HE DID NOT LISTEN!

A man with leprosy came to Him and begged Him on his knees, ‘If you are willing, you can make me clean.’ Jesus was indignant. He reached out His hand and touched the man. ‘I am willing,’ He said, ‘Be clean!’ Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cleansed. “See you don’t tell this to anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.’ 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 (Mark 1: 40-45).

It began with a desperate man and ended with a frustrated Master. All because he did not listen!

A man with leprosy came to Jesus. Leprosy – or an unidentified skin disease which was classified as “leprosy” – was not only a devastating condition because of what it did to the individual physically, but also because of what it did to a person socially and spiritually. The sufferer was doomed to a life of isolation from the family and society and loathing from the rest of the unaffected population. He was “unclean” and therefore untouchable and an outcast.

Any disease or condition that made a person less than perfect, made the sufferer “unclean”, but leprosy was particularly abhorrent because of what it did to the patient. True leprosy attacks the nerve endings, causing the loss of feeling. No feeling, no pain – no pain meant any injury went unnoticed and soon turned into suppurating sores and eventual loss of extremities, leaving the person offensive and deformed.

For this man even to come anywhere near Jesus was risky. He was not permitted to approach people because his condition was infectious. How did he know that Jesus was his lifeline to wholeness and cleanness again? Perhaps he had heard, via the grapevine that there was a rabbi with extraordinary power to heal, moving around in Galilee. To his great delight, Jesus came to his community and he was not going to miss his opportunity.

Only one thing troubled him. He had no doubt that Jesus could heal, but would He want to heal him – a smelly, diseased, deformed outcast? He grabbed his opportunity when Jesus appeared. Falling to the ground before Him, he voiced his misgiving. “If you want to . . .” Jesus was indignant. What gave the man the idea that He would heal some conditions but not others? Did he think that leprosy was one of those sicknesses on His list of “not-to-heal” diseases?

Just to show the man that He was not fazed by what he looked like or smelt like or any of the taboos surrounding his condition, He not only spoke to the man, He also touched him. Jesus, how could you do that? Don’t you know that to touch an unclean person makes you unclean? Not Jesus! He was never contaminated by anyone’s “uncleanness”, not by disease, not by death. He made “unclean” people clean. The poor, sick leper, one minute a pitiful, stinking, offensive outcast, in an instant was transformed by a touch and a word. God’s kingdom had broken through this man’s plight and restored him to wholeness again.

‘Don’t tell anyone,’ Jesus commanded. But how on earth could he keep it a secret? People would recognise him and ask him what happened. Lepers don’t just suddenly shed their leprosy and its terrible consequences like taking off their clothes. But more than that, he just could not shut up. Wouldn’t you tell everyone, even those who didn’t want to listen, what had happened to you? After all, it’s not the kind of everyday thing to be cured of an incurable disease, now is it?

But telling his “good news” did exactly what Jesus did not want him to do. It tied His hands. He became an instant celebrity. People ran after Him for the wrong reasons. Instead of basking in the limelight, He had to retreat and hide, but they still sniffed Him out and swamped Him to fix their problems. He had not come to fix problems. He came to reveal the Father and to show them what life would be like if they returned to God and to obedience to His will.

Jesus was not then and is still not interested now in followers who can get what they want out of Him. He is calling people to follow Him who are so convinced of who He is that they put Him above everyone and everything else to join Him in His mission to make earth where they live a little bit of heaven. Every time we make life better for someone else through the leading and power of the Holy Spirit, we are doing what He prayed, “Your kingdom come; your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”

Don’t you want to be a part of that?

Scripture taken from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

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