MARK 1:40-45-The Touch of the Master’s Hand

This is Mark’s gospel, the action-packed one, the let’s cut to the chase gospel.

If you want to look at it this way, it is the blue-collar gospel. It is as if Mark is inviting you into a restaurant, telling you pull up a chair, pour yourself a tall glass of sweet (or unsweet) tea and lemme tell ya about this Jesus.

And this is one of those snapshots of Jesus’ ministry. Everything written in Mark’s gospel is mean to show us that Jesus is the true king of the world, and that no dictator, no terrorist group, no other person can rival or challenge Him.

That no amount of greed or power can stand toe-to-toe with Him, and that the church, can withstand whatever challenges we face exactly because Jesus is the King, the Emperor. The One to whom we all bow the knee

So the question becomes will we do so willingly out of love or out of fear? 

Mark writes these stories to show Jesus is the Son of God and to get us to stop and say, “NOW what are we gonna do about it?”

These are not dead words on a page, but they are God’s story meant to halt us in our tracks, grab us by the collar and say, “This is something worth paying attention to.” And we see this happen often in Mark in examples like this one right here.

The King is about to do something very unexpected: touch the untouchable. Gasp!

I don’t know how much you may know about leprosy, I didn’t know much about it as it is not a common condition we encounter here in America. Now when the Hebrew Scriptures (the Old Testament) mentions leprosy, it was one of many skin conditions, but here in this story in the New Testament, it probably was what is known as Hansen’s disease.

This disease is common in parts of India. This condition distorted the human body, and it made your nerves inactive so you couldn’t feel pain, so even the smallest injury could lead to a serious infection or even death.

Not only were you hurt physically, but socially. Lepers were not permitted to participate in any religious or social activity, because it was believed if you touched an unclean person you yourself became unclean. You know how you sometimes avoid someone who has a common cold, imagine that times 50…million. So deep was this fear of being unclean, some people even threw rocks a lepers to keep them at a safe distance.

Even the mention of this disease terrified people. Do we have a way we can understand what they must have felt? Well at first, I thought “na”, but then I looked at just my own lifetime and it seems like there have been a few diseases and viruses that in my life got me so scared I was being overly pre-cautious to borderline paranoid. Let’s see there was Killer Bees, SARS, West Nile Virus, Swine Flu, Asian Bird Flu, Ebola, and for some of you younger youth reading this, let’s not forget the so-called “Zombie apocalypse”.

It is as if every two years or so, some condition has to be blasted by the press to get people shaking in their boots.

So this disease, hurt you physically, it hurt you socially, and in a way it hurt you spiritually. See the Old Testament put a law out there that for the sake of quarantining and containing an infected person, you had to avoid them and put them outside the community.

Now, a point of clarification here: The Old Testament never said that someone who was struck with leprosy was a sinner, but unfortunately, by the time Jesus came, that idea began to sink in to the culture because people took it one step too far. If you got this disease it mean that you were being punished by God for something that you did, and surely God would want nothing to do with you.

Jesus is about to undo all that, shake things up, and prove that the touch of the Master’s hand can reverse the damage.

With being hurt physically, with being hurt socially, and with being hurt spiritually, this leper has no hope…except to approach this holy man, sent by God. And he does so humbly, but he also does so boldly, for remember what he risks; he has to make his way close enough, endure the scorning of others, yet he does so with faith and trust, and says the simple statement,

“If you are willing, you can make me clean”.

And Jesus, replies simply, yet in a way that shows His perfect goodness…”I am willing, be clean”

But Jesus does more than just speak. He does something with it, and it was done not only to show His power but to prove a point.

He reaches out, and touches the unclean, the sick, the diseased, the one who everyone else avoided. Jesus does this often, He does not need to touch the man, He could have just spoken it and it would have happened, yet Jesus disregards what is taboo in favor of human well-being. What motivates Jesus is not fame, not a desire to prove Himself, but to show that…

***God goes after the untouchables, those who the rest of us tend to avoid, to show them His love and mercy are for them too.***

The gospel is not just for those who think they have their act together, but rather for those who know and admit, “I am in need of God.”

Remember how the leper was hurting, physically, socially, and spiritually? Well Jesus heals all of him!

Spiritually, He shows that God loves him!

Physically He heals his body!

Socially, He says “go and show yourself to the priest at the Temple in Jerusalem so that you can be accepted and welcomed back!”

In a way, we are all lepers. We may not be physically deformed as he was, but we all have a disease that hurts us, it’s called sin.

It too hurts us physically because we chase after the desires of the flesh.

It too hurts us socially because we neglect to love our neighbor as ourselves.

It hurts us spiritually because it pushes us further away from the God who loves us.

Yet, He proves this love by sending His Son Jesus, to touch us and give us the opportunity to be healed. 

Don’t ever doubt that. Look at what the leper says to Jesus, “if you are willing, you can make me clean” Friends I don’t  always understand the mind of God, but I do know that the answer Jesus gave to that man is the same one He will give to you when you ask Him, “Lord if you are willing, heal me of sin”…

He WILL ALWAYS answer “I am willing, be healed”

That is how good our God is, that is why we have victory in Jesus. He not only touches us, but gives us the power to act to touch others, to show them just how the Master heals. 

You may not be able to miraculously heal someone, but if you put your trust in Jesus Christ, you have the ability and opportunity to reach out and heal those who are hurting so that they would not be in pain. You have the chance to show them the way to the God who loves them, that should excite and energize us.

 Let me summarize by a poem, “the Touch of the Master’s Hand”. A poem written by Myra ‘Brooks’ Welch.

“Twas battered and scarred and the auctioneer

thought it scarcely worth his while

to waste much time on the old violin

but he held it up with a smile;

‘What am I bidden, good folks,’ he cried

‘Who’ll start the bidding for me?”

‘A dollar, A dollar’; ‘then two’, ‘only two?’

‘Two dollars, and who’ll make it three?’

‘Three dollars, once; three dollars twice;’

‘going for three’…But no

from the room, far back, a grey-haired man

came forward and picked up the bow.

Then wiping the dust from the old violin,

and tightening the loose strings

he played a melody as pure and sweet

as caroling angels sings.

The music cased and the auctioneer

with a voice that was quiet and low,

said ‘What am I bid for the old violin?’

and he held it up with the bow.

‘A thousand dollars, and who’ll make it two?

two thousand, and who’ll make it three?’

‘Three thousand, once, three thousand twice

and going and gone’ said he.

The people cheered but some of them cried

‘We do not quite understand’

‘What changed its worth?’ Swift came the reply

‘The Touch of a Master’s Hand’

And many a man with life out of tune,

and battered and scarred with sin,

is auctioned cheep to the thoughtless crowd

much like the old violin.

‘a mess of pottage’, ‘a glass of wine’

‘a game and he travels on’

‘he is going once and going twice’

‘he is going and almost gone’

But the Master comes, and the foolish crowd

never can quite understand

the worth of a soul and the change that is wrought

by the touch of the Master’s hand.”

Let the Master touch and heal you so that you can play beautifully for Him.

Amen

 

I had the pleasure of viewing Disney’s most recent film, Cinderella, which was tastefully done, yet it was in viewing this film that I definitely had one of those “God-moments”. (Warning what follows does contain spoilers so if you have not yet seen it and want to, look away now!!)

Many of us are familiar with the classic tale: innocent young lady raised by a cruel step-mother and taunted by immature and spoiled step-sisters, yet despite it all, Cinderella maintains her goodness. In the film, we see why: shortly before her early and untimely death, her real mother tells young daughter Ella (Cinderella’s real name) to always, “Have courage and be kind”. Cinderella dutifully obeys despite the harsh treatment of her step-family. Yet, when it came to her step-mother Lady Tremaine’s viciousness, the question on my mind (and I would guess several others’) was why. Why such evil toward someone so innocent? I mean there are frustrations of a blended family (as a former youth pastor having seen it I can respect that), but this went above and beyond the realm of reason. At one point, close to the end of the film, Cinderella bravely asks her that very question point blank, “Why, when I have done nothing to you and nothing to deserve it?” Lady Tremaine answers by proceeding to give a litany of reasons (“I married my first husband for love and that did not work out”, “I married your father but he secretly never stopped loving your mother”, etc) but never once did an apology ever happen.

Not once.

Never once did step-mother own up and take responsibility for her actions or say “I recognize that I am broken, and I transferred that to you and I should not have and I am sorry. Please forgive me.” This is a common characteristic of sin in the lives of broken humanity: always and only blaming others for our flaws.

Yet in this case, something profound is seen. Lady Tremaine hates Cinderella, not for anything Cinderella did, but simply because of who she is. Cinderella, the perfect expression of good, is targeted by evil, and this is an illustration of a truth of the Judeo-Christian worldview. Evil hates good simply because it is good, and evil cannot just co-exist alongside good; it seeks to destroy it. For the disciple, this can be most obviously seen in his crucifixion of Jesus. Evil humanity as a whole encountered perfect goodness and peace, and yet rather than welcome it warmly, we attempted to destroy it because its very existence makes us crazy with madness. I have always held the belief that no matter where Jesus was born, no matter what culture, people, or group, the outcome would have been the same for Him because He was perfect goodness that would not be manipulated or intimidated despite humanity’s best efforts. This should cause us all to be humble and recognize that there is always a temptation to ignore the Master rather than listen patiently to His words, even if they are of gentle rebuke.

Yet, for Cinderella, even after all of the pain, rather than let bitterness set in, rather than lash out in vengeance against her step-mother, indirectly giving her the satisfaction of saying “Ha! at least this proves she is no better than I”, Cinderella maintains her innocence and goodness. What encapsulates this the most is the final encounter between Cinderella and Lady Tremaine. The prince has already come, the glass slipper is shown to fit, and even the step-sisters apologize for their treatment of her. Right as the prince and Cinderella exit her childhood home start their new lives together, she turns and locks eyes with the source of her pain, her step-mother. In a similar fashion, I can imagine while He hung on the cross, Jesus locking eyes with those who mocked and taunted Him.

In Cinderella’s case, when she finally experienced her prince’s love that rescued, freed, and redeemed her, giving her a new identity, she had the strength to lock eyes with evil and simply say, “I forgive you.” And the look in her step-mother’s eyes was a mixture of confusion, befuddlement, desperation, and awe, almost as if she could not comprehend that such pure goodness could exist. Cinderella is free, and Lady Tremaine is now locked in a prison of bitterness, resentment, and lost opportunities. Compare this with Jesus, the Prince of Peace who loves, rescues, frees, and redeems a lost humanity; He knew who He was and so He did not need a new identity, and so having walked so closely with His heavenly Father, had the strength to pray even in His crucifixion and death, “Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.”

If the Master has done this, then there is a lesson we as servants can glean, and we can use Cinderella to help us see it. When we forgive, we are freed from bitterness, indignation, rage, and so much more. The strength to forgive and show grace comes from a relationship with Jesus Christ and remembering that when we let Him define us and fill us with His love, His Spirit expels the pain and desire to hold grudges. He not only frees us of the evil, but empowers us with good, focusing our mind on heavenly things.

In forgiving, we glorify God and confuse evil, showing the world the way of the cross is higher than the way of retribution. When we let God judge, we have the freedom to forgive and enjoy an unadulterated relationship with Him. The Scriptures say this, and I am slowly but joyfully experiencing this truth for myself.

Peace friends