“JESUS CHRIST - A MAN APPROVED OF GOD (Acts 2:22)”
  Miracle #6-   CHRIST HEALS THE LEPER
(Matthew 8:2-4; Mark 1:40-43,44-45; Luke 5:12-14)

 The most feared disease in the Old Testament was leprosy, starting with Miriam (Numbers 12:10). It was incurable except for a visit to the priest where animal blood was shed (Leviticus 13:1-59)

 POINTS TO CONSIDER:
1. Leprosy is one of the most terrible of human diseases. At one time, there 95 hospitals for lepers in England alone. It has been called the ‘living death’, because the patients members, arms and legs, decay and fall off one by one. It is accompanied by an odious smell, and is terribly infectious. Many kinds are incurable. It is a parasitic disease … slow and feverish …and certain. However, with early detection today treatment can be highly effective.

 2. No-one could touch a leper in the Old Testament … not even a priest … but could only look upon the leper. When Christ touches the leper he is disobeying the law of Moses (Leviticus14:3). However the exception is made that a priest could touch a leper only by means of shed animal blood (Leviticus 14:14).

 3. Dear reader, there had been a changing of the priesthood from Aaron to Christ with Christ becoming the new high priest. We have Matthew’s account …

“Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to Jordan unto John, to be baptized of him. … And Jesus, when he was baptized (WATER), went up straightway out of the water: and, lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove (OIL), and lighting upon him: And lo a voice from heaven, saying, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” (Matthew 3:13-16,17)

This was the ‘re-enactment’ of Aaron in the Old Testament …

“And thou shalt bring Aaron and his sons … and WASH THEM WITH WATER. And thou shalt put upon Aaron the holy garments, and anoint him (WITH OIL), and sanctify him; that he may minister unto me in the priest's office.” (Exodus 40:12-13)

And with this new high priesthood, no blood was necessary ... signifying that a better priesthood with Christ had arrived.

4. So here Christ simply says to the man “… be thou clean …” (Matthew 8:3) … with no shedding of blood. How could this be? And what an insult to the Jewish priesthood. Here is a healed and cleansed leper walking up to the priest that someone else has already cleansed … the carpenter’s son! How much more powerful was this new priest Jesus Christ!

 5. The gift that a leper would offer, and that was commanded by Moses, is found in Leviticus 14:19-22,23-24 … that is … birds or lambs, offered by the leper for a trespass offering.

 6. Why would Christ instruct the man not to tell no man? Well, like today, people crowd into churches looking for what they can get … the hand-outs … and not coming to be healed from sin and worship the Lord Jesus Christ … the only one who can heal them from sin. It becomes a circus because of healings, money, blessings and so on just like today. Then people are simply fickle and turn on Christ when the tap gets turned off … they ‘crucify’ him, as the Jews did, as Christ is not living up to their expectations.

Harley Hitchcock

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www.AustralianBibleMinistries.com

“JESUS CHRIST - A MAN APPROVED OF GOD (Acts 2:22)”
  Miracle #7-   “PALSIED MAN
THROUGH THE ROOF”
(Matthew 9:1-4,5-8; Mark 2:1-4,5-8,9-12; Luke 5:17-20,21-24,25-26)

The creator Christ brings amazement,
glory and fear in some and in others … not!

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