The “TA-DA” of Grabbing Hold of a LEPER S31e103 Mt8:1

There is a bigger miracle here than in the healing of the leper.  It is that Jesus touches him.  He grabs hold of him. Jesus lays siege to a leper. It is an aggressive word in the text. 

IMHO, this is the Lord saying, "I'm here. I see your physical and spiritual disease. I'm here to help."

The big question for all us spiritual lepers is: will we let him help us? Will we let Him  grab hold of us?

Watch 7 minutes. It is worth it.  You are in trouble.  He can help.

https://youtu.be/QlCTJMguR2c 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hey, this is a good one. The tada of grabbing hold of a leper. This is from Matthew chapter 8. So, what's a bigger miracle than the healing of a leper? Now, the situation we find ourselves in is Jesus is coming down off the mountain. What mountain? Well, it's the Sermon on the Mount Mountain. That's the greatest, most extensive teaching we have recorded from the mouth of Jesus. And it's got to say something to everyone in the world, and particularly those who are encountering him kind of for the first time. So if this is your first day in the podcast, go back, review that, and then come to this wonderful passage. We're going to go from this great teaching to now some very practical demonstrations of his power, starting in Matthew chapter eight. Here we go. I'm going to break the story down as we come to different parts in it. Just first line in Matthew chapter 8, verse 1. When he came down from the mountain, the Mount Sermon on the Mount Mountain, great crowds followed him. No kidding. Alright, verse 2. And behold. So this word behold means look at this. Pay attention to this. Don't casually pass by what is going to happen. It's an invitation to come and see what's going to happen in the story about our leper here today. Why? Because there's going to be something in it for us. There's going to be a tada, actually, there's going to be two tada's as far as I read it. And here's what happens in the story. Verse 2. And behold, a leper came to him. Now, why do we care about lepers? It's a collective term for people that have skin diseases. And what might you know about leprosy? Well, here's the point number one is you don't want it. And now you don't want your family to get it. So every person in this crowd is going to treat leprosy and this collection of diseases as a as possible at least contagion. So it's a terrible way to live, I would think. Your only friends have to be lepers. So remember when COVID was brand new and it was on the news every night and in on the internet and people were dying and people were upside down and ICUs. I remember Andrew Cromo, the governor, saying when the government offered him 3,000 ventilators, he says, we don't need 3,000. We need 30,000 ventilators. And it was at that moment in time, kind of collectively, that the Jews were facing this disease of leprosy. They didn't know what the causative agent was. They knew it was serious. They knew they didn't want it. They knew that it was contagious. And you've got it, and I don't want to get it. And we still hear that there is a great crowd who at least witnesses, perhaps close enough to be a witness, but far enough away that they're not going to be contagious. But I was wondering like, what about the specific danger to the 12 disciples? How close were they to this situation? So perhaps this story puts them at particular risk, and maybe they had to be brave to endure this story. So what is Jesus going to do with this situation? How he's going to interact with this guy? It's more than just like ministering to the marginalized, which Jesus specializes in. Today, it's ministering to the dangerous. So Jesus will demonstrate his character here. He's saying, I'm in this, despite the physical danger to myself, my ministry is going to, or at least potentially cost me something. So if Jesus isn't who he says he is, then everybody associated with the story could die. The leper, Jesus, the disciples, and maybe even the crowd if they're nearby enough. So this is a life-threatening encounter, and then it turns out it's a life-giving encounter. All right, so what happens to the leper? He comes and kneels before him, saying, Lord, if you will, you can make me clean. So it seems to be that this issue is can Jesus heal versus will Jesus heal has already been dealt with in the mind and the soul of the leper. He doesn't say, if you can heal me. He does say, if you will hear me. So I think it's a settled issue. He's saying, I think he's saying, I know you can heal me, Lord. I know you have the ability, the power, the sovereignty, the lordship. But do I get a tadah regarding healing? So apparently, based on the evidence of his actions, how do we know this? Well, he comes, he kneels, does the right body posture. Remember, God loves the bent, he loves the bowed, he loves the falling down. We get that from early in Matthew chapter 5. And then his words, his words betray his heart. He calls him Lord, addresses him as identity, and then he says, if you will. In other words, like we see what we pray in the in the uh Lord's Prayer, thy will be done. So if this is good for your kingdom, if your rule and your reign, you could come over me in this situation, that be great. And all the while I know you can do it. It's but if you will. And then here we go, verse number three. And Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him. So, first of all, Jesus stretched out his hand. So Jesus deploys his hand. But the question is, which way? Is it toward him or is it like fleeing in horror with this guy, deployed towards safety? But Jesus deploys towards compassion. And then, not just kind of like, oh bless you, he touches him. He has contact with him. Now, the Greek word here was very helpful to me. It means to grab hold. It's not just like a glancing touch. It's taking hold, clinging to him. He fastened himself. Here's the teaching point for today. Jesus fashions himself, fastened himself to a leper. So he touched him violently, laid hold of him with force and intent. It's one of the tadas of the story that Jesus lays siege to the leper. And by extension, Jesus is going to lay hold of spiritual lepers, unclean people. He doesn't just kind of salute us and send us on our way waving, saying, live well and prosper. He grabs hold of the leper and grabs hold of us. I am with you. I see you. I hear you. I've come to bear your spiritual sin. So I'm with the leopards. I am one of the leopards. I'm here for the leopards. So the tada is I'm putting my life on the line with and for the leopards. This is an all-in kind of a word. So will you heal me and what happens? Here it is, verse 3. Jesus stretched out his hand, touched him, saying, I will, be clean. And immediately the leprosy was cleansed. So here's the take-home for today. Let's learn from the leper a couple things. You're the boss, Lord. I bow down, I ask, I remember your will, I submit, I know you can do this. And then we kind of learned from Jesus, number two. There's the tada of the healing, but I think the better tada of today is the tada of the touching, associating, identifying. So this, in my humble opinion, is the big miracle of today. So this is the God we have. He that He'd come and associate with us, spiritual leper. He reaches out his hand, he grabs hold of the leper, he laid siege to the leper, and by extension, Jesus lays hold of the spiritually unclean people. So why these two big tada's? Well, so we can get to the third ta, which is you are the leper, and we can say, Will you come to Jesus? Will you let him grab hold of me? That would be the third ta da. Thanks for listening.