[AI translation] The story is such that we should not talk about every sentence, but about every word. Unfortunately, we would not have time. Let me therefore try to highlight the most important words, to underline some of the more significant ones, so that the Word itself speaks to us more emphatically!It begins, "When He came down from the mountain, a great multitude followed Him." Mt8,1 What a wonderful magnet Jesus was! Just as a magnet attracts iron to itself, so that it can only be removed by force, so the Lord attracts people. Wherever he went, people followed him, to hear what he said, to see what he did. And here let me ask you at once, have you ever felt this drawing power of the Lord? Has He ever drawn you after Him to follow Him? Has He drawn you into an inner communion with Him? I don't know, but one thing is certain, the Lord has tried to draw you to Himself, because He wants all men to come to the knowledge of the truth. It may have been a sickness when the Lord called and drew you. When you have been forced to be in silence, when you have been left out of all the noise, occupation, and amusement of the noisy world, and on sleepless nights you have been forced to hear the blessed call, as it has said quietly, Give me your heart, for what will be with you in eternity? Do you remember how the Lord drew you to Himself then?
Or someone very dear to you died, and you felt as if everything inside you had been shattered. You didn't notice, as if a hand reached out and a warm voice called to you: "Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." Mt11,28
Or you were without a job, you didn't know what to do with your time, you couldn't find your place. Did you feel that maybe it was so that you could finally have time to take care of things that you had not been able to do because of your busy work? Questions such as: what about your salvation, how are you dealing with your sins, is your spirit still alive in you? Perhaps God has given you this compulsive silence to remind you of the great questions of your life that have been neglected!
Jesus is drawing you! Like the multitudes of old! And if you have felt the pull of this wonderful magnet, the search for His grace: let Him, let Him find you! There may have been a lot of things involved in your coming here now, but in all the events that have led to your being here: feel the Lord's attraction, his personal and personal call. You are here because the Lord has brought you here, and because the Lord has something to say to you here!
His very first message is very devastating. This is how this verse continues, "And behold, an intestate came." Mt8,2a Just think of the misery and the pain that is in that word: "leper"! The one who began to suffer from this dreadful disease was the son of death, the one who was irredeemably a son of death, the one who witnessed the slow disintegration of his own body. And there was no hope, no deliverance, no help! He who had enteric fever was hopelessly lost!
And it was not only that he himself had become the betrothed of death, he was infected. It spread by touch, by touch. That is why such a man had to be cut off from his environment. He had to live somewhere outside the city. And when they came near other people, perhaps to beg for a piece of bread, they had to shout from afar: I am unclean! I am unclean!
How horrible it must have been when someone discovered a little wound like a leprosy on you. At first, perhaps, he was as most of us would be, not daring to think at once of the worst. He secretly hoped that it might not be the worst of it, but what a devastating discovery it must have been when it became clear that it was the worst of it! Then there was no more mercy: without a single good-bye kiss or handshake he had to leave home, to go out among the people, to a deserted country! The pain, suffering, and misery that enteric leprosy brings upon a man are unspeakable!
And now, truly, it is no rhetorical exaggeration, but a bitter reality, for the Word of God reveals to us - that all men suffer by nature from this murderous disease. Though not a physical, but a spiritual intestinal leprosy. And it is no better than the physical! For bodily leprosy leads to bodily death, and spiritual leprosy to eternal death, unless some help comes, unless some miracle happens! This constipation of the soul is sin! There is no other thing in the world that so expresses the essence, the effect, the danger, the hopelessness, the consequence of sin, as intestinal leprosy! Unfortunately, we have all inherited this misery!
Have you ever made the terrible discovery that you are hellish? It is here as with the body: one fights to the end against this discovery. Of course there are certain minor problems, it must be admitted. After all, we all have our weaknesses and faults, they say, we are not angels after all! But to be a downright lost sinner: that's not possible! Well, I have always been a good man, no one can really say anything against me, I have always been a man of honour and integrity. Am I mentally intestinal? Would my condition be so hopeless, so lost, so doomed? Impossible!
But I am, and that is why it is important to come to this terrible realization, because until I know how terribly wrong I am, I cannot cry out for help, I cannot even call the doctor! And yet, if the doctor who alone can cure intestinal constipation doesn't come to my aid, I am lost and you are lost, whoever you are. Oh, if you would only hear and acknowledge that you are a bowel leper too! Don't take my word for it! Retire to your inner room and ask the Lord God Himself in silent prayer, tell Him: Lord, I heard today that I am a leper. Is that possible? Am I also a lost sinner? Is it possible?
I know what the Lord will answer. He will say: Yes, it is true! And perhaps it will be a terrifying hour for you when you will recognize in yourself without a doubt the hellishness. But it will also be one of the most blessed hours of your life. For then will be born in you an unquenchable longing for the Saviour! Then you will long for Christ, for a living encounter with Him. It is then that one has only one thing to do: to come to Jesus at all costs!
Look at this inbred, how he wanted to get to Jesus at any cost! He knew very well that he must not blend in with the crowd, they must have tried to keep him away when they saw him approaching with determination, but he paid no attention to anyone, he just went like a madman, as if he knew that now or never, life or death depended on this meeting. This is what I read from this short sentence, "And behold, a leper came and fell down before him, saying, 'Lord, if you will, you can make me clean.'" Mt8,2 Yes, that is what it takes for someone who has recognized the spiritual hell in himself, who does not care about people, scolding, mockery, prohibition, job loss, but only feels that he has a more important matter than the whole world: he must now come to Jesus and bow down before him! He who thus presses on, through every obstacle, at all costs, towards Christ, the blessed meeting will never fail. He who comes to Christ as if fleeing from his sins, his case is no longer hopeless, he is already on the right road! The only one who does not meet the Lord is the one who approaches Him with a very upright posture and a very confident superiority, the one who comes in passivity. "Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." Mt 5,3
This man's confidence in Jesus is touching. "Lord, if you will, you can make me clean!" Mt8,2b He had no doubt that Jesus could heal him. And it was no small thing! There had never been a case of a leper being healed. Yet this man looks out of Jesus, assumes that He can do this. He was just not quite sure if the Lord wanted to perform this miracle on him. He did not yet know Jesus well enough. She did not yet know how much love and compassion and sympathy there was in the Saviour's heart. "Lord, if you will, you can make me clean!"
The confidence of this man is shameful. How little he knew of the Lord, how little he knew who Jesus is! And how much we know about Him! We have already accompanied Him many times from the manger in Bethlehem to the cross at Calvary and the open tomb, we should no longer say, "Lord, if you want", because we already know that He does want! Because He wanted the whole redemption, not us. He wanted to die on the cross, not be defeated by His enemies. "The Father loves me because I lay down my life that I might take it up again. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it up again. This commandment I have received from my Father." John 10:17-18 He Himself said that the Son of Man came to "give His life a ransom for many" Mt 20:28c. Jesus' whole life and death proclaims in a powerful way that He does want our salvation, He does want our eternal life, our deliverance from sin, our cleansing. We can no longer say, as the leper said, "Lord, if you will"! The cross says to us: God our Saviour wills it. So, Jesus wants! Do you hear? Jesus wants! The only question is, do you want what Jesus wants? If you now understand that the Lord wants very much for you to be saved, wants very much for you to receive forgiveness of sins and eternal life, then say it to Him now with a grateful heart, with a decisive heart, as if you were completely surrendered to Him: Lord, I want it too!
What unconditional confidence there is in this declaration, "Lord, if you will, you can cleanse me!" This man knows that Jesus can do this if He wants to. He can. He has the power! "You can cleanse me" and he has not counted himself out. Jesus really did cleanse him. And so it was in other cases: whatever troubles and afflictions anyone ever came to Jesus with, He could heal them all. He never refused a single supplicant. He has never said to a single person asking for help: 'I am very sorry, but I cannot help you, your case is beyond even my abilities. But: everyone who has ever come to Him to ask Him for something has found, time and time again, that Jesus is able to help them! And that was not only then, but also today. There is no bondage of sin that Jesus cannot break, no bondage that Jesus cannot free. Come, then, whoever you are, and fall down before the Lord, and you will find with joyful exultation that Jesus can indeed help you.
"And immediately the leprosy of it was cleansed" Mt8,3b read on for the miraculous healing. I want to underline this here, immediately! Not in the way earthly doctors heal the patient, by slowly improving the patient's condition. Not in the way that every day he is a little better, and after a long lie in bed it is a great thing to be allowed to get up for an hour. It is not that after a few days he is allowed to go for a walk in the yard, but care must be taken not to fall back. Jesus did not heal like that, but immediately! One minute the patient was covered with hellish sores, the next minute he was healed!
Nor does it take a long process to turn a lost sinner into a redeemed child of God. It doesn't take months and years, it doesn't happen slowly and gradually, but instantly, as we read in the story. The salvation of a soul, just as the healing of a leprous body with Jesus, is a work of the moment, and it does not matter here how deeply rooted in sin one is. For our Lord, the salvation of a very deeply fallen evildoer is no more difficult a task than that of one whose conscience is much less burdened. There is no difference between someone who is very strongly bound and someone who is only a little bound. Both equally need the Deliverer Jesus Christ, and Christ's deliverance of both is equally the work of a moment.
Finally Jesus released the healed man thus. Do not tell anyone, but go and show yourself to the priest." (Mat 8,4b) It is as if Jesus had said: "Let not men hear what has happened to you, but let them see! Do not speak, but show yourself! If your mouth is only full of telling the miracle that has fallen on you, it is not worth much. But: make a statement in your life! Let your actions speak for you. Don't talk so much about all the blessings you have received from the Lord, but rather show it in your life! God will be more pleased with it and people will benefit more from it. So don't tell anyone now, but show yourself!
I have just underlined a few words in this great story. Let all human additions be left out now and let the Word itself speak to us, as the Holy Spirit of God wrote: "When he came down from the mountain, a great multitude followed him. And, behold, an intestate came and fell down before him, saying, 'Lord, if you will, you can cleanse me. And Jesus stretched forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus said unto him, See thou tell no man. But go, show yourself to the priest, and take up the gift which Moses commanded, as a testimony to them." Mt8,1-4
Amen
Date: 11 June 1950.
Lesson
Mt 8,1-4