Sermon Tone Analysis

Date: 2022-03-27

Audience: Grass Valley Corps

Title: The King Restores

Text: Matthew 8:1-22

Proposition: Jesus brought people to wellness

Purpose: We should do the same, but it costs

Grace and peace to you!

Matthew just finished telling us about Jesus teaching the Sermon on the Mount – the instructions he gave to those following him about what it means to live in the Kingdom of God – what their responsibilities are and how they can trust the King to support them.

Now he’s going to show that Jesus is a person who has the authority to lay out those kind of instructions.

And he’s going to do it in a way that is particularly meaningful to his audience – those of the Jewish faith in the First Century who have recently come to follow the teaching of Jesus and those who are considering whether they should.

For us, this presents a couple of challenges.

First, we aren’t – and I know I’m speaking generally here and that some of you who hear or see this may very well be, but in general it is true that we aren’t – religiously observant, ethnically included members of the Jewish population.

We are Gentiles – people whose ancestors abandoned the LORD and followed other gods and other ways while the People of God, at least sometimes, followed him.

What does it mean that we aren’t part of that group?

Well, we’ve already seen Matthew explain, both on his own and in the words of Jesus, that God has a place for us in his Kingdom and that we are invited to accept that place.

But it also means that there are things which will be harder for us to understand because we didn’t grow up in the culture and with the understanding that Mathew’s main audience did.

So, we need to do a little extra work to understand what’s going on in some of these stories in the Bible.

That’s all right.

We have working brains and we have easy access to the tools needed to figure stuff out.

We just need to use them.

Second, we are living in a time two-thousand years down the road of history!

Can or should any of these old thing, old ways apply to us in the here and now?

If so, what?

And if not, why are we wasting our time with it?

Also, being separated for these events by so much time, can we trust the stories we’re being told?

What was it Matthew’s original audience found so compelling that they were willing to change EVERYTHING after they heard it?

And is there anything we can hang onto from these ancient tales which will inspire us the same way?

Here’s what Matthew is going to give us: Three sections of signs that Jesus is who and what Matthew claims: The long-awaited Messiah who is also, somehow, God himself.

Each of the three sections has three unusual events – things that we call miracles nowadays.

Things that can not happen in the usual course of events as we understand them.

And for each of these signs, he supplies witnesses.

People that we could go ask if we were skeptical about what happened.

Now, for us, that’s a little more problematic because the witnesses are long-dead.

But at the time, most of these folks would have still been around to ask, either directly or through their immediate descendants and friends.

Matthew has thrown some narrative in around these stories, filling them out, giving more shape to the circumstances around the unexpected signs that Jesus was giving.

But, as we go along, you’ll see that this only adds to the story and its credibility, as remarkable as it seems.

And just as we have done through the first several sections of this biography, we’re going to try to ignore the chapters and verses and little added headings as much as we can while we look at the story.

We don’t want to break up a narrative that should be flowing like a river instead of going and stopping like rush hour traffic.

Start in Matthew chapter 8 today, beginning at verse 1. I’m reading from the Lexham English Bible, so if you are using a different translation the word might be different, but the meaning should be the same.

And when* he came down from the mountain, large crowds followed him.

2 And behold, a leper approached and* worshiped him, saying, “Lord, if you are willing, you are able to make me clean.”[1]

Leprosy wasn’t what we think of now.

Now there is a thing called Hansen’s Disease which is a bacterial infection that eats your nerves, leaving you susceptible to injury and infection.

It often presents with symptoms like spots on your skin or uncontrolled inflammation.

The long-term effects are horrific and memorable.

This is modern leprosy.

Biblical leprosy could be that, but it was really a catch-all term for infectious skin diseases of all sorts.

It was even applied to homes with mold that couldn’t be controlled.

Those homes would be burned if they couldn’t be cured.

Human beings were shunned – sent out of the camp or city to keep from spreading their ailment to their neighbors.

It was assumed God had cursed them and so lepers were considered unclean – they couldn’t perform the rituals that were necessary to communal living and worship.

Others who encountered them could be tarred with the same epithet – “Unclean, unclean!” – and rejected until they went through the process to demonstrate they had been restored to health.

The only close human contact allowed was with others of their kind – the other infected and rejected people scavenging to live in the fringes.

This man choosing to approach Jesus about his leprosy had to overcome his cultural training and experience to get near enough to ask for help, and he had to do it knowing that Jesus could very well have had him run off and beaten (or more likely had stones thrown at him) for risking the health of others.

But he gathered his courage and approached and said, “If you are willing, you can make me clean.”

3 And extending his hand he touched him, saying, “I am willing, be clean.”

And immediately his leprosy was cleansed.

4 And Jesus said to him, “See that you tell no one, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a testimony to them.”

[2]

They were surrounded by a crowd here, so I think Jesus was trying to calm the man’s excitement at being healed.

“Take it easy.

There’s still some steps you need to take.”

That was the law – to be restored to the community when you had survived your disease, if you did, you needed to present yourself to the local priest to be examined.

Once you were declared physically clean, an offering of thanksgiving was expected, and then you could become spiritually clean.

And then you could return to your life, your family, your work, and your place in society.

It was a conversion from outcast to accepted.

In this man’s case, he had already been accepted by Jesus.

We could tell that because Jesus touched him.

That isn’t the action of a man towards an unclean leper – it’s the hand of a compassionate friend or empathetic neighbor.

It’s love in action, a reaching out to make a connection that had been denied to this man.

It was a touch that said he was already restored, even before he knew he was healed.

The rest of the process was simply a formality.

This miracle is so much more than just clearing up a skin condition.

This wasn’t the only healing Jesus would do, not by a long shot.

As Matthew tells it, just after this, as Jesus headed towards home, he was approached by another man.

5 Now when* he entered Capernaum, a centurion approached him, appealing to him 6 and saying, “Lord, my slave is lying paralyzed in my house, terribly tormented!”

7 And he said to him, “I will come and* heal him.”[3]

A centurion was a Roman military commander, a position that was at the head of a hundred men, give or take.

His appearance in a crowd of Israelites would have been startling.

The Romans weren’t friends or neighbors.

They were the overlords.

They were the enemy who held Israel captive.

They were hated, they were feared; they were never taken lightly or ignored.

When this Centurion addressed Jesus as “Lord”, it would have been startling.

It wasn’t just polite.

It was humble from someone people never would have associated with the ability to be humble.

They would have been confused and uncertain about what he might be up to.

But Jesus simply said he would come and heal the sick slave.

8 And the centurion answered and* said, “Lord, I am not worthy that you should come in under my roof.

But only say the word and my slave will be healed.

9 For I also am a man under authority who has soldiers under me, and I say to this one, ‘Go!’ and he goes, and to another one, ‘Come!’ and he comes, and to my slave, ‘Do this!’ and he does it.”[4]

There is again – Lord.

Kyrios – one who has authority over me.

The Roman Centurion is giving public respect to a Jewish peasant and referring to him as if he was Someone, not a Galilean preacher, not a member of a subject people.

This would have been more than startling.

In fact, even Jesus couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

10 Now when* Jesus heard this,* he was astonished, and said to those who were following him,* “Truly I say to you, I have found such great faith with no one in Israel.[5]

Jesus was ASTONISHED/AMAZED – Something that we are only told about happening twice.

This is one.

The other is in Mark’s story of Jesus teaching in his hometown and being soundly rejected by his own.

That also AMAZED him.