How to know that Jesus Was the Messiah Jesus Heals a Man with Leprosy 
(Matthew 8: 1-4)

Introduction - The Messianic Hope

The Old Testament predicted that a Messiah was coming, and Christians claimed the name of Jesus Christ as the fulfillment of that prophecy. The Jews for the most part, even to this day reject that Jesus Christ is the Messiah, and most believe they are still waiting for him to appear. So maybe we should ask how do we know that Jesus Christ is the Messiah promised in the Old Testament books in the Bible.

In a sense the entire purpose of Matthews account of the life of Jesus is to prove that supposition true. In Matthews day, for the most part, the 1st century Jews living in Roman occupied Palestine and beyond believed that the Messiah was yet to come and when he came he would conquer and kick out the Romans and set up a Jewish kingdom and state.

In his Gospel of one of the ways that Matthew tries to prove that Jesus is the Messiah is by describing for us the miracles that Christ performed. As a matter of fact in the following couple of chapters of Matthew, now that we’ve just come to the end of the Sermon on the Mount, in the next two chapters, chapters 8 and 9 of the Gospel of Matthew, he will give us an eye witness account of some of the  miracles of Christ. In Matthews narrative account, first we have Matthews own words to set the scene. Then we have his words of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount, in which Jesus delivers his teaching on the kingdom of God and the principle of inner righteousness before God instead of religious rituals, and then we have a written account of Jesús’ miracles in chapter 8 and 9. Which are given as to demonstrates his power. So, we first hear Jesus gives us his message and then we see him demonstrates that message by miracles, that he is able to do in the power of the Holy Spirit.

Forgive me if I play devil’s advocate for a minute, how do we know those miracles prove that Jesus is the Messiah. I mean at the end of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus himself said that there were there were going to be people in the day of judgment who were going to say they had done wonderful works in His name. Furthermore, the magicians in Pharaohs court seemed to be able to do miraculous things. How can we then say that the miracles in chapters eight and nine proved that Jesus is the Messiah. To answer that I would like for us to look at all these miracles in Matthew chapter 8 Matthew Chapter 9 and we are going to spend about a week doing that but today so we’re going to start by looking at some of those in Matthew chapter 8. However, before we do that, let me just give you an overview of these next two chapters. If you take a birds eye view of these chapters there are nine miracles and those nine miracles are put in groups of three.

So, in the first group there is the healing of the man with leprosy. (8: 1-4) Then the healing of a Centurion’s servant in (8: 5-13) Then in Matthew chapter (8: 14-17) there’s a healing of Peter’s mother-in-law and a mention of some other similar miracles. Jesus them take a moment to talk about The Cost of Discipleship in following him (8: 18-22)

Then there is a second group of three miracles consisting of the calming of the storm, the casting out of the demons and the healing of the paralytic man. (8:23- 9:8) A third group of miracles then follow consisting of the healing of a ruler of the synagogue’s daughter, the woman with the problem of continual bleeding, and the healing of a demon possessed man. (9: 9-26) The finally two blind men are healed and a man suffering from mutism is also able to speak. (9; 27-34)

So, the miracles come thick and fast and we’re going to look at each of these three groups of three miracles, maybe one at a time over the next week or so. Today we are just going to look at the first of that initial group of three. The first group depicts Jesus’ power over disease, and the second group portrays his power over nature, and then we will finally get to look at the third group which depicts his authority to forgive sin and his power over death. So today we’re going to begin look at the first of that group of three so look with me at Matthew chapter 8 beginning at verse one.

The Healing of the Man with Leprosy

When He had come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed Him. And behold, a leper came and worshiped Him, saying, “Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean.” Then Jesus put out His hand and touched him, saying, “I am willing; be cleansed.” Immediately his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus said to him, “See that you tell no one; but go your way, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.”

(Matthew 8: 1-4)

I’m going to stop right there and pause for a word of explanation about this one. Obviously this is the healing or the cleansing of the man with leprosy, it would be good to talk for a minute about leprosy and what that disease signified at that time. I myself have some experience in understanding this disease, my father for over 40 years was Mission Director for an organization called “The Leprosy Mission, and I myself travelled to countries like Pakistan and Nepal where I saw its affects firsthand.

In the ancient world, as today, leprosy was one of the most terrible of diseases. It might begin with little nodules which become an ulcer the ulcer then developed in a develop a foul-smelling discharge. In some case the eyebrows fall out the eyes become staring and unblinking due to nerve damage around the facial muscles, leading to eventual blindness. The vocal cords become ulcerated, the voice can become horse, the breath becomes wheezy and smells badly, the hands and the feet also ulcerate. Slowly the sufferer becomes a mass of ulcerated skin and as the disease takes its course after a period of years it leads to mental decline, and ultimately death.

Along with that journey leprosy cause the loss of all the sensations in the extremities of the body, the nerves are affected the muscles waste away the tendons contract until the hands are like claws, there after follows ulceration of the hands and the feet then comes the progression of the loss of a fingers and toes due to secondary infections until in the end a whole hand or a whole foot may become an ulcerated stump.The duration of this terrible disease is anything from 20 to 30 years. It is a kind of terrible slow progressive death in which the individual dies inch by inch. But there’s another problem that compounds the effect of leprosy and that is it was a contagious disease, so the Mosaic law decreed that someone with Leprosy had to live apart from society.

This meant that they not only had a physical disease, but they had a huge social stigma to deal with as well. They could have no social relationships with anybody. As a matter of fact, the laws that governed what the leper could do at that time was long. Experts tell us that at the time of Jesus there were 61 different laws that regulated the conduct and contact of people with leprosy and other people. If people got too close, they had to cry out leper, so that nobody would get too near to them.

One Rabbinic school taught that no one should even buy food from a street which a leopard had passed through recently. Another Rabbi boasted that he flung stones at lepers to keep them away. Most people took to their heels at the sight of someone they thought might have leprosy, even from a distance. There never has been a disease as this which so separated a man from his fellow human beings. 

However, the person in this story came to Jesus and asked for help, he needed physical healing, and he needed cleansing from being a social outcast. Matthew chapter 8 tells us the man came and worshipped Jesus saying, “Lord if you are willing make me clean” by the way the word translated worship here just means that, he knelt down and offered obedience to him. That isn’t what we would normally think of as worship, here it is more of a description of his physical act here, that of kneeling before the Lord. At any rate he obviously he believes that the Lord can heal him and the fact that he has leprosy means that he has even more faith than just normal people. So he asked the Lord to heal him the text tells us then the Lord put out his hand and touched him say I am willing be cleansed and immediately his leprosy was cleansed.

The remarkable thing about the story is that Jesus touched him, this was a highly contagious disease no one would get anywhere near these people much less touch them. But Jesus touched him and said be clean, and it says immediately he was healed of his physical disease and cleansed from his social stigma all in one simple touch from Jesus Christ. Consider what Jesus says next, Jesus gives him a command he says, “see that you tell no one, but go your way and show yourself to the priest and offer a gift that as Moses has commanded as a testimony to them”. W

Why did Jesus heal this man with leprosy and then send him to the priests at the temple. Well we could perhaps argue that he was a man of compassion, and he did it out of compassion and certainly there is some truth to that. That is the motivation that is sometimes stated in about some of his miracles elsewhere in the gospels. He did it simply because he wanted to relieve suffering. On the other hand, there’s no question that something else is going on here, because he says don’t go tell anybody but do what the Mosaic law said to do when someone is healed. Take a gift to the Tabernacle and go show the priest that you’ve been healed and give that gift of thanksgiving that the Mosaic law requires and do that as a testimony to them that God has healed you. Let me just remind you that one of the official jobs of the priest was to determine if anyone claiming to be the Messiah was actually the Messiah. What Jesus is doing, at least in part, is saying go tell the priest that you’ve been healed, knowing that they would come and investigate his claims that he had been miraculously healed.

As we get deeper into the Gospel of Matthew this will become a significant point, at which point I’ll discuss this more, when we get there, but at this juncture, just know that Jesus heals and cleanses someone with leprosy. At one and the same time he brought about physical healing combined with him being made free from social isolation. Why did Jesus do that, how does that prove that Jesus is the Messiah. Well, this miracle doesn’t go into a lot of detail about that but the next one does, so let’s keep going.

The Next Miracle

5 Now when Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to Him, pleading with Him, 6 saying, “Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, dreadfully tormented.” 7 And Jesus said to him, “I will come and heal him.” 8 The centurion answered and said, “Lord, I am not worthy that You should come under my roof. But only speak a word, and my servant will be healed. 9 For I also am a man under authority, having soldiers under me. And I say to this one, ‘Go,’ and he goes; and to another, ‘Come,’ and he comes; and to my servant, ‘Do this,’ and he does it.” 10 When Jesus heard it, He marveled, and said to those who followed, “Assuredly, I say to you, I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel! 11 And I say to you that many will come from east and west, and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. 12 But the sons of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” 13 Then Jesus said to the centurion, “Go your way; and as you have believed, so let it be done for you.” And his servant was healed that same hour.

(Matthew 8: 9-13)

So, this is the second miracle in this initial trilogy of miracles, but we shall unpack this one in the next episode.