Matthew 8 - Healing is His Will!

And, behold, there came a leper and worshipped him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.And Jesus put forth his hand, and touched him, saying, I will; be thou clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. Matthew 8:2-3. 

We started out by looking at the parable of the two houses built on the rock and sand--when the rains and winds came, the house on the rock stood firm, but the house on sand suffered a great fall. This was a prophecy of the coming destruction of the Temple and Jerusalem in 70 AD. We know that Jesus represents the firm foundation of a rock and anyone who builds their house on this foundation will always prevail!

The first healing described in the Book of Matthew is the healing of the leprous man. He was desperate to be made whole and knew Jesus could heal but wasn't sure if the Lord was willing to heal him. Does this sound familiar? All of us who have been in denominationalism have heard this theology espoused. And yet the Bible clearly states that Jesus went about healing all; all who came to Him in faith were healed!

We are to look to the Word to learn truth and not to our experiences and circumstances. All of us have known believers who died before their time due to sickness or disease. It was tragic and sad, because we know it is not God's best and it doesn't seem to line up with what we see on the pages of the Bible. But we are to continue to believe the Scriptures, knowing that revelation and knowledge of the truth will come if we press in with faith.

The healing of the leprous man was important because Jesus indicated His willingness to heal AND He took authority over the situation by declaring the man clean. Under the Old Covenant, only the priests had the authority to declare the unclean clean. History shows that no one was ever known to be healed of leprosy through the Temple system--if they had, they would need to complete a laborious system before being declared clean.

Jesus instantly healed the man, and then directed him to go to the temple, show himself to the priest, and go through this legalistic cleansing process. Why? As a sign to the Jewish leadership that Messiah had come.

What the law was incapable of doing, Jesus did in an instant. God's righteousness through grace far exceeds any righteousness know to man through the Mosaic, Levitical system. A new age was dawning!! Praise God it is now here!