The Healing Power of Hope
Luke 5:12-16
Our scripture text today tells about a man who made an awful discovery. His discovery kept him awake at night. His friends began to notice he was pre-occupied.
The man knew what he had to do. He had to make a journey. He told his wife and children not to worry, he would return after several days.
The long, lonely journey began. He waved goodbye to his family and as he turned away tears filled his eyes.
Finally when he reached Jerusalem he walked into the Temple and found a priest. He showed the priest the white spots on his legs and arms. The priest had seen spots like his before. The priest was careful not to touch the man.
The priest using Leviticus 13:45-46 as his guide said, “I declare before God that you are unclean.” God’s Word says, “The leper who has the disease shall wear torn clothes and let the hair on his head hang loose, and he shall cover his upper lip and cry, “Unclean, unclean.” He shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease, he shall dwell alone in a habitation outside the camp.” The priest looked at the man and said, “May God have mercy on you.”
The man started sobbing. He knew what the diagnosis meant. He could no longer hold his children in his arms. He could no longer embrace his wife. He cold no longer worship in the synagogue or earn a living. What would become of his wife and children?
With panic and sorrow etched on his face he began to tear his clothes so they looked like rags. He stepped into the street and put his hand to his mouth and covered his upper lip and cried, “Unclean! Unclean! For the first time in his life people were afraid of him. Parents grabbed their children and hurriedly walked away.
When finally the man approached his village, he knew the hardest part of his life was before him. When his children and wife approached him he told them to come no closer. His appearance frightened them. He told them goodbye and went to the leper caves and his family went back home.
Luke 5:12 reads: “While Jesus was in one of the towns, a man came along who was covered with leprosy.”
I. Hopelessness Results in a Life of Problems
Here is a man who has lost contact with his family. He is isolated from healthy people. He has no future. He has no hope.
The man was “full of leprosy.” What was said of he leper could be said of many people. People are “full of problems.” “Full of ugliness.” “Full of bitterness” and living without hope.
When a person thinks he has no future he has no hope. Joyce Roberta-Burditt, in her novel, The Cracker Factory, tells about a woman living without hope. Cassie drinks too much and is hospitalized for emotional distress. She writes to her brother Bob:
“It’s been a terrible year. I’ve been running around half crazy, trying to remember whatever it is Alexander my Psychiatrist said I learned in the hospital the last time. Bob, I don’t even know, I just know that I’m coming unraveled and can’t seem to stop it. It’s been a whole year of my husband Charles running off and slamming doors when I need him. I tell him I’m sick and he says, ‘You’re telling me? I’m sick of your sickness” And … bam…out the door.
Charles looked at me one night and said, “Cassie, you’re just a loser.” Bob, when I stand on Judgment Day to hear myself condemned to hell, it will be no more devastating and irrevocable than Charlie’s “you’re a loser.” Forever defective. Forever doomed. No hope at all.”
Living without hope is like not living at all. Like the leper we all need a renewal of hope in our lives.
II. Hope Comes From Seeing Jesus
The first part of Luke 5:12 we see a hopeless man full of leprosy. The second part of verse 12 hopelessness turns into hope, “When he saw Jesus.” He saw someone who could help. The leper had heard of Jesus the Master Healer. “When he saw Jesus, he fell with his face to the ground and begged him, ‘Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”
How do you see Jesus? Whatever your situation you can see Jesus as one who can meet your need and make you clean.
With the Leper kneeling before him, Jesus did something very unusual, he reached out and touched him and said, “I will, be clean.” “And immediately the leprosy left him.” Luke 5:13
Jewish law said, “Don’t touch a leper and not let a leper touch you.”
Just seeing Jesus changed the outlook of the leper from hopelessness to hope. When all seems hopeless cry out to Jesus and He will give you hope.
Jesus told the cleansed leper to verify the healing by going back to the priest. “Then Jesus ordered him, ‘Don’t tell anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and after the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.” Luke 5:14
The healed man hurries to Jerusalem. This journey is one of celebration and joy. He still is wearing shredded clothes like a leper, but he is no longer a leper.
He shows his arms, lets, and body to the priest. The priest looks and when he can’t see any problem calls other priests to help him examine the man. They can’t find any leprosy. The man tells them about Jesus and his healing. The priest tells him they must have made a miss-diagnosis in the first place.
They go through the sacrifice of cleansing and the healed man is to wait eight days. On the eighth day a lamb is sacrificed and oil is sprinkled on the man. Then the priest says, “Go, you are clean.”
Can’t you see the man rushing home? Word has gone before him. He is now wearing clean cloths and looks like a brand new man. His children jump into his arms crying out with joy, “Abba! Abba! – “Daddy! Daddy! He kisses them and his wife. They dance and sing and he tells them the story of meeting Jesus.
In spite of what Jesus said, this man couldn’t stop talking about Jesus. Luke 5:15, “Yet the news about him spread all the more, so the crowds of people came to hear him and to be healed of their sicknesses.”
III. Hope Gives A Fulfilling Future
“Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. ‘I am willing,’ he said, ‘I will, be clean!’ And immediately the leprosy left him.” Luke 5:13
When the leper was healed he had a renewal of hope. He now faced the future with joy and enthusiasm.
Hope keeps us moving forward. Without hope life loses it meaning. The feeling of hopelessness can be devastating.
Who would have thought that a rugged, strong willed, powerful, passionate and determined man like Peter would lose hope for the future?
Peter had promised Jesus that he was willing to go with Jesus to prison or even to death. Within hours after his affirmation of faith, Jesus was arrested and Peter denied his Lord three times.
When Jesus was crucified Peter’s life came to a stand still. Hope died for Peter with Jesus on the cross.
On the morning of the resurrection the women saw the empty tomb and the angel of the Lord told them to “Go tell his disciples and Peter, He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him just as he told you.” Mark 16:7 - Jesus spoke to Peter one-on-one by the Sea of Galilee. Jesus reassured Peter of His love and gave Peter his mission of teaching and preaching.
When Peter saw Jesus, his hope was restored. Peter wrote about the healing power of hope in Jesus Christ in I Peter 1:3, “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead…”
A vita faith in Jesus gives us hope for the future. A life apart from hope is a life of despair. If a person has no hope then why even look forward to the future. Hope pulls you into the future. Everyone needs to believe they have a future and a hope. Hope moves you from pessimism to optimism.
Erwin McManus, pastor of Mosaic Church in L.A. tells of two ladies that felt like taking their lives, but found a reason to live. He tells their story in his book, Soul Cravings.
One lady decided to take her life at work. She was walking to the window in the high-rise building where her company’s offices were located. She was walking down the hallway to go out a window onto the ledge. Someone met her in the hallway and asked her if she knew where the Coke machine was. It was just enough that day. Instead of pointing to the Coke machine, she showed the person the way. She said that simple act, doing something for someone else, gave her a reason to live.
Erwin McManus writes about another lady who was a dancer in Los Angeles. She had grown up in a world of divorce, drug abuse, and homelessness. At twenty years of age she could think of no good reason to life. She traveled to “Suicide Bridge” in Pasadena. She decided to end her life there. She decided to call out to God one more time, “If you have anything to say about this, God, speak now or forever hold your peace.”
She didn’t know her cell phone was on. There had been no good reason to take it with her. No one ever called. But suddenly it rang – an unexpected call. Someone needed her, had been looking for her, was wondering where she was, and what she was doing. How could she end her life when someone needed her? She had reason to life. She regained hope.
Viktor Frankl, who lived during World War II, was one of the many Jews put in a Nazi concentration camp. He was one of the few Jews that survived. He published a book, From Death-Camp to Existentialism in 1946, telling the lessons he learned while in prison. His main theme is this: “Hope is essential for life.” He said that “He who has a why to live can bear with almost any how.” Later his book was reprinted with a new title: Man’s Search for Meaning.
Those who survived the Nazi concentration camp overcame despair by not making sense of life, but by believing in the future. There is healing power in hope.
Hopelessness results in a life of problems.
Hope comes when you see Jesus.
Hope gives you a fulfilling future.
When the man with leprosy knelt before Jesus he gave Jesus a specific request. “Lord Jesus you can make me clean.”
The man with leprosy had faith in the ability of Jesus go heal him.
He asked Jesus for help. He was specific in his request. James 4:3 says, “You have not because you ask not.” Jesus wants us to ask, seek and knock until He answers. The answer may be “yes, no, or wait.” The Apostle Paul prayed three times before he received an answer from the Lord concerning his personal affliction. And the answer was “no.” The Lord said, “My grace is sufficient for you.”
When we pray we need to pray with proper motives. James 4:3 continues, “You ask, and receive not, because you ask amiss, that you may consume it upon your lusts.” Selfish, self-centered prayers are not answered.
Jesus tells us to not give up on praying. Luke 11:9-10, “So I tell you, keep on asking, and the gift will be given to you, keep on seeking, and you will find; keep on knocking, and the door will be open to you. For everyone who keeps on asking, receives; and the one who keep on seeking finds; and to the one who keep on knocking, the door will be open.”
We are going to conclude the worship service today with special prayer for healing. Our basis for healing prayer is found in James 5:13-15, “Is any one of you in trouble? He should pray. Is any happy? Let him sing songs of praise. Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church to pray over him, and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven.”
Invitation for healing prayer at the altar
Write on a 3/5 card found in the worship folder your specific prayer for healing and bring it to the altar.
