Obstacles to Healing
Series: Markers Along the Narrow Way
November 4, 2012
READ Mark 2:1-12
So a few days later, after Jesus had called his 1st disciples (1st of many…you included)…AFTER He had already driven out an evil spirit with authority that no one had ever seen before…AFTER he had healed many at Simon Peter’s house…(including Peters mother-in-law)...He comes back to his home base in Capernaum and the word of his arrival spreads like wild-fire! Back then, life in a small town was very public. They lit. had an open-door policy, and you were welcome to walk in whenever you wanted. And so people started cramming in to the place where Jesus was speaking.
Of course not only were they there to hear him preach, but they wanted to be healed of their diseases. If Jesus was in town and you had the chance of having your sickness healed (back problems, knees, cancer, skin conditions etc.) would you go? Sure you would! Unfortunately, there were some “Johnny Come Lately’s” who had heard what was going on and had carried their crippled friend to Jesus…but they couldn’t get near him. Yet, that didn’t stop them! Very determined bunch! No, instead of using the front door, they climbed up the side stairs that led to the roof-top. (People liked to hang out up there at night even sleep, like an extra room). They began to open up a hole. (Explain roof construction) As they peeled away the layers of palm branch and mud eventually made a hole big enough for their friend to fit through.
Meanwhile, Jesus is teaching in the room below…when all the sudden He hears some noise above His head. Roofing material falls from ceiling and 4 men poke their heads through the hole and look around. They spot Jesus, (& without even asking permission), they start lowering their friend down on a stretcher. Now I’ve had some pretty crazy interruptions while I’ve been preaching before, (people falling, going to bathroom, nursing home example…Lady: “Shut up!”) but this one takes the cake!
Whether he wanted it or not, the owner of this house just got a new skylight in his home! He might have been a little upset…but Jesus was impressed! In fact in all 3 gospels say that…”Jesus saw their faith”. Jesus loved it when people would show tangible faith! Now put yourself in the place of the paralytic, if you’d just crashed the party and were lowered down into the middle of a crowed room, how would you feel? I can tell you how I’d feel… embarrassed! I’d feel a little fearful, a little anxious, wondering what Jesus’ reaction would be.
But Jesus doesn’t bat an eye…he just looks at him and says…”Son, your sins are forgiven”. Kind of a strange thing to say isn’t it? I mean, what if went into doctor for a physical condition wanting to be cured and instead of prescribing medicine to you, he looks at you and says…”Your sins are forgiven?” I think I might be a little offended! I’d say, “Doc, I didn’t come here to get your moral judgment…I came to get well!” I mean, what does sickness have to do with sin? Well, in many cases…a lot. (Stress, bitterness and guilt have been linked to all kinds of physical ailments…from cancer, to heart problems, to headaches…you name it. There IS a link between spiritual, emotional and physical disease.
But especially in the minds of people back then. In Jesus day, people kind of assumed that if you were sick, you’d committed some kind of a sin (whether you had of not). In fact a popular Rabbi saying stated, “There is no sick man healed of his sickness until all his sins have been forgiven him.” We see that attitude in the words of Jobs friends. It was just assumed that a sick man was someone that God was angry with.
But Jesus wasn’t angry with this man…he was just being honest with him. In his case, there WAS a sin issue that was causing his paralysis, and so he dealt with it!
Seems pretty straightforward…but wait just a minute! We have another problem! The “teachers of the law”. These were the ‘sin police’ of their day. It was their job to make sure the people lived according to the O.T. law and to be on the lookout for any false prophets who deviated from their theological view points. So they were sent out as a kind of ‘scouting party’ to check up on Jesus and make sure he didn’t do or say anything heretical. After all, he was gaining a lot of influence with people and they had to make sure he wasn’t leading them astray.
And when they heard Jesus say to this paralytic …”Your sins are forgiven!”…their alarms went off! They thought, “Whoops! There you go Jesus! You just stepped in it!” I mean to claim to forgive sins was something only God to do, and so to say that you could do that…was a claim to be God. Which of course was blasphemy and according to Lev.24:16 punishable with death by stoning.
Now vs. 8 is very interesting because Marks records that Jesus’ reacts to their hidden thoughts! HA! I mean they hadn’t even voiced their concerns yet, but the bible tells us that “Jesus knew in his spirit what they were thinking in their hearts!” Do you know anyone who can read the thoughts in your mind and heart before you can even express it? I don’t! There are some magicians and psychics who might claim to be able to do that…but they’re just using cheap parlor tricks. No, the only person in the universe who can know my thoughts according to the bible is God Himself! Ps.139:1-2 says, You have searched me, Lord, and you know me.2 You know when I sit and when I rise; you perceive my thoughts from afar.” Only God knows our hearts! In fact, He knows what you’re thinking right now! (“I’m bored”, “Can’t wait to watch that game today”, “What’s this guys point?”) My point is this…here these teachers are accusing Jesus of blasphemy because he’s claiming to be God, and He’s doing something only God can do by reading their thoughts! How ironic! And so Jesus calls them out! “Why are you thinking these things?” What? Who me? Jesus says, “Yeah…I’m talking to you! Let me ask you this…what’s easier to SAY…”Your sins are forgiven” OR “Get up, take your mat and walk?”
What do you think? Which one of those statements is easier to SAY? (pause) Well, obviously, you can SAY anything…you can SAY the moon is made out of cheese…but it’s backing it up, that’s the hard part! Right? It’s EASY to say…”your sins are forgiven”. Anybody can say that! But it’s hard to back it up. So because sin and sickness were closely related in their minds…if you want to put some money where your mouth is and actually PROVE that the sin is forgiven…you’ll say…”Get up and walk!”
The healing would prove that the forgiveness actually took place. So…that’s what Jesus does! He looks the bewildered cripple straight into his eyes and says to him…”Get up…take your mat and go home!”. And to the amazement of everyone watching…that’s exactly what he does! Jesus proves the forgiveness of this man’s sins by healing his sickness.
By the teachers of the laws own belief that man could not be cured unless he was forgiven. He was cured, therefore he must have been forgiven! Jesus proved to them that He was God! Now listen…contrary to popular belief…Gods attitude towards sin isn’t to judge or condemn it…He wants to forgive it! The condemnation and judgment only kick in if you refuse to admit the sin and hold onto it! Jesus’ lesson that day wasn’t so much about physical healing as it was about spiritual healing! He lit. brought God’s forgiveness to earth.
Now was forgiveness free? Ask this man. Yes…to HIM it was free, but eventually Jesus knew that for every sin he forgave, a price would have to be paid…and HE would have to pay it. His crucifixion would soon show that grace and forgiveness aren’t cheap. It’s free to us…but it would cost Him His life! As the teachers of the law were left grumbled to themselves, the fact remains… Jesus had proved that His words weren’t just empty phrases…He really had power to DO what He said He would do! To not only heal the body, but heal the soul!
Did this guy ask to have his sins forgiven? NO! He didn’t come asking for forgiveness, He came expecting healing. Right? We’re just like this guy! We’re more interested in our external symptoms than we are in our internal causes. We’re more concerned about the problems going on around us (our health, our finances, our relationships) than we are with the problems going on inside us! But Jesus has this annoying way of always looking beneath the surface in our lives, looking into our hearts. He’s always digging deeper trying to get us to deal with the real problems in our lives. The problems we want to ignore!
• We want him to heal our bodies…He wants to heal our hearts.
• We want Him to remove that difficult person… He wants to deal with our fear of confrontation.
• We want him to heal us of our addictions… He wants to deal with our emotional wounds.
Jesus looks at this man and sees that not only is he physically paralyzed but He’s spiritually paralyzed! He was paralyzed by his past, (just like some of you are). I know people can’t get on with their future because they’re stuck in the past…(either by guilt over things they’ve done, or resentment over things other people have done to them). So Jesus deals with the real issue here. He says “Friend, your sins are forgiven.” Did you know that most of the world is dying to hear those 3 simple words? – “You are forgiven”. Why? Because we’ve all blown it! We’ve all messed up! We’ve all made mistakes. None of us is perfect. So we all need forgiveness. Of all the paralyzing emotions…I can’t think of a worse one than guilt! Guilt robs you of your energy, your strength. It steals your joy and it destroys relationships. I wonder how many marriages have been destroyed by guilt? Did you know that guilt has a destructive physical effect on your body? Studies have shown that 50% of the people in hospital beds right now are there because of a stress related illness. Primarily for unresolved guilt or anger. Don’t misunderstand, I'm not saying that all sickness is caused by guilt, but a lot of it is! Our bodies weren’t meant to carry a load of guilt.
You say, “Should a follower of Jesus Christ ever feel guilty?” Yes… for about 10 seconds! That’s about how long it should take you to recognize you blew it, confess it to God, & say, “Forgive me Lord! I want to change!.” Whoever said that God wants you carrying around a burden of guilt all the time? Jesus Christ came to ease your fears and eliminate your guilt. That’s what the cross is all about. Here’s the truth. All of us have blown it. We’re all imperfect. I don't measure up to my own standards much less God’s. We all need to know how Jesus Christ forgives. The Bible is very clear that He forgives us in at least 3 ways…
1. Jesus forgives me INSTANTLY.
In Isaiah 55:7 “God is merciful and quick to forgive.” [Circle “quick”] God’s quick to forgive. It doesn’t say, “I want you to suffer a little while and then I’ll forgive you.” That’s the way you & I like to forgive people, but that’s not the way God forgives.
2. Jesus forgives me COMPLETELY
That means He forgives every sin in your life. Notice this verse in Colossians 2: “He has forgiven all your sins. He has utterly wiped out the evidence of broken commandments which always hung over our heads and He has completely annulled it by nailing it to the cross.” You say, “Well, which of my sins did Jesus Christ die for?” All of them! Even the ones that you didn’t know were sins! Even the ones you committed in ignorance. They were all forgiven – completely. This vs. says “wiped out, annulled” When God wipes out a sin, He not only forgives it He completely annuls it. Jer.31:34 says that Once He forgives them, He chooses not to “remember our sins anymore”. Now, that doesn’t mean that He comes down with a divine case of amnesia! If when God forgives us it means that he lit. has no memory of those events, then we got ourselves a theological problem, because that would mean you and I know things God’s not aware of, and that there are stories in the bible that because He forgave…He can’t remember. No, when that verse says, He “remembers our sins no more”…it means that He treats us as if it never happened! Here’s the point. If Jesus Christ doesn’t hold it against you anymore…if He wipes it out and annuls it…don’t you think you should?
And then 3rdly… When Jesus forgives me…
3. He forgives me FREELY
In other words, you’ll never be able to earn it. You’ll never be able to deserve it. God’s forgiveness is a gift. Notice this verse in Romans 3 “God says He will accept us and acquit us and declare us not guilty if we trust Jesus Christ to take away our sin no matter who we are or what we’ve been like.” I love that last phrase in the Living Bible. It says, “no matter who we are or what we’ve been like.” That includes all of us! Jesus looks at this man who’s physically paralyzed and He sees a deeper wound. It’s guilt from a past sin. And notice He doesn’t minimize the guilt – “Don’t worry! It’s no big deal,”… because it is a big deal when you sin. He didn’t minimize it. He eliminated it. AND HE WANTS TO DO THE SAME THING FOR YOU!!! Take your deepest, darkest, most secret sin today and I want you to hear Jesus’ words to you this morning…”Your sins are forgiven!”
It is so important that you understand that Jesus Christ forgives instantly, completely and freely. Because if you don’t… every time something bad happens in your life you’re going to start thinking, “God’s getting even with me.” God’s punishing me for what I did.” No, He’s not! The Bible says if you’ve given your life to Jesus Christ, He took the punishment for all your sins on the cross, not just some of them! Think about it…why would God punish you, if Jesus Christ was already punished for you? Not only would that be double jeopardy, but it’d be a waste of his death on the cross! Just like Jesus wasn’t mad at this paralytic for interrupting his message…he’s not mad at you when you come to Him and say, “I want to be changed.”
Now some of you don’t believe that Jesus can forgive sin and eliminate guilt. You don’t believe you can be forgiven. You believe you have to live with that stuff, and suffer the rest of your life! If that’s you…you’re just like the teachers of the law! But here’s what Jesus wants you to know this morning…You don’t have to live with your guilt! Even if there were no such thing as heaven, (which there is!) it would be worth becoming a Christian just to have a clear conscious. He forgives completely, instantly and freely. When I think about myself, (knowing me like I do) …I’m amazed that God would love and forgive a heart like mine.
Now even though the lesson this morning is really more about forgiveness of sin…Let’s talk about faith and healing for a minute, cause there’s a lot of confusion about it…If this guy was supposed to be healed by faith that Jesus would heal him…then he failed miserably. But notice it wasn’t HIS faith that healed him…it was his friends faith! The bible says that when Jesus saw THEIR faith. Whose faith? The 4 guys who just lowered him through the roof! When you look at this story closely, you realize that faith has more to do with obedience than anything else. See, the word ‘faith’ in our bibles
• doesn’t have anything to do with loud proclamations, or having a powerful imagination.
• It doesn’t have anything to do with mind over matter, positive thinking or even getting rid of that microscopic particle of doubt in your mind.
• It has nothing to do with “feelings”…and everything to do with OBEDIENCE.
In fact, when you read the stories of men and women of great faith in the bible…you don’t go away thinking…Wow! What great positive thinking skills they had!” In fact, if anything you go away thinking…”Wow! They’re so filled with doubt, and obvious weaknesses …how did God ever work in them?” Answer? They obeyed. They did the “little thing” God told them to do and then trusted Him with the outcome.
Jesus asked this guy to do the very thing he’d been unable to do his entire life. He could have asked him to do all kinds of different things… He could have told him to quote scripture. He could have told him to fix the roof! But He asked him to do the 1 thing he’d never been able to do in his life. Remember… this guy was an invalid. Have you ever had to care for an invalid? He’s been a shut-in his whole life. If He wanted to go somewhere he had to be carried there. They didn’t have little scooters back then! So he was totally dependent on others. And Jesus looks at him and says, “I want you to stand up, take your mat …and get out of here! You’re healed.”
Now why in the world would Jesus ask him to do the impossible? Because He wanted to stretch his faith. Most of us have this faith thing all mixed up in our minds. See,
• Faith isn’t something you believe. No. Faith is something you do!
• Faith isn’t just something you think about. It’s something you act on!
• Faith isn’t simply an belief, a philosophy or even a conviction. Faith is an activity!
It’s trusting & obeying God, doing what He says to do (even if you don’t know how it’s all going to work out). And trusting God with the outcome! Think about it, if you knew how it was going to work out… it wouldn’t be faith!
What’s God asking you to do this morning, that looks impossible? Whatever it is… you need to know that God is testing your faith. He’s saying, “This situation is a test. Are you going to believe Me? Are you going to trust Me? Are you going to place your faith in Me? Or are you just going to lie there, and be an invalid all your life?” See, if you’re like most people, you have areas in your life that you’d like to change. Areas that are under your control to change, but a long time ago, you gave up on yourself. You decided in your heart, “It’s too hard!”, or “It’s too impossible, I can’t do it! It’ll never happen!”
Again, I’m talking about things that are under you’re control. There was a time I wanted to be 6’ 3, but no matter how much I prayed I’m never going to be that tall. That’s not under my control…that’s in God’s control. But there are many things in your life that ARE under your control …you’ve just decided they’re too hard.
• I’ll never be able to lose weight.
• I’ll never be able to overcome this habit…
• I’ll never be able to recover from that failure... ...
• I’ll never be able to love again…
• I'm never going to become what I’ve always wanted to be…
• I can never forgive that person who hurt me.”
If you believe that…you’re right! Because you’re emotionally paralyzed. That’s why you need Jesus Christ! Jesus said, “Without God it is utterly impossible… but with God everything is possible.” Listen…your greatest need is not for relief of your problems. Your greatest need is to see how big God really is, to understand the greatness and love and majesty and forgiveness of God.
That’s exactly what the paralytic had to do. Even though it was humanly impossible for him, if Jesus said He could do it…He could do it! He took Jesus’ words at face value, and against all rational or reason…He stood up! Listen… when God asks you to do something that seems humanly impossible, He gives you the power to do it. After Jesus said, “Get up”, …the very second he decided to get up…God gave him the power to walk! And God will give you the power to do whatever He asks you to do. What change in your life seems impossible? Are you in a relationship right now that’s dying before your eyes (and you can’t stop it)? You feel powerless, hopeless and helpless? Are you consumed with some painful memories that you can’t forgive (or even forget)? Are you stuck in a habit that you’ve tried many, many times to change…and you can’t? Jesus Christ specializes in those kinds of situations. He’s the God of the impossible.
In many ways every one of us in this room are like this paralyzed man. Whether it’s depression, worry, guilt, fear or indecision…if you’re unable to move past it… you’re paralyzed!!! And you need to have the power that only Jesus can give you to get off your mat… and walk! Jesus is telling you right now, today… GET UP! Can you hear Him? But if you don’t ACT on it, knowledge alone isn’t going to help you! It makes no difference that Jesus Christ will forgive you instantly, completely and freely…if you don’t accept it, and act on it. So what you need to do today are the 3 things that this paralyzed man did:
1. He turned to Jesus Christ. We’re just like he was…unable to move and utterly reliant on God to help us.
2. Like the paralyzed man, you must believe that Jesus Christ can and will help you change.
3. You DO whatever He tells you to do even if it seems impossible. When Jesus looked at this man & said, “I want you to get up right now. I want you to take up your mat. And I want you to leave this room because you’ve been healed. “ That was impossible. But He did it. And the moment he decided to do it, as soon as he stood up, his legs and his arms were filled with strength he’d never had in his life. He did what he’d never done before. Question: What would have happened if this man hadn’t done what Jesus said to do? What if he’d just come to Jesus and believed that He could and would heal…but he didn’t ACT on that belief? I’ll tell you what would have happened. NOTHING! He would have been carried out of that house on a mat! But when your faith meets Jesus’ power… amazing things happen!
So what about you? Are you going to go home today, lie down on your mat in front of the TV and say…“Boy, that was a good message! Too bad it doesn’t apply to my situation. My situation is too difficult. Too tough. Too impossible. I wish it did!” If that’s your attitude, don’t expect anything from God! Listen: Don’t spend another wasted week, paralyzed…laying around, wishing you could move ahead in your life. You might get some sympathy…but that’s not what you need… you need the courage to get up off your mat and do what Jesus is telling you to do! On the otherhand, you might be like this young man, you’re tired of lying on your mat…you’re ready to get out of the rut, and you want Jesus Christ to change you… NOW is your time! In the name of Jesus… I want to say to you this morning…GET UP! TAKE YOUR MAT… AND WALK!
