Naaman wants to be healed of his leprosy, but he also seems to need to be recognized as an important person. Naaman wants Elisha to perform some complex ritual, not just prescribe a simple bath in a not very impressive river. Naaman’s ego almost gets in the way of his healing, until his assistants point out that he would have gladly performed a difficult task if the prophet had assigned it. So why not take a simple path?

Naaman is not a sympathetic character, so we might be reluctant to identify with him. But I can imagine feeling slighted and skeptical if I traveled to a respected hospital for relief from an ongoing illness, only to have the doctor send someone out to the parking lot to tell me just to wash my hands each day.

Naaman needed for his healing to be complicated to satisfy his sense of importance. Sometimes we want a recognition of how serious our problems are. But what if what we need is not complexity but humility? Humility is often the first step toward being able to accept help, to be human. As long as we are insisting on our own agendas, we miss the signs that God is working through something or someone we do not expect.

A prayerful posture that begins with gratitude for our lives and the world around us can help us step back and find our place in God’s intentions. We might realize we are standing deep in the flow of a healing river.