The Healing Faith of Others
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
We have been studying in the Gospel of Mark over the past couple of weeks, and we’ve said Mark is presenting Jesus as the Suffering Servant.
Last week we saw looked at some of the miracles—the healings that Jesus preformed in His early ministry. We finished out time seeing Jesus heal a man with leprosy. After healing him, Jesus told him to go and present himself to the priests and make the offerings required by the Law of Moses. Then Jesus told him not to tell anyone about what had happened. But that is not what happened. Look at Mark 1:45.
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.
Today we want to continue our study of the Gospel of Mark. If you have your Bibles, turn with me to Mark 2 and we’ll begin reading with verse 1.
A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home.
This verse tells us that Jesus returned to Capernaum. Yet, the verse also makes an interesting statement. It says that the people heard that he [Jesus] had come home. We know this was the home of Peter and Andrew, and presumably James and John. As such it became a kind of base of operation for Jesus during this part of His ministry.
This verse also tells us that the people heard Jesus had returned. Remember the last verse of chapter 1—the crowds were the reason Jesus had stayed out of towns. Capernaum is no different! In fact, it may have been worse, because the people had already heard Jesus teach, and they had already seen the miracles He preformed. So Verse 2 should come as no surprise!
No Room
No Room
So many gathered that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them.
When the people heard Jesus was back in Capernaum, people came to hear Jesus. So many people, that it wasn’t possible for another person to get into the house. It was crowed—we’d say, “Bursting at the seams.”
And Jesus preached the word to them. He kept giving them the good news about God’s Kingdom agenda. Now what happened next surprised everyone!
The Faith of Some
The Faith of Some
Some men came, bringing to him a paralytic, carried by four of them.
Now stop there for a minute. Some men came—we really have no idea how many men there were. We know there were at least 4 of them because the verse tells us the man was carried by four of them. But we have no idea how many men were in the group.
We may not know how many of them there were, but we do understand their dilemma. Jesus is there and the paralyzed man is there, but they cannot get to Jesus! Look at the next verse.
Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus and, after digging through it, lowered the mat the paralyzed man was lying on.
To understand this part of the story you need to understand how a peasant house was built. Most often it was a small, one-room building with a flat roof. Most of them had access to the roof by means of an outside stairway. The roof itself was generally made of wooden beams with thatch and compacted earth to shed the rain.
This was most likely the kind of structure Peter and his family lived in. With the house packed, the area around the door to the house packed, the men could not bring their friend to Jesus.
Still, these men refused to be deterred! So they find the stairs to the roof, and carry their friend up onto the roof. Then these men begin digging a hole in the top of the roof.
Now picture this! Jesus is in the house teaching. The crowd is intently listening to Jesus. As Jesus teaches, there is this scratch, scratch, scratch. It gets louder and louder. Pieces of the roof begin to fall on the crowd below. Undeterred, Jesus continues to teach.
All of the sudden, there’s a hole in the roof, and from that hole four men look down on the crowd. Then carefully, and slowly the four men begin to lower the stretcher of the paralyzed man down. Lower, lower, until the stretcher and the man are laying at the feet of Jesus.
Jesus strange response
Jesus strange response
When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”
When Jesus saw the faith of the men who brought the paralyzed man to Jesus he said to the paralyzed man “Your sins are forgiven.” Jesus acted, not because the man in need had faith, but because of the faith of the men who brought the man to Jesus!
Your faith and my faith can make a difference in the life of someone else!
STOP & THINK—Who in your life needs some of your faith? Who doesn’t have enough faith for themselves and could use some of faith from you?
Now, look at the answer Jesus gives! It is NOT what they expected (or wanted)—Your sins are forgiven. That is not what the friends wanted to hear. They wanted him to be healed! They wanted Jesus to do something amazing. They wanted a miracle!
Many of those sitting there watching were looking for the same thing. A miracle that was what they expected. After all, only God can forgive sins, right? Well that is exactly what the teachers of the law were thinking. Look at verse 6.
The Opposition
The Opposition
Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, “Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”
Don’t read these verses too fast. They are charging Jesus with blasphemy! For a Jew that was a huge deal. It was a huge accusation! In fact, if the accusation was true, it would have been punishable by death—death by stoning!
Jesus, knew what they were thinking! Look at His response.
Jesus’ Response
Jesus’ Response
Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, “Why are you thinking these things?
I can’t help but wonder what Jesus had been teaching about. Because I almost get the idea that Jesus is asking them, “Haven’t you been listening?” Jesus goes on to say:
Which is easier: to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, take your mat and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins….” He said to the paralytic, “I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.”
The Response
The Response
He got up, took his mat and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, “We have never seen anything like this!”
First notice, the paralyzed man’s response! He got up. Then he picked up his stretcher. And finally, he walked out!
I wonder what would have happened if the man had just laid there. Think about it. Jesus tells him to get up, but what would it had been like if
he hadn’t got off the mat?
Now look at the people’s response. This amazed everyone. . . Remember, they had witnessed other miracles. They had seen Jesus do some amazing things. But they are still amazed.
Their second response, is praising God. Unlike the religious leaders, they recognize that God is doing something in their midst! They are amazed because this miracle was unlike anything they had seen before.
So What?
So What?
When was the last time you brought someone to Jesus for healing?
When was the last time you exercised your faith on behalf of someone else?
When was the last time you experienced your sins being forgiven?
When was the last time you were amaze by God?
When was the last time you said to God, “I’ve never seen anything like this” ?
We serve the same Jesus today.
He’s still a sin forgiving Jesus!
He’s still the same miracle working Jesus!
And He’s still the same Jesus that is worthy of our praise!