#33. Luke 5:12-13 DESPERATELY IN
NEED OF CLEANSING
Introduction:
The people at
then that He must go and preach
to other cities. He then left and went
throughout
the cities of
the leper. The leper desperately needed to be cleansed
from his leprosy.
As he needed to be cleansed from leprosy,
even so all men need to be
cleansed
from sin.
I.
A man full of leprosy
V.12, "Ant it came to pass, when he was in a certain
city..." Luke does
not tell us what city Jesus was
in at the time. In fact neither of the
gospel
writers tell us which city this is. What
Luke does say, however,
leads
us to believe is that it was one of the cities of
traveled
to after He left
(V. 12), "...behold a man full of leprosy..." Leprosy is a disease that
we are not very familiar with
today. There are relatively few lepers
in the
anything
about it. Just out of curiosity, I
wonder if any of you--to your
knowledge--has
ever seen a leper. If so, would you
raise your hand, please.
Leprosy is a dread disease. It is
a slow working deadly disease. It
starts
out as an infection deep down within the body of the individual.
The first symptoms are small spots on the
face that may be either red, white
or black. Then after a prolonged time, joints of the
fingers or the joints
of the toes may come loose or
a joint of the finger or toe will just fall
off. As the rotting process works its way toward
the trunk of the body, an
ear may fall off or the nose
may fall off. As it affects the joints
of the
lower
legs, the legs may become extremely swollen and look like elephants
legs. This is not a painless process. It is an extremely painful disease.
It is a long slow process of pain. It may take anywhere from five to fifty
years
to kill its victim. About twenty years
is average.
I do not know how many years this man had had leprosy. Neither do I
know for sure just how far
advanced his leprosy was. Luke does tell
us that
he was full of leprosy and
that leads us to believe that his was in an
advanced
stage. He was in a pitiful condition. It was very obvious that it
was just a matter of time until
it would mean death for him. But the
worst
part of it was that in the
intervening time, there would be worse and worse
pain that he must endure. If any man in the world ever needed to be
cleansed
of his affliction, this man needed to be cleansed.
II. Little hope of ever being cleansed
The problem was that there was no known cure for leprosy. Medically at
that time, there was no known
cure. It is true that for some unknown
reason
some people who were afflicted
by leprosy would get well. It is also
true
that in Old Testament times
there had been at least one man healed by one of
the prophets of God. But as far as medical treatment was
concerned, there
was no known treatment.
Medically, for this man there was no hope whatsoever. The chances that
he would be one of the very
few who would get well for unknown reason was
very very
slim. As to the possibilities that one
of God's prophets would
heal him, the chances must have
seemed just as slim.
He had surely heard of Jesus and the miracles that Jesus had performed
in other cities. But he had no hope of ever being to make the
trip over to
the area where Jesus was
reported to be. And the chances that Jesus
would
ever come his way must have
seemed so small to him that he totally dismissed
it from his mind.
So far as I know there were no instances up to this time that Jesus had
ever healed any leper. He had healed all manner of other diseases,
but not
any leper. So far as reports were concerned, Jesus just
might not be able
to heal leprosy. But he had given serious consideration to the
question in
his own mind and he had reached
the conclusion in his own mind that Jesus
most certainly would be able to
heal a leper. This was something that
nobody
else in the whole world could do, but he just believed that if he
were to be able to come into the
presence of Jesus that Jesus would be able
to heal him. The problem was that he would probably never
be able to come
into the presence of Jesus.
III. The unexpected presence of Jesus
(V. 12), "...who seeing Jesus fell on his face..." But, behold, the day
did come in which he did see
the Lord face to face. Totally
unexpected to
himself,
there was Jesus standing right before him.
I am not certain just
what the circumstances were in
which he came to be in the presence of Jesus.
It could have been in a Jewish
synagogue. Ironically, a leper was not
forbidden
to be in a Jewish synagogue. He was
forbidden to be in the
temple,
but not in a synagogue. He would still
be required to warn all
others
that he is a leper and that they should not touch him. But whatever
the circumstances were, there
Jesus was right before him.
Luke says that he fell on his face before Jesus. This means that he did
more than just to bow before
Jesus. He fell prostrate face down on
the
ground. I can hear him crying, "Leper!
Leper!" as he falls to the ground
before
Jesus. He was warning Jesus as well as
others not to touch him.
IV. His belief in the Lord's power to help
Once he was sure that he had the attention of Jesus he expressed to
Jesus his belief in the Lord's power to
help him.
(V. 12), "...and besought
him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt,
thou canst make me clean."
He was saying, "I believe, Lord, that
you can heal even a leper. Lord, I am
sure in my own mind that you
have the power to heal me. I believe
that if
you are just willing to do it,
you can. If you want to heal me you can."
V.
The willingness of Jesus to help
It was right then that an amazing thing happened. V. 13, "And he put
forth
his hand, and touched him, saying, I will: be thou clean...." What is
amazing
about this to me is not that Jesus was willing to heal the man.
What is amazing to me is that Jesus
touched him. There was nobody else in
all the world who would have
reached out his hand to touch a leper.
Nobody!
But Jesus did.
Note what Jesus had said as He reached down to touch the man. He said,
"I will: be thou clean." Can you imagine the Lord saying anything
else?
Can you imagine Him saying, "No. I am not interested in healing
you"? Can
you imagine Him saying
that? Not by a long shot. Never in this world.
There has never been the heart of any man
to love the way that Jesus loves.
He did care about this man. He cared about his physical well being. He
cared
about his spiritual well being. Jesus
was perfectly willing to make
this man whole.
VI. The instant healing of the man
So Jesus reached down and touched the man. Now note:
(V. 13), "...And
immediately
the leprosy departed from him." Now get this. As Jesus was
reaching
down and reaching out His hand toward this man, the man was still a
leper. When His hand was but a fraction of an inch
away from the man the
man was a leper. But at the very instant that the hand of the
Lord touched
this man, that man was
completely free of leprosy. He was
completely whole.
He was completely well.
VII. A desperate need of cleansing today
Now I want each one of you to take a look at yourself. I am not asking
you to stand before a mirror
and to examine yourself to see if you have any
red or white or black spots on
your face. What I am asking you to do is
to
take the Bible, the holy word of
God and see in the light of God's word if
you have not sinned in the
sight of God. Listen to Romans 3:23,
"For all
have sinned and come short of
the glory of God." Listen to James
4:17:
"Therefore, to him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is
sin." Listen to your own conscience. You may not be infected with leprosy,
but you are infected with
something that is far worse. You are
infected
with something that is far more
damaging. You are infected with sin.
The pain is far greater than the pain of
leprosy. The pain lasts a lot
longer
than the pain of leprosy. The end result
of your sin will be to
suffer
in the fires of hell forever and ever.
Furthermore, from the human point of view, there is no cure. There is
no way for you to cleanse
yourself from the sin that you have already
committed. There is no way humanly possible for you to
be cleansed from the
dreadful
disease of sin.
There is but one way that you can be cleansed from your sin and that way
is the Lord. The Bible says that the blood of Jesus
Christ, God's Son
cleanses
from all sin.
The first question is: Is He able
to cleanse you from your sin? The
answer
to that question is: He is able. John 1:7 says that the blood of
Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all
sin. He shed His blood on
He might be able to cleans
you. But because His blood was shed He
is able
to cleanse you from your sin.
The next question is: Is He
willing to cleanse you of your sin? The
answer
to that question is: He will not cleanse
you from your sins if you
will not repent and trust Him as
your Savior. Jesus said, "Except ye
repent,
ye shall all likewise perish." The Bible says, "Believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ and thou shalt be
saved." But He is willing to cleanse you if
you are willing to repent of
your sin and to trust in Him as your Savior.
If you will but trust in the Lord as your Savior, Jesus will save your
soul. He will save you at the moment that you trust
in Him. John 3:18
says, "He that believeth on
him is not condemned; he that believeth
not is
condemned
already because he hath not believed on the name of the only
begotten
Son of God." One moment before you
believe you are a lost sinner
on the road to hell. But the moment that you believe you are uncondemned.
You are saved. You are on the road to heaven. "Believe on the Lord Jesus
Christ and thou shalt be saved."