The Women who Supported Jesus' Ministry
Luke 8:1-3
Sometimes, a passage of Scripture gets overlooked because it is seen as simple background information to the narrative. This is true of the passage we read this morning. At first it seems to act as a transition from the story of Simon the Pharisee, and the woman who came in and washed Jesus’ feet with her tears and then wiped his feet with her hair and the Parable of the Sower, both of which are commonly preached. These verses are seen as telling what happened between these two stories in a very brief summary. In other words, these verses serve to add continuity to the Gospel. However, we should realize that as Paul tells Timothy, “All Scripture is God breathed and is profitable.” (2 Timothy 3:16) If we keep this in mind, then we can see how profound this short passage is. So let us now examine the text to see what it teaches us.
The first thing it mentions is that Jesus preached the Gospel in every city and village. There is much talk in evangelical circles about the early church centering on the large population centers in the important cities in the Empire. From there, the message spread out to the villages. There is a tension between the city and the small villages. Cities are important, but villages are not particularly esteemed. Villagers were considered superstitious and boorish. In Latin, villagers were called “pagani” from which we get “Pagan.” We see the contempt the leaders in Jerusalem called Peter, John and the other Apostles uneducated and stupid as they came from the Galilean villages. (Acts 4:13). The religious leaders of the Jews despised these common people calling them “am ha-aretz) which means “People of the Land.” This condescending attitude is expressed by them in John 7:49 in that these people were cursed because they were ignorant of the Law.”
One of the chief teachings of the early church is that God is no respecter of persons. (Romans 2:11, Acts 10:34, James 2:9, et al.) God does not favor one groups of persons over another, the educated and the uneducated, men and women, master and slave, rich and poor, etc. In fact the James passage condemns showing favoritism in seating in the assembly with the rich getting the important seats and the poor being told to sit in the back of the church. This is a besetting sin in the church today to show favoritism for the big givers. Considering how many different Gospel writers along with Jesus Himself condemn this practice, we commit a gross sin against the body of Christ and of the Lord. Away with the idea of letting the rich come in the front door while the poor line up at the back door of the church to get a biscuit or a handout. We leave the outcasts of society outside like the lame man at the beautiful gate in Acts 3. there he begged alms. But as a cripple, he was never allowed to come into the Temple. But this man needed something more than silver or gold. He was instead healed. Now he could enter the Temple, which he did, lea[ing and jumping and praising God. We read in this text that Jesus preached the Gospel in all the villages as well as the cities. Everyone is important in the eyes of God. The true need that everyone needs is to have the Gospel preached to them.
Even though we place emphasis on the main population centers like Jerusalem, Antioch, Ephesus. Corinth, and Rome, the Book of Acts also says that the villages were not neglected. When Saul of Tarsus before his conversion persecuted the church in Jerusalem, the believers were scattered like weed seed preaching the Gospel everywhere (Acts 8:4) One of these places was the village of Samaria to which Phillip the Evangelist went. This was God’s means of fulfilling Acts 1:8). Even on the way to the important Council of Jerusalem, the representatives preached Christ along the way (Acts 15:3). These are just a few examples which can be given. We might also consider Paul’s travel to the out of the way villages of Lystra and Derbe. Some saw this as a place to which Paul and Silas fled to after the uproar in Antioch of Pisidia. If that was the purpose, then it was a failure because the Jews found them, and Paul was stoned and left for dead. But what was God’s purpose for the trip. what good could come out of such a remote place.
There was a young man there who was the son of a Greek father and a Jewish mother. As a half-breed, he would have been rejected by Jew and Greek alike. His future in such a remote place was bleak in itself, at least by wordly standards. His being of mixed race would seem to be the final nail in his coffin. But what is despised by man is honored by God. When Paul and Silas first came to Lystra, they healed a man who had never walked (Acts 14:8-10). This crippled man in the remote village was as important to God as the man at eh beautiful gate in Jerusalem who had procured one of the best begging spots in Israel and had friends who brought him there every day. And God also cared for Timothy as well. Paul adopted the lad, circumcised him, and made him his junior partner in ministry. Would we have the vision of God to see potential in places which man overlooks and despises.
So far, we have only covered the first verse, and can see how rich it is. The next two verses are equally
enlightening. It mentions “certain women.” Jesus was concerned with women as well as people in remote villages. Women were often overlooked. They were generally to remain in the background. they were ruled by their husbands or their father. Not all women were oppressed by the system. Many women had good fathers or husbands. But the power of the law and society offered no protection for women from a bad father or husband. Some of the more liberal Jews would allow them to attend synagogue services, usually observing from the back of the assembly and remaining quiet. Some of the Jews did not even allow women this privilege. They were to stay home. The Palestinian Talmud even has these words: (Talmud Sotah 3:4). “A woman asks him a question and he refuses to answer her. His son, Hyrcanus tries to get his father to answer her saying that the woman's family gave large contributions -- so perhaps R' Eliezer should answer her question. That is when R' Eliezer said, "Let the words of the Torah be burnt before being handed over to women.” So at the best, women were excluded from active participation in worship, and at worse were treated with contempt.
Luke records that these “certain women” had been healed from evil spirits and sickness. Luke uses the Greek word which translates directly into English as “therapy.” He also makes distinction between women who were possessed by unclean spirits and those who were sick. It is thought that Luke was a physician, and he would know the difference. He shows familiarity with medical terms. The Greek uses a construction which emphasizes that these women were healed and remained so. This perfect construction puts the emphasis on the results which had come from the act of healing. Many women had been healed. Jesus ministered unto women as well as men.
Three of these many women are specifically named. One of these is Mary Magdalene from whom Jesus had cast out seven devils. Some think that Mary is the unnamed woman Jesus had pronounced to be healed from sin because of her faith. (Luke 7:50) Tradition has often thought that Mary was a harlot like the woman in Simon’s house, but the Scripture is silent on this. It seems best to think to list this woman as one of the many women Jesus had healed rather than associating her with Mary Magdalene. But having said this, Mary had to have been one troubled soul. Seven is a perfect number, and seven devils had been cast out of her. Yet, the emphasis should not lay upon this, but rather because of the compassion of Jesus, she was forever free from this oppression. She went from a woman with seven devils to being the first witness to Christ’s resurrection. In other words, she became the church’s first evangelist when she went back and proclaimed the risen Christ to the terrified apostles who hid behind locked doors.
The other named women were a woman named Joanna, the wife of Herod’s chief steward, Chuza and Susanna, of which we know nothing more about. David had his mighty men, but Jesus His mighty women. These women, as well as many other unnamed women who ministered to Jesus and His apostles from their substance. In other words, they helped pay the bills for the ministry of Jesus. The three named women had been healed by Jesus. Jesus had ministered unto them, and now they were ministering to Jesus’ financial needs. These women must have had some means, and women of means had much more freedom that the common women. They had their own money, and they chose to spend it to support the gospel. The needs of Jesus must have been considerable. He had seventy men whom He had sent out to proclaim the word. Other than the incident where Jesus told Peter to catch a fish which had a shekel in His mouth with which Jesus commanded it be used to pay the half-shekel temple tax fro Peter and Himself (Matthew 17:24-26), Jesus never used His privilege as the Son of God to minister to Himself. He refused to turn the stones into bread to feed His hunger (Luke 4:3-4). Instead, He allowed people to minister to His needs, including these women.
What ties this passage together is that Jesus cared for everyone, and did not just cater to the rich. Village people need the Gospel, and women need the Gospel and to be ministered unto as much as city folk. Women needed to be healed physically and spiritually as much as men. The second unity is that God used many of these people whom men thought unworthy of personal care to respond to the ministry by doing ministry in return. In the case of these women, it was to minister directly to Jesus and His band of disciples of their substance. In most other cases. ministry is rendered back to support the ministers of the Gospel who have given up wordly goals and ambitions to proclaim the Gospel. The ministry of thanks-giving is also rendered to the poor and other needs, first within the congregation, but also to those outside as a witness to Jesus Christ. There is a place for the ministry of women. There is a place for the Timothys as well. We need to consider this as were conduct our ministries in the church.
