He Touched Me

 

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO MARK

HE TOUCHED ME

Mark 1:43-45

43 Jesus sent him away at once with a strong warning: 44 "See that you don't tell this to anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them."  45 Instead he went out and began to talk freely, spreading the news. As a result, Jesus could no longer enter a town openly but stayed outside in lonely places. Yet the people still came to him from everywhere.

NIV

First, we have to note that Jesus did not command, but sent him away with indignity, as the Greek word here means, and is translated as a strong warning. Other translations use sternly warned, straitly charged, strictly charged, and told him sternly. It would seem this is important because Jesus thought is best for the man to follow the law of the land and do that which was needed to be pronounced clean by the priest as well as bring the appropriate sacrifices. It is thought by some of our scholars the main reason was so that it would have been proven by the law that the man was indeed cured of leprosy, which would say that Jesus had that kind of authority to cure this man and in fact, he was cured. But the man did not follow that warning, but of his own delight and excitement, he went immediately spreading the news that Jesus has cured him as it was apparent he no longer was a leper, as his skin was absolutely clean and free from any of that horrible disease. How could he not want everyone to know that he had a miracle happen to him, that this Jesus touched him while he was still a leper, which it would have been considered to be unclean by the law to touch a leper. The leper had to live without any human contact at all. It had to be a very lonely existence, not being about to even walk freely about town, or hold a dear one even by the hand. To be a total outcast living outside the city. Maybe they touched each other, in an effort to comfort each other. We simply don’t know that much about how they actually lived. But this man was now clean, he was cured, he was healed and he freely moved about the city telling everyone, I was a leper, but now I am not, Jesus healed me. We are told that because of this man’s testimony all over town, Jesus thought it best not to go into the city, as it might cause such a crowd and disturb the daily lives of those earnestly trying to make a living, so he stayed just outside of the city and the people still came to him, after hearing the news the leper had shared. What we get from this is that we need to be sharing everywhere the healing we have received by the hand of Jesus. Certainly, everyone, every believer has one healing that they should share everywhere. We all have been healed from a life that leads to death. We all have been saved from that penalty of death and given eternal life. However, many of us have also had the hand of Jesus touch us in a physical way and we have been healed of some ailment, disease, or infirmity and we should be telling everyone all the time, all over the place, that Jesus has healed us. How can we hold that in? How can we not share it? If we don’t share our healing, will anyone come to Jesus? Not just the town’s people, but our other fellow believers who are still suffering from some physical difficulty. Yes, some would quote about Paul and his problem and that the Lord told him that His grace would be sufficient. But that was Paul, only one man, and it was for a reason the Lord has not shared with us. But if we look at Jesus, he healed multitudes, hundreds of people from a myriad of diseases. Whoever came to him, he healed. We have to conclude that we are one of those people who when we come to Jesus, asking him to heal us, surely he will not say, no, or just suffer in silence because my grace is good enough. Now if he did say that, then we never need to ask for continued prayer, because we have our answer.  If that is his answer then we need to stand up and speak up that we heard from the Lord and he wants us to remain in pain as a testimony of his authority in our lives, and get on with being like Paul, spreading the good news all over the land. However, if we want to be healed, like all the other people, then he will simply say, I am willing, and he will heal us, he will touch us. We will be able to say the same thing that leper said, He touched me.