Sermon for Pentecost 5B, February 8, 2015

Text: Mark 1:29-39

            Beloved in Christ, last Sunday we saw our Lord expelling a demon. We heard that this was what His preaching was intended to do: to destroy the kingdom of the devil and to establish His own. Even now, Christ still triumphs over the devil and the forces of evil wherever His word is preached. Now this week we see that Christ also healed. We learn that wherever Christ came, He preached His Word and undertook His ministry so that He could bring healing to this broken world.

            It is at this point that the hard-boiled skeptic objects. They don’t mind us talking about God and demons, since they think that either such things don’t exist or are metaphors that may be useful for some. But when it comes to health and disease, they think they know it all. Disease is a matter of the body, and a spiritual teacher such as Christ has no business meddling in it. Disease is caused by pathogens or the wear and tear of the body. It is purely a mechanical process and it is fixed by mechanical processes—things such as antibiotics, medicines, exercises, and the like.

            But what fools our skeptics are! Of course, it is useful to rely on the vast knowledge that the medical sciences have acquired over the centuries. We Christians as a rule appreciate the advances of science in general and we want to enjoy the comforts that the latest technologies give us. But we know a deeper truth than the skeptics do: “Unless the LORD builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchman stays awake in vain.” Now people knew back then how to build sturdy buildings that would last centuries. They knew how to stand guard and protect a city. But God’s faithful people knew that it took more than just knowledge. Even the best of human plans fall apart, sometimes for the smallest of reasons.

            Now we do not neglect modern medicine any more than an ancient bricklayer or stonemason would have ignored his art and relied on his piety alone. Instead, we expect our physicians to ply their trades diligently, even as we pour forth our prayers for healing to Almighty God. The builders must still labor, the watchman must still stand guard, and the doctor must still apply medicine. But all is for naught unless the LORD helps.

            You see, we Christians understand that we live in a broken world. Buildings crumble. Empires fall. People get sick and die. We may take ever so much good care as we can, but it will not be enough. “What is crooked cannot be made straight,” no matter how much ingenuity and hard work we apply. It wasn’t supposed to have been this way. God created the world to be a good place where death was unknown and where health prevailed. But ever since we rebelled against God, we have been living in a broken world. Nothing works the way it really should. And, worst of all, that is the case with our bodies. Ultimately, our bodies will die. In the meantime throughout our life our bodies are made to endure several illnesses, which are miniature forms of death, you might say.

            And thus we bear within our bodies disease and death. That is true of all of us. Now we might like to make comparisons with one another and assume that people with graver afflictions are worse people than those who are healthy throughout their life. But that is a silly way of thinking, for we all end up dead. We all show that ultimate brokenness. Some of us may be better at concealing it longer than others, but we all have it.

            What good news it is then to see Christ healing Peter’s mother-in-law and many other people. We see that Christ intends to restore not only our souls, but also our bodies. Forgiveness is not just a word that calms our souls, but brings about a restoration of all creation, including our bodies. And so Christ healed the many people in today’s Gospel precisely because He cared for them in body and soul.

            In so doing He pointed forward to what He would do on the Last Day when He returns in glory. On that day He will raise up our lowly bodies and make them to be like the glorious body He has enjoyed especially after His resurrection from the dead. That will be our ultimate victory. We will be holy in our souls and whole in our bodies. We will be perfectly at peace inside and out—with God, with our fellow human beings, and with creation around us. No more will there will be disease or germs to wage war against us, just as no person will fight against us or we against them. Instead we will know only a lasting peace for all eternity.

            But now we are still in the midst of the fray. The war still rages on inside of us. We battle against our own evil impulses, as well as the temptations offered by other people and by the devil. We find our bodies to be a battlefield, where righteousness and wickedness duke it out to determine which will rule over us. Sometimes we win, sometimes we lose. In fact, we would soon give up altogether, were it not for the fact that Christ has already won the war for us and that He will continue to forgive us when we fall and strengthen us so that we can stand.

            Consequently, we are not surprised to see disease and even death fighting against us, too. Sometimes we’ll rout those forces, and other times they will overwhelm us. In fact, we know that as many times as we may defeat illness and injury, one day death will defeat us. Any victory we have in our health is only temporary, at least when we consider that we will die. But here the good news about Jesus Christ gets better. Our Lord did more than heal people temporarily so that they could enjoy a few good, healthy years before they died. He Himself went into the unhealthiest of all places for us: death itself. He was beaten, wounded, and crucified. He suffered an agony deeper than that of any illness we will undergo. He even died and was buried so that He could deal with the very worst enemy of all, death itself. And then He rose from the dead.

            And so through this life’s hard struggle to become healthy and to stay healthy we have the good news that death has been conquered and healing has entered the world. Even if we must wait until the resurrection to experience the healing and new life in its fullness, we still experience forgiveness, peace, joy, and spiritual healing in this life. Many times (although not always) we also experience physical healing here too. Even when our Lord makes us carry the burden of physical pain or disease, we find it easier to bear after we have come to know the Lord, for we know that He shares our burden. Therefore, whenever we are healed, we thank God rather than merely chalk it up to the medicine. And whenever healing is held back from us, we still thank God and implore Him to let His strength see us through.

            Well, once we understand this about healing, what follows next? Here it is useful to look at the final paragraph of our text. After spending the entire evening healing people, Jesus got up early and prayed. We might have celebrated our success, had we been Jesus. Or we might have said that we deserved to sleep in after such a long, exhausting evening. But Jesus didn’t do either. He knew the grave spiritual danger that confronted Him. The people of Capernaum would have been happy to have held on to our Lord for the rest of His ministry. They would bring Him sick person after sick person all day long. Whenever any one of them had the smallest sniffles, they would go to Christ and ask to be healed. And human nature, being what it is, would soon have paid more attention to the miracle than the giver of it. People would also seek bodily healing but ignore the deeper spiritual healing that Christ has come to bring. They would have been content with Christ as healer of temporary maladies, but would have stopped Him from redeeming the world of its sin. Indeed, that is what has happened in a broad swath of Christianity, such as in Pentecostalism. And so Christ understood very well that He couldn’t stay in Capernaum, but had to leave.

            Christ spent the remaining years of His ministry traveling throughout Galilee. He didn’t heal every last sick person in that region, but He did go to many places and heal many people so that all would have an understanding of what He was doing by His holy life, death, and resurrection. And in the same way He reaches out and heals us, not necessarily of every disease and in the quickest way possible, but still often enough so that we take His message to heart.

            Therefore, beloved in Christ, let us take to heart this message of healing for both body and soul. Relish the forgiveness of sins He gives you and the new life and spiritual healing that flows from it. And then give thanks to Him who throughout your life “heals all your diseases and redeems your life from the pit.” In Jesus’ name. Amen.