Luke: Healing the Sick, Freeing the Captive

Introduction

The Preacher’s Commentary Series, Volume 26: Luke Expectations

God invariably surprises us with something unexpected, perhaps because you and I have so many false expectations of what life will hold for us. We’re like the marine biologist I read about who crossed an abalone fish with a crocodile, hoping to get an abadile. Instead, he got a crocabaloney.

Luke has presented Jesus as one with authority

We’ve seen people and spiritual beings responding to this authority in different ways.

Authority can cause us to bristle depending on our experiences.

How would Jesus use this authority? Can he be trusted?

Some of you might still be at a step before this - did Jesus really exist.

500 witnesses - Luke has verified

Writers outside of the Bible

Lets read our passage

I. Separation

A. Clean/Unclean

Should take us back to the laws of Leviticus.

This points first to God’s holiness

I. God is Holy

set apart - as creator and sustainer of life and in Him is full and perfect life

1 Samuel 2:2 ESV

“There is none holy like the Lord: for there is none besides you; there is no rock like our God.

But the fall....Abraham....Israel

ii. God desires to be among his people

a. Tabernacle in Camp

b. Temple in Jerusalem

iii. Clean vs unclean

a. The people were to reflect then a holiness in order to retain this proximity to God

Leviticus 11:44–45 ESV

For I am the Lord your God. Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy. You shall not defile yourselves with any swarming thing that crawls on the ground. For I am the Lord who brought you up out of the land of Egypt to be your God. You shall therefore be holy, for I am holy.”

They were to be clean - morally but also ritually

b. Unclean

-it is morally and/or physically

This example of leprosy - a skin disease - is that it separated the person both from God and the camp at least for a period

Why?

Numbers 5:1–4 ESV

The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, “Command the people of Israel that they put out of the camp everyone who is leprous or has a discharge and everyone who is unclean through contact with the dead. You shall put out both male and female, putting them outside the camp, that they may not defile their camp, in the midst of which I dwell.” And the people of Israel did so, and put them outside the camp; as the Lord said to Moses, so the people of Israel did.

This was both a protection against disease etc but also had a spiritual reality

All these things, from which people were to be put out of camp, represent death

Genesis 2:15–17 ESV

The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it. And the Lord God commanded the man, saying, “You may surely eat of every tree of the garden, but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”

What happened to Adam and Eve they had to go outside the garden

Death and things related to death cannot be in the presence of the author of life

B. Separation

i. These things then separate humanity from God and his presence and as this was in the midst of the people, they would have to be sent out of the camp.

So Paul says this about humanity:

Romans 3:10–18 ESV

as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” “Their throat is an open grave; they use their tongues to deceive.” “The venom of asps is under their lips.” “Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.” “Their feet are swift to shed blood; in their paths are ruin and misery, and the way of peace they have not known.” “There is no fear of God before their eyes.”

ii. The depth of separation from the Holy God is insurmountable

Isaiah 6:4–5 ESV

And the foundations of the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, and the house was filled with smoke. And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”

C. Jesus came to us in our Uncleanness

The things with these things that were unclean is there was always the possibility of coming back

For some it was just a matter of 7 days, for others like this man was to be healed from their disease

They were not to be permanently separated

And so Jesus, as God and man, walks among and interacts with those who would fit into this unclean category

Here’s what is tremendously impactful in this story

look at vs 12 again. “If you’re willing, you can” - but will you?

Could Jesus be trusted? Is he compassionate? ....

And what Jesus does is huge - he not only states his willingness but look at vs 13

He touched him - this was how uncleanness was passed, this was the Holy Son of God

Jesus touches him and he is healed and restored to God and community

In other words Jesus/God has come to us in our uncleanness and is not only able to but willing to give us life again

And while we don’t practice this ritual cleaning today - I think we all in life and moments feel this separation

Is there a God? Does he love me?

And we feel it in our broken marriages, estranged children, betrayal of a friend, in our loneliness.

Jesus has come to us and his love(touch) is available to us all

But Jesus tells this man not to tell anyone but go to the priest(who could pronounce him clean) and to offer sacrifices of thanksgiving but also for his sins - read Lev 14 - receiving forgiveness as well as healing.

Ultimately pointing to the true issue

II. The True Problem

After a little interlude....

A. Jesus often withdrew - connection

B. Imbued with power to heal - life

Luke jumps to:

Story of a paralyzed man

And so we’re brought to the question again, so as Jesus has come to us, what will we do with him?

A. Faith is the “means’ to receive life from God

Belief and trust

The man with Leprosy had belief but he didn’t trust that Jesus would

Jesus displayed for him that he could be

The men in this story don’t waver and because of their faith they receive but not what they were looking for

B. Forgiveness or healing

instead of healing this man, Jesus states that His sins are forgiven because of this man’s faith

This is the actual problem - sin in it’s general consequences and it’s internal decisions and actions all lead to death

Jesus shows the depth of separation

But the forgiveness of sins can only be done by God - authority

forgiveness of sins was only possible by the one who is Holy

And so the Pharisees and Scribes are troubled by this

So Jesus asks them which is easier “to say”?

Forgiveness or healing

So that they know, in essence, that He is God; he does both

Luke has shown us the authority of Jesus’ teaching, over illness and demons and now to do the ultimate restoration through forgiveness for those who are outsiders and unclean - received by faith

And Jesus here replaces the temple, priest and sacrifice that the leprosy man was sent to attend to.

Jesus not only comes to us in our uncleanness, through his love and forgiveness, he bring life to both body and soul

And the people there were filled with awe vs 26

III. Healing Found in Jesus

So Jesus shows that he brings “healing” “restoration to life” to those who believe and trust by forgiving their sins.

Psalm 32:1–5 ESV

Blessed is the one whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no deceit. For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy upon me; my strength was dried up as by the heat of summer. Selah I acknowledged my sin to you, and I did not cover my iniquity; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the Lord,” and you forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah

And so on the heals of these two stories, Luke adds the calling of Levi(Matthew)

Again it says he left everything and followed vs 28

Let’s put it into the proper context

Jewish Tax collector - hated outsider - often corrupt for their own personal gain and for Rome

Jesus ends up at his house for a banquet with a large crowd of other tax collectors and some others

As the story goes, some of the others were Pharisees and Scribes - they seem to be following Jesus around but as we saw last time and this time not because they believe or support Jesus

They question Jesus’ disciples how they could be eating with such sinful outsiders?

And again here is Jesus’ reply vs 31-32

not righteous but sinners

Here’s the kicker - that’s everyone but the Pharisees and Scribes saw themselves as right and good and superior to those “sinners”

Sinners know they’re sinners and need restoration

How does Jesus do this?

By touching and loving and reclining around a table with those who are “sick” - outsiders, unclean, sinners

Jesus says that’s his very purpose.

Levi - Peter, Andrew, James and John

Their call was to begin to live this same purpose out

catch men/ fishers of men

You can come to Jesus - some of us need to know we are separate; some of us need to know we can come to him

We are called to help

“We want to be a people/place where the hurting, the lonely, the seeking and lost souls of this community will find salvation and life in Jesus Christ.”

Keys:

Know where we have come from

Love like Jesus in order to call people to repentance

Conclusion