Epiphany 3
Mt
8:1-13
1/26/14
When we lived in Brookfield, IL,
which is inner suburban Chicago, I don’t remember ever seeing any wildlife in
our neighborhood. Of course, that’s not
surprising. After all there was nothing
in the area except village after village – suburb after suburb. You drove through one continuous city, and
apart from the signs marking each village you would never really know that you
had left one and entered another.
On the other hand, Marion is very
different. Here if you live near the
edge of the city as we do, you are living near the countryside. There are fields, woods and some farmland.
And there is a lot of wildlife out there.
I thought about this a couple times recently when I have been driving Abigail
home from basketball in the evening.
Several times as we drove into our neighborhood we saw a number of deer
standing in a front yard. On one
occasion I slowed down and surprisingly the deer didn’t move at all. We were probably ten feet away from the deer
who just stood there looking at us.
Now I enjoy seeing the deer. They are pretty and graceful animals. It has been fascinating to see an occasional
fox. But I don’t like it when one
particular animal shows up in our neighborhood. And that animal is a skunk.
There have been quite a few of them recently.
With their black and white stripe they are hard to miss. And very often, you don’t even have to see
them in order to know that they are around.
The scent they spray is powerful and unmistakable.
It smells bad when you just sniff it
in the air. Our dog Baylor basically
lives in the house, and yet somehow in the brief time she goes outside she has
managed to get sprayed on multiple occasions. You would think that one experience of
a full blast of skunk odor would have taught her … but apparently not. I don’t like it when I see a skunk show up
around our house, because unlike Baylor I know for sure that one of the
last things in life I want to experience is to get sprayed by one of these
annoying creatures.
The crowds around Jesus probably had
a similar feeling when they saw the leper show up in our Gospel lesson. This was not someone you wanted to see, and
it certainly was not someone you wanted to come anywhere near you. The
term “leper” in the Bible describes a person with some kind of skin condition
that was easily noticeable. However, it
seems unlikely that it refers to what the modern world has called “leprosy” – a
condition known as Hansen’s Disease.
Leviticus chapters thirteen and
fourteen describe how leprosy made a person unclean in the ritual system of the
Torah. As such, it cut those afflicted
off from fellowship with the rest of the people. Leviticus thirteen provided the instruction: “The
leprous person who has the disease shall wear torn clothes and let the hair of
his head hang loose, and he shall cover his upper lip and cry out, ‘Unclean,
unclean.’ He shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease. He is unclean.
He shall live alone. His dwelling shall be outside the camp.”
The leper had to do this because
contact with another individual made that person unclean too. Leviticus says that when a person knows that
they have touched human uncleanness, they must sacrifice a lamb or a goat in
order to make atonement. If a leper
showed up and touched you, your whole day was messed up. Forget about what you were going to do. Now you had to undertake a significant effort
and expense in order to return your life to normality.
This is the reason that our text
says, “And behold! A leper came to him and knelt before him, saying, “Lord,
if you will, you can make me clean.” In
the previous three chapters Jesus has been on the mountain teaching. Now he has come down the mountain and we are
told that great crowds followed him.
Then suddenly a leper approaches Jesus. The one who is supposed
to stay away; the one you don’t want anywhere near you came up to Jesus and
began to bow before him.
The leper bowed down, and said
something remarkable: “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.” There are three things to notice here. First,
the leper called Jesus “Lord” and so we know he approached Jesus in faith
because in Matthew’s Gospel only those who have faith use this title to address
Jesus. Second, the man’s request is
built on the assumption that Jesus does have the authority and power to cleanse
him. And third, the man doesn’t make a
direct request. Instead, even in his
request he submits before Jesus as he says, “If you will.”
The leper knew that he had a
problem, and so he came to Jesus for help.
Like the leper, you have a problem.
The thing is, you often want to deceive yourself into thinking that it’s
really not there, or that it’s really no big deal. Sure you say harsh, cutting and angry words
to others – but they say them to you as well.
Sure you worry about how to pay for that lifestyle that you simply
must have – but so does everyone else.
Sure you may indulge in the use of some pornography – but it’s only soft
porn; it’s not any of that really bad stuff.
In these and a host of other ways,
you sin in your thoughts, your words and your deeds. You can try to rationalize it. But that won’t do you any good when you are
dealing with the holy God. “Pretty good”
doesn’t cut it. And deep down, you know
it. You know the nagging sense, after the fact, that you failed; that you have
not been what God wants you to be.
The leper came to Jesus because of
the way the fallen world had afflicted his life. He approached in faith and humility as he
said, “Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.” And then as the Lord who brings salvation,
Jesus acted. He did the unexpected. He touched the leper. Jesus did the
thing that normally would make him unclean. Yet instead, his touch overcame the
uncleanness. It overcame the
leprosy. We hear in our text, “And Jesus
stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, ‘I will; be clean.’ And
immediately his leprosy was cleansed.”
Jesus began his ministry with the
words, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven stands near.’” Then shortly after this we receive a summary
statement of what his ministry looked like when we are told, “And he went
throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel
of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction among the people.”
Jesus preached and he healed. And in
both his authority was revealed. That’s
what the verses right before our text say as we hear: “And when Jesus finished
these sayings, the crowds were astonished at his teaching, for he was teaching
them as one who had authority, and not as their scribes.” And that’s what the second half of our Gospel
lesson says as the centurion believes that Jesus has the authority simply to
say the word and heal his servant.
Jesus has authority because he
brings the kingdom of God – the reign of God that is present in his
ministry. But there is something very
important to recognize about this authority.
He hasn’t come to use this authority for himself. Instead he seeks out those in need – those
who struggle with sin and all of the ways it has impacted the world. In the next chapter when Jesus calls Matthew,
the Pharisees will complain that our Lord eats with tax collectors and
sinners. He will respond to them, “Those
who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn
what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.’ For I came not to call
the righteous, but sinners.”
Jesus brought the saving and
powerful reign of God. And he came to
serve you, a sinner. Our Lord said, “The
Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom
for many.” He brought God’s saving reign by dying on the cross as the ransom
for you – as the One who received God’s judgment against your sins. And then he brought the reign of God by
rising from the dead and beginning the resurrection of the Last Day – the
resurrection that will one day be yours.
And now, he continues to bring God’s
reign to you. He continues to come and
serve you. In fact, that is the reason
we call what is going on this morning the “Divine Service.” Here our Lord comes and serves us with his
gifts of the Means of Grace as he gives us forgiveness, life and salvation.
In our text today, Jesus does the
unexpected. He reaches out and touches the
leper with a power that healed the leprosy and drove away the uncleanness. In a few moments, our Lord will touch
you. In the Sacrament of the Altar he
will touch your mouth with his true body and blood. He will touch you with the
power to forgive all of your sins because it is his true body and blood, given
and shed for you on the cross.
Our Lord will send you home today
after embracing you with forgiveness in a variety of ways: in Holy Absolution;
in the reading of the Scriptures; in the proclamation of the sermon; and in the
Sacrament of the Altar. You will once
again have received the saving reign of God. Through these means the Holy
Spirit strengthens you in the faith and nourishes the new man.
He does this so that you can once
again take up the struggle against sin. He does this so that you can forgive and
pray for the person who has wronged you.
He does this so that you can give thanks for all the blessings God does
give to you, even as you trust in him to provide the things that he
thinks you need. He does this so
that you can take the practical steps needed to avoid pornography; so that
single Christians can wait to make us of sexuality in marriage; so that married
Christians can rejoice in this gift of God with their spouse.
It is an ongoing struggle. Through
the work of the Spirit you will be able to do these things. And we also know that there will be times
when we fail. And so next Sunday we will return here again. We will give thanks for all of the ways that
we have seen Christ at work in our life.
And where the old man he raised his head we will repent. We will return to Jesus Christ and say, “Lord,
if you will, you can make me clean.” And
in the assurance of the Gospel we know that once against he will touch us
through the Means of Grace as he forgives all our sins.
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