Reading Assignment: Matthew 8:1-17
Main Idea: Jesus is the willing healer.
Key verse: Matthew 8:17
Jesus shows Himself as the willing healer with three incidents of healing:
1. Leprosy
2. Paralysis
3. Fever
Prayer Suggestions:
1. Jesus, You are the willing healer. You see our suffering and pain, and You feel compassion for us. And You have promised the ultimate and permanent solution to all the suffering in this world. You will bring Your kingdom of heaven. We cannot wait for Your kingdom to come. Thank You that I have a place there with You because You came to save everyone who repents and trusts in You.
2. Jesus, I repent as You preached, to be prepared for the kingdom of heaven that is coming. I no longer want to pursue a life of self and sin, but a life of obedience to You.
3. Every day that I have good health is a gift from You, not so that I would merely enjoy myself, but that I would serve You and honor You and keep Your word another day. Help me to always think this way, to use my body, my mind, my hands, my mouth, and my eyes to honor You and to show everyone how great You are.
Transcript
Let me pray and we'll begin.
Our Lord, thank You for Your holy word. Thank You that we can look to You every morning and hear from You the unadulterated and pure truth. Thank You that You never lie to us. You always speak that which is the truth. And as often as we hear from You, our souls are refreshed and renewed. And even as Jesus prayed, Your word sanctifies us. It calls us away from sin and self to be more like Christ, who alone lived a life of true righteousness and love, compassion and mercy, all the wonderful attributes that belong to You. We pray that You would ever more conform us to You in the likeness of Jesus, as we look to Your word every day. Thank You that You have sent the Savior. He is the hope of the nations, and He is our hope. We thank You that everyone who clings onto Jesus Christ with faith and repentance truly belong to Him and that eternal life is ours, that we can have the guarantee of spending all eternity with You in heaven. We thank You that You not only give us the promise for the future, but You transform us in this life that we would not squander the precious time that we have here on earth, but that we would live fruitfully in service to You. Thank You, our God, for the wonderful gift of salvation in Christ. Guide us now as we look at Your word. We pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.
The next reading assignment is Matthew 8:1-17. The main idea of this section is this: “Jesus is the willing healer.” Jesus is the willing healer. The key verse is found in verse 17 where Matthew tells us that Jesus' healing ministry was yet another fulfillment of the prophecy about the Messiah. Verse 17 reads thus, “This was to fulfill what was spoken through Isaiah the prophet: ‘He Himself took our infirmities and carried away our diseases.’”
Now, so far Matthew's given us a taste of Jesus's teaching. That's the Sermon on the Mount. Now he's going to give us a taste of Jesus's healing ministry.
It is important to note that Jesus' healing ministry isn't just a nice facet of what He did. This is a part of who He is as the Savior. He is the healer. Healing is an important part of Jesus's saviorhood because sickness is what came as a part of the curse for sin. And since Jesus came to save us from our sins, He also delivers us from the curse that came from sin.
Let me give us a little quick background to this. When God first created the world, He created everything good. In fact, at the end of Genesis Chapter one, we're told that everything was very good. That means there was no sin and there was clearly none of the effects of sin, including suffering, pain and sickness. This means that God did not intend for human existence to include suffering, pain and sickness. All those things came about because of sin. And so when the Savior comes, He comes with the power to reverse the effects of sin.
I think all of us understand the devastating effects of sickness. I remember many years ago one of my sons suffered from childhood seizures. It was like epilepsy. He would shake and not be able to control his own body. And so I took him to the doctor or watched him in the ER. Long story short, I was told that all known causes for childhood seizures are bad and that the best case scenario was to not know the cause. This is what it turned out to be, and they couldn't find an explanation for his seizures. In due time, he grew out of them, but he did have a number of episodes beforehand. You know, in a time like that, you feel so helpless. It's the same thing that Simon experienced this past week with his son, Jacob, running a fever of 104. You know you don't know what to do. You wish you could do something to help your child, but you don't have too many options. You rush them to the ER, thinking that the doctors can just solve everything; but you know, as experience shows us, doctors have a hard limit on what they can do for someone who is ill. But here's Jesus, the true Savior who comes into the world. He clearly pays for the sins of the world through His death on the cross, but more than that He also reverses the effects of sin, including sickness. And Matthew, in this section of his gospel, starts off with a series of healing miracles. These are three incidents of healing. With these, Matthew gives us the absolute assurance that Jesus has the power to solve this problem of sickness. Now I said that the main idea is that Jesus is the willing healer. He is not only the healer, but He is the willing healer. He not only has the power to heal; He wants to heal people. And we see this through the three examples of Jesus's healing in this section. The three examples include leprosy, paralysis and a fever.
First, a leprosy. There's a man that comes up to Jesus. He's a leper. Leprosy, by the way, is a skin disease that is known today as Hansen's disease. This disease can affect the person’s nervous system, their muscular system and in some cases, they could even cause paralysis. So it's a skin disease that has far reaching impact on the human health. Anyhow, this man is in whatever stage of leprosy he was in, and he comes up to Jesus. And he seems to believe that Jesus can heal, but he was unsure whether Jesus is willing to heal him. So he asks Jesus, “If you are willing, you can make me clean.” And here was Jesus' answer: “I am willing; be cleansed.” Jesus is not only the healer, who instantaneously cleansed this leprous man, He is the willing healer. This is wonderful news that God has sent the Savior. And He is not so lofty, not so exalted, not so high class that He refuses to lower Himself to the level of sinners affected by all the effects of sin. But He actually comes down to our level. And He's willing to help us. And so we learn with the leprosy. Jesus touches this man and willingly heals him.
The second example is paralysis. There are two interesting twists with this second story. First of all, the sick person doesn't come to Jesus Himself; it's his master that comes. The sick person happens to be a slave and his master happens to be a Roman Centurion, a military leader. And as a Roman, he was a Gentile. And this Gentile Centurion wanted him to be healed. And he believed that Jesus has the power to heal, and so he calls for Jesus to come to his house to heal his servant. And here, we see Jesus as the willing healer, for He willingly goes to the Centurion’s house, a Gentile’s house, to go heal his slave. Then comes the second twist in the story. You would figure that Jesus shows up and heals this paralytic. Instead, when the Centurion learns that Jesus is on His way, he considers Jesus' power and asks Him to do something else. This was a military man and he understood how authority works. The person in authority speaks a word and all of his subjects do as he says. That's how things work in the military, and he just thought, “Well, Jesus has authority over diseases, and so if Jesus speaks a word, then the disease will be healed.” And so the man sends another message to Jesus, this time saying to Him, “Lord, I'm not worthy for You to come under my roof. Just say the word and my servant will be healed.” And when Jesus receives the message, He does exactly that. He speaks a word, and the slave was healed in that very instant. Again, Jesus shows Himself to be a willing healer. He not only heals, but He willingly goes to visit this Gentile. And of course, He is the healer. He shows His power over paralysis. There's another important footnote to be made here. Jesus' word has power. He speaks and it is done. That, by the way, also shows us that Jesus is truly God, because, as you would all recall, when God created the world, He just spoke the world into existence. And so here is Jesus, He speaks a word and He reverses the effects of sin.
The third example is a fever. We may not think much of a fever today because everyone has had a fever before, and of course, we have many helps to deal with fever— Tylenol, ibuprofen, etc. But back in the ancient times, fevers can lead to death. As fevers today can lead to death if they're not checked. And so we find this example of a woman who happens to be Simon Peter's mother-in-law, who has a fever. Well, Jesus comes into that house, and Matthew tells us that He saw her. And here's what the willing healer does. He touches her and He heals her. Luke tells us also that Jesus rebuked the fever, once again showing the power of His word. And the gospels tell us, including Matthew, that she was immediately well. She became so well that she actually got up and started to serve Jesus and His disciples. This probably means she served them food and drinks or something. But she became well in that instant.
And so here's Jesus. He has the power to heal. And He is willing to use that power to heal sick people. He is the true Savior. In the gospels, including Matthew, we find that Jesus’ power to heal was not limited to only certain diseases. He had the power to heal every kind of disease and every kind of sickness. We we read of Jesus healing blindness, lameness, muteness, deafness. He just heals orthopedic problems, hemorrhaging problems, cyst problems (dropsy), and spinal problem (bent double). Jesus heals all kinds of diseases because He has the divine power to reverse the curse of sin. And as Matthew shows us, Jesus not only has the power to do this, but He has the willingness to help us in the fallen world.
Let me highlight just one more important thing about Jesus’ healing ministry. He did not come to bring permanent relief at His first coming. He healed to demonstrate His power to reverse the curse of sin. He came to show people that He is truly the Savior. His message wasn’t, “Be healed.” His message was to point people to the ultimate place of healing and wellness, the Kingdom of heaven. The purpose of His healing wasn't to give everyone here on Earth perfect health for the rest of their lives in this life. Everyone whom Jesus ever healed, even those whom he raised from the dead, they eventually died. We know this because if they lived on, we would today have people who are 2000 years old, and of course there's no one like that today. Jesus’s healing demonstrated His power to bring about the ultimate solution for our problem of sin and sickness. His message was for everyone to get ready for the Kingdom of heaven to come. His message was repentance in preparation for the Kingdom of heaven that draws ever nearer. It is coming, and our duty in this life is to repent and be ready for its arrival by getting right with God through faith and repentance. And so Jesus’ healing on earth gave a foretaste of the Kingdom to come, the Kingdom in which there will be no more death, no more crying, no more pain, no more diseases, no more curse for sin. We read in Revelation 22 that heaven will be the place of the tree of life which yields fruit, and the leaves of that tree bring healing to the nations. So our permanent healing comes in heaven. What Jesus does in His ministry is to show that He has the power to bring the Kingdom of Heaven, and that He has the power to reverse all the effects of sin. He is the true Savior.
So how might we respond to this in prayer?
We can affirm our faith in the Lord that he is indeed a willing healer. And I think if we were to pause and really think about the stunning reality of that, we should have a profound gratitude in our hearts. One day, the Savior of the world will return and eliminate every kind of sickness, every kind of disease. He will bring in the Kingdom of heaven. And we will be there with Him if we truly trust in Christ. Thus, we can first affirm that Jesus really is this willing healer.
Second, tell Jesus that we have heard His message and that we believe Him. Tell Him that we have heard His message to repent in preparation for the kingdom of heaven, that we are no longer pursuing a life of self and sin, but a life of obedience to the Lord.
I think maybe another aspect of prayer would be to tell the Lord that every day that we have good health on earth is a gift from Him. Our good health is not merely for our enjoyment, it is to serve Him; it is to use our bodies, our clear minds, our hands, our feet, our mouths to honor the Lord, to keep His word, and to make His name great on Earth.
I hope that as you read this next section that your heart is warmed as mine is, to see that Jesus is indeed this powerful and willing healer. He is our wonderful Savior. He loves us. He cares for us. He sees our pain of sickness and suffering, and He came to assure us of the permanent and eternal solution to our problems.
Let me pray for us, and we’ll conclude.
Lord Jesus, thank You for this wonderful message. Thank You that You have the power to heal because You are God. And You are the most gracious God, who brings salvation and deliverance from sin and all of its travails. We trust in You. We hear Your message of repentance and our answer is “yes.” Our commitment is to turn away from our sin, our rebellion, our independence from You; and to honor You every day, to keep your word. Please continue to teach us the proper pathway of life. And I pray that everyone here would have a heart that continues to be committed to You in obedience to Your word. Thank You for Your great love for us. Thank You for coming to save us. In Your name, we pray. Amen. I'll see you on Monday. Take care, and good bye.