“…Ministry That Heals Hurts,…”
Matthew 8:1-7
July 29, 2001
Introduction
I don’t know if it’s pride, or just a sense of being awed by the fact that God would use someone like me, but I like to tell people that I’m a minister.
Maybe it’s because I’m a walking testimony to the fact that God can use absolutely anybody who will allow himself to be made usable.
I like telling people that I’m “in the ministry.”
The danger with talking like that, however, is it reinforces a faulty notion. And that notion is that “ministry” is for the professionals.
It’s faulty because nowhere in Scripture will you find ministry being defined that way. In fact, Scripture is filled with the idea that all who call themselves Christians are to be involved in ministry, and it is one of the stated purposes of this particular church.
Please take your bulletins one more time and read aloud with me our purpose statement printed there on the front.
Our purpose is to bring unchurched people into God’s family, and to offer worship that lifts up God, ministry that heals hurts, a home for fellowship, and instruction in Christian living.
Today, in our series of messages based on our statement of purpose here at Aberdeen Wesleyan Church, we are going to discuss ministry that heals hurts.
In doing that I want us to examine a portion of Scripture that illustrates a bit of how Jesus did ministry.
Before we get into the passage, I want to make an effort to define what ministry really is, so we will be on the same page, so to speak, about what it is we are discussing.
The purpose statement gives us a clue to what ministry is about. It says, “ministry that heals hurts.” And I think that is a fine definition, because it covers a rather broad spectrum.
There are emotional hurts, mental hurts, spiritual hurts, and physical hurts.
The dictionaries basically define ministering as not necessarily doing professional clergy duties, but rather “bringing aid.”
The idea of ministry is not being a “high and mighty professional” minister, it is people, hopefully including the “professionals,” getting involved in the lives of people, to bring aid and comfort, both within the family of God and outside it.
At its most basic level, ministry is helping hurting people.
And my hope this morning is that after looking at how Jesus acted, you will be desirous of extending the same type of ministry to others.
With that, please turn with me to Matthew 8:1-17, which can be found on page 686 of the Bibles in the seats.
Please follow along as read:
When he came down from the mountainside, large crowds followed him. 2 A man with leprosy came and knelt before him and said, "Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean."
3 Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. "I am willing," he said. "Be clean!" Immediately he was cured of his leprosy. 4 Then Jesus said to him, "See that you don’t tell anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded, as a testimony to them."
When Jesus had entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, asking for help. 6 "Lord," he said, "my servant lies at home paralyzed and in terrible suffering."
7 Jesus said to him, "I will go and heal him."
8 The centurion replied, "Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed. 9 For I myself am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. I tell this one, `Go,’ and he goes; and that one,`Come,’ and he comes. I say to my servant, `Do this,’ and he does it."
Skip down to verse 13.
13 Then Jesus said to the centurion, "Go! It will be done just as you believed it would." And his servant was healed at that very hour.
When Jesus came into Peter’s house, he saw Peter’s mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever. 15 He touched her hand and the fever left her, and she got up and began to wait on him.
16 When evening came, many who were demon-possessed were brought to him, and he drove out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick. 17 This was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah:
"He took up our infirmities
and carried our diseases."
First, let’s briefly note the three…
I. Episodes
And First, let’s look at…
A. The Leper.
Here Jesus ministers to a man with the most terrible affliction known to the Jews, or anybody really, at that time, leprosy.
Leprosy is basically a nerve disease, and one of its manifestations is the killing of nerves so you feel no pain. This allows you to injure yourself and not even know it. Rotting flesh and disfigurement often accompanied leprosy.
The next episode concerns…
B. The Centurion’s Servant.
In this case, the ministry of Jesus did not include touch. Isn’t that interesting. Sometimes ministry can be done from a distance. That tells you something about the power of a God who is not shackled by time and space.
Next, let’s look at the last episode, involving…
C. Peter’s mother-in-law, others.
You’ve got to wonder, “Did the guy ever get tired?” I mean, here’s a guy who just spent a good bit of time preaching the Sermon on the Mount, heals a leper, walks to Capernaum and immediately comes across someone else needing healing for someone, and Jesus offers to go there, but ends up not needing to, then is in a situation where he has to heal a guy’s mother-in-law.
And after he does that, a bunch of other people start coming over needing deliverance from demon possession, and sickness.
Give the guy a break, why don’t you?
But we never hear Him complain. Instead, He jumps on the opportunity to minister.
Why? Because He never got tired? No, He got tired a lot. But it was an opportunity to show the love of God in a tangible way.
What’s my point in discussing these three episodes?
Basically it was to set the table for section II, the…
II. Principles
What can we learn from these three incidents about Christ’s ministering to people?
Jesus illustrates 3 principles that I want you to grasp firmly. The first is that ministry is…
A. Focused outward.
Jesus did not do these healings so people would flock to Him. He never advertised Himself, and often commanded those healed to talk to no one about it.
He did it because the people needed it. It’s that simple. There was a need, and He was able to meet it.
Philippians 2:3-4 says this:
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. 4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.
Scripture is full of admonitions to look not at yourself, but at others. Scripture has two focuses – God and others.
And Jesus modeled it here, when he told the man to simply offer the appropriate sacrifice as commanded by Moses.
You simply cannot have long-term effective ministry if the idea is to make you look good.
Secondly, ministry…
B. Reaches the unlovable.
Ministry cannot be confined to our comfort zones.
If you get serious about entering into ministry that heals hurts, you will find yourself in situations that are unfamiliar and uncomfortable.
In an effort to help us see some of the modern application of this passage, I want us to take another look at the people healed.
First,
1. Lepers – unclean
In the episode of the healing of the leper, Jesus not only ministered physically, he ministered socially.
Aside from the physical torment involved, leprosy carried an enormous social stigma. If you were a leper you had to live in a place outside the city gates in a leper’s colony, and if you encountered anyone, you were required to call out, “Unclean! Unclean!”
I am going to take the time to read a rather lengthy passage from a book called Just Like Jesus, by Max Lucado.
(read)
Leprosy is still around, by the way. The disease is still out there, but we tend to look at others as if they were lepers as well.
Homeless people. Alcoholics. Punkers.
Homosexuals, esp. if they have HIV. Unwed mothers. Welfare recipients. Ethnic minorities. How about ethnic minorities that are punkers?
Am I hitting home yet?
How about drug addicts. The disabled. The dying. Those of a different faith such as Islam, Judaism, or Buddhism.
Sinners, yes. Lepers, no.
We tend to shy away from people who we think might soil our clothes if they get too close.
We would do well to remember that before we came to Christ our own righteousness was like filthy rags before God.
I’m guilty – and I pray that God will continue to break me as He has been doing lately.
There is a story of a young hippie who gave his life to Christ during the Jesus Movement of the late sixties and early seventies.
One Sunday he went to a church, not knowing it was one of the more “upper class” churches in the area.
He was late to the service, and the pastor was about to begin the message. As he walked in, he saw that the place was packed and he could not find a place to sit. So, not knowing any better, he sat down on the floor in front of the platform where the pastor was standing.
Well, you can guess what kind of reaction he caused, although people were quiet about it. Everyone was wondering how the pastor was going to handle the situation, and how they were going to get rid of this unmannered young man.
After what seemed like an eternity, an elderly gentleman rose from his seat and headed down the aisle toward the young man.
“Finally, we’ll get some action. He’ll tell this guy what’s what, and we’ll be done with him.”
Everyone held their breath as they waited to hear how the old man would tell the hippie to leave.
The old man bent over as if to talk to the young man, then bent his knees, and sat down next to the young man, worshiping with him for the rest of the service.
He saw past the social barrier and saw the heart of the matter.
God, work that in us as well!!
Next, look again at the…
2. Centurion – enemies
Here, Jesus ministered not only physically, but also politically.
If you remember, Israel in Jesus’ time was under Roman rule. This centurion was a Roman soldier.
He might as well have been the devil himself to the Israelites. Rome was no friend to Israel, and here was a warrior of Rome asking the Jewish rabbi for help.
What was Jesus’ response? It certainly wasn’t the response most would have given.
I think most would have said something like, “Look, buddy. You Romans believe your emperor is some kind of god, go pray to him and leave Jesus alone! He doesn’t have time for the likes of you.”
But Jesus doesn’t say that. Rather, he exemplifies something He had just said earlier in the Sermon on the Mount.
Something about loving your enemies and praying for those who persecute you.
Funny, He’s pretty consistent that way, isn’t he?
The third type of unlovable people are…
3. Strangers
In the episode involving Peter’s mother-in-law, we see that Jesus healed many who were demon-possessed as well.
He ministered not only physically, He also ministered spiritually. He reached out to the spiritual needs as well as the physical needs.
But what I want to focus on here is the fact that in all three of these incidents, Jesus ministered to strangers, with the possible exception of Peter’s mother-in-law.
Strangers are many times hard to minister to simply because they’re strangers. We don’t know how to act, what they need, or how they will react to our efforts to minister to them.
Besides, they’re…strangers.
That didn’t seem to bother Jesus much. Scripture implies that Jesus had never met most of the people before He ministered to them.
But He saw a need and ministered to them.
This last week God gave me the opportunity to do just that.
A week ago Friday I received a call from the hospital that an elderly member of our congregation was in critical condition. When I asked the name, it was someone I had never heard of, and I knew he was not a member of our church, and never had been. But sensing a need, I offered to go to the hospital.
It was obvious that the man was near death, and as I tried to converse with him, I was sure that every breath was going to be his last.
The sister from the pastoral care staff and I tried to figure out just where his church home was, but we couldn’t, so I became his pastor.
He held on for a few more days, and passed away Wed. morning. He had very little family, and so arrangements were made by a third cousin here in Aberdeen.
Yesterday I performed his funeral at the cemetery.
He was a stranger to me, yet God moved me to push aside the fact that he was not one of my “flock.” I needed to be there so he could know he wasn’t being forgotten.
Unfortunately, he died alone in the hospital, but I thank God for the chance to minister to a stranger.
I don’t say this to bring honor to me. I would rather it hadn’t happened.
I hope Jesus was honored. And I pray that when God gives you the same opportunities, you will not run, but will enter, trusting God for the wherewithal to do the job.
Please reach out to strangers.
We need to move quickly to letter C…
C. The real issue – it is Christlike
As I have already mentioned, Christ’s actions provide us with a picture of what He was like.
And if we claim to be Christians, if we claim to be called after Christ, then we need to act like He acted.
1. We act on His example.
2. We draw on His resources.
He gives us the strength and wisdom to do the work of ministry. He wants to be honored through your ministry, and He will help you to do it.
We are fast running out of time, so we need to move quickly to the last section,…
III. Hindrances
There are three main hindrances to effective ministry. The first is that you may feel…
A. Unsure/Untrained.
If you feel you aren’t up to the task, good! God won’t use someone who thinks they’ve got it all together.
However, training is available. This is one reason I am so excited about this new adult class beginning in September. Toward the end of the class, you will have the tools you need to discover just what ministry gifts God has given you, and some insight in how to use them.
If training is the issue, we can help!
The second hindrance is…
B. Pride.
I just mentioned that God won’t use someone who is too full of themselves, whether because of haughtiness or a self-image that is too low.
Ask God to give you a grasp of what it means to see yourself as God sees you, and you will go along way toward being effective in ministry to the hurting.
The last hindrance is…
C. Bitterness/Unforgiveness.
This may or may not be toward the person or persons who need your ministering.
If you are harboring bitterness in your heart toward anyone, it will keep you from being effective in ministry.
You cannot really meet the heart-needs of others if your heart is cold.
Forgive and be free. I’m not saying forget – I’m saying forgive and move on. Don’t be a slave to past hurts.
I’m going to get very personal for just a moment, though I promise not to name any names from this congregation.
Some of you are still hurting from the situation of your pastor leaving here seven years ago. Your hurt is genuine, and I don’t want to belittle it.
However, seven years is a little long to be nursing a grudge, don’t you think? And I’ve seen it in some of your faces when discussing it.
Bitterness has taken root, and it is squeezing the life out of you.
Folks, if you want my opinion, my guess is that one of the main reasons we haven’t had to worry about building a sanctuary is because bitterness has gotten in the way of compassion, and that has kept us out of the game.
The enemy is thrilled to see Christians feeding that root of bitterness, especially if it is against other members of the Body of Christ.
I challenge you to pray for that pastor. Choke off the root of bitterness by starving it. Then allow God to yank it out by the bottom and experience the freedom that comes from forgiveness.
I received a bulletin in the mail from him this week, and it reminded me to pray for him.
“That’s easy for you to say, Pastor, you weren’t here!”
I know. But I also know that bitterness and anger have no place in the body of Christ.
In the Bible, the land was supposed to be given a rest every seven years as a Sabbath for the land.
Why don’t you give your bitterness to God and let Him give you a “Sabbath” from the heartache?
Conclusion
Ministry is focused outward, it reaches the unlovable, and it is Christ-like.
May God grant that we will be ministers of His love and grace, so that those who are hurting may see the love of God, and be so attracted to it that they respond with their lives to His saving grace.
Shall we pray.
Offering
Hymn #68 O To Be Like Thee
