~~~ The Hands of a Healer ~~~ | |
Your Faith Has Made You Well (Mathew 9:20-22):
One day the disciples of John the Baptist came to Jesus questioning why His disciples do not fast. As He was answering them, a local official arrived and requested Jesus come lay His hands on his daughter. So Jesus and his disciples followed the man to his house. Quite a large number of people followed along. One in particular was a woman who had suffered for 12 years with a bleeding disorder. In an act of desperation, she came up behind Jesus and touched the hem of His garment believing that by this simple act she might be healed. And indeed, she could tell right away that she was cured. Jesus stopped, turned around and asked, "Who touched me?" Everyone nearby denied touching Him, and His ever pragmatic disciples queried aloud how He could ask such a question, considering the crowd pressing about Him. The woman, trembling, fell down before Jesus and confessed, telling all who could hear an explanation for her action and that she was cured of her affliction. Jesus replied, "Daughter, be of good cheer. Your faith has made you well. Go in peace." |
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Healed and Forgiven (Mark 2:1-12):
Shortly after Jesus started His ministry, He began to attract large crowds. The manner of His teaching and reports of miraculous healings were published far and wide throughout Palestine. So it was one day when He returned to His home in Capernaum, a city on the northwest coast of the Sea of Galilee, that His house was soon filled to overflowing. As Jesus was speaking to the people, four men arrived bearing a paralyzed man but they were unable to enter because of the crowd. They lifted the man up onto the roof, made an opening above where Jesus was standing, and "...let down the bed on which the paralytic lay." When Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, "Son, your sins are forgiven you." There were some 'religious' men present who heard what Jesus said. They turned to each other having the same thought, "Who can forgive sins but God alone?" But Jesus, perceiving their thoughts, posed this question: "Which is easier to say to this man: Your sins are forgiven, or rise up and walk?" Revealing who He was, He turned to the paralytic, "I say to you, rise, take up your bed, and go home." The man rose up and picked up his bed. Whereas there was no way in before, they all made way for him to leave saying, "We never saw anything like this!" |
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A Spirit of Infirmity (Luke 13:10-17):
It was Jesus' custom to attend synagogue on the Sabbath day and He frequently taught on these occasions. One day He noticed a woman there who presented with a peculiar affliction. This condition caused her to be bent over double at the waist. He called her forward and learned she had suffered with this for 18 years. He laid his hands on her and said, "Woman, you are free from your infirmity." Immediately she was made straight and glorified God. This angered the ruler of the synagogue who believed any kind of work, even a healing, should not be done on the Sabbath. In reply, Jesus reminded him that he showed greater kindness to his farm animals on the Sabbath. "Don't you untie them and lead them out to water? Should not this woman then, whom Satan has bound these eighteen years, be loosed from her bondage on the Sabbath?" This logic silenced his enemies, but everyone else was filled with joy by everything Jesus had said and done. |
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Blind from Birth (John 9:1-12):
Jesus and His disciples, walking through Jerusalem one day, came upon a blind beggar. His disciples inquired, "Who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" Ridiculous as it seems, this was a commonly held belief. Following this faulty reasoning would mean that the man sinned while still in the womb. Jesus corrected them, "Neither this man nor his parents, but that the nature of God should be revealed through him." Jesus took the man aside, made a mud poultice which He applied to the man's eyes, and told him to wash in the nearby pool of Siloam. He crawled over to the water, washed, and returned seeing. Those who knew him were puzzled, "Is this not he who sat and begged?" To which the man said, "I am he!" This occurred on the Sabbath. When the Pharisees questioned the man some accused Jesus of being a law breaker, while others said, "How can a sinner do such signs?" But the man who received his sight said, "If this man were not from God, He could do nothing." |