Sermon Tone Analysis

A Man Cleansed

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Main Idea - Jesus continues to demonstrate his authority over disease, this time bringing physical healing and ceremonial purification to a man whose disease had isolated him from family relationships and from corporate worship with the people of God.

1. Jesus’s Messianic Authority

As throughout the early Galilean ministry, Jesus’ authority is the central theme of this passage.

The Messiah has authority in announcing the Kingdom of God, in calling disciples, in teaching, over demons, over disease, and over ritual defilement.

All of these confirm his role as God’s agent in announcing and inaugurating the kingdom of God.

Leviticus 13 Talks about Regulations About Defiling Skin Diseases

A chronic, though not highly contagious, disease that primarily affects the skin, mucous membranes, and nerves, known also as Hansen’s disease.

The cause is an organism, Mycobacterium laprae, identified by the Norwegian physician G. A. H. Hansen (1841–1912).

Most scholars agree that Heb.

ṣaraʿaṯ, translated “leprosy” by most English versions (Lev.

13–14), should not be equated with Hansen’s disease.

This term encompassed a variety of conditions characterized by chronic discoloration of surfaces, including human skin and the walls of houses (Lev.

14:34–57).

Persons afflicted with ṣaraʿaṯ were regarded as impure, and Lev.

13:44–46 prescribes exile from the community for them.

Some texts from Qumran apply even more comprehensive restrictions for “lepers.”

The sociological implications of levitical policies, if implemented, were probably significant.

Bands of persons affected with ṣaraʿaṯ roam outside of cities (2 Kgs.

7:3).

The cases of Namaan (2 Kgs. 5) and Uzziah (2 Chr.

26:16–21) show that even officials and kings with ṣaraʿaṯ were not exempt from negative social consequences.

Early Christianity apparently disagreed with levitical policies.

Jesus touches a “leper” (Mark 1:41) and commands his disciples to minister to them (Matt.

10:8).

2. The Necessity of Faith

As the man affirms Jesus’ power to heal: “If you are willing.

you can cleanse me.”

It is not the amount of faith that is important, but the object of faith (Matt.

17:20).

The man’s simple declaration that Jesus is able to heal stirs Jesus to respond.

3. Jesus Compassion

Jesus’compassion, which motivates the healing.

Jesus’ willingness to touch the man, and his words of healing all reveal his empathy.

He also shows concern for the man’s social restoration by insisting he perform the rituals necessary for purification.

Those who minister effectively to people know that true healing concerns more than healing bodies or meeting physical needs.

It involves emotional health, spiritual wholeness, and reconciliation with God and others.

See that you say nothing to anyone:

Leviticus 14 Talks about Cleansing From Defiling Skin Diseases

There is more to the process in verses 10-32.

Within these verses the priest will make offerings of both guilt and sin offerings.

4. The Sanctifying Power of the Kingdom of God

The purifying touch of Jesus.

Instead of becoming defiled by the man’s leprosy, Jesus brings purity and healing.

In the old covenant, Isreal was called to be a people separated from the world around them and set apart to God.

The whole ceremonial system confirmed the need to maintain separation from a world of sin and impurity.

While believers today are also called to personal purity and sanctification, the kingdom has an outward rather than an inward focus, permeating the world and taking back territory for God.

Jesus takes an offensive posture, not a defensive one, by invading the domain of Satan and claiming back its captives.

The people of God.

Jesus says in Matthew, are to be salt and light (Matt.

5:13-16)

two substances that permeate and transform their environment.

Paul tells us a similar point in 1 Cor.

7:12-16.

Some in the Corinthian church were evidently encouraging those married to unbelievers to divorce their spouses iin order to avoid the defilement that na unbeliever brought to the marriage.

This would be analogous to the situation in the OT book of Ezra, where the Israelites were called to divorce their pagan wives in order to maintain spiritual purity (Ezra 10:10-11; cf Judg.

3:6)

Paul, however, encourages the Corinthians to remain with their spouses

It is significant that Paul uses the language of purity and defilement here.

Paul is not saying that a person is saved by default because he or she is married to a believer, but rather that the children of the kingdom bring a purging and transforming influence wherever they go.

In the new age of salvation, the old laws of ritual purity and defilement no longer apply because the kingdom is not an inward protective cocoon but and outward force of the Spirit with the power to transform the world and bring it once again into a right relationship with God.

The church today needs to claim back its authority as salt and light.

We should not take a defensive stance, cringing back in fear at society’s defiling encroachment on our values and beliefs.

Instead we need to go on the offensive, transforming the world through the unconditional and self-sacrificial love of God.

Rather than complaining about the world’s defilement, we restore it to purity and wholeness by overcoming evil with good.