The Vanity of the Flesh

2 Kings 7:8 KJV

And when these lepers came to the uttermost part of the camp, they went into one tent, and did eat and drink, and carried thence silver, and gold, and raiment, and went and hid it; and came again, and entered into another tent, and carried thence also, and went and hid it.

What vanity is manifest in human flesh!

Here are four lepers whose disease has left them exiled from the common people. Their circumstance is compounded by the siege on their city leaving them starving. They are in such bad straits they finally come to fling themselves on the mercy of their nation’s enemy, claiming "if they kill us we shall but die." Death has lost its sting for them.... until they discover the food and the wealth the Syrians had left behind. 

I can certainly understand their eating enough to satisfy their hunger. I can understand why they would get something to drink before they come to their senses and realize they need to tell the people in the city. What I can't understand is why they felt like they needed to hide some gold and silver and clothing before they told them. 

These are dying men. Food satisfies a present need but wealth serves them no purpose. 

·         It won't cure their disease

·         It won't make them welcome in society

·         It isn't going to get them a better position in their life

Wealth is useless to a dying person. But they chose to hide some wealth for themselves anyway.

In the worst of conditions these men had come to a place where God could use them. They realized death was no enemy. But then some worldly trinkets presented themselves and the flesh took over and good was given up. They really only reported back to Samaria out of a sense of self preservation.

The flesh lusts for all the wrong things. Its priorities are always skewed. It seeks

·         The temporal over the eternal

·         The sense of pleasure over the sense of glory

·         The now over the future

There is so much better to be had but it can only be seen through the eyes of the spirit. The flesh must be mortified or we will waste our lives on bobbles rather than eternal treasures. 

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