This sermon was preached to Grace Church Guildford on 11 September 2022. The full video recording of the service can be found below along with the transcript.
How do we know that Jesus really is who he says he is? If you have grown up around Christianity, or you have been coming along to services here for a while, you will know that Jesus made a remarkable claim. Throughout the Gospels, again and again, Jesus claims to be nothing less than the Son of God who was sent to save his people from their sins. It is a remarkable claim. But how can you know that it is true? How can you know Jesus really is who he says he is? I believe that this is the question Matthew begins to address in chapters 8-9.
Since the start of this year, on Sunday evenings we have been slowly working our way through Matthew’s Gospel. Before the summer, we completed Jesus’ longest and most famous speech, the Sermon on the Mount. And tonight we start a new section, the healing ministry of Jesus in chapters 8-9. And yet we very much pick up where we left off. If you look back up to 7:28-29, you can see the Sermon on the Mount ends with the reaction of the crowd: [READ]. Through this comment, Matthew highlights the main theme that comes out of the sermon and continues into the stories that follow. What amazed the crowds about Christ’s teaching? As they went away that day, what was the lasting impression left on them? Well, it was that when Jesus taught, he did so with ‘authority’, a rightful command, a proper power. Jesus did not go about merely suggesting what was true, he declared what was true. When Jesus spoke, he spoke as the very voice of God. His words had weight. He had authority. And it is this same authority that Matthew wants us to notice in chapters 8-9 as well.
We know this not merely because he opens the section by highlighting it, but also because he closes the section by again mentioning it to us. If you look forward to 10:1, you will see Matthew begins the next sermon by telling us Jesus ‘gave authority’ to the twelve disciples, sending them out on a mission. The theme of authority starts and ends our section. And it is also referenced throughout it as well. For example, today we will hear how the centurion in chapter 8 describes Jesus as one who has authority to heal with a word. In chapter 9, Jesus himself will declare that he wants them to know that the Son of Man ‘has authority on earth’ to forgive sins. Matthew 8-9 is all about authority. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus claimed to be Lord, spoke as one with authority. And here in chapters 8-9 he proves it, shows he really is who he says he is. How can you know that Jesus really is who he said he is? Well, come here and see what he did. If the words of Jesus suggest his identity, his works prove it to us. His lips and life unite to show that he is Lord.
In 8:1-17, Matthew mentions three incidents that indicate Jesus’ identity. In 8:1-4, we see a leper ‘healed with a touch’ (Ryle), in 8:5-13 we are told of a servant who is ‘made well by a word’ (Ryle) and in 8:14-17 we hear of a woman ‘restored in a moment' (Ryle). However, these remarkable miracles not only show us Christ’s authority in a general way (e.g. Jesus can heal and therefore has divine authority). But Matthew uses each of them to teach us something in particular about this authority of Jesus: (1) The Result of Jesus’ Authority (8:1-4); (2) The Response to Jesus’ Authority (8:5-13); and (3) The Reason for Jesus’ Authority (8:14-17). Let’s consider these together.
1. THE RESULT OF JESUS' AUTHORITY (8:1-4)
Our passage begins as Jesus descends from the mountain in 8:1 with a large crowd. However, in 8:2 we zoom in from the surrounding masses to look at a single man. There we read, ‘A man with leprosy came and knelt before’ Jesus. And so, the scene is set, the stage is ready, for a miracle to take place, the first miracle that Matthew records in his book. We will soon see that this event (along with the rest of our passage this evening) sets a pattern, erects a paradigm, for how we are to understand the rest of the miracles in Matthew. As a result, it is crucial that we look closely at what happens here. If you are familiar with Jesus’ miracles, it can be easy to simply skim over this, conclude Jesus demonstrates who he is by curing a man from a debilitating disease. And of course, that is true. And yet this miracle is even greater than that. For here we are told that Jesus doesn’t simply cure the man, he cleanses the man. Did you notice that? What does this man request in 8:2? ‘Lord, if you are willing, you can [cure me? No!] make me clean.’ And how does Jesus respond? He doesn’t say ‘be cured’, he says ‘be clean’. Do you see the emphasis lies just not on the man’s infirmity, but his impurity? Not just on his disease, but his defilement?
This theme is present in all three of these healings in 8:1-17. To go into the house of a Gentile or to come into contact with a fever was to become impure. These miracles not only portray Jesus as a physician who cures, but as a priest who cleanses. And by beginning with a leper, Matthew makes this as clear as possible. The disease we know today as leprosy is different to the one in the Bible. There the term covered many different skin conditions, including those that are relatively minor. However, from the perspective of Old Testament law, even if the medical consequences were minor, the social and spiritual implications were always severe. For a Jew, leprosy was the most serious condition you could contract.
Over the last few years, we have all experienced at least some social implications of a disease. Upon spotting the symptoms of COVID, we have had to temporarily remove ourselves from society, test and self-isolate for a few days. Well, that is only a fraction of the impact that testing positive for leprosy had in the Jewish world. In Leviticus 13-14, two whole chapters are completely dedicated to the identification and isolation of lepers. There in 13:45 we read, ‘Anyone with such a defiling disease must wear torn clothes, let their hair be unkempt, cover the lower part of their face and cry out, ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ As long as they have the disease they remain unclean. They must live alone; they must live outside the camp.’ To be labelled a leper meant moving away from family, leaving your life behind, living in isolation. [...] However, the consequences were spiritual as well as social. Lepers were deemed unfit to enter the Tabernacle or Temple, could not come to worship God. Indeed, by the time of Jesus, lepers weren’t allowed in Jerusalem, the Holy City. To be a leper was to be a social and spiritual outcast.
When we read all this, we need to remember that this isn’t some unfortunate form of unfair discrimination. This is what God told his people to do in his good and just law. However, when you read about such purity requirements in Leviticus, it is important to remember why things like leprosy, bodily discharges, and touching a corpse, defiled a person. Why did it make them unclean? Unfit to appear before God? It is because of the connection with death. To have contact with death in the Old Testament was to become defiled.
You see, when God created this world, he created it perfect and good. There was no death, there was only life. But when humanity rebelled against him, when we sinned, death entered this world. Death is a result of sin. And so, to have contact with death, the result of sin and reminder of this world’s rebellion against God, was to be rendered unclean and unfit, to be impure and defiled, unable to approach God. It would be like the American President sending his condolences to our new King on a video call with a giant print out of the declaration of independence in the background of the video. That would be offensive, inappropriate, because that declaration is a sign of contempt for the crown. And it is the same here. Death defiled people because it covered them in the consequences of sin. And a leper was the most unclean of all, for they were literally covered by death, with skin that is dead and decaying. That is why they were known at the time as the ‘living dead’. They were the 1st century versions of zombies! They were a walking sign of our sin against God, a living demonstration of the judgment of death that we all deserve for what we have done. This leper didn’t simply need cured, he needed cleansed, saved from the results of sin, delivered from this living death.
And so, this is what he asks of Jesus. In 8:2, he says: [READ]. Or put more literally, ‘you have the power [ability, authority] to make me clean.’ And that is exactly what we see Jesus do. Jesus demonstrates his authority, his power, by cleansing this leper. by undoing the work of death, cancelling the consequences of sin. As we soon see, he could have healed with a word, but instead he decides to do so with a touch. In 8:3, we read: [READ]. This is both stunning and shocking! Leviticus 5:3 taught all who touched a leper became unclean themselves. To touch death, or those defiled by death, was to become impure. It kind of worked the way washing clothes does today. We are told not to wash colours and whites at the same time. For if a stray red sock slips in among your whites, it will turn them all pink! Well, under the law, a single touch of impurity renders you completely unclean. And yet, in the moment that Jesus touches this man, in the instant that Jesus himself should become unclean, Jesus declares this man to be clean! It seems that Jesus is so pure, so clean, that he turns that red sock white when it is washed with him. Clearly, to be connected to Jesus is to be cleansed from all traces of sin and death.
Christian – do you then see why such purity laws are no longer valid for us? As Paul puts it in Titus 1:15, ‘To the pure all things are pure’. Connected to Christ, all of creation is cleansed. Once Christ has brought you near to God, not even a defiling disease like leprosy can take you away. Not even death itself can divide you from God in Christ. Such is Christ’s authority, that it cleanses you completely, continually, forever. Just a touch, and this man was transformed forever.
As one writer puts it, ‘the Gospel is in that grasp.’ (Bruner) The central truth of Christianity communicated in a single touch: Jesus reaching out to his hand to the leper, making him whole again, bringing him back to God. Matthew will explore the reason for such authority, how this is all possible, later in our passage. However, here he simply shows the remarkable result of Christ’s authority, shows how it can cleanse us.
None of us here have leprosy, and yet the Bible leaves us in no doubt that like this leper, we all carry around the consequences of death’s curse, are stained by sin. If you are here and are not a Christian, have not yet experienced this cleansing touch of Jesus Christ, then the Bible describes you as part of the ‘living dead’, that is someone who may be alive physically, but is already dead spiritually. Just as the leper’s skin showed him to be under death’s curse, your outward actions and inner thoughts demonstrate that you are spiritually dead. You do walk according to God’s lifegiving laws. But instead, you have turned away and lived by your own rules, followed your own desires. And so, you are separated from God, unable to approach him, deserving of his just judgment of death. Even if we are not physical lepers, Scripture says that we are all born spiritual lepers. And only Jesus can cleanse us. With a touch he can transform you from death to life. He can unravel the results of your rebellion. Cover over the consequences of your sin. See here that Jesus has authority to do this. The only question is, how will you respond to his authority?
2. THE RESPONSE TO JESUS’ AUTHORITY (8:5-13)
This is what Matthew points to in the second part of our passage. Here we see Jesus can not only heal with his hands, but also through his commands. Such is the scope of his authority, a single word can restore this servant. And the centurion knows this is the case. In 8:8-9 we read: [READ]. This centurion is sure that Jesus can make his servant well with a word in 8:8 because of what he understands about his authority in 8:9. There he describes himself as both being under authority and having those under him, that is given authority and so able to act with it, commanding others with a word. And it seems that he sees Jesus as in a similar position, as one who has been given authority by God, and can use it to command all who are under him. At the end of Matthew, in 28:18, Jesus declares, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.’ And yet, long before that happened, the centurion clearly understood that all authority belonged to Jesus! That is why Jesus reacts as he does in 8:10, marvels at what this man managed to perceive. By considering Jesus’ words and works, this centurion worked out who he really was.
And yet, it isn’t simply his great knowledge that is brought to our attention, it is his great faith. That is what Jesus highlights to his followers in 8:10-12, isn’t it? Not just the centurion’s understanding of Jesus’ authority, but his response to Jesus’ authority. And we are going to see this throughout chapters 8-9. Time and time again, after showing us that Jesus has authority, Matthew will tell us how different individuals respond to it. How they react to who Jesus is. This continues throughout the book, for Matthew is telling the story of ‘The King and his Kingdom’. That is how we can sum up the message of the book in five words. And we see it in our passage. Matthew shows Jesus to be king, have great authority. And we see what people do with that: will they oppose this king? Or will they join his kingdom?
If you are here and not a Christian tonight, the same choice confronts you. Friend, you really can know that Jesus is who he says he is. That he has authority, is a king. Like this centurion, you can come and examine the evidence. Listen to his words, watch his works. Does his great authority over disease and death not demonstrate he is a king? Does the fact that he cleansed with a touch and healed with a word not show his authority? Prove he really is who he says he is? Or like those priests at the temple in 8:4, you can see this in the testimony of Christians, those Jesus has touched. The priests would have listened to the leper’s remarkable tale that day, looked at his clear skin and seen Jesus clearly had authority, because of the difference he made in this leper’s life. Well, friends, look at, listen to, the Christians around you, see that Jesus has authority, for he rules in their hearts, governs their lives, causes them to walk more and more in his ways, to increasingly live lives of love. O see Jesus has authority, is a king! What are you going to do with that? How will you respond to it? Will you submit to his rule? Or will you stand against it? Will you come into this kingdom? Or will you reject this king? Will you humbly bow before him, like that leper did, acknowledging your need of forgiveness and his authority over your life? Or will you resist this king, this one who has all authority in heaven and on earth?
In the case of the centurion, we see him entrust himself to Jesus’s authority, believe in who he is and what he can do. We already seen this in the life of the leper, didn’t we? Do you remember what he said when he approached Jesus in 8:2? He did not come asking, ‘if you can, will you make me clean?’ He came asserting, ‘if you will, you can make me clean.’ There was no doubt in the leper’s mind that Jesus had the authority, ability to cleanse him. He believed Jesus was who he said he was, and had the divine authority that came along with that. And it is the same here with the centurion. And yet, is it not even more remarkable here? For this is not an outcast leper, a powerless patient who desperately needs healing for himself. But here is a Roman centurion, a man who himself has great authority, and yet he comes humbly before this Lord to ask for the life of his sick servant. The centurion knows that whatever earthly authority he has, it is nothing compared to the heavenly authority of Jesus. And so, Jesus uses him as an example of all who willing bow before him, who take him to be their Lord, crown him as their king and come into his kingdom.
In 8:11-12 he says: [READ]. Here Jesus teaches outsiders will be brought inside the kingdom, and insiders will be put outside the kingdom. That gentile, like this centurion, will find themselves to be part of his people along with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, because they respond to him in faith, believe in his word, accept his authority. And yet Jewish hearers who fail to accept his authority, who reject him as king, disregard his word, will be cut off and removed from the kingdom. If we respond rightly, Jesus can deliver us forever. If we respond wrongly, he will damn us forever, cut us off from his kingdom, cast us outside forever. This king has authority either to deliver or to damn us with a single word, and he will do it based on how we respond to him. So, surely it is clear that we must all ask ourselves tonight, how are we responding to this king?
If you consider yourself a Christian this evening, then you are reminded here just how great Jesus’ authority is and how you must always be responding to it. While Jesus is no longer with us physically, this in no way lessens his authority. Unlike the leper, we can no longer feel his touch, and yet we can still hear his word. For even from afar, our king rules in our lives and hearts through the authority of his Word. That is why, when we gather as a church, everything we do should revolve around, reverberate with and run according to his Word. Like the servant in this story, it is God’s word that brings us back to health and life, for we have been born again through the living and enduring word of God (1 Peter 1:23). And it is God’s word that continues to work in us even now, for our kind is cleansing us by the washing of his word (Ephesians 5:26). We are to be a people of the word, a kingdom ruled by the word of its king, those who respond to Jesus’ authority by both believing and obeying his commands.
Friend, when you read something in God’s word that challenges how you think, or what you do, are you open to change? Happy to alter your views or actions in light of Jesus’ authority? When you are confronted by Christ's commands, do you obey them? Do you treat a single word from his mouth as sufficient for you to act on? Are you a faithful solider of Jesus Christ, ready to spring forward as soon as your commander gives an order? [v9] Like soliders under the authority of this centurion, when Jesus says go, do you go? He says, be baptised, and so you get baptised. He says, strive for holiness, and so you struggle towards that every day. He says, stir others up to love and good works, and so you spend your time and energy seeking to encourage the spiritual growth of those around you. When Jesus says ‘do this’, do you do it? Or do you hesitate? Require him to explain himself? Friend, does your obedience show that you accept the authority of Jesus over your life this evening? If it doesn’t, if you are resisting his authority, rejecting his ability to direct your life, then like Jesus’ Jewish hearers that day, you may be mistaken, think you are part of his kingdom, when you are really outside it. How we respond to Jesus’ authority is the great test that tells us where we stand. Those who belong to his kingdom believe, obey and live by what he says. Those who resist his authority show they do not really know him as King, do not truly belong to his kingdom.
3. THE REASON FOR JESUS’ AUTHORITY (8:14-17)
In final part of our passage Matthew records the reason for Jesus’ authority, explains to us how he is able to heal. In 8:14-15, we have an account of him healing Peter’s mother-in-law, who is in bed with a fever. And then in 8:16, we hear of how many who were sick or suffering came to Jesus that evening. Wherever Jesus appears, it seems that miracles are performed, people healed and restored, death and disease begin to be undone. However, Matthew not only describes these events to us, he also begins to interpret them for us. In 8:17 he writes: [READ]. This comment not only relates to the healings of 8:14-16, but to the whole passage. Did you notice that these two miracles in this last part match the two from earlier in the chapter? Like the leper, this lady in 8:15 is healed with a touch. And like the centurion’s servant, the crowds in 8:16 are made well by a word. Here we see Jesus using the same authority as before. And so in 8:17, Matthew stops to explain it. Having introduced us to Jesus’ healing ministry for the first time, he wants to make sure we understand the reason for it, the power behind it. For in 8:17 he claims Jesus can cleanse and heal the diseased and dying because he was fulfilling the prophecy in Isaiah 53:4.
If you have been a Christian for a while, you are probably familiar with Isaiah 53, which we read earlier together. It is the clearest and fullest prophecy we find in the Old Testament of the salvation Jesus will accomplish for his people and the suffering he underwent to achieve it. It speaks of God’s servant being despised and rejected by men (53:3), stricken and smitten by God (53:4). And the reason it gives for such suffering is that this servant is acting as a substitute for God’s people. All of our iniquity is laid on him. He is pierced for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities (53:5-6). It speaks so clearly, doesn’t it, of what takes place later in Matthew’s gospel, when on the cross Jesus suffers the punishment that we deserve for our crimes against our creator, dies in the place of all who turn from sin and trust in him. And yet, do you see Matthew not only sees Isaiah 53 as foundational for Jesus’ work on the cross, but also his work among the crowds.
In 8:17 he explains that the reason Jesus could give this leper, servant and woman health, was because he took on death. That there was a wonderful exchange in those moments of healing: when Jesus gave them life, they gave him sickness, took their illness, bore their disease. This doesn’t mean that Jesus became a leper, was paralysed or developed a fever, but rather it means that he would deal with such diseases when he went to the cross. By dealing with sin, Jesus also dealt with suffering and sickness. For sin is ultimately the source of each of them. It was through sin that death came into the world. And while our sickness is not necessary caused by our own sin, it is always caused by general sin, a result of living in this fallen world, an effect of that first sin that corrupted creation and put us all under the curse. And here, Matthew says that by suffering for sin the cross, starts to pull the thread of the tapestry of all our troubles in this world, Jesus was undoing all the effects of the fall, including our disease and illness. By chopping the head off the monster of sin, he causes all of its tentacles to fall away. By cutting the plant off at the root, he ensures that all of its flowers and fruits will wither and fade. And so, as Isaiah 53:4 says, it is by his wounds that we are healed: spiritually, physically, mentally, emotionally, healed in every way, in any way we need. Whatever kind of healing we need, it is available to us through the death of Jesus. For as Nicola reminded us recently at our prayer meeting, he is the ‘wounded healer’. And here we see what that means. He is a healer because he was wounded. He can undo sin’s symptoms, because of his sacrifice.
If you are a Christian this evening, someone who is trusting in Jesus for the forgiveness of your sins, looking to him for that spiritual healing, do you see here that you can also trust him for physical healing, trust him to deliver you from disease, to save you from sickness? Of course, many of us will suffer illnesses and ailments that are not healed in this life. All of us must pass through the doorway of death. And not all diseases are undone on this side. Even when he was on earth, Jesus did not banish all sickness from Israel. And yet he did give us a glimpse, a foretaste, of what he can and willone day do for all his people. Every leper he cleansed, every lame man he healed and blind man he restored, are a signs to us of what our Saviour will one day do for all who trust in him.
If you are here this evening, and you are struggling with your health, or you have a loved one who is suffering with illness, or has died as a result of a debilitating disease.See here that you can be sure that one day that will all come to an end. That Alzheimer’s and Dementia will be in the past. That Parkinson’s and heart disease will be no more. That cancer will be cured. Depression will be defeated. For by his wounds, we will be healed. O friend, if you are trusting in Jesus to save you from sin on that last day, can you not also trust him to deliver you from disease and death too? If you can trust him with your soul, surely you can trust him with your body? For the same sacrifice that saves your soul, also secures the restoration, the resurrection of your body. It is the same work that accomplishes both. When Jesus died on the cross, he dealt with sin and all its symptoms.
O see here, that the cross is a key that unlocks a bright, better world. A new world, where we read in Revelation 21, there will be no more disease or death, no sickness or sin, no illness or ailments, but all will be health and life and joy. O see here that Jesus has authority to do that. That the cross is powerful enough to achieve that. To make each one of us holy and healthy and happy forever and ever.
ALEXANDER ARRELL