You hear the Word of God and the leper came to him, imploring him and kneeling said to him, if you will, you can make me clean. Move with pity. He stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, I will be clean and immediately the leprosy left him and he was made clean and Jesus sternly charged him and sent him away at once and said to him, see that you say nothing to anyone but go show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded for a proof to them. But he went out and began to talk freely about it and to spread the news so that Jesus could no longer openly enter a town but was out in the desolate places and people were coming to him from every quarter. Let's pray. While they're prayed that as we consider this text tonight as we consider Jesus interaction with this leper, you'd make it abundantly clear where we stand in the story. We are the leper and I pray that you would open the eyes of the blind and the ears of the deaf. I pray that you'd be in my head and in my thinking, in my heart and in my understanding and in my mouth, in my speaking. Christ's name, we pray these things, amen, amen. Well, we've been looking at the book of Mark and remember if you were here last week, we basically ended a day in the life of Jesus. And the way the day ended, remember Jesus healed Simon Peter's mother-in-law and the evening that he healed Simon Peter's mother-in-law, the whole city came of cappernum. The whole town, it says, came out and they were in Peter's yard, I guess. And so they came and Jesus healed many and he cast out many demons. And as he, after he had done this, we assumed he went to sleep. And the next morning, it says, he got up before dark and before dark, he went out to a desolate place and was praying. And during this time of prayer, apparently people were still gathering at Simon Peter's house. You know, imagine, you know, look, when people, like when a new video game is launched, you know, people with lawn chairs and, you know, six inch TVs waiting for Jesus to wake up and to be first in line to be healed again. He wasn't there. And Peter and the other James and John and Andrew went to look for Jesus and they found him out in the desolate place. And if you remember, Peter basically rebukes Jesus. And he says, everyone's looking for you and the implication is you need to get back there and start healing people. And Jesus says, no. He doesn't say it just like that, but he actually says his intention. He says, let's go to the next towns. So I can preach for that is why I came out. So Jesus will not go back to Copernum. He says because the reason I came is to preach. And so instead of going back to heal those people, we're going to keep moving so I can preach. And then the very next story, and in this text, it should catch your attention. He meets this leper. In other words, it says that Jesus went around preaching, but Mark put these stories next to each other on purpose. So Jesus says, the reason I came is to preach. And what's what is it that could could make Jesus break his stride if you will? What is it that could make Jesus stop from this preaching tour and just stop in his tracks and deal with something? And it's this leper. And this story is so important that Jesus interaction with the leper effectively ends his preaching ministry. So something about this leper is important enough and make Jesus stop. And important enough that it's going to end his preaching ministry, Jesus had to have known that. And yet he stops and interacts with this leper anyway. What is it? What is it about this guy that is so special? And the answer is he's a leper. We're going to look at three things tonight. We're going to look at the scandal of leprosy. We're going to look at the scandal of grace. And then the third thing is a call to decision. That's what the end of this text is about. What's the scandal of leprosy? If you look at the very first verse, it says, an leper came to him. What does it mean to be a leper? Lepper came to him imploring him and kneeling him. And the leper says, if you will, you can make me clean or if you want to, you can make me clean. Notice he didn't ask him for anything. I talked about last week that really what praying is all about is telling Jesus. You tell Jesus and by telling him what's going on, the request is implicit. He tells Jesus if you will make me clean. And that is one of the biggest, most bold statements in all of the Bible. And here's why. Because if you look at the Old Testament, the worst possible thing for you to be besides dead was to be a leper. In fact, to be a leper was to be dead functionally speaking. And what's interesting in the Old Testament, the book of Leviticus, specifically chapters 13 and 14, in chapters 13, there are at least, depending on how you count them, there are at least 20 different ways for a priest to go about diagnosing leprosy. You see, we tend to think of leprosy. We tend to think of countries like India or if you're like me, the first thing that comes to mind is a movie papillon, or Steve McQueen and papillon and he meets the leper that's sort of a gangster and he picks up this cigar and smokes it. And the leprosys, how do you know I wasn't contagious? Some acquaintances, I didn't. Here they go. That's pretty bold. It's not, it's not just that kind of leprosy. In the ancient Near East, any kind of skin ailment, any number of things would be considered leprosy to them. It wasn't just what we technically would term in Western United States leprosy, the specific disease. So any of various different kind of diseases, so in Leviticus chapter 13, there's about 20 different skin ailments or things that could get you the diagnosis of leprosy. And then what's interesting is when you get to chapter 14, so it's easy to be diagnosed as a leper. And then in chapter 14, there's a lot of different rules and laws governing the way someone is proclaimed to be clean from leprosy. In other words, if someone is clean, here is how you're supposed to go about making that official. Now what you have though is a sort of leprosy gap, if you will. In other words, you can diagnose someone as having leprosy. You can diagnose someone as having been cleansed from leprosy, but there is nowhere described how do you make someone clean. There's a gap there. The reason there's a gap there is because in rabbinic tradition and the Old Testament, the only person that could heal leprosy was God himself. In fact, leprosy was grouped with one other thing that was the purview of God and only God himself. There are two things that only God can do and that is to heal leprosy and to raise the dead. And so if you've got leprosy, you are in bad shape because the priests can tell you you're in bad shape and the priests can tell you you've been healed after the fact, but what about in the middle? What does it mean to be a leper? Let me read to you just after all these diagnoses. So assuming you've had one of the 20, after all this, the priest has pronounced you unclean. It says in verse 45, the leprosy person who has the disease shall wear torn clothes, let the hair of his head hang loose. He shall cover his upper lip and cry out unclean, unclean. He shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease. He is unclean. He shall live alone. His dwelling shall be outside the camp. So if you had leprosy, what did that mean? Well for one thing we tend to forget is pride painful, right? For one you had a disease so that had to be bothersome, but you were complete in utter outcast. Not only were you in outcast, you were literally declared to be an outcast and when you walked through the streets you were bound up to to let people know that you were an outcast and to shout unclean, unclean. You had to live outside of the camp and eventually you weren't when you got into when they started building you were not allowed to go in to the city of Jerusalem. You literally were banned from contact. So how did you feel about that? You might have felt rejected, you might have felt alone, you might have felt anything, but what you were practically and emotionally which you were utterly and completely hopeless. What could you do? Here you are. The only thing that can make you clean is a direct act of God. What do you do? What most people do is that you just live this life in misery. You live this life being rejected. You live this life with this disease that no one understands and isolates you from everyone else. And then you hear of a guy who might be able to heal you. You see the scandal of leprosy is that isolates you and it separates you from everything that is good. It separates you from community and makes you feel abandoned. It makes you feel rejected. By the way, leprosy in the Bible is a metaphor for something else as well. And you guess what it is? Sin. You see why do you think the Bible would equate leprosy with sin? Rejection with sin. Not being able to be healed by anyone but God himself but sin. What do you do then? It's no good for you. You see anyone can proclaim you clean or anyone can tell you what hoops to jump. In fact, Christianity is the only religion. I know that doesn't tell you that. You see anyone can tell you, you know, if you can do all these things we might be able to proclaim you as clean but no faith can make you clean. All they can do is tell you the hoops to jump. Is there any faith that can actually accomplish what it can pronounce? Is there a faith that can actually make happen what it's able to declare after the fact? And there's only one. It's the one that revolves around the personal work of this guy, Jesus. Notice what the lepper does. The lepper goes to Jesus and he says, if you will, you can make me clean. That is one of the greatest statements of faith in the whole Bible. Because he's the lepper has to have known, you know, we can only speculate about what his life has been like. Maybe he's tried, you know, he's been down to Mexico to try special healing things, all these kinds of things. And he finally, he goes to this guy, Jesus and he doesn't say, you know, I saw you healing other people. You think you could do something for me. The lepper has come to some conclusion in his mind. And he's actually so humble. He's not even willing to ask for it. But he simply says, you, if you will, you can do, I know that. There's no question in my mind. If you want to, you can do it. The scandal of leprosy is being in a place that's so helpless and so hopeless, you don't know where to turn. Fortunately, leprosy is not the only scandal you see in the Bible. The other scandal you see is the scandal of grace. You see, the reason that Jesus, that I think this lepper was so important to Jesus, that he stopped him in his tracks is because this lepper represented every single person. This lepper was like this living metaphor of what all humanity is like. And it's interesting when you see Jesus words, listen to what Jesus says to him.
The first thing, before he says anything, he says, moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said, I will be clean. The first part where it says Jesus was moved with pity, that's actually not a very good translation. But the reason it's not a very good translation is because the language there is almost impossible to translate. And people usually take one side or the other when you're translating biblical scholars, and I need to throw them a bone, because this word sometimes means outrage. It sometimes means indignant. On the other hand, sometimes it means compassion. And so biblical scholars argue back and forth saying, well, the context of this and the Greek means it should always be angry. Or the others, and makes me wonder when these guys are translating the Bible, if they've never had kids, because if you've had kids, or even if you've been a kid, it's easy to understand what it means here when it says Jesus was moved with pity, or he was moved with an indignant compassion. If it's apparent in an hourhouse, for example, have you ever told your kid not to do something, and then they do it? But worse than that, you tell him not to do something, and then they do it, and they get hurt in the process. A few months ago, one of our kids, I've constantly, she's short, and I thought, don't climb on the counters. Be careful, because she's short, she climbs up in the counter. You're going to fall, right? I'm an eye parent, which means I'm always afraid they're going to lose an eye. You know, if you climb on the counters, you're going to fall, and I'm one night I'm sitting down watching news, and I hear this tremendous whomp, and I go running in the kitchen, sweet little girl falling in the ground, and at the very same time, I was furious, and I was moved with pity in compassion. Have you ever felt that way? You don't know whether to kill or heal? That's the emotion that is being communicated here. So at one hand, Jesus is angry and indignant on the very same minute. He is also compassionate and moved with pity to heal, but he's probably not indignant at the leper himself. He's indignant at what has made the leper a leper, and it's this thing called sin. The Jesus at the same time, he's angry at sin. On the other hand, he has moved to do something about it, and what he does in this text is amazing, because you see other places in the Bible when someone is blind or something. Jesus sometimes he just speaks, or someone will come and say, my daughter is sick, can you come and heal her? And Jesus says, go home, she's been made well. So obviously for Jesus to heal someone, he doesn't need to touch them. And in this case, if Jesus, anyone seeing Jesus touch a leper that would have been scandalous, why? Because to touch a leper would have been to make yourself unclean. And yet Jesus says to this, he doesn't say anything, it says, moved with indignant compassion, Jesus touched it.
That's before he said anything. He didn't have to touch him. Why is he touching this guy? And I think the answer is simple. You think you're unclean? But you're not so unclean that you will push me away. You're not so unclean that I am not willing to touch you. You're not so bad that I'm not going to come and help you anyway. In other words, it's just like with our sin. Some people, the sad thing is, some people don't come to Christ. They don't come to no Christ. Not because they think they're too good, but because they think they're too bad. If Jesus really knew how I was, he wouldn't forgive me. If Jesus knew the things that I'd done in secret, he wouldn't have anything to do with me. And if you ever have any question about that, read this text to yourself. Jesus reaches out and he touches the leper. If you want to, you can make me clean. And what does Jesus say? Now, let me think about it. He puts his hand on this guy and he says, I want to. I will. In other words, he doesn't say, I'll think about it or because you ask nicely. Jesus proactively, he says, if you want to, you can't. And he says, I want to. I want to make you feel be clean. And then what does it say? Immediately, the leprosy left him. You see the scandal of graces that grace pursues those who are hopeless and grace pursues those who know that they can't help themselves. This leper knew he couldn't help himself. And the scandal of grace is that grace God himself pursues the humble and he pursues the lepers. And the scandal is that all the good people stand around going, who does he think he is? I've worked my whole life to get that kind of treatment and yet I haven't. That's scandalous. And it's that that's true because grace is scandalous. Grace by definition is unmerited. So what is Jesus? You see the scandal of leprosy? You see the scandal of grace. And the last thing you see here is a call to decision. And that should become clear when I when I point that out. Look at the next thing Jesus says to him. It says in verse 42, immediately, he's cleaned of leprosy left him and he was made clean. And Jesus sternly charged him and sent him away at once and said to him, see that you say nothing to anyone but go show yourself to the priest and offer for your cleansing what Moses commanded for proof to them. Another translation of that might be for an accusation against them. So Jesus heals the person and he says now see to it that you say nothing to anyone but go show yourself to the priest. And it's amazing to me how much time people spend arguing because the guy does he goes out and tells everyone and most people when they talk about this talk about whether it was right or wrong for him to go telling people what happened to him. And I think to ask that question you're missing the point completely because the guy has been healed of leprosy. In other words just by walking down the street he couldn't help but but people seeing and knowing what's going on. So there must be something else going on here. And really what's going on is Jesus is outferricying the Pharisees in order to make them have to decide whether or not he is in fact who he says he is. You see in the ancient Near East when when someone was healed of something there was this Jesus is following the letter of the law don't tell anyone until you go tell the priest show yourself to them so he can declare you clean and that will be a proof against them or an accusation against them. In other words remember what I told you at the beginning who is the only person who can heal a leper or raise the dead. It's God himself. It's now here you have a guy that everyone knew had leprosy. Jesus has healed him and now Jesus says go back to the priest and have him declare you clean. And so now imagine the priest who who has been saying this guy Jesus we got to get rid of this guy we got to kill me thinks he's God. And this guy who everyone knew had leprosy comes in and now he's completely clean and the guy says Jesus said you now have to put me let me jump the hoops so that I can be declared clean by you and that then puts these these priests in the very precarious position because if they if they do proclaim this guy clean they're basically saying that Jesus is who he says he is. And if they don't proclaim him clean they'll be just seen as a bunch of idiots because he obviously is clean. And so by sending him back to the priest Jesus is actually putting himself right it squarely in front of the priest and saying what are you going to do with me. It's a call to decision because if you you see that this guy is clean only God can do it so if you believe that he's clean which he is you got to embrace me are you gonna not are you gonna regard are you not going to or are you going to reject me. It's a call to decision. And yet we don't see what happens. We don't even know if the guy ever goes back to the priest and said what it says is that buddy went about and began to talk freely about it and to spread the news so that Jesus could no longer openly enter a town. It goes out in the desolate places and the people were coming to him from every order. I don't know why it doesn't tell us why what happened when this man went to see the priest but I know what it made me think of all the time. You see if you're as a church any church you know any churches or what I'm looking at now I'm looking at a leper colony. The church is a leper colony full of healed lepers and full of healed lepers that have been made cleaned and if you had been healed by leprosy and someone from the came in the back who had leprosy what would you do would you scorn them and say they're unclean I got mine or would you go to them and you would say let me tell you how my leprosy was taken away. Let me tell you how I was made clean. Let me tell you who healed me who actually reached out and touched me I didn't have to jump any hoops I didn't have to do anything I just asked I said I know you can do it will you and he did you only do that if you understand that you are a leper who has been made clean and the reason our church and any other church isn't as effective as it ought to be at bringing in those who are outside is because we really don't think we're lepers. You see you're either a leper or you're a Pharisee but there and there's really no in between and the question is do you really understand that Jesus has made you clean and if Jesus has made you clean who or we or anybody or any church to tell those who we perceive to be unclean that they can't come or who we did not to stay away from them I mean there's another lesson there from Jesus so many times Christians we avoid people who are morally reprehensible at least to us and I always ask myself why I don't the only reason you would avoid them and that is if somehow you would think that by touching them you would be made unclean like they are and the glory of the gospel is that if you are a Christian there's nothing that can do that to you if Jesus makes you clean you are clean indeed and if Jesus and if Jesus can't clean the worst of sinners he can't he can't save you he can't help you you're hopeless I know if I told the story I think several years ago and I'll close with this when Judy and I lived in Atlanta we were we were asked to plant a church in downtown Atlanta and we were people were recruiting us pretty heavily and it's just like in the business where people you know if they want you to plant a church in downtown Atlanta or downtown so you know basically someone who's like a recruiter will take you down in the wine you and die and you and tell you what a great place it would be to live and what a great place would be to plant a church well we were living in Atlanta at the time in near Buckhead in Decatur and I grabbed my buddy Paul Warren many of you have heard him preach here from his Baltimore and his Paul come on let's take a bus downtown Atlanta I want to see what it's really like from the ground I don't want a recruiter telling me and as soon as Paul and I took a bus downtown we got off bus and a young black man very handsome very muscular came up to me and asked me for a dollar and I said no it's but we're going to lunch I'll take you to lunch if you want to go to lunch with us and he said all right and I said so what's your name we're walking and he said my name's Anthony and I said what do you do and he said mostly men and I said come again and he's a male prostitute and frankly that caught me off guard be honest with you but not as off guard as it caught him when he asked me what I did and we're walking along and went to lunch and talked to him about the gospel and and I say it tongue in cheek made the mistake of giving him my card and saying call me if you ever need anything right it wasn't a mistake by the way so that was when the Olympics I forget what year 1996 that was when the Olympics were in Atlanta and a few days after that remember when the bomb the guy set off a bomb at the Olympics I got a call about seven in the morning and it was Anthony and he said pastor Tommy he said the police are sweeping through he month park and the rest of the place about all of us who live there and they're going to put us in jail until after the Olympics because of this just because they don't want us around can I stay with you and right and those ones that that's one of the decisions where you think should I ask my wife or not to ask permission or not and I forget whether I ask permission or not Judy's pretty great about that stuff I went and got him and he came and he and he stayed with us I remember we're having turkey that day and he ate about the whole turkey we gave him clothes gave him everything and the girls I remember would run up to him and they would sit in his lap and ask him to re green eggs and ham and he just didn't know what to do and at some point that night I went out on the porch and he was out there crying and I said what's wrong and he said how could you let your children touch me and I said what are you talking about and he said do you know how bad I am you know how simple I am and at that point it was my turn to cry and and I started crying and he said what's wrong with you and I said Anthony if Jesus can't help you he can't help me I said we're going down together and he was so overwhelmed with that he didn't even respond he went and picked up his clothes and he left he couldn't he didn't know what to do with grace and the reason for that is because there's nothing you can do with grace but receive it and the question is are you willing to receive it are you do you see yourself do you look at the mirror and go do you know how bad I am and then but in the same breath Jesus says yeah I do actually and I'll finish that you know the interesting thing when the leper would have gone to get cleansed by the priest you know what the priest would have had to do he would have had to slaughter a lamb as a sin offering to a tone for the sins that had brought this guy's leprosy on you see the beauty of the this this whole picture is that Jesus is telling this guy now I just cleaned cleanse you now I want you to go see a living picture of what I'm actually going to do to cleanse you on the inside the way Jesus takes where sins is he becomes that leper on the cross takes away all our sins and gives us all of his righteousness and return think about that let me pray father I pray that you would just keep in ever before us both our need for the gospel and the gospel itself Jesus who reaches out and touches us no other religious teacher makes anything remotely claims anything like this and yet you got in the person of your son came and you actually touch the worst of centers and make them wider than snow worth that deeply into our heart Christ name we pray these things I'm in and I'm in