What Jesus did #13: he reached out with a healing touch

At 7am this morning, I phoned the Doctors’ Surgery and got an appointment to see a doctor at 10am. We may moan at how hard it is to get an appointment these days, but this level of accessibility to health care is something to be thankful for. Here in the UK, we get free access to health care. We may moan about the state of the NHS, but we don’t realise how lucky we are compared to many others around the world. With advances in medical science, doctors can now diagnose and treat many illnesses that we present with. As I said, we have much to be grateful for.

I believe that God is at work in our health service, bringing comfort and healing to those who need it. It’s not one or the other: medicine or God. Some rely so heavily on medical progress that they don’t believe God has any part to play in their healing. Others refuse medical treatment on the grounds that God will heal them. I believe that God can heal through medical intervention – and sometimes without any medical intervention at all – and sometimes he does not heal. It’s a complex issue, isn’t it?

Jesus healed the sick. We already looked at that in general terms in What Jesus did #6: he brought healing. We considered how Jesus healed many. That’s the wording in the Gospel accounts. He healed many. Not all, did you notice that? That’s one of those mysteries we’ll never fully understand.

This week, we’ll focus on more specific cases of healing as recorded in the four accounts of Jesus’ life here on earth. Today, let’s have a look at the first specific physical healing recorded in Mark’s account. In the first chapter of Mark – in only 45 verses – there’s an awful lot going on! John the Baptist Prepares the Way…The Baptism and Testing of Jesus…Jesus Announces the Good News…Jesus Calls His First Disciples…Jesus Drives Out an Impure Spirit…Jesus Heals Many…Jesus Prays in a Solitary Place…Jesus Heals a Man With Leprosy…it’s like a whistle-stop tour of Jesus’ ministry here on earth all in one chapter!

Jesus Heals a Man With Leprosy…

A man with leprosy came to him and begged him on his knees, “If you are willing, you can make me clean.”

Jesus was indignant. He reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cleansed.

Jesus sent him away at once with a strong warning: “See that you don’t tell this to anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.” Instead he went out and began to talk freely, spreading the news. As a result, Jesus could no longer enter a town openly but stayed outside in lonely places. Yet the people still came to him from everywhere.  Mark 1:40-45  (also found in Matthew 8:1-4 and Luke 5:12-16)

Firstly, this may not have been leprosy at all. The Greek word traditionally translated leprosy was used for various diseases affecting the skin.

And secondly, we’ve come to know that leprosy is not actually a skin disease.

Leprosy is a mildly infectious disease associated with poverty. It is easily cured. Leprosy starts by damaging the small nerves on the skin’s surface resulting in a loss of sensation. Without the gift of pain, everyday activities are fraught with danger. Unnoticed burns and ulcers can lead to permanent disability. Due to the inability to detect grit in the eye, blindness is a common consequence of leprosy. The Leprosy Mission

Whatever it was, skin diseases were treated with much contempt and suspicion and fear in Jesus’ time. No one understood what they were and how to treat them. The only way to feel safe was to exile these people together away from everyone else. These skin diseases will have been physically uncomfortable and painful, but there was a level of emotional and mental suffering involved in being separated form loved ones and no longer able to live a normal life.

And so the man begs.

As we all do when we are ill. It’s a normal human reaction. We cry out for answers. We’re desperate for a cure. We’ll do whatever it takes. We just want it to go away.

The man believes that Jesus can heal him. That’s why he’s come. He understands though that it has to be a part of God’s plan, God’s will for his life. That’s the tough bit, isn’t it? ‘If you are willing…’ ‘Your will be done..’ ‘Not my will, but yours…’ This is huge. Do we have the courage to pray this way?

It seems odd that Jesus was indignant. There’s a suggestion that this is a mistranslation – ‘Many manuscripts say Jesus was filled with compassion’. Certainly, his words and actions fit with compassion rather than indignation.

He reaches out.

He touches the man.

He speaks the words.

He brings healing.

There’s no big show. It’s all very simple. No conditions, no hoops to jump through. Jesus doesn’t want anyone to know. This is just between Jesus and this one man. People would soon know when they saw the man however. They’d know when he presented himself for cleansing at the temple, completely healed. In this account from Mark, the man cannot resist telling everyone about it. The good news of his healing is bursting out of him. He can’t keep it in. How could he possibly keep this to himself?

There’s another account in Luke’s Gospel about Jesus healing those suffering form leprosy. There are ten this time. The ten beg for healing and all do as Jesus instructed. They present themselves before the priests and they are healed.

One of them, when he saw he was healed, came back, praising God in a loud voice. He threw himself at Jesus’ feet and thanked him—and he was a Samaritan.

Jesus asked, “Were not all ten cleansed? Where are the other nine? Has no one returned to give praise to God except this foreigner?” Then he said to him, “Rise and go; your faith has made you well.” Luke 17:15-19

Only one of them remembers to come back and say thank you. The least likely one too. The foreigner, the one who is not a Jew, the one who did not grow up in the Jewish tradition. The others are so caught up in the joy of being healed that they forget to show gratitude to the one who healed them.

So let’s make today’s blog about gratitude. We started there, didn’t we? We have so much to be grateful for. We have a national health service in this country. We have a God who hears when we call out to Him, a God of compassion who reaches out with a special touch to those who need it most.

I’ve come to see that that special touch is not always what we expect or want or ask for. Sometimes it is healing, yes, but other times, it is comfort or strength or the grace to face another day.

If you get a chance, spend some time thanking God for all that He has given you today. When you catch yourself complaining, stop. Focus on how fortunate you are.

When I feel the touch

Of your hand upon my life,

It causes me to sing a song

That I love you, Lord.

So from deep within,

My spirit sings out unto you,

You are my King, you are my God,

And I love you, Lord.