Give the people, that they may eat: for thus saith the LORD, They shall eat, and shall leave thereof. So he set it before them, and they did eat, and left thereof, according to the word of the LORD.
2 Kings 4:43-44 · King James Version
Questions to take home
What was the servant's objection about the twenty loaves, and how did the LORD's word answer it?
Why was the man so worried about the axe head?
What small need would you not normally think to pray about?
This week
Pray this week about one ordinary need you usually handle alone, and look for God's care in it.
2 Kings 5:1–27
The passage in brief
Naaman, commander of the Syrian army, has leprosy. A captive Israelite girl tells his wife about the prophet in Samaria. Naaman goes with gifts and a letter, but Elisha only sends a message: wash seven times in the Jordan. Naaman is angry but his servants persuade him, and he is healed. He confesses that the God of Israel is the only God, and Elisha refuses payment. Elisha's servant Gehazi runs after Naaman, lies to get silver and clothes, and is struck with Naaman's leprosy.
A verse to keep
And he returned to the man of God, he and all his company, and came, and stood before him: and he said, Behold, now I know that there is no God in all the earth, but in Israel: now therefore, I pray thee, take a blessing of thy servant.
2 Kings 5:15 · King James Version
Questions to take home
Who first told Naaman's household about the prophet, and what had happened to her?
What had Naaman expected Elisha to do, and why did that make him angry?
What did Gehazi do wrong, and why was it so serious?
This week
This week, do one simple thing God has asked of you that you have been too proud to do.
Music and video connected to the passage
Related media appears when its Scripture reference overlaps this study. Music and video can illuminate a theme while the biblical text remains the foundation.
