Good News...

This may seem a little stretch in comparison but good news is good news, so give it a chance. If the news benefits others, then it’s our obligation to share it with them. Here in 2 Kings chapter 7 we read about a famine that struck Israel. It was so bad people were eating their own children (no joke). The Aramean army was planning an attack, but God caused them to flee in fear. They left everything behind. Three desperate lepers went to surrender to them but they found the camp deserted, and all the spoils left to their discretion. While they were consuming the booty, their consciences were stirred. They knew this was too good to be true. It was unbelievable. They went there hoping the enemy would take them as slaves and feed them, but we’re willing to die if they didn’t. Isn’t this the same with the Gospel? The Good News of Jesus’ work on the cross? It’s not until we are willing to accept the bad news, that we are sinners headed for death and eternal separation from God with no hope of redeeming ourselves, that we are willing to accept the free gift of God’s grace. The Good News becomes the Best News we will ever hear. Then, just like the 3 lepers, we realize that we need to share this Good News with everyone, because it will benefit them as well as honor God in carrying out the Great Commission. It’s only when we are willing to risk it all, give it up, die to self, that the Message of the Bible truly becomes Good News. If the Gospel is Good News to you, then it isn’t fully put to use until you share it (what it means to you personally) with the world. Go out today and share the spoils of the message of salvation with all the starving souls God has prepared to hear it. Then you will experience a soulful satisfaction, the depths of how Good the News really is.

3 Now there were four men with leprosy sitting at the entrance of the city gates. “Why should we sit here waiting to die?” they asked each other. 4 “We will starve if we stay here, but with the famine in the city, we will starve if we go back there. So we might as well go out and surrender to the Aramean army. If they let us live, so much the better. But if they kill us, we would have died anyway.”5 So at twilight they set out for the camp of the Arameans. But when they came to the edge of the camp, no one was there! 6 For the Lord had caused the Aramean army to hear the clatter of speeding chariots and the galloping of horses and the sounds of a great army approaching. “The king of Israel has hired the Hittites and Egyptians to attack us!” they cried to one another. 7 So they panicked and ran into the night, abandoning their tents, horses, donkeys, and everything else, as they fled for their lives.8 When the lepers arrived at the edge of the camp, they went into one tent after another, eating and drinking wine; and they carried off silver and gold and clothing and hid it. 9 Finally, they said to each other, “This is not right. This is a day of good news, and we aren’t sharing it with anyone! If we wait until morning, some calamity will certainly fall upon us. Come on, let’s go back and tell the people at the palace.”10 So they went back to the city and told the gatekeepers what had happened. “We went out to the Aramean camp,” they said, “and no one was there! The horses and donkeys were tethered and the tents were all in order, but there wasn’t a single person around!” 11 Then the gatekeepers shouted the news to the people in the palace. 2 Kings 7:3-11