Redeemer Evangelical Lutheran Church

Healing for Your Sin

Matthew 9:1-8

October 15, 2023 anno Domini

In today’s text Jesus gives you a sure-fire test to determine if you are sinner or not.  If you never get sick, you are not a sinner. If you’ve never had a cold, passed every covid test, don’t take a single medicine, never had to visit a doctor, you are not a sinner.

In the same way, if you’ve had a cold, ran a fever, take some medicine for blood pressure or depression, then know this. You are a sinner. Before you run to the doctor the next time you get sick, it might be better first to confess your sins and receive forgiveness.

Now I don’t mean there is a one-to-one correspondence between a certain sin and a certain sickness. You watch pornography and get pink eye. You covet in your heart and get clogged arteries.  Although sometimes there is such a connection – drink too much alcohol and your liver is going to give you problems. Be promiscuous and you might get a sexually transmitted disease.

However, the root cause of every sickness is our sinfulness. If you’re not sinful you won’t get sick. If you do get sick you need Jesus. 

That’s what the friends of the paralyzed man knew about their friend. He was in a bad way. It took four of them to carry him around. They helped him as they could, but mostly he begged in the marketplace to get food and money. There were no elevators or wheelchairs, or powered scooters. There was only misery relieved occasionally by a few good friends, but even friends have their limits.

Jesus has no limits. He is the Son of God and wherever He walked on earth He brought His Kingdom, His reign and rule over sin, death, and the power of the Devil, your enemies, which are also His enemies. 

Put yourself on that paralyzed man’s mat. Your friends likely told you where they were taking you, because usually they just dropped you off at your favorite begging spot by Applebees. “We’re taking you to Jesus. He heals people.”  And then you’re there. Right in front of Jesus. He sees your friends. Sees their faith, looks at you, and says, “Take heart, my son your ….”  Your what? What do you want above all else? “Your spine is healed. Your legs are made well. Rise and go home.”

Now, let me put you back on the paralyzed man’s bed, but let’s say this time you are paralyzed by your own fault. You just got your chariot license and borrowed your dad’s fastest horse for an evening with your friends. After too much Maddog 20/20 you got in an accident that killed your best friend and left you paralyzed. Now you’re lying in front of Jesus. He looks you in the eye and says, “Take, heart my son, your ….” What are the next words you need to hear, but would never expect?  “Your sins are forgiven.”

When it comes to suffering it doesn’t matter if you caused it by your sin or you are just afflicted by it. The Devil is always going set you against God with his lies. God is angry with you. He’s punishing you for some long-ago sin or some hidden sin you’ve kept in the dark. The truth is you’re sick because you’re dying because you’re sinful. The Son of God came in the flesh of Jesus to heal you and He knows your true ailment. It isn’t cancer or cholesterol. It is sin. Your God-given human nature is corrupted by sin and therefore your body suffers sickness. The Son of God became man for one reason according to Isaiah,

he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.

Jesus of Nazareth was fully God and fully man. Fully man so He could bear our sins and take our place. Fully God so that His death would be sufficient to bring us healing – all your sins are forgiven by His death.

But there’s two things working against our receiving that forgiveness. One, we don’t think our problem is sin. Like that paralyzed man we too might be tempted to say, “Forgiveness, what good is forgiveness, my legs don’t work, my cancer is terminal, my son’s wife left him.” You judge your needs far more with your eyes, than with your ears, listening to God’s Word and His diagnoses.

Second, we question if forgiveness is real. Has Christ truly taken away my sin? Can He? This time the problem isn’t with your eyes, but with your heart, your feelings. You endure the pain your sins have caused. You stilll feel guilty. This, in a way, is what the Scribes complained about. When they heard Jesus forgive sin, they accused Him of blasphemy. To blaspheme is to soil God’s name, to demean or lie about God. The Scribes accused Jesus of this because by forgiving He was acting as if He was God. God become a man? A man forgiven sins? Blasphemy. No, it is not blasphemy. It is the blessed truth by which God accomplishes your forgiveness.

Jesus eventually gives the Scribes something to see, but first He questions them. “Why do you think evil in your hearts? For which is easier to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise and walk’?  Note what Jesus asks. Not what is easier to do, but to say. It’s easy to say, “You’re forgiven” because that cannot be seen. But would you dare to say “Get up and walk” to a person in a wheelchair? Why not? Because you don’t have that power. You’re not almighty God. But Jesus is, so He said the harder thing “Rise, pick up your bed and go home” to show He could do that harder thing – forgive sins.

The crowds that day recognized this unique event, glorifying God “for giving such authority to men.” Jesus alone has this authority. The Son of God was authorized by His Father to take on human flesh, then humanity’s sin, then their suffering and hell on the cross. You could have seen that if you lived 2000 years ago, but only God’s Word would have convinced you that His death was of God and was good. Jesus rose from the dead and that too you could have seen, as did over 500 witnesses.  Now you can only hear of that historic event.

The authority to forgive is still given among men. Jesus called twelve men to baptize in the name of the Triune God and to teach His Word. He told them to preach repentance and the forgiveness of sins in His name. He told them to untie sinners from their sin when they repented and to chain them to their sin when they didn’t. He told them “to do” the Lord’s Supper – to eat His body and drink His blood often for the forgiveness of sins. You can still see that today  – the water poured on the head of an infant, a pastor forgiving your sins, bread and wine placed on your tongue. All of that is like the cross of Jesus – your eyes and the Devil would tell you it’s nothing, but when you hear what Jesus says of it, then baptism becomes your resurrection, your second birth to eternal life, and preaching becomes the breath of life and the Supper becomes the medicine of immortality.

Your sins are forgiven. You can believe that because Jesus has given you something to see – His death on the cross and His resurrection from the dead. The water of your baptism, the Word of your Pastor and Christ’s Body and Blood in the Supper. Like the paralyzed man that forgiveness will work healing, first in your heart as you believe, then in your body as you are sanctified, and finally when He returns and says, “Rise from your grave and come home.” In the name of Jesus.  Amen.