3-26-2025  Midweek Lenten

“THE HAND OF THE LORD WHO HEALS THE SICK”

Text: Matthew 8:1-17

Wednesday March 26, 2025 – Lent Midweek 3

Trinity – Creston

       Grace, mercy, and peace is yours from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ! Our text for this evening’s message is the Gospel Lesson from Matthew chapter 8 that was just proclaimed.

Let Us Pray: Dearest Jesus, send your Holy Spirit to remind us that not only do you have the power to heal disease and sickness. but you provide eternal healing that last for eternity covering all our sin.  Amen.

Dear Fellow Redeemed in Christ:

Do you know what it is like to be kept at arm’s length? Out of the reach of loved ones?

 In biblical times, lepers knew exactly what that was like. “Leprosy” in the Bible is likely a catchall term for a whole host of diseases that involved sores on the skin. According to Leviticus, “The leprous person who has the disease shall wear torn clothes and let the hair of his head hang loose, and he shall cover his upper lip and cry out, ‘Unclean, unclean.’

He shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease. He is unclean. He shall live alone. His dwelling shall be outside the camp” (Leviticus 13:45–46). Those whose condition was persistent were forced to live outside of society only among other lepers.

In biblical times, lepers were physically ostracized, socially ostracized, and religiously ostracized. To have leprosy meant that you were essentially cut off from life as you knew it. “Unclean!” “Unclean!” And if you made contact with a leprous person, you would be unclean!

The general conclusion was that lepers must have done something to bring this disease upon themselves. Furthermore, people would go a step further to use concerns for being unclean as justification for being uncompassionate toward those in need.

Then we run into this man in our Gospel. To make contact with this man would make anyone unclean. No one would want to come near to this man, much less touch him.

Now make no mistake: Jesus was capable of healing this man in any way that He saw fit. In our Old Testament Reading this evening, leprous Naaman, a mighty commander of the army of the king of Syria, made his way to Elisha’s house. Though he was not concerned with Mosaic Law, leprosy was still a great hindrance to him.

Elisha did not even come out to him but sent out a servant with a command to wash in the Jordan River. Naaman saw this as an affront to his pride. But when he finally listened to the word given to him, God healed him. It was what Naaman needed. His pride needed to be broken down in order for him to simply believe the Word.

Jesus could have responded like Elisha. If He wanted, He only needed to say the word and the leprous man in our Reading would have been healed. Even in the Reading right after this, Jesus healed the centurion’s servant just by His words alone. And likewise, Jesus cleansed ten lepers in Luke 17 simply by speaking the word: “Go and show yourselves to the priests.” The Lord is capable of healing in whichever manner He sees fit.

But in our Reading this evening, this man first asks if the Lord is willing to heal him. Does Jesus want him to be clean? This question gets right to the heart of the Lord. What does the Lord desire? What does He do? He reaches out and touches the man! There is no concern about being unclean. And He says, “I will; be clean.”

Just like the healing of the ten lepers, the power is in the command. The power is in the Word. But here the Lord combines it with the touch. He does not need to do it, but He willingly and compassionately reaches out and touches this unclean man.

Under the Torah, people with leprosy were unclean and needed to keep their distance, but Jesus’s action says that He is the source of what makes one clean. The amazing thing is that when Jesus touches the unclean, it does not make Jesus unclean. No! The unclean becomes clean!

Jesus is not deterred by any uncleanliness, disease, or condition. To Jesus, there is no person that is untouchable, no person that is unreachable. Jesus does not keep people at arm’s length! He reaches out to touch them! Christ comes right to the sick, the outcast, and the sinner. He is not concerned about Himself or His reputation among those who would distort the Torah into justification for their uncompassionate inaction and deeds. Jesus is the fulfillment of the Torah and shows us what it truly means to be clean before God.

All over the Scriptures, the hand of our healing Lord shows His compassion. He willingly takes the hand of Peter’s mother-in-law, and the fever leaves her (Mark 1:30–31); and He goes on to heal many others. Matthew echoes Isaiah 53:4: “He took our illnesses and bore our diseases” (8:17).

In Isenheim, France, there stands a medieval monastery that served as a hospital for people with skin diseases. In it, the artist Matthias Grünewald was commissioned to create an altarpiece. When the leaves of this altarpiece are closed, it shows the famous central scene of Jesus contorted upon the cross.

While many are familiar with this painting, it is not often pointed out that Grünewald added a unique feature to this portrayal of Christ as a reminder for the patients at Isenheim. He depicted Christ’s body covered with many skin sores as a visual reminder for them that “He took our illnesses and bore our diseases.” When the people looked upon this depiction of Christ, they were reminded that their Lord was with them in the midst of their afflictions.

Jesus does not stay far removed from us. You are never too far from Jesus’ touch. Jesus is the great Suffering Servant, who has come to us in our lowly estate. He bore the effects of our fallen world. The fallenness of this world is the cause of all infirmity and disease in this world. Our sin has created a separation between us and a holy and righteous God.

But the Father is still compassionate to us in sending Jesus. Jesus willingly reached out to us in our sinful condition. “For our sake [God] made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).

When Jesus healed the leprous man in our Gospel, He demonstrated His compassion for all those who are far off. The pinnacle of this compassion is shown in Christ’s elevation upon the cross, where He took on the disease of our sin.

In fact, all the healings in the Scriptures point to Christ’s identity and ultimate mission, which is to defeat sin, taking it all to the cross and rising on the third day “to never die again” (Romans 6:9).

Indeed, the Lord can and still does work miracles of healing in this world. The Lord has not promised that healing in this life will always come. However, He does promise eternal healing that has begun at the cleansing waters of Baptism to heal sinners.

So, we hold fast to what He promises and entrust the rest into His compassionate care. Just as someone who is ill has need of a physician, the sinner needs a savior. That is just who we have in Christ Jesus. He is your Savior. He is the one who has taken your sin to the cross.

It does not matter the depth of your sin. You may be a person not known to the world. That cannot keep your Lord’s outstretched hand from your life. There is no place that you can go to where He cannot reach.

As David says, “Where shall I go from Your Spirit? Or where shall I flee from Your presence? If I ascend to heaven, You are there! If I make my bed in Sheol, You are there! If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there Your hand shall lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me” (Psalm 139:7–10).

No matter where you go, how far away you are, or how unhealthy you may be—physically, socially, emotionally, or spiritually—your Lord’s outstretched hand is reaching out to you today and freely offering His words of eternal healing. Amen.  

Now may the peace of God which passes all human understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior.  Amen.

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