Mark 1:40-45
I would like to start back in Mark 1:41-42 as I attempt to paint for you a mental picture of what was happening in this passage.
Leprosy has been described as a terrible disease.
It first appears as just a white-then pink spot; but, as it slowly progresses it becomes dreadful, loathsome, and fatal in its effects. It illustrates how insignificant sin first appears, but eventually the result is eternal hell. Because of this disease, socially this man would have been looked on as someone who, more than likely, was a terrible sinner or one of his parents were and this was God’s punishment for that family’s sin.
You see a leper loses the ability to feel pain because of infected nerves. The leprous body can be burned, cut, or broken without the person realizing it, since it has lost its natural protection against self-destruction. Still worse, as leprosy progresses, fingers fall off, arms, toes, and legs drop away. Lepers were incurable – they were the untouchables.
So let’s look at it from this man’s point of view. In his mind there probably wasn’t much hope. This was an incurable disease that would eventually take his life. He knew first hand that life was cruel and people could be even crueller. Being a leper, his own family wouldn’t come near him. He had no friends. It would have been easy for him to believe that no one cared or ever would care about him again. He was as alone as a man could be in those days. No money, no house, his skin was probably thick with scars, covered with open sores that leaked out a pale foul-smelling liquid constantly, parts of his fingers and toes were probably gone or about to fall off.
By Jewish Law, he wasn’t allowed to bind his hair; it had to hang loose. He had to wear torn, dirty clothes. And when anyone approached, he had to cover his mouth and yell at the top of his lungs, “UNCLEAN! UNCLEAN!” You see, many times this disease would eat away at the lips, causing spit to fly out when a leper would talk or yell and no one wanted to touch or be touched in any way by a leper. If he wanted to attend synagogue, he had to go to a special place and look in through a hole in the wall, or if he was to make the journey to the temple in Jerusalem, he was sent to a special courtyard, separated from all others in an area made just for the lepers.
So this man could no longer even live in the town that he probably grew up and played in and had probably known his whole life. Try to Picture with me if you will, this man walking the streets trying to find scraps of food, just so he can eat a meal and hearing that a rabbi had come to town and was teaching like one who had the authority of God. He had probably heard of the miracles this rabbi had performed, maybe even that some had been healed. Can you imagine the seed of hope that might have been planted when he heard that this rabbi was teaching just off the square today?
I can imagine the thoughts that might have gone through his mind. Could he really heal people? Did he really teach with authority? This kind of thing didn’t happen in these days. “Could he heal me? Would he heal me?”
So, this leper. His mind made up, he works his way to the place where he had heard Jesus was teaching. Covering himself in his only rags and making his way up to the back of the crowd, his heart sinking as he thinks, “there are too many people, he won’t see me, he will never hear me. Wait that’s it!” He throws back his robes and yells with all of his might “UNCLEAN! UNCLEAN!” The crowd gasps and parts and there he is in the middle of this space with Jesus.
In Mark 1:40, it says that he came to Jesus beseeching Him and falling on his knees. In Matt it says he bowed before Him, in Luke its put this way: He fell on his face and implored Him saying “if thou wilt, you can make me clean.” How profound of a statement! He didn’t say, “if you can,” but “if you will”. What a faith, what a hope! This is the type of faith and hope that can only come from God.
This poor man, who had been humbled beyond anything most of us could understand by this gross and relentless disease, and even by his family and friends, had enough understanding to know that Jesus could heal him if He was willing.
In Verse 41, it says that Christ was moved with compassion. The picture I get is this: Christ is so moved with compassion that His heart sinks, it moves with deep seated emotion; but for our understanding, His heart breaks when He sees this man so stricken by such a devastating disease. Some scholars translate this passage not that he was moved with compassion, but He was moved with anger. But if it was anger, what was Christ angry about? There are different ideas: if it was anger that Christ showed, I believe it would have been anger at sin that had caused such a curse as a disease as devastating as this.
Jesus was moved with compassion, so moved in fact that He broke with one of the most upheld traditions in Jewish society. The verse continues, “Jesus stretched out His hand and touched him, and *said to him, “I am willing; be cleansed.”
And with a touch from the hand of the Great physician he was healed. I am amazed at the depth of Christ compassion for this man indeed for all of us. Think about this simple act in context of the time and culture Jewish tradition taught that anyone who had leprosy was cursed by God and deserved what they were getting. The leper wasn’t even supposed to be in the city. No one would ever interrupt a Rabbi when he was teaching, but the leper broke with tradition to meet Jesus. He broke tradition to get to Jesus. No one would ever speak to a leper let alone touch him. Christ broke tradition by stopping his teaching; He broke with tradition and not only spoke to the leper but TOUCHED him, and HEALED him. Jesus showed His authority over disease, and over tradition as well as His compassion for Humanity. Think about what He can do for you if you ask?
I would like to start back in Mark 1:41-42 as I attempt to paint for you a mental picture of what was happening in this passage.
Leprosy has been described as a terrible disease.
It first appears as just a white-then pink spot; but, as it slowly progresses it becomes dreadful, loathsome, and fatal in its effects. It illustrates how insignificant sin first appears, but eventually the result is eternal hell. Because of this disease, socially this man would have been looked on as someone who, more than likely, was a terrible sinner or one of his parents were and this was God’s punishment for that family’s sin.
You see a leper loses the ability to feel pain because of infected nerves. The leprous body can be burned, cut, or broken without the person realizing it, since it has lost its natural protection against self-destruction. Still worse, as leprosy progresses, fingers fall off, arms, toes, and legs drop away. Lepers were incurable – they were the untouchables.
So let’s look at it from this man’s point of view. In his mind there probably wasn’t much hope. This was an incurable disease that would eventually take his life. He knew first hand that life was cruel and people could be even crueller. Being a leper, his own family wouldn’t come near him. He had no friends. It would have been easy for him to believe that no one cared or ever would care about him again. He was as alone as a man could be in those days. No money, no house, his skin was probably thick with scars, covered with open sores that leaked out a pale foul-smelling liquid constantly, parts of his fingers and toes were probably gone or about to fall off.
By Jewish Law, he wasn’t allowed to bind his hair; it had to hang loose. He had to wear torn, dirty clothes. And when anyone approached, he had to cover his mouth and yell at the top of his lungs, “UNCLEAN! UNCLEAN!” You see, many times this disease would eat away at the lips, causing spit to fly out when a leper would talk or yell and no one wanted to touch or be touched in any way by a leper. If he wanted to attend synagogue, he had to go to a special place and look in through a hole in the wall, or if he was to make the journey to the temple in Jerusalem, he was sent to a special courtyard, separated from all others in an area made just for the lepers.
So this man could no longer even live in the town that he probably grew up and played in and had probably known his whole life. Try to Picture with me if you will, this man walking the streets trying to find scraps of food, just so he can eat a meal and hearing that a rabbi had come to town and was teaching like one who had the authority of God. He had probably heard of the miracles this rabbi had performed, maybe even that some had been healed. Can you imagine the seed of hope that might have been planted when he heard that this rabbi was teaching just off the square today?
I can imagine the thoughts that might have gone through his mind. Could he really heal people? Did he really teach with authority? This kind of thing didn’t happen in these days. “Could he heal me? Would he heal me?”
So, this leper. His mind made up, he works his way to the place where he had heard Jesus was teaching. Covering himself in his only rags and making his way up to the back of the crowd, his heart sinking as he thinks, “there are too many people, he won’t see me, he will never hear me. Wait that’s it!” He throws back his robes and yells with all of his might “UNCLEAN! UNCLEAN!” The crowd gasps and parts and there he is in the middle of this space with Jesus.
In Mark 1:40, it says that he came to Jesus beseeching Him and falling on his knees. In Matt it says he bowed before Him, in Luke its put this way: He fell on his face and implored Him saying “if thou wilt, you can make me clean.” How profound of a statement! He didn’t say, “if you can,” but “if you will”. What a faith, what a hope! This is the type of faith and hope that can only come from God.
This poor man, who had been humbled beyond anything most of us could understand by this gross and relentless disease, and even by his family and friends, had enough understanding to know that Jesus could heal him if He was willing.
In Verse 41, it says that Christ was moved with compassion. The picture I get is this: Christ is so moved with compassion that His heart sinks, it moves with deep seated emotion; but for our understanding, His heart breaks when He sees this man so stricken by such a devastating disease. Some scholars translate this passage not that he was moved with compassion, but He was moved with anger. But if it was anger, what was Christ angry about? There are different ideas: if it was anger that Christ showed, I believe it would have been anger at sin that had caused such a curse as a disease as devastating as this.
Jesus was moved with compassion, so moved in fact that He broke with one of the most upheld traditions in Jewish society. The verse continues, “Jesus stretched out His hand and touched him, and *said to him, “I am willing; be cleansed.”
And with a touch from the hand of the Great physician he was healed. I am amazed at the depth of Christ compassion for this man indeed for all of us. Think about this simple act in context of the time and culture Jewish tradition taught that anyone who had leprosy was cursed by God and deserved what they were getting. The leper wasn’t even supposed to be in the city. No one would ever interrupt a Rabbi when he was teaching, but the leper broke with tradition to meet Jesus. He broke tradition to get to Jesus. No one would ever speak to a leper let alone touch him. Christ broke tradition by stopping his teaching; He broke with tradition and not only spoke to the leper but TOUCHED him, and HEALED him. Jesus showed His authority over disease, and over tradition as well as His compassion for Humanity. Think about what He can do for you if you ask?
