Jesus, the Restorer (Matthew 9:18-34)

Introduction

The feeling of despair, the grasp of hope…

Before we read our passage, let me encourage you to pay attention as you follow along at the repetitive themes. In the sandwich of Matthew 9:18-26, we see faith in Jesus to heal, an act of mercy, mockery and Jesus’ fame spread. In the second section of Matthew 9:27-31, we see faith in who Jesus is, an act of mercy, and Jesus’ fame spread, but this time through disobedience. Then in Matthew 9:32-35, we see an act of mercy, Jesus’ fame spread, and rejection. Each scene shows Jesus showing acts of mercy to those who come to him by faith, but at the same time faith is shown in others, there are still those who reject him. Let us now see this as we read Matthew 9:18-35.

Main Idea: Jesus has come to meet us in our despair and pour his mercy upon us, but we must come to him by faith. For it is our faith in him that makes us well. We are going to unfold this in 3 points following the three scenes: (1) Two Women Restored , (2) Two Blind Men Healed, and (3) Two Responses to Exorcism.

1. Two Women Restored

In our first scene in Matthew 9:18-26, we come to a rarity in Matthew, a text that makes what we are going to call a sandwich. This is where one story is sandwiched between another. And that is what we have with the story of a woman with 12 years of suffering from a discharge of blood sandwiched between a story of a grieving father in the loss of his daughter. Both stories are connected by faith and a healing touch. Verses 18-19.

Opposition and questioning of Jesus has been front and center with the Scribes, the Pharisees, and the disciples of John opposing Jesus at different points. However, here we have one coming to Jesus to make a plea of desperation to him. A plea for Jesus to come with him and lay his hand on his dead daughter, for then if he will, she will live.

This plea comes from a ruler, Mark and Luke add that this is Jarius, a ruler of the synagogue. And while many of his colleagues are beginning to oppose Jesus, this man is desperate and comes to Jesus as his only hope. He comes though even in his desperation with hope, with faith, believing that Jesus by a touch can raise his dead daughter to life.

Now, if you aren’t aware, there are parallel accounts of this in both Mark and Luke that slightly differ here from Matthew. Both Mark and Luke say the girl is not dead when the father first arrives, but near death. However, both also include later that the father is met on the way to the house and it is told that the daughter is dead and that there is no longer any need to bother Jesus.

So which is it? Is the girl alive or is she dead? Well she is likely alive in this initial moment as noted in Mark and Luke. However, Matthew continues to be more brief in his accounts than Mark or Luke, and chooses to skip over the additional meeting and just make clear that Jesus is going to the house where a dead girl lay to heal her to show Jesus’ power and authority over death. For Jesus in hearing the father’s belief arises and follows him, and so do the disciples of Jesus.

As they are on the way, before this power is shown, the story is interrupted as another seeks Jesus. Verses 20-21.

Imagine suffering twelve years from a discharge of blood? But not only suffering from this, none able to assist her and help her? For we learn in Mark (Mark 5:24-34) and Luke (Luke 8:42b-48) that she has seen many physicians and spent all she had in attempts to stop the bleeding.

And if that wasn’t bad enough, because of her discharge of blood, she is considered unclean according to the law. In Leviticus 15:19-33, which I would encourage you to write down and look at fully later…but here in Leviticus 15:19-33 we are told that a woman in her menstrual period is considered unclean and then if a discharge of blood continues for many days, she will continue in her uncleanness.

Therefore with this woman considered unclean, she would have been unclean from touching anyone, preventing her from being married or touching her husband if she was married. Anything she would sit on would be considered unclean. To be unclean meant that she would have prevented her from entering the temple to worship with others.

It is in the midst of this suffering, this desperation that the woman seeks Jesus. She comes holding to a bit of a superstition of her day, that the power of men lied in their hair, their saliva, their clothes. And so this woman comes to Jesus, thinking if she just touches the garment of Jesus, likely the tassel of it, she will be healed.

And it is in the weakness and confused faith that the woman comes. Yet, even in the weakness and imperfection of her faith, it is enough. Verse 22.

In the midst of any doubts or any fears, this now previously bleeding woman is told to take heart, daughter and immediately made well! She is told to take courage, for she has no need to fear. Her faith in Jesus has done this, it has made her well.

In his Expository Thoughts on the Gospels, J.C. Ryle paints this picture:

Expository Thoughts on Matthew Matthew 9:14–26: New Wine and New Bottles,—The Ruler’s Daughter Raised to Life

“She came trembling, and went back triumphing.”

Let us store up in our minds this history. It may perhaps help us mightily in some hour of need. Our faith may be feeble. Our courage may be small. Our grasp of the Gospel, and its promises, may be weak and trembling. But, after all, the grand question is, do we really trust only in Christ? Do we look to Jesus, and only to Jesus, for pardon and peace? If this be so, it is well. If we may not touch His garment, we can touch His heart. Such faith saves the soul.

Friends, if we are like the woman in coming to Jesus with a weak faith, a faith that is still immature, we need not fear we will be turned away. For all that Jesus requires is for us to come to him by faith in him alone, and he too will say to us take heart, child. Your faith has made you well, it has saved you!

For that is the main application here, it is not that we come to Jesus like the woman or the others to follow in expecting Jesus to heal all of us from our physical and earthily infirmities. That would be disheartening. For how many of us have plead for Jesus to take away sickness, illness, and hardship to see it not happen? If this was the main application, despair would soon onset, that none of us must not have faith enough in Jesus.

The main application for us to see is that Jesus came with authority and within his three years of earthly ministry did many miracles to show he alone had authority to overturn the curse of sin and death. And that he and he alone will undo the evil of the world. That is what each of these miracles continue to show us so that we may turn our eyes away from anything else and set them on Jesus and Jesus alone by faith! Trusting he has come to make us well, first from sin and that one day in his return, every tear and sorrow will be wiped away, that death itself will be defeated. All we must do is to have faith in him and we can trust it will be well with us in the last day. That is the hope we need.

We see this point starting with the bleeding woman who was made well by her faith. And we see it as we come to the other side of the sandwich, as Jesus comes with the grieving father to his house. Verses 23-24.

These flute players and crowds are part of the tradition of death. It has been said that there was a cultural expectation for even the poorest of society to have 2 professional wailers present. This drawing attention to the death that has come as the family prepares for a quick burial within 24 hours of death. And this crowd has already gathered for such, and the crowd is causing much commotion. Yet, Jesus dismisses them. He dismisses them by telling the crowd that the girl is not dead, but sleeping.

This again brings question back to wondering if the girl was really dead. But, this language of sleep is a theological statement that death is but sleep for the believer, for those who trust God. For it is this language of sleep that is used even in burial of many in the pages of the Bible. For instance we read this in 1 Kings 2:10 “10 Then David slept with his fathers and was buried in the city of David.” Again in 1 Kings 11:43 “43 And Solomon slept with his fathers and was buried in the city of David his father. And Rehoboam his son reigned in his place.”

To say one is sleeping, even in physical death is looking forward to the day of being restored to life, for David and Solomon with the hope of future resurrection. For this little girl though, it was because she was about to be brought back from death to life. Verse 25.

The crowd is put out, and again the power of Jesus is put on display through a touch. This time, Jesus touching the dead girl and bringing her back to life. The power and authority of Jesus is shown to be so great that he can even overturn that of death itself.

This act of power to turn back death itself is a foreshadowing of what Jesus has come to do. He has come back to turn back the curse of sin and death by his own death on the cross and his own resurrection. The days of death are numbered. As Christians, when we close our eyes in death, it is not final. Because Jesus rose from the grave, we have hope that when he returns, we too will have a resurrection like his. This is our future hope Christian!

But though that is our future hope, we too have hope in the present. We have in the here and now that when we come to Jesus by faith, no matter how weak it is, we need only to come to Jesus knowing that by our faith, he will turn and tell us to take heart, that our faith in him has made us well.

We are to come by faith that the sickness of our sin has been taken away. For though we come in our uncleanness to Jesus, he touches us and makes us clean. For he bore the curse of our iniquities and disease on that bloody cross at Calvary. He who was clean became unclean in order to make us clean! Beloved, if you have come in this faith, resting in Jesus and Jesus alone for your salvation, take heart!

However, we must not be surprised. For though Jesus’ power and authority continue to be revealed, though the reports keep going out, there will continue to be those who doubt Jesus and mock him as the crowds did as Jesus said the girl is not dead. Though they see, they do not see. Though many in our day will hear the gospel, will see evidence of the power of the gospel as it transforms sinners, they will continue to reject Jesus. And unless they come to Jesus by faith, salvation will continue to escape them and they will continue to be unwell in their sins. This mockery and rejection should concern us, but not surprise us. For if this took place in Jesus’ day from his ministry, how much more as we continue to spread that same message today?

2. Two Blind Men Healed

Verse 27. As many as have seen the works of Jesus and the authority that he has over all things, including death and have not believed, here two blind men who cannot see and can only hear of the accounts about Jesus recognize him for who he is as the Son of David. The Son of David is a title that is rooted to God’s promise to David back in 2 Samuel 7 of God’s covenant to David to put a son on the throne forever. These two blind men grasp that this Jesus is this Son of David and cry out to him for mercy, mercy to heal them from their blindness. While, they cry out, Jesus does not yet respond or answer their cry. But he enters the house. Verse 28.

The house likely being the primary place Jesus stays during his Galilean Ministry, but this is not certain. Regardless, the blind men follow him in and there Jesus questions them. He questions them if they believe that he is able to show them mercy and heal them. They profess their belief, their faith that Jesus as the Son of David is capable of showing them mercy and healing them. And what should happen as they profess faith? Verses 29-30a.

Because of their faith, Jesus showed them mercy and cured them of their blindness. Jesus continuing to prove that he is the Son of God who has come to fulfill all the law and the prophets. For previously we saw Jesus raising the dead, and here the healing of the blind. Is that not what we read earlier in our service that was promised in Isaiah 35:4–5 “4 Say to those who have an anxious heart, “Be strong; fear not! Behold, your God will come with vengeance, with the recompense of God. He will come and save you.” 5 Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf unstopped;”

Jesus has come to open the eyes of the blind as he who is the second person of our Triune God! He is the long awaited Messiah who has now come! And it is in this Jesus and him alone that we are to place our faith in, believing that he indeed will show mercy to all who come to him by faith in him. You who believe, Jesus has come to open our once blind eyes to see the truth and believe! And eyes continue to be opened, the veil removed as the gospel goes forth! Mercy comes to all who come to Jesus by faith! What mercy has come to us in Jesus!

And yet, as mercy comes, we must understand the need to obey the one who has shown us such mercy. Look back to verse 30 and 31.

Jesus forbade the two blind men from speaking of what he had done for them. We know not the reason for this stern warning, but we do see that they did not obey. Christian, this is a sobering warning for us. To quote Charles Spurgeon, “We may not hope that we are doing right if we disobey our Lord.” [2]

We are in danger of often trying to proceed with our own thoughts and ways of how things should be done in the Christian faith. Going where Jesus has not told us, or worse where he has forbidden us. One clear example that we as the church have been in such danger is that we have ignored the Apostle Paul’s warning for the church to hold those inside the church more strictly than the outside world as instructed in 1 Corinthians 5:9-13. The church is to be called to holiness and walking uprightly as the light of the world and then going to be visibly present in the world around us. Allowing the doctrine we proclaim to be the doctrine visibly showing through us. As the church, we must teach all that the King has commanded and obey him in it. And we must be careful to not presume we know better than he has instructed us and taught us.

However, we must never wonder about the command today to go and make disciples. This is the charge we have been given by our King Jesus. And while the blind men were too quick to go and spread Jesus fame as a miracle healer, he has never forbidden it from being told the rich mercy and grace shown to us in him! We must go and make the name of Jesus famous, famous for the mercy that we find in him and teaching others what it means to follow our King! This is the second of three healings.

3. Two Responses to Exorcism

Verses 32-33. In this third encounter in these healings, we are not told like the previous two of an act of faith. But we see again how Jesus has authority over the demonic world, over the powers of darkness. And how this authority causes the crowds to marvel at his authority as they have never seen anything like it.

For here Jesus casts out a demon and a man previously mute speaks. Speaks what, we know not or need not know. Jesus continues to show that he has come with authority and power over disease and illness, demons, and even death.

Yet, while the mute man speaks, likely marveling at what Jesus has done for him, the crowds likewise marveling, there is still another response to this act. Verse 34.

The Pharisees do not believe, they do not have faith that Jesus is who he says he is. They instead continue to oppose Jesus, no longer from wondering why he eats with sinners and tax collectors, but now saying he casts out demons by the power of Satan himself in calling him the prince of demons. They tie the works of Jesus to that of the works of demons due to their hard hearts and their unbelief.

Friends, beware unbelief in your hearts and minds. That unbelief will blind you from truths, it will keep you from seeing the truth right before you. It will cause you to be like these Pharisees, saying the only explanation of Jesus’ casting out of demons was to be under the power of Satan himself instead of one greater than Satan and his demonic powers!

Seeing the power of Jesus over that of the powers of darkness instead should cause us to open our mouths with praise that there is nothing outside the rule and authority of King Jesus! There is none to oppose him!

Friends, this should be of great encouragement and hope in the midst of yet another tense election cycle. Over the last 3 cycles we have heard that this is the most important election of our lives. This simply is not true. We certainly as Americans should go and vote. But do not think for a moment that either party’s victory can usurp authority over the King of glory! If the powers of darkness are under the authority of Jesus, how much more are American politics? Take heart in this, beloved.

Conclusion

Jesus has come with great authority to overturn the curse, having authority to heal a woman with a bloody discharge, raising a dead girl to life, giving sight to the blind, and casting out demons. He is the one who has long been promised and now has come to rescue God’s people from their sins by the outpouring of mercy on all who come to him by faith. Therefore by faith let us come to Jesus, God’s forever King, the Son of David!

Let’s pray.

Endnotes

[1] J. C. Ryle, Expository Thoughts on Matthew (New York: Robert Carter & Brothers, 1860), 89.

[2] C. H. Spurgeon, The Gospel of the Kingdom: A Commentary on the Book of Matthew (London: Passmore and Alabaster, 1893), 64.