Healings, Galilean Ministry (Part 2)

The Life and Teachings of Christ — Steve Gregg

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Healings, Galilean Ministry (Part 2)

The Life and Teachings of ChristSteve Gregg

In his talk, Steve Gregg shares insights on the healing ministry of Jesus in Galilee. He emphasizes the physical and emotional toll that healing and exorcisms took on Jesus, causing him to seek solitude and rest. Despite facing criticism for healing on the Sabbath and breaking Jewish purity laws, Jesus continued to heal, helping those who sought him with faith. Gregg emphasizes the importance of having confidence in one's prayers according to God's will, and the power of Jesus to heal not only physically but also mentally and spiritually.

Transcript

Especially praying for the sick or dealing with demon possessed knows that there is some there's something exhausting about it you might think of a person who's a pastor of a church or an evangelist or or someone like that whose principal activity or some Bible teacher whose principal activity is talking and Studying and so forth as having a gravy job Compared to the person who's out there, you know building houses Who's a stonemason or something like that, but actually Work of ministry spiritual work is if it's done in the you know with the right amount of zeal and with the right amount of Commitment and so forth is very exhausting Jesus himself often sought places to retreat. There's the Bible says there's times when Jesus felt power go out of him and When he was exhausted When people were healed by him power went out of him and there were times when he was exhausted so exhausted that he couldn't even Wake up or didn't wake up naturally even in a storm at sea Even Jesus would have gotten exhausted because he was a man too as well as being God He was a man and with the limitations on his omnipotence that he had assumed upon himself He could become weary and became very weary at times hungry tired sleepy exhausted Sick needed to seek places of retreat but here's a night where he's healing everyone in town and casting demons out and Even at a few times having some short arguments with demons when they scream out things He just tells him what to do and they apparently he didn't he didn't have to argue all night with him like some modern exorcists Do it specifically says in Matthew 8 16 he cast out the spirits with a word a Word of authority it doesn't mean a single word, but it means a command with a command He cast them out sometimes not before they spoke because Luke tells us that they the demons came screaming You heard the Christ the Son of God, but then he rebuked them and told them to shut up and got him out but still this was a very You know exhausting night no doubt and yet He didn't use a long night of ministry as an excuse for sleeping in in the morning. He says a long time before daylight He got up to pray Apparently feeling that prayer was more a source of revitalization of his ministry than sleep would have been Usually when we become exhausted physically Sleep is what's? recommended for recovery Jesus was no doubt Exhausted physically, but because of the nature of the work he'd done.

He was probably fairly exhausted spiritually, too And to take care of that business Was more important than his physical strength and no doubt by being spiritually revitalized there was something of a Refreshing physically the experience as well, but he he deprived himself of sleep in order to spend plenty of time in prayer now One might say couldn't have slept and prayed I mean couldn't have slept in a little longer and then gone out to pray as he did no He had to get up before everyone else was awake because as soon as they were awake They came looking for him. He'd have he wouldn't have a moment's privacy and he knew it and So it was that he went out to a solitary place and there he prayed Eventually Simon and those who were looking for him Searched him out and found him and they said in verse 37. Everyone's looking for you implying, you know Hey, you know you had a big meeting last night.

We're gonna have even bigger meeting tonight. Everyone's after you We're gonna put up a big tent over here on this vacant lot And we're gonna have revival services for as long as this thing goes on and he said no Revival services over here for now. We're gonna go on to some other towns at the height of success, you know, Jesus didn't seem to know how to how to capture a Movement in the way that modern promoters do I? Mean he just couldn't he didn't know about striking when the iron is hot apparently About riding the crest of the wave.

I mean any modern evangelist if he came to a town it would seem if suddenly everyone in the entire town came out one night and There's a great healing service and then everyone that first thing in the morning says the sinking that was looking to have another meeting Any modern evangelist realize he's got he's got a revival on his hands here. He should stick around for a while And you probably you know, don't let this thing get away But Jesus was not concerned about those kind of indicators It was more important that everybody get a chance to hear the gospel of the kingdom These people would have another chance by the way, but it was not time for them to do that He said to them let us go into the next towns that I may preach there also because for this purpose I have come forth Now this statement for this purpose. I have come forth the wording of it Has been taken two ways Some have understood it to mean for this purpose I have come forth that is I I've left I left the house and came out here in the solitary place To kind of escape the crowds because I for this reason I want to get away from these crowds I want to go to another town The reason I came forth out of the house early in the morning before day and came out here to the solitary place where I Was hard to find was so that we could get out of town and notice and for this reason I came forth Some have understood it that way.

The other possibility is that he means for this purpose I came forth from the father that I came from heaven to earth as a matter of fact, I believe that's the correct meaning because in the parallel in Luke in Luke 443 the parallel to this Instead of saying for this purpose, I have come forth. He says for this purpose. I have been sent Which clearly suggests something about you know his mission He's being sent from from the father.

So here he says for this purpose. I came forth Apparently it means I came forth from the father because Luke 443 the parallel statement has for this purpose. I've been sent Um Verse 39 and he was preaching in their synagogues throughout all Galilee and casting out demons Now this is a very brief summary statement of his itinerary.

The fact of the matter is When he left Capernaum and made this itinerary He did nothing that is recorded specifically except healing a leper before coming back to Capernaum By by Mark chapter 2 verse 1. He's back in Capernaum again. He left Capernaum in verse 38 but the entire itinerary around Galilee is summarized essentially in verse 39 and one particular notable incident the healing of a leper and The only specific case that is mentioned of this particular itinerary of all the towns of Galilee is given in verses 40 through 45 but verse 39 is a summary statement of what he did throughout and this may have taken weeks or even months of Moving throughout these towns. He was preaching in their synagogues throughout all Galilee casting out demons also Doesn't mention healing but it does over in Matthew.

In fact this statement in Mark 139 actually summarizes Three come three whole verses in Matthew which because Matthew gives us more on it It's good for us to take a look at how he tells us about Jesus ministry in this occasion Matthew chapter 4 verses 23 through 25 Matthew 4 23 through 25. This is the this is the parallel to this one verse in Mark 139 Matthew 4 23 says now Jesus went about all Galilee teaching in their synagogues Preaching the gospel of the kingdom healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people Then his fame went throughout all Syria and they brought to him sick people who were afflicted with various diseases and torments and those who are demon-possessed epileptics and Paralytics or is that correct? Paralytics, thank you. That's right.

I've sometimes pronounced it both ways Paralytics, I think is correct and he healed them and Great multitudes followed him from Galilee from Decapolis Jerusalem Judea and beyond Jordan now This is a much more lengthy description of what Jesus did on this particular itinerary through the cities of Galilee before he came back to Nazareth I mean to Capernaum, but it's pretty much the same stuff He'd been doing teaching preaching the kingdom and healing sicknesses. However, it tells us here and casting out demons by the way It mentions epileptics and paralytics that he also healed on these on this itinerary, which is pretty major Healings and then in verse 25 that tells us they drew multitudes from not only Galilee Which is the reason he was ministering in but from way outside Galilee from Decapolis, which were the ten cities outside of Palestine that were Jewish cities from Jerusalem and Judea which were at the other end of the country and from beyond the Jordan which was of Course over in the region that had been Edom at one time now called Perea in his day Jesus did some ministry there in his final year So people all over the country and outside the country were hearing about him and bringing their sick So you can see why this is called the year of popularity At this point in the narrative Matthew gives the Sermon on the Mount However, Matthew probably is not correct in his chronology here For one thing Matthew does not in any sense adhere to a strict chronological approach in the Sermon on the Mount itself in Matthew appears to be a collection of sayings a compression of material from several sermons But the better reason for believing that Matthew has the Sermon on the Mount in not in the chronological place is Because Luke chapter 6 Places the Sermon on the Mount in a specific context Right after Jesus chose the twelve apostles. We haven't come to that yet We will before Mary much longer But the Sermon on the Mount at least at this point is added in Matthew before the cleansing of the leper Matthew 5 6 and 7 have the Sermon on the Mount and then Matthew 8 Begins with the cleansing of the leper Mark goes directly to the cleansing the leper does not contain the Sermon on the Mount in His gospel, but Luke does have it and puts it a different place chronologically Verse 40 then a leper came to him imploring him kneeling down to him and saying to him if you are willing You can make me clean clean is the term That a leper would be would be used for getting healed of leprosy The reason is that leprosy didn't just make a man sick.

It made him ceremonially unclean He was unkosher like Like several different things that if a Jew would come into contact with that would make them defiled So leprosy was one of those things a leper was himself unclean and he was He was a defiling agent if a person would have contact with a leper he would be defiled unless It was a priest who was going through the motions delineated in Leviticus 13 and 14 those two chapters in Leviticus 13 and 14 talk about the procedure for diagnosing leprosy and also for Offering sacrifices when one turns up cured of what was thought to be leprosy There are laws about this two whole chapters full in Leviticus 13 and 14 But apparently the priest could go through all these things with the leper to diagnose him and so forth without himself being made unclean It was a ceremonial thing to say a leper was unclean was not enough. It was not a way of saying he was infectious He may well have been infectious and that might even been one of the reasons why God knowing this Told people not to come near him, but the matter of uncleanness was not specifically tied to Infectiousness or else of course the priest himself would be subject to it by contacting the leper But it was a matter of uncleanness in the ceremonial sense, which was a picture of something You know all the ceremonial laws were a type or a picture of something New Testament ish something something spiritual and Leprosy in my opinion was a type in a shadow of sin and the cure of leprosy Was a type in a shadow of forgiveness of sin That is why I believe there are so many verses given in Leviticus to the subject of leprosy because it's an important type a Type of sin which is a different. It's not the same thing at all as saying the leper was himself a sin a sinful person or considered to be in sin He was not considered guilty of sin because he was leprous, but the the working of leprosy on the man Was analogous to the working of sin on the soul it began small With a slight discoloration of the skin, and then it would spread to every organ of the body According to the law because this made a man unclean it would separate him from the tabernacle worship Emblematic of its separation from God and It would separate him from his family and friends He had to live outside the city and say unclean if anyone came near it created alienation between God and man like sin does now of course the alienation with God was simply symbolic a man who was a leper could it still be Christian could still be a believer Even if he was not healed of his leprosy He could still be a righteous man But his leprosy still served as a type of what sin does to people and for that reason it was one of those things It was unclean now when a leper would be healed that was being called being made clean now leprosy as we know it The modern name for leprosy is Hansen's disease it is incurable at this point and People who have it do not as far as I know ever have spontaneous remissions where it just kind of goes away And one might wonder then why it was that Leviticus made provisions for a leper who was no longer leprous to be readmitted into society through this ritual of Leviticus 14 since leprosy doesn't remit Leprosy doesn't just go away The reason for this is possibly twofold one is on occasions very rare occasions lepers were healed by God In Moses own Family there was a case of this Miriam contracted leprosy as a judgment from God, but then on the intercession Moses She was healed again of it Naaman the Syrian was cured of leprosy and For these extremely rare cases where a person actually was cured of leprosy there'd have to be some way For him to be you know readmitted especially if he's Jewish now There's also the fact that there was probably no way of exactly Diagnosing what we call leprosy today.

I mean many kinds of skin Infections and so forth might look like leprosy and since they didn't have the you know sophisticated Medical means of diagnosing what we call leprosy today They might many times mistake something for leprosy that wasn't and that being the case a Person might be called a leper and be made unclean who had something other than Hansen's disease and in fact Recovered later of whatever it was they had Might have been psoriasis. I mean it might have been Dandruff or it might have been who knows you know a flaky skin of some kind could lead a person to be diagnosed as a leper somewhat imprecisely and When they overcame that condition they could be readmitted to society if they if they proved that they overcame it in a sense In most cases that would simply prove that they didn't have leprosy in the first place that they've been misdiagnosed But since it was not easy under the in those days to tell the difference between someone who had real leprosy and something else That looked a lot like it better safe than sorry was the rule and so if a person had those problems They were isolated and treated like a leper Anyway This man had not only been sick and it must be a painful thing to have your your parts of your body eaten away by disease but he had also been isolated from family from friends from from worship and He longed to be clean like any leper would now Jesus was moved with compassion And put out his hand and touched him and said I am willing be cleansed Now the man had come and said Lord if you are willing You can make me clean the man was not sure whether Jesus was willing or not Jesus said I am willing and he cleansed him now those who believe that it's always God's will to heal Sometimes point this out. They say this is the only time in the Bible where anybody ever prayed if it is your will May I be healed it is in fact the only time in the stories of Jesus where one of the people that he healed said if you are willing and There they continue by saying and it's in the only case where anyone ever wondered whether it was Jesus will he makes it very clear he was willing and By this they imply that God's always willing to heal always wants to heal the only case where someone ever had any doubts about it They were corrected and he said of course, I mean some translations even like paraphrases say, of course, I'm willing although that's not in the Greek As if well, you ought to know I'm willing it's a it's a foregone conclusion.

It's not a foregone conclusion Healing is not always The best thing God can do for a sick person frequently it is and if it is on the basis of their faith He'll grant it But if it's not he may deny it even if they have faith for it Now here's the thing though Word of faith people tell us that we should never pray if it is your will Because they say it is always God's will to heal and the very fact that you say if it be your will, please heal me is sort of leaving yourself and out an Excuse for not having faith. In fact, it is itself a demonstration of lack of faith Because You should not have to ask such a question. Is it your will? You should have faith to know that it is God's will and the very raising of that Condition if it's your will suggests that you don't have good faith Furthermore, they say you're asking it for all the wrong for the wrong reason Because then if you don't get healed because you don't have enough faith You can always claim it wasn't God's will and then you don't have to take the heat for it when they say it was really Your faith that was defective By introducing the idea if it is your will God heal me Then if your faith proves to be faulty and you don't get healed you can always blame God for it They say you can always use the well, it wasn't God's will instead of your faith being deficient.

This is how they argue it However, I'd like to argue back This is the only case in the Bible where anyone wishing a healing said if it be your will and he got healed anyway It was not treated as a lack of faith Jesus also he always healed people according to their faith This man had enough faith to be healed, but he still Had no guarantees that it was always his God's will to heal in this case. It proved to be In other cases apparently it has proved not to be as we mentioned some earlier now It is not a lack of faith to say God if it is your will as a matter of fact The Bible tells us to and Jesus himself prayed that way Jesus said father if it's your will and if it's possible let this cup pass from me, but not my will but yours be done Now Jesus was praying for something to happen that really turned out not to be the will of God that is for this cup to pass from him and He conditioned his petition on the will of God He said not my will but yours be done The idea being here's my vote. Here's what I would like I would be I'd be very much relieved if you would take this cup from me But if it's your will that I don't have the cup taken from me then that becomes my will also I let my will be swallowed up in yours.

Let my will be forfeited in yours done but that's certainly a way of saying if it be your will and in James chapter 4 We're told that we should specifically Speak in with with this kind of contingency about things that are not guaranteed It says in James 4 verse 13 come now you who say today or tomorrow We will go to such-and-such a city spend a year there and buy and sell and make a profit Whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow for what is your life? It's even a vapor that appears for a little time then vanishes away Instead you ought to say if the Lord wills we shall live and do this or that But now you boast in your arrogance all such boasting is evil Now to boast in your arrogance is evil James says and Boasting in your arrogance is when you're saying I'm going to do this and I'm gonna do that now I'm gonna prosper and I'm gonna have profit and I'm gonna That sounds like the prosperity doctrine to me, which is another part of the word of faith doctor They say just confess it just confess your prosperity. No James says no you say this If it God if it's God's will then I'll even survive to see tomorrow Well, I should have faith to be you know, when people die, they often die sick But I should have assurance. I'm not gonna die Since God doesn't want me sick and As far as prospering is concerned some have told us that's God's will for us, too so why should I have to say if the Lord wills I will live and do this or that and problems over because There's no guarantee in the Bible that it is God's will there was nothing wrong with this leper saying what he said Jesus was moved with compassion.

He didn't rebuke the guy for saying what do you mean if it's my will? Some kind of a cruel God who lets people suffer. I don't want anyone to suffer. It's always my will to heal Jesus didn't talk that way.

He just had compassion the guy He had he did not find fault with the way the man made his request He obviously granted his request which means that by saying if you're if you are willing That was no proof that the man didn't have adequate faith. He obviously did have adequate faith. He got healed There's nothing faithless and certainly nothing sinful or wrong about Conditioning your requests with the statement if it be your will that's what prayer is about.

It's not about your will. It's about God's will first John 5 14 Says this is the confidence that we have in him that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us first John 5 14 and if we know that he hears us we have the petitions that we desire of him So to say if it if you're willing you can heal me is certainly nothing to be faulted for and that is a good way to pray though the word of faith people have made their own people feel guilty and afraid to talk that way as If submitting to will of God is somehow faithless Verse 41 tells us that Jesus put out his hand and touched him. That was a no-no.

You don't touch a leper In fact, you don't even go close to a leper, but to touch him was the ultimate defilement You see if a man touched a leper that man under the law became unclean for a week However, Jesus touched a leper giving no consideration whatsoever to the law of ceremonies and He didn't become unclean Now, of course the uncleanness that a person would normally Take on himself from touching a leper usually Would be you know, not necessarily infection, but just a ceremonial thing In other words if a Pharisee was watching when Jesus touched this leper, he no doubt would say that Jesus was unclean Regardless of the evidence because the uncleanness of which the law speaks is an invisible sort of formal legal reality rather than a than a tangible kind of reality and Therefore those who are under the law would not even acknowledge that Jesus had remained clean while touching a leper They would simply say well, he's violated that law of touching a leper that has made him unclean and that's the way he stands for the next week however There was a visible proof that Jesus didn't become unclean in the fact that the man he touched by the time Jesus hand left the man the man was himself clean That the uncleanness did not flow from the man to Jesus, but the cleanness of Jesus flowed to the man and This too is part of the type. I believe of leprosy as sin because Contact with sinners under the old covenant Defiled people that is why the the Israelites had to wipe out all the Canaanites The Israelites had to wipe out the Canaanites because contact with their sinful ways God said it's going to defile you You're gonna be led astray You won't be able to live around them without falling into the temptation and being attracted to their gods and so forth and sure enough He was right because under the law there was no inward power to avoid defilement when contacting that which is defiled but Jesus obviously brought in a new dynamic a new principle a new life a new wine and this was That even contact with sinners does not necessarily have to defile one We don't have to go out and kill all the homosexuals now We don't have to go out and kill all the atheists and all the pagans. We can live among them and infect them That's in fact what we're told to do We're supposed to go into their territory and live in their midst like leaven in a lump of dough and infect them With our cleanness and that is the difference between the law and grace the law had no provided no immunity and no invulnerability from Defilement as pictured in the fact that if a person who touched a leper they became unclean by that contact but Jesus brought grace and truth and life and power and which is ours also in the spirit and So that those who are under the law can expect to be defiled by contact with a sinful world But Christians cannot or should not but we should be on the offensive going into the sinful world to Impart cleanness to the unclean just as Jesus did on this occasion Now it says in verse 42 as soon as he had spoken immediately the leprosy left the man And he was cleansed and he strictly warned him and sent him away at once and said to him see that you do say nothing To anyone but go your way and show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing those things Which Moses commanded as a testimony to him now does this mean that Jesus was reinforcing the law of Moses about leprosy and about Going to the priest and so forth obviously not some people say that we should still pay tithes because Jesus said to the Pharisees in Matthew 23 23 that they paid their tithes of mint anise and cumin and he says this you should have done and Not left the other things undone by saying that the Pharisees should have paid their tithes some say we'll see Jesus Reinforce the tithe as part of the New Testament obligation.

No Jesus didn't say that Jesus said that the Pharisees who had been paying their tithes were doing in fact what they should have done But they were omitting other things that they should also have done But the point is here is that under the law which the Pharisees lived under they should have paid their tithes the law required it That's not the same thing as Jesus teaching his disciples that they should tithe which he never did Likewise here in telling this leper to go to the priest and show himself and do the things that Moses said that doesn't mean that Jesus is is Instituting those legal requirements into the New Covenant age, but simply that this man was a Jew living under the Old Covenant There was no New Covenant yet and therefore a leper who was cleansed to be readmitted to society into fellowship Needed to go through this procedure it was to be a Testimony Jesus said it was not because these ceremonial laws had great validity in terms of their spiritual value it was symbolic of course all these rituals, but It was for a testimony to the priest Jesus said in verse 44 do it as a testimony to them and certainly It would be a testimony to a priestess. He probably never had to go through that ceremony with anyone before Lepers just didn't get clean It's probably the first time the priest in his training when he's younger had had to read Leviticus And what he should do in a case of a cleansed leper he probably Probably read it with you know half attention since he never expected ever run into a leper that needed to be Go through this but here he gets his first case must have been a real testimony to him of the power of Jesus But also of course it was necessary simply for this man's social life that he go through this Jump through the hoops to be readmitted to society. That's obvious now He did tell the guy not to tell anyone about this except the priests, but it says in verse 45 But he went out and began to proclaim it freely and spread the matter so that Jesus could no longer openly enter the city But was outside in deserted places, and they came to him from every quarter This seems to be one of the main reasons that Jesus told people not to broadcast what he had done He was getting enough publicity without their help Somehow the news of him was spreading and that somehow had to do with God Promoting Jesus and Jesus didn't want to be guilty of promoting himself Some modern evangelists if their wife has a headache and they pray for and she gets well They want to start a magazine You know I mean because they want to broadcast every healing they've ever had a part in Jesus obviously wasn't motivated in that way to him promoting his own ministry that way It was important to him that his mystery be promoted by his father not by himself Therefore he did not take advantage of the many opportunities He had to set people out send them out to proclaim what he had done for them He always told him not to in most cases now the man of the tombs He specifically told him to go and tell the his friends what God had done for him And he specifically told the leper to go show himself to the priest, but of course that would be necessary But many many times Jesus sensing that There was sort of a mass hysteria about him already on people were you know just entertaining these ideas that he was their Messiah as he Was but the wrong ideas they had was that he was going to liberate them from the Romans and so forth he didn't want the movement to get out of hand and Even so when crowds you know did hear about these things Jesus went out to the wilderness to escape them and they followed him there.

That's what we read in verse 45 Luke Has a parallel to verse 45 here Luke 5 15 through 16 Luke 5 15 through 16 is the parallel to this verse verse mark mark 145 Luke says however the report went around Concerning him all the more and great multitudes came together to hear and to be healed by him of their infirmities So he himself often withdrew into the wilderness and prayed So we get a little more detail from Luke Luke 5 15 through 16 Then mark gives us here that Jesus often withdrew to the wilderness to pray and that's but but here It says in Mark that they even found him there and came to him from every quarter going on to chapter 2 And again he entered Capernaum now. He's made his rounds. He's back to where he left from Capernaum's his headquarters He's back home again now and after some days.

It was heard that he was in the house He probably snuck in by night hoping no one would hear about him and he's hiding out at Peter's house, but news got around anyway someone leaked it Immediately many gathered together so that there was no longer room to receive them Not even near the door he preached and he preached the word to them then he they came to him bringing a paralytic who was carried by four men and When they could not come near him because of the crowd they uncovered the roof where he was And when they had broken through they let down the bed on which the Paralytic was lying. I always have a tendency to put the emphasis on the second syllable on the second syllable When Jesus saw their faith he said to the paralytic son your sins are forgiven you But some of the scribes were sitting there and reason in their hearts why does this man speak blasphemies like this who can forgive sins, but God alone and Immediately when Jesus perceived in his spirit that they reasoned thus within themselves. He said to them Why do you reason about these things in your hearts? Which is easier to say to the paralytic your sins are forgiven you or to say arise take up your bed and walk But that you may know that the Son of Man has power on earth to forgive sins He said to the paralytic I say to you arise take up your bed and go to your way to your house And immediately he arose took up the bed and went out in the presence of them all so that all were amazed and glorified God saying We never saw anything like this Now when Jesus came back to Capernaum remember last time he was there he had healed the mother-in-law of Peter and then everybody else in town and the next morning he'd gone out early to escape the crowd so he could pray and Then they found him and they were ready for more action, but he left Because there were other towns that needed him and it's quite obvious from the summary that he had immense popularity in these other towns as well So no doubt he kind of as quietly and unobtrusively as possible came back to Capernaum Knowing that the people were pretty wild about him last time He was seeking some privacy But the news leaked out that he was in the house and immediately it says in verse 2 many gathered together So that there was no longer room to receive them Well, wouldn't it be nice if it was that way in churches today That as soon as people hear that someone's that Jesus is in the midst of the people Suddenly everyone in town wants to come and crowding in the churches and so forth.

I have seen that Some of you may have in some other countries or maybe even in this country It's not happening anywhere here now that I know of during the early 70s. That's pretty much what the Jesus movement was like Calvary Chapel where I was was one of the hubs of that and and You literally had to get there an hour or two early to get inside the door And if you didn't get inside the door, let me put it if you did get inside the door That didn't mean you had a seat You'd be sitting on the floor in the aisles up on the stage in the narthex every square foot of floor space in the building had somebody's bottom sitting on it and And then because the church had large windows like these at the side They set up hundreds or maybe thousands probably just hundreds of folding chairs outside and If they put speakers outside and all those before plus there'd be people standing around I mean, it was just the place was choked with people Because news got around that Jesus was there and That's was called the Jesus movement. Well When I read about this early Jesus moment in Galilee It's it's not unrealistic to me because I've seen that coming before But prior to seeing that I couldn't imagine this in the Baptist Church I grew up in with there was no nothing like this ever happened.

And even now in the last 10 years I haven't seen anything comparable to it Although I understand such things are going on in in other continents in other places where the church is really growing rapidly There's tremendous revival going on but it makes me miss it to read of it here to see that kind of excitement now, I suspect That the church is somewhat at fault Today for this lack of attractiveness to the world The world I think does not look at the church any longer as the place where Jesus is to be found There's been too much publicity of the wrong kind and too much hypocrisy by those who are in the church That the general view of the world When they think of the church, they don't think of that as a place where really Jesus is I think 20 years ago. That was the difference people thought I need to find Jesus Let me find some Christians. Let me go to church but Unfortunately, I think the church is the last place some people think of going even if they were looking for Jesus because of the kind Of PR the church has had and some of it's been deserved But when Jesus is manifest when Jesus Disciples are You know following him then he's a very attractive person and There have been revivals like that in this country many times in its history I feel very fortunate to have seen one of them because I mean, I don't know if I'll see another one in my lifetime I certainly hope so This man that was lowered before before Jesus was paralyzed His friends carried him they couldn't get in the door because the crowd so they went up on the flat roof all the houses in Israel had these flat roofs with a Sitting area on top in the cool of the evening after dinner people go up there and just sit in the cool of the evening And there were stairs going up to the roof of virtually every house And so it was not hard for these men to find their way to the roof carrying a man on a stretcher they broke up the tiles of the roof and Let the man down now.

I hope I imagine they intended to repair the roof That they broke up. There seems to be little doubt of that, but just think of the commotion would cause inside You know, I mean to have this this dust falling on people's heads and it was right in front of Jesus you know probably dust falling on his head and and You hear this breaking up of the tiles and stuff and especially when they finally broke through all this dirt and dust falling down Probably right on Jesus lap and yet instead of Jesus being irritated by this which I think many people would be tempted to be In similar circumstances Jesus was impressed with their faith How was their faith demonstrated well certainly in persistence, but apparently also They were so sure that this man would be healed if they could just present him to Jesus That they were willing to risk even You know the offense of breaking up this guy's roof Peters probably They figured that you know, it's worth it if this guy gets healed It's worth it for us to fix the roof or to take the heat for breaking it up or whatever It would be and yet they had no doubt that the guy be healed So they took that risk and they broke up the roof. We don't read of them fixing it.

I'm sure they must have But it's a really Interesting thing it sort of illustrates how hard it was to get to Jesus now Jesus first words the man was that his sins were forgiven and some people feel That Jesus said that because the man had sinned in a way that was on his conscience which maybe some would feel that his Paralysis was even maybe psychosomatic I don't know that that's true or not and it wouldn't change very much if it if it were in my opinion, but a Lot of sicknesses are said to be psychosomatic that is The conscience or the mind is is affecting the body negatively with symptoms people do actually get paralyzed sometimes with fear physical paralysis sometimes occurs because of people's mental state and Some have felt that since Jesus didn't always say to people before he healed them your sins are forgiven you That he might have done so on this occasion because the man's own sense of his unforgiven sins Was the cause of his sickness or related to it whether that's true or not, we can't say but when Jesus said your sins are forgiven you of course that sparked the ire of the Pharisees and the others standing by because only God's allowed to do that and They felt like this was blasphemy. And of course it would have been blasphemy for Jesus to say that if he were not God he was taking on himself the prerogatives of God and That offended those who did not believe him to be God So he demonstrated that he had the right to do this that he was in fact sent from God and he was God in the flesh And he did have God's prerogatives of forgiven sins And he says I'll do that which is harder So that so that you can know that I can do the easier the easier meaning the less risky It's not too risky to tell some of their sins are forgiven because no one can tell whether that's true or not by looking But to say rise up and take up your bed and walk to a person paralyzed will demonstrate immediately to all observers whether you have any authority Beyond your own human claims and of course the fact that the man was healed Jesus indicated was a proof of his own authority to forgive people's sins and And so that is the principal meaning of this particular healing in other respects, it's another just another healing I mean, he's cured epileptics paralytics and so forth already. The record is shown this story is told partly because of the unusual nature of him being lowered through the roof and Partly no doubt because this particular healing was an occasion for Jesus to claim his divine prerogatives to forgive sins and No doubt that is why it's recorded in the Gospels one other short story here verse 13 through 17 Then he went out again by the sea and all the multitude came to him and he taught them and as he passed by he saw Levi the son of Alpheus sitting at the tax office and said to him follow me and he arose and followed him Now it happened as he was dining in Levi's house that many tax collectors and sinners also sat together with Jesus and his disciples and There were many and they followed him and when the scribes and Pharisees saw him eating with the tax collectors and sinners They said to his disciples.

How is it that he eats and drinks with tax collectors and sinners when Jesus heard it? He said to them those who are well have no need of a physician But those who are sick, I did not come to call the righteous but sinners repentance I probably don't need to tell you how the tax collectors were viewed by Society in those days the Jews resented the Roman presence the tax collectors were Jews who were employed by Rome to collect the hated Roman tribute or Roman tax from the Jews in other words any Jew who would do this for Rome Was considered a traitor and was hated and yet Jesus Showed himself to not be that patriotic Patriotic Jews would hate the tax collector. Jesus wasn't a patriotic Jew He was patriotic for the kingdom of God, but not for any nationality Certainly not for the political systems of his day including those that of the Jews to which he was a part or the Romans He just was unimpressed and uninterested in such matters and he called a tax collector and had no shame In associating with him now here the tax collectors said to be named Levi the son of Alpheus in Luke's gospel. He's simply called Levi and in Matthew's gospel.

He's called Matthew and He is the writer of the first gospel. He's the writer of the gospel of Matthew, but only the gospel of Matthew Calls him by that name Matthew Apparently his name his other name was Levi and many of the disciples had more than one name So this isn't too surprising but the fact his name is Levi suggests that he may have been a Levite many times a Jew's name will reflect something of his tribal background and Levi was one of the twelve sons of Jacob and one of the tribes of Israel and the man probably having a name like that was a Levite which means that had he not chosen to be tax collector, he would have very possibly been a servant in the temple and Therefore it's all the worse if this is so that he chose an occupation in tax collecting because of Levite was holy unto the Lord and could not do something other than serve in the temple. That was that was forbidden but Jesus apparently overlooked whatever offense or might have been in that area and simply called him and It was Levi himself who had the feast in his house with the other tax collectors Matthew's gospel tells us that and when Jesus was criticized for his associations, which he often was He said well, it's the most appropriate place for the doctor to be is with the sick people I didn't come to call righteous people as if there were any I came to call sinners to repentance doctors don't go and make house calls on people who aren't sick and people who aren't sick don't