There is an old story called the magic mask. It is about a

powerful lord who ruled over a great domain who became so

hard and cruel that ugly lines deepened into his face. On a

tour of his country one day he saw a surprisingly beautiful

girl, and he longed to take her as his wife. But he was

appalled as he looked into the mirror and saw the hard and

cruel lines in his face. He could never win her love with such

a face, and so he called for a magician to make him a mask of

thin wax that would make him look kind and loving. The

artist agreed to do it if he promised to pray daily to the God

of love to change his heart and make him loving toward his

subjects. He said he would and the mask was made. The

lovely girl became his wife, and they enjoyed a remarkable

period of peace and prosperity. He became a truly loving

ruler, and the people marveled at the change in him.

He finally became so bothered by his deception of the wife

he loved so dearly that he begged the magician to remove the

magic mask. It was with fear and trembling that he then

went to the mirror. But to his delight he did not need the

mask any longer because the ugly lines on his face were gone.

His changed heart and spirit had changed his face, and he

had a loving face even without the mask.

We all have to wear a mask at times to hide the ugliness of

our negative spirit. If we let people see all that we are all of

the time, it would not be a pretty sight, and so we mask

ourselves and put on a good front that is pleasant and

acceptable. In contrast to many Halloween masks that are

put on to scare people with their grotesque faces, we put on a

mask to protect people from the real scariness in us. Only

God can see us totally naked in our soul and still love us. We

need to mask some of who we are to be acceptable on the

human level. So wearing a mask of some sort is very

common.

The proof of this is that Jesus Himself, the sinless Son of

God, wore a mask. Jesus hid His identity as long as He

could, and did so in a very conspicuous manner. The first

thing we need to do to get to the bottom of this mystery of the

Master's mask is to establish that there is, in fact, a mystery.

Let's begin by looking at-

1. THE REALITY OF THE MASK.

The first hint we have of this mask is the encounter Jesus

has with the demonized man in the synagogue. When the

evil spirit in this man cried out at Jesus, "I know who you

are-the Holy One of God," Jesus did not say, "Speak up, this

is just the kind of publicity I need right now." Instead, He

said, "Be quiet!" Other translations have it, "Shut up!" He

stopped this positive testimony to His identity, and cast the

evil spirit out. Now if this was just an isolated incident we

could ignore it and not try to read anything into it of

significance. But this was just the beginning of a pattern

Jesus followed.

Notice verse 34: "And Jesus healed many of various

diseases. He also drove out many demons, but He would not

let the demons speak because they knew who He was." I can

see if He would not let them speak because they didn't know

what they were talking about, but it says He would not let

them because they did know what they were talking about.

The demons could identify Jesus, and so He stopped them,

for He was not ready to take off His mask and be known for

who He was.

Even two such mysterious incidents could be over looked

as a possible idiosyncrasy of Mark, but when we see Jesus

going out of His way many times to protect His identity, then

we have to face up to the reality of His mask. Look at verses

43-45. Jesus had just cured a man of leprosy. It was a

marvelous miracle, and one that could bring a lot of

publicity. But note the response of Jesus. "Jesus sent him

away at once with a strong warning." Note, it was not a

polite suggestion, it was a strong warning. And the warning

was, "See that you don't tell this to anyone."

You would think that whatever His reason for trying to

keep His identity a secret, that those whom He healed would

be grateful enough to cooperate with Him. But one of the

paradoxes of the Gospel account is these very people that

Jesus warned and begged to keep His secret were the biggest

blabber mouths in His life. This man went out and spread the

word and the result was Jesus could no longer enter a town

openly. He had to stay out in lonely places it says. His life

was negatively affected by this very man who received new

life from Him. Jesus did him life's biggest favor, and in

return he made life miserable for Jesus.

But the mystery is, why did Jesus want to keep His

identity a secret so bad that He worked at it overtime? We

will try to solve this mystery after we demonstrate beyond a

shadow of a doubt the reality of the mystery of the Master's

mask. We have only looked at the first chapter. What if we

can show that Jesus kept up this battle to hide His identity

over and over again? Let's look at chapter 3:11-12. "When

ever the evil spirits saw Him they fell down before Him and

cried out, you are the Son of God. But He gave them strict

orders not to tell who He was."

Jesus was perpetually trying to keep evil spirits from

telling who He was. Evil spirits were especially a threat

because they knew His identity perfectly. The mask did not

fool them at all. His whole incarnate body did not hide from

them the reality that He was the eternal Son of God. He had

to use His authority as Lord over the spirits to keep their

mouths shut and maintain His secret. People were guessing

all sorts of things about Jesus. Some said He was John the

Baptist, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets. In spite of all the

blabber mouth spirits Jesus was succeeding to fool everybody

with His mask.

Jesus has just raised a little girl from the dead, and all

who saw it were astonished and we read in 5:43, "Jesus gave

them strict orders not to let anyone know about this.." In

this case Jesus was able to suppress His wonder working

power. It is one of the few occasions where He succeeded to

get the cooperation of others. But look at 7:36, where after

He healed a deaf man, it says, "Jesus commanded them not

to tell anyone. But the more He did so, the more they kept

talking about it."

Jesus had a terrible time trying to keep His mask on. But

in spite of almost consistent disobedience to His wishes, He

was able to keep people guessing. They did not really know

who Jesus was. Elijah or one of the prophets were popular

guesses, but then one day Jesus asked Peter who do you think

I am? Peter gave his great confession in Mark 8:29: "You

are the Christ." Peter was the first to acknowledge that

Jesus was the Messiah. He saw beneath the mask of this

wonder worker, and knew this was the Messiah. You would

think Jesus would then end His masquerade, but not so. In

the very next verse Mark 8:30 we read, "Jesus warned them

not to tell anyone about Him."

This was no game with Jesus. He has been very seriously

avoiding exposure of His true identity through His whole

ministry. One of the greatest mysteries of the life of our Lord

is that He was the primary hindrance to people knowing He

was the long awaited Messiah. Don't blame the devil for this

or his demons. Don't blame the Pharisees or the fickle

masses. The facts are clear: Jesus wore a mask and

prevented the knowledge that He was the Messiah from

spreading. What few people did come to that conclusion, He

warned to keep quiet. All the demons that would have

proclaimed it, He silenced. The number one cause why Jesus

was never received by Israel as their Messiah was Jesus

Himself. His disciples were instructed to keep it quiet. Now

if this is not a mystery to beat all mysteries, I don't know

what a mystery is. There can be no question about the

reality of the Master's mask. But now we need to seek an

answer to this mystery, and look atII.

THE REASON FOR THE MASK.

It is real all right, but why in the world would the Messiah

Himself be the primary suppresser of the good news that the

Messiah had arrived? He was the answer to millions of

prayers, and now that all these prayers were finally

answered, Jesus would not let the people know by taking off

His mask and proclaiming, "Look! It's me, the Messiah!"

He never did that, and it was all clearly a part of a

pre-conceived plan.

It was His intention that only a few would ever see behind

His mask and know without a doubt that He was the

Messiah. He only took Peter, James, and John up to the Mt.

of Transfiguration where they saw Jesus glow with the light

of deity, and talk with Moses and Elijah, and hear the voice

of God saying, "This is my Son whom I love. Listen to Him."

None but these three had such clear evidence of who Jesus

was, but they were not allowed to share this unique

experience with anyone. Mark 9:9 says, "As they were

coming down the mountain, Jesus gave them orders not to

tell anyone what they had seen until the Son of Man had

risen from the dead." The next verse says they kept the

matter to themselves. The secret of Jesus was to be kept until

after His resurrection, and so His own disciples were

muzzled.

Obviously we are dealing with a major strategy in the

whole purpose of Christ coming into this world. Keeping His

identity a secret is a vital part of the plan of salvation. And it

really does make sense when you think about it. If Jesus

would have taken off the mask and let the whole world know

the truth of who He was, there is no way He could have ever

been sacrificed for our sins. No Jew could ever dream of

killing the Messiah. If He had permitted this message to be

broadcast over the land, He would have been followed with

such enthusiasm that there would be no chance of Him being

despised and rejected of men, and offered as the Lamb of

God for the sin of the world. Even the Pharisees and

Saducees would have been willing to die for Him.

So Jesus had to do what the Messiah was to do and fulfill

the Old Testament prophecies. Yet, at the same time keep it

hidden that He was, in fact, the Messiah. What we have here

is the mystery of concealed revelation. He was ever revealing

that He was the Messiah by doing what only the Messiah

could do, yet ever keeping it a secret that He was the

Messiah. He was like the Lone Ranger, and people were

always wondering, who is that masked stranger. Jesus never

took off the mask, and so there was always the mystery in

people's minds: Yes He seems like the Messiah, yet we do not

know if He really is. He does not say I am the Messiah. He

seems like He might be, yet maybe He isn't. This was Jesus

succeeding as the popular, yet hidden Messiah.

Why such a strange strategy? It was the only way Jesus

could have it both ways. He could be the Messiah, and yet be

also the suffering servant who would die for the sin of the

world. It was cleverness on the highest level. Jesus had to

work hard for the chance to die for us. The demons sought

to destroy the plan of God by trying to expose Jesus.

Disobedient people also tried to foul up His plan by their

spreading the news that He must be the Messiah.

Fortunately, His disciples did cooperate with Jesus, and they

went along with the secret. This seems so crazy. The demons

were preaching the deity of Christ, and the disciples were

suppressing it, and it all makes sense. If Jesus would have

become only the Messiah of Israel, He could not have become

the Savior of the world.

So what we have here is Jesus sacrificing the good for the

better. He had to wear His mask and keep His identity as

Messiah a secret in order to achieve a far greater goal of

being the redeemer of the whole lost race of man. If Jesus

had had the limited goal of saving only Israel, then none of

this mystery would have been necessary. He would have

proclaimed Himself Messiah, and the story would not have

ended in death and resurrection, but in an earthly kingdom

for the people of Israel with Jesus as their king.

I have read some authors who say the reason that did not

happen is because the Jews rejected Jesus as their Messiah.

But the facts are, that did not happen because Jesus rejected

that limited kingdom. The scope of His salvation was not

limited to Israel, but His love went out to all the world. He

had no intention of being a king of the Jews only. He

intended to be kings of all kings, and be Lord of all peoples.

That was His goal all through His life, and that is why He

wore the mask and refused to settle for anything less than

being the Savior of the world.

No wonder the demons would have loved to derail His

salvation plan by getting the Jews to go wild over Jesus as

their Messiah. If they could have limited Jesus to one

segment of the human race, they would have won the largest

portion for hell. Jesus refused to allow them to interfere, and

so the first thing He did with demons was to shut them up

when they exalted Him for who He really was. They tried to

take off His mask, but they did not succeed. Jesus was able

to remain hidden enough so that He made it to the cross.

The cross was the reason for all the mystery of the mask.

The failure of the leaders of Israel to receive Jesus as their

Messiah was not a frustration of the purpose of Christ, but a

fulfillment of His purpose. The cross was the goal of Jesus in

all that He did. It takes the very mind of God to figure out

how to become amazingly popular, and yet still be hated

enough to be crucified. It takes divine cleverness to be able

to fulfill all the prophecies of the Messiah, and yet still keep

people in dark about it so you can be rejected and fulfill an

even greater plan.

When Jesus prayed on the cross, "Father forgive them for

they know not what they do," He was expressing the success

of His mask. Nobody but a few disciples knew that He was

really the Messiah. Those who crucified Him did not know

even though Jesus clearly fulfilled all prophecy. He revealed

that He was the Messiah, yet He also concealed it, and,

therefore, they never realized they were crucifying their own

Messiah.

None but the wisest can both reveal and conceal a thing at

the same time, but that is what Jesus did. It was essential to

His plan of salvation. Paul confirms this in I Cor. 2:7-8.

"...we speak of God's secret wisdom, a wisdom that has been

hidden and that God destined for our glory before time

began. None of the rulers of this age understood it, for if

they had, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory."

In other words, without the mask Jesus wore He never would

have made it to the cross. Your salvation and mine, and that

of the whole family of God depended upon this mysterious

mask of the Master. We have been saved by a masked man.

Jesus fought through His whole ministry to prevent the

good from robbing Him of the best. If He became too

popular, and if too many people would have acknowledged

Him as the Messiah, it could have ruined His greater goal.

He had to avoid fulfilling the dreams of the Jews in order to

fulfill His own dream of being the Lamb of God that takes

away the sin of the world. Sometimes that dream was

hanging by a thread as the people tried to take Jesus by

storm and make Him king. He had to use His supernatural

power to avoid that kind of popular uprising.

Don't ever waste your emotional energy feeling bad that

Jesus was never accepted as Israel's Messiah. The reason He

wasn't was He fought it with all the cleverness and power of

His divine mind. He masked His Messiahship, and all the

power of hell could not rip that mask off, try as they did.

Satan's only hope of maintaining control of the earth and

mankind was to prevent the cross. This is the hidden battle

that is going on all through the life of our Lord. Satan was

trying to get Jesus limited to a earthly lordship where Satan

would still be in control. Satan wanted Jesus to be the most

popular man in Israel. Leap from the temple and let the

people carry you to power. Bow down to me and receive

power over the nations. Satan wanted Jesus to take off the

mask and let it be known He was the Messiah. This was the

point of all the temptations, and Jesus had to fight constantly

to keep His mask on.

This explains those mysterious sayings of Jesus about His

parables. Jesus had a paradoxical purpose in His teaching

with parables. He told them in order to make truth simple to

understand, and at the same time make truth so obscure that

people could not understand. The parables were part of His

mask. Listen to Mark 4:11-12."He told them the secret of

the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on

the outside everything is said in parables so that they may be

ever seeing but never perceiving, and ever hearing but never

understanding..."

Jesus explained His parables to His disciples so that they

could understand them, but they were puzzles and riddles to

the leaders of Israel. This was not by accident, but by plan.

Had they understood, they would have make Him their

Messiah. Jesus kept them confused and puzzled on purpose

to fulfill His greater plan for the whole world. Whose fault

was it that Jesus was not accepted as Israel's Messiah? It

was His own fault, for this was His plan. Anybody who hates

Jews for rejecting Christ and crucifying Him has a screw

loose somewhere, for this is the way Jesus planned it. You

just as well hate Jesus for getting Himself crucified, for He

planned it, and then cleverly orchestrated His whole ministry

to make sure it happened. If you want to blame anybody for

the cross, blame Jesus, for He had a thousand chances to

escape it by removing His mask. But He kept it on to be our

Savior.

Which would you rather have Jesus be: The Messiah of

Israel or the Savior of the world? By means of His

mysterious mask He became both, and the result is both Jews

and Gentiles can forever say, Thank God for that masked

man who outwitted the subtle serpent and the wisdom of men

to be our Savior. He avoided the limited destiny that others

would have forced on Him to fulfill that greater destiny His

Father had planned for Him, that He might be King of kings

and Lord of lords with a name above all others.

So much of the life of Jesus is explained by solving the

mystery of the mask. I use to look at Jesus before Pilate and

wonder why Jesus did not speak up in His defense. Why be

silent when you can speak out and do a miracle and reveal

your power? It never made sense to me that Jesus would be

so passive when so much injustice was happening. But now I

see, for Jesus would not let all the power of hell make Him

remove His mask, for that was the key to His getting to the

cross.

Jesus could have made Himself King of Israel with no

problem. He could have had the Pharisees and Saducees

bowing to Him and swearing allegiance. If Jesus had wanted

no higher goal than to be the Messiah of Israel, He could

have easily achieved that ambition. But Jesus chose to

sacrifice that goal to be the Savior of the world.

He had one last chance as He hung dying on the cross. He

could have called legions of angels to come to His rescue. He

could have ripped His mask off and said, "Look you blind

sinners. I am the Son of God. Nobody does this to me and

gets by with it." And He could have wiped out the whole lot

of them. But Jesus refused to remove the mask. He died

looking like a common criminal. One Roman Centurion

got a peak under the mask and saw who He really was and

said, "Truly this was the Son of God." But it changed

nothing, for the rest saw only the mask and they crucified

Him.

To the end He wore His mask because of His love for all

mankind. If saving men meant so much to Jesus, there is

certainly something missing in our love for Jesus if we are not

motivated to share this good news of His love. Paul said he

would become all things to all men that he might win some.

Paul would wear any mask and be what he had to be to win

men. Are we willing to play different roles in life to touch

others for Christ? Jesus paid an awful price to wear His

mask for us. Are we willing to wear a mask for Him? We

need to learn how to relate well to anyone God brings into

our lives that we might in some way touch them for Christ.

This was a goal Jesus had in mind all along, and it will help

us cooperate in fulfilling the ultimate purpose of the

mysterious mask of the Master.

7. THE GREAT PHYSICIAN MARK 2:1-12

People who survive great dangers and diseases are often

creative people who do the unusual. Robert Muller, in his

memoirs, Most Of All, They Taught Me Happiness, tells of

how creative he became under pressure. In 1943 he was a

member of the French Resistance. Using the name of

Parizot, he infiltrated a government agency, and was able to

gather information on German troop movements. He was

tipped off that the Nazis were on to him, and coming to

arrest him. He fled to the attic of his office building.

Gestapo men were soon searching the premises.

Muller knew he had to come up with a plan to survive.

So he took off his glasses, and slick down his hair, and

grabbed a file folder, and walked down stairs. He walked

right into the office where his secretary was being

interrogated. He asked her what all the excitement was

about. She didn't bat an eye, but said the gentlemen were

looking for Parizot. "Parizot!" He exclaimed. "I just saw

him a few minutes ago on the fourth floor." The Nazis

rushed upstairs, and Muller was led to safety by his friends.

Cleverness and creativity are the keys to surviving what

seem like hopeless situations. We see it in the realm of

diseases also. Senator Frank Church of Idaho was told at age

33 that he had incurable cancer, and he was given 6 months

to live. He decided to take chances, and he submitted to a

new radiation treatment just being developed. He also

decided to take chances, and be creative with his life. He

went into politics and sponsored risky legislation on

civil-rights and the environment. He was the first Senator to

publicly oppose the Viet Nam war. He did eventually die of

his cancer, but not until 1984, which was 37 years after he

was given 6 months.

The point is, people who are clever and creative, and who

chose to do the unusual, are the people who experience the

exceptional in life. They survive when others parish. They

are restored to health when others die. The paralytic in Mark

2 is just such a man. He was bed ridden, and yet he got his

body where men with two good legs could not get. Jesus was

surrounded by people, and no one could even get through the

door into the house, let alone, near to Jesus.

Even Zacchaeus's idea of climbing a tree would not work

here, for Jesus was in the house. We don't know if it was his

idea, or that of his friends carrying him, but they were like

an ancient ambulance team who got their patient to the

doctor on time. When the normal route is closed, you need to

come up with a creative alternative to reach a goal. This

team recognized that sometimes you have to start at the top

and work down, and that is what they did.

They created a skylight before anybody thought of such a

thing, and let their patient down through the roof right into

the presence of Jesus. They had no doubt what would

happen, for Jesus, as far as the record reveals, never had a

sick person in His presence that He did not heal. We have no

hint that any sick person ever went away saying, "I am not

healed." Nor do we have any record of Jesus ever walking

away from a sick person, and not healing them. They knew if

they could just get him into the presence of Jesus, their labor

would not be in vain. Their faith in Jesus motivated them to

be clever and creative.

I've read this account many times, and I always read

verse 5 in a restricted sense. Jesus seeing their faith

responded and healed the paralytic. Their faith, always

meant to me, the faith of the friends who let him down.

Some make a big point of this being their faith, rather than

his faith. It is true, if it would have said his faith, the friends

would be excluded. But saying, their faith, does not exclude

his. The their, is plural, and could refer to all five of the team,

including the young paralytic himself. There is no reason

why he should be excluded, as if he was just a lump of clay,

with no say in what his friends were doing. For all we know,

he was the coach, and the whole thing was his idea from the

start, and the roof route was his creative choice.

All we know for sure is, there were many paralytics who

never walked again, but here was one who carried his bed

home that day. He was the exceptional paralytic. He was

aggressive in his search for a miracle. We have all had

experiences where it was hard to get into see the doctor,

because he or she was so busy. That was the problem with

this paralytic. When he got to the place where Jesus was, he

realized he should have made an appointment. The line of

those ahead of him was long, and his only hope of seeing the

doctor was aggressive cleverness.

This morning we want to look at this event from the point

of view of the doctor's response to this most aggressive

patient. Keep in mind, it is aggressive patients who are often

a pain to the doctor, who are the most likely to get well.

Let's begin with a negative aspect from the doctor's point of

view, and look at-

I. THE DISTURBANCE OF THE DOCTOR.

I've often thought that one of the hardest aspects of being

a doctor is the perpetual interruptions. They can be doing

one thing, and get a call to do another, at anytime of the day

or night. They can have a waiting room full of patients, and

get called away to deliver a baby, or some other emergency at

the hospital. Being interrupted can put a lot of stress on

people.

In our text, you will note that verse 2 tells us that Jesus

was preaching to the crowd. He was preaching the word,

and nobody likes to be interrupted in the middle of a

message. This is highlighted by the police report concerning

the New Testament Baptist church in Stockton, Cal. It seems

that Oscar MacAlister interrupted the morning message by

shouting at the pastor that he was getting out of hand. After

the service pastor Murphy Paskill had an idea on how to

prevent further such disturbances. He got a revolver, and

shot MacAlister for four times. The pastor was booked on

charges of attempted murder. We do not know if he was as

poor as preacher as MacAlister thought, but he was

obviously a very poor shot.

The point is, interruptions can be very disturbing. They

can add so much stress to life that they become a cause for

illness. Rabbi Joshua Liebman wrote the popular book,

Peace Of Mind, that started the avalanche of such books. He

was so swamped with calls and letters from people who

wanted his help to get peace of mind, that he lost his own

peace of mind. He tried to help all who interrupted his life

with a cry for help, and in just three years he was dead at age

43.

Perpetual disturbance can be deadly. That is why Jesus

very wisely got away from the burden of dealing with

people's problems perpetually. He was a physician who

healed Himself by getting rest for restoration. But we see

also, that He handled interruptions in His life as

opportunities. It was a radical disturbance to have the roof

torn away while you are preaching, but Jesus was not overly

disturbed by this disturbance. He was preaching the word of

God, but he recognized that even the best things in life can be

set aside to deal with the emergency of the moment. If you

are having your devotions, and are in prayer, and your child

comes crying with a cut finger, it is not an offense to God to

leave you devotion to care for the cut.

Jesus was a good emergency doctor. He took this radical

disturbance in stride, and gave it His full attention. What

Jesus demonstrates here is that we can decide to make an

interrruption in our life a burden or a blessing. It was a very

rude thing to do, to come in through the roof. It is not only

not appropriate in polite circles, it is not appropriate in any

circle. Jesus could have been offended, and He could have

complained, and gotten the whole crowd to be critical of this

team of disturbers of the peace. Instead, He turned it into

one of His greatest messages. By healing this paralytic, Jesus

not only demonstrated His power to heal, but His authority

to forgive sin, and even more important, His willingness to

do.

The crowd learned more that day about Jesus then they

would have had this disturbance never taken place. This

paralytic became a powerful object lesson for the Greatest

Doctor who ever lived. If we are going to be like Jesus, we

need to ask of every interruption in our lives, "How can I use

this for a blessing?" Next look at-

II. THE DIAGNOSIS OF THE DOCTOR.

Diagnosis is a Greek word used only once in the New

Testament in Acts 25:21. It refers to a judgment based on

thorough knowledge. Jesus judged immediately that this

young man was a paralytic because of sin, for he did not say

this to most of His patients, which He said to Him: "Son,

your sins are forgiven."

Jesus called him son, and so he was a young man, and so

his illness was not age related nor accident related. He was

obviously a victim of a disease somehow related to his

life-style. You can break nine out of the ten commandments

that do not directly relate to illness, but one does, and that is

sexual immorality. Sexually transmitted diseases have been a

major health problem all through time. Aids is one of the

most talked about diseases of our day. But there is also

Herpes, which is epidemic, affecting 20 million Americans.

Gonorrhea is the most prevalent bacteria infection on

earth, with over one hundred million cases a year. Syphilis is

another major social disease, and this is likely the disease of

the young paralytic of our text. Syphilis leads to many other

illnesses, and by 1876 it was discovered that if it moved to the

spinal cord it could cause complete paralysis. It is the only

social disease I could find that could lead to paralysis. The

Greek words used to describe this mans disease are

paralutikos and paraluomai. Out of 14 uses of these two

words in the New Testament, ten of them refer to this young

man. He is the most paralyzed man in the New Testament,

and Jesus says it was because of sin in his life.

Sin and sickness are sometimes directly linked.

Immorality and illness are linked. Defiance of God's laws and

disease, often go hand in hand. Here is the immoral man

made conspicuous by his paralysis. Note, Jesus said, "Your

sins are forgiven." He used the plural of sins, for seldom is

an immoral person immoral just once. The man's life-style

was an open invitation to infection.

My problem here is, how can Jesus be so forgiving of such

an immoral person? It seems that Jesus is just too lenient

with some sinners. I think we all feel like the elder brother at

times, and wonder how the father could let the prodigal son

off the hook so easy, and welcome him home, when he knew

he wasted his substance with harlots. He was immoral, and

yet dad took him back like he was still a virgin. There are

some hard things to grasp about forgiveness, and one of them

is, how can you do it, and still escape being soft on sin.

Christlike forgiveness almost seems immoral to us at times,

and makes being forgiving very hard.

Jesus diagnosed this man immediately as suffering from a

sin caused disease, and yet, without a call for repentance, or a

lecture on holiness, or at least a brief condemnation, He

healed him, and did so by forgiving his sins. It was not his

mistakes, his poor judgments, his inadequacies, but his sins.

I have stuggled with this for years, for Jesus seems to take sin

too lightly at times. Another famous example being the

woman taken in adultery. But then I began to look at Jesus

in the light of His major role as the Great Physician. A

doctor is a healer, and his or her task is not that of judging

the patient, but of helping them to be healed. The reason

Jesus was 100% successful in the area of healing, when He

was not in preaching or teaching, is because in healing there

was never a distinction between those who were sick because

of their sin, and those who were sick just because they were a

part of a fallen world.

Jesus never failed to heal people who deserved what they

were suffering, because they brought it on themselves,

because of their sin. This explains so many of the mysteries

of the world of healing. There is no discrimination in

healing. It falls into the same category as the sun rising and

the rain falling on the just and the unjust. Healing is not a

gift God gives only to His own children. Unsaved people can

be healed as well as the saved, for the same laws of health

work for them, as for the Christian. They can receive

miracles also, for miracles also have laws by which they

operate.

In the next paragraph the Pharisees are upset with Jesus

for eating with tax collectors and sinners. We are talking

about prostitutes here, and people who are immoral, and who

spread the sort of diseases that lead young men to become

paralytics. Jesus responds in verse 17, "It is not the healthy

who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the

righteous, but sinners." Jesus never asked anything of His

patients except the nature of their illness, and if He

diagnosed it as sinned caused, He never hesitated to heal, for

the sick need to be healed, and that is a need He always met

regardless of the cause.

Not only does this mean non-Christians can be healed, it

means Jesus supports all the medical efforts to heal all

diseases, even those that are caused by sin. Many Christians

are involved in ministering to those with aids, a usually sin

caused disease. This is a legitimate ministry for those with

the compassion of Christ. I abhor the folly that leads to such

a disease, but at the same time, I must applaud those who

seek a cure for aids. It seems that to do so is to be soft on the

sin that leads to it, but it is the spirit of Jesus as the Great

Physician. If aids is the judgment of God, then how can a

Christian be concerned about healing those who come under

His wrath? This has been the same question all through

history on leprosy, syphilis, and many other diseases.

We need to see that you can know a disease is a direct

result of defiance of God's will, and still seek for the healing

of that disease. This is so clearly illustrated in Num. 12

where Miriam is cursed with leprosy for her critical stand

against Moses. She was facing a horrible fate, and Aaron, her

brother, pleaded with Moses not to hold this sin against

them, for he too was a part of the criticism. He pleads, "Do

not let her be like a stillborn infant coming from its mother's

womb with flesh half eaten away." What a gruesome fate.

Moses did not say, "She made her bed let her lie in it. She

suffers the just reward of her sin and folly." Instead,

knowing it was God's judgment on her sin, He prays in Num.

12:13, "O God, please heal her!" And God answered that

prayer, and she was made clean, and only had to suffer 7

days of shame outside the camp.

Jesus had the same attitude toward those clearly under

the judgment of God. The paralytic at the Pool of Bethesda

was an invalid for 38 years. Jesus did not hesitate to heal

him, but after He said to him in John 5:14, "See, you are well

again. Stop sinning or something worse may happen to you."

Sin led to his disease, and again, it was likely a sexually

transmitted disease, yet Jesus healed him.

The evidence is clear: Disease discrimination is as

inconsistent with Christlikeness as is race discrimination. It

does not make any difference if one is suffering from personal

sin, or from just being a part of the sinful world, the sick

need the physician, and all are to be cared for and healed. A

Christian nurse or doctor, or any of us, need not feel we are

compromising our faith if we care for, and loving seek the

healing of, people who are suffering as a direct result of their

sin.

Pat Boone writes about his experience with a Jewish

pornographer in Las Vegas. He was facing gall bladder

surgery, in feared he would die. He read one of Pat's books

and called him up, and asked him to pray for him. Pat not

only prayed for this man, so out of the will of God, he got

him to pray for himself. When he went in for his surgery

they could not find the gall stones on the x-rays, and he was

sent home. He was a happy and healed man, and Pat got him

to reading the Bible, and learning about the Jesus who

healed him. At the time of his writing the man had not yet

received Christ as his Savior. Was he right to help a godless

man like that to find healing? Would not the world be better

off had he suffered a just judgment, and died?

The answer to both questions is yes. Yes the world would

be better off without him, and yes it was right to seek his

healing, even if he never does come to Christ, and eventually

dies as a lost man anyway. Why is this right? Because in

healing there is to be no discrimination. Christian, Jew,

Moslem, or Atheist: They are all to be dealt with in

compassion, and if possible, by medicine or miracle, be

delivered from their disease.

The Christian has the right, and even the obligation, to

make a distinction between people in many areas of life. You

do not have to cooperate with all people in their projects or

life-style. You do not have to let your children date

unbelievers. You have to discriminate in dozens of ways, and

refuse to let homosexuals be Sunday schools teachers, and

camp counselors. Life is loaded with valid discrimination,

because light and darkness cannot share the same space. But

when it comes to healing, there is a universality about it that

cannot be escaped.

It is doctor's orders. Whatever the diagnosis, and

however related to sin, the Christian healer does not

discriminate. The Christian healer heals all. Jesus is the

universal physician, and because it is so, the non-Christian

may also experience his healing power. Medical missionaries

minister to many non-Christians around the world. They

heal more non-Christians than anybody, and they always

have, because it was the way of, and the will of, our Great

Physician.