The Lord Heals Us
Mark 1:29-39
Fifth Sunday after the Epiphany
Grace, mercy and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ amen. The sermon text for the fifth Sunday after Epiphany is the Gospel reading Mark 1. In our Gospel reading for today we hear about the Lord healing Peter’s mother-in-law. She lay ill with fever. The Lord comes to her and heals her. She felt so good after being healed that she was able to immediately get back to work. There was no need for recovery time. It was miraculous. The word started to spread about Jesus’ miracle. The town’s people brought many who were sick with disease or oppressed by demons to Him so that He could heal them. The message that we hear in our Gospel reading is that Christ is the Lord of healing. Our text tells us that people who were ill, filled with disease and under Satan’s power were all healed by Jesus. The Lord did not turn away from the multitudes that were afflicted. The Lord healed them all with His almighty power. In our Old Testament reading Isaiah talks about those whom are faint, weary and exhausted and then he speaks about how God will lift them all up and give them strength. It is a theme that runs through our readings for today. The Lord is the One who heals.
All we have to do is look at our world and see that it needs healing. Sickness and disease have touched many of us. Sickness and disease has affected people that we know. Even when we are not sick many of us run around to the point where we grow weary and tired. God’s Word tells us that the Lord is a Lord of healing. It tells us that God is the one who gives strength. It tells us that Christ is the One who can do miracles.
This is wonderful news. We all like to hear about the miracles of Jesus. But we also note that our Lord’s earthly ministry is over. He has ascended into heaven. It is nice to hear about the healing miracles in the Bible, but does it really help us now? It is doubtful that Jesus will appear to us and heal us from our ailments like He did to Peter’s mother-in-law. And so we have to ask this question. Do we have less of Jesus and His healing then those people in the first century? Sometimes we might think just that.
Of course that thinking would be wrong. We have the same Son of God with us right now. It was Jesus who told His disciples, “I am with you to the very end of the age”. The same almighty Word is spoken to us. Why then do we not have the same kinds of miraculous healings that happened when Christ walked in Galilee? The answer to that question is that the Lord does still heal people. The Lord may not heal us by doing miracles, but He is still the one who heals. The mode that the Lord often uses to heal is through normal means. That is to say that God works through doctors, nurses, and medicine to bring about healing. When doctors are able to help someone recover, we know that the healing was from God, even if it was performed through earthly means. Any skills given to the doctor comes from God. Any medicine made comes from His creation. People are healed and made well every day. What is important for us to remember is that source of that healing is the Lord. No one could ever be healed without God.
Our text tells us that Jesus is the Lord of healing. But Christ did not come only to bring a healing here and there. He came to bring complete and full healing of every sickness for all time. The people in the first century that were healed from their ailments eventually died. Peter’s mother-in law was healed but eventually she grew old and died. Jesus came into this world to do far more than give us temporary healing. Jesus came to bring healing to every part of us. He came to heal both our body and soul. He came to save us, restore us and give to us eternal life.
Our physical flesh is most definitely affected by sin. We see the curse of sin in our body with each illness we suffer. We see it with every broken bone that we have had. We know we are in a fallen world every time we get sick. We see and feel what sin does to our body, but we also see what sin does to our soul. We see it when we harm others in words and deeds. We see it with every evil thought that goes through our mind. We see it when we look at our selfishness, lack of patience and any other short-coming we may have. Christ came to heal us from sin in both body and soul. He came to save us from sin and death itself.
After Jesus healed the people in our text He woke up the next morning to pray to the Father. When Peter found Him, the Lord said these words, “Let us go on to the next towns that I may preach there also, for that is why I came out”. The reason that Christ healed the people was to direct them to God’s grace and provision. He wanted them to know that the ultimate healing that God gives to all of us comes from the Gospel.
Jesus is the Lord of healing. The healing of both body and soul comes from the Gospel. In our epistle reading Paul tells us that he will do what takes for the sake of the Gospel. Isaiah talks about how God will renew the strength of the weary. That strength comes from the good news of Jesus Christ. Our Lord came into this word to carry our burdens including sickness. But in order to be healed for all eternity Christ had to strike at the cause of all sickness. The Lord came into the world to do more then just temporally heal people. He came to destroy sin. He came to defeat Satan. He came to overcome death itself. It was His suffering on the cross that defeated suffering. It was His death on the cross that defeated death. It was His shed blood on the cross that purchased for us eternal life. It is in our Lord’s resurrection that we see that He is the Lord of healing.
Christ has given to us a perfect life with Him in heaven even though we must wait a little while for its complete fulfillment. Until then God gives us the strength to endure the suffering of this present word because we know it is temporary. As Christians we call out to God as beggars, and we look to Jesus in faith. The illnesses that clings to our flesh will be removed and even death will be no more. As we wait for the great Physician to bring us to the heavenly realm we are given the added assurance that He will continue to be with us in this life.
The prophet Isaiah said it quite well. “Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint, and to him who has not might he increases strength. Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not be faint”.
The Lord comes to you and gives you strength. He comes with great compassion. He comes to forgive your sins and to restore you. He comes to give you everlasting life. He comes to you right now to heal you. Amen.