February 13, 2022
St. John’s United Church of Christ, Union, Illinois
Luke 5:17-26[1]
What was it about
those friends that made them do it? They had loyalty. They would do whatever it
took to help their friend, even if it was hard, even if they might get into
trouble. They also had faith. They believed, they knew in their hearts, that
Jesus could heal their friend. And their faith was so strong that they did
something so outrageous, so crazy, that people are still talking about it
two-thousand years later!
The man who had been
paralyzed got up and he walked right out the door. “Immediately he stood up
before them, took what he had been lying on, and went to his home, glorifying
God” (v. 25). Can you imagine being there? Quite a show, right?
Close your eyes for
a moment and visualize the scene with me. See the crowd packed into the room,
spilling out the doorway. Feel the heat as they press against each other. Smell
the hot, dry air and the warm bodies. Listen to the whispers and the scuffling
of feet. Hear the voice of Jesus as he speaks to them. Feel the strain of
lifting the pallet to the roof, the heavy breathing as they dig through the
roof. Hear the crash and see the ceiling cascading down. Look at the anxious
but determined face of the paralytic as he is lowered down in front of the
crowd. See the scowling scribes, the amazement on the faces of the crowd, and
watch them part in stunned silence as the forgiven and healed man walks out of
the house with the mat tucked under his arm. You may open your eyes.
Jesus speaks: “I say
to you, stand up and take your bed and go to your home” (v. 24). How much time
passed as the crowd waited to see what he would do? What did the paralytic feel
as he stood up to walk? What was he thinking? What did he say to his family and
friends? We don’t get an answer to these questions. All we know is: “Immediately
he stood up before them, took what he had been lying on, and went to his home,
glorifying God” (v. 25). Amazing! “We
have seen strange things today” (v. 26) But if that is all you saw, you missed
something rather important.
Why does Jesus tell
the paralytic to stand? It is so that the scribes may know that “the Son of Man
has authority on earth to forgive sins (v. 24). This was a big deal, a
challenge and a threat to the authority of the religious and political elite. It
might even have been heard as blasphemy, as only God is supposed to have that
kind of authority. This was also a challenge to the system that exerted control
over the poor.
A professor at Pomona
College, Jerry Irish, writes about the relationship between sickness and sin in
Galilee at that time. “Apparently, Jesus’ healing ministry challenged the
system in
If your sickness is sin-based,
then the cure must be also. There weren’t, however, any clinics or pharmacies
around. As Professor Irish explains: “Their only recourse was the temple, where
they could remedy their sin, but only by giving up more of their meager
resources, thereby increasing their poverty and the likelihood of further
sickness.”[3] Even then healthcare was expensive.
So, Jesus comes
along and cures the sick. That takes money out of the pockets of the temple
priests. Plus, if sickness is divine punishment for sin, and Jesus can forgive
sins as well, there goes the corner on the market for sin-forgiveness too. Oh,
no. We can’t have that.
“From the scribes’
point of view, the forgiveness of sins is possible by God alone, through
appropriate ritual ceremonies administered by authoritative, professionally
trained priests, following the instructions in the Torah, in the holy temple.”[4] You can’t have just anybody healing people
and forgiving sins willy-nilly. Where’s the accountability? Where’s the respect
for authority? Where’s the profit to be made? (Oops, did I say the quiet part
out loud?)
By healing and
forgiving sins, Jesus reveals that God is not contained in a box. God’s power
is not limited to the temple, or the priests, or even to the regular church
attendees. Jesus challenges the social and religious structure of that time and
place by demonstrating that God is not contained or constrained by human
institutions. No longer do people need to go somewhere special or perform some
sacred ritual to connect with God. God is here, now, in Jesus, in the
paralytic, and in this gathered community.
If Jesus has the
authority to forgive sin, then he speaks with the authority of God. He doesn’t
say: By the power vested in me by the State of Illinois (or the State of Israel).
Instead, he simply says “stand up and take your bed and go to your home” (v. 24).
The power and authority of God is revealed in the new life of the paralytic,
healed outside of the traditional procedures, forgiven directly by God, who
stands up and walks out. And through that act, God challenges us to reexamine
our thinking.
Luke asks us, is the
paralytic a sinner who has forsaken his God-given duty to work the land, too
lazy to work, or is he a reflection of a social system that offers him only
poverty for his labor, if it offers him a job at all? If every advertisement promises
the good life if you just buy their product, if every TV show has a happy
ending, if hard work is not always rewarded with anything other than more hard
work, is it a sin to be tired and sick? Can a person be broken down and burned
out without being seen as lazy, unproductive, or useless?
The interplay
between individual and society is complex. But a society where so many are one
illness or one injury away from homelessness is not a healthy society. There
are no simple solutions, and we disagree about the difficult solutions. But
Jesus challenges us to seek solutions, not only for the individual who suffers,
but for the brokenness of our society as well. Jesus walked through Galilee healing
and teaching the peasants, and he engaged the powerful and the wise in considering
a better way.
God knows who we
are. God knows what we’re going through. God knows what we’ve done, who we have
hurt, and who we have healed, because God has lived among us as a human being, in
the person of Jesus, and God’s Spirit inhabits all of our hearts. God knows us
and loves us. The psalmist says, “As a father has compassion for his children,
so the Lord has compassion” (Ps 103:13)“He does not deal with us according to
our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities” (Ps 103:10). God offers us
forgiveness, healing, and a life set free from all that paralyses us.
What if we repent of
our sins? Can we receive the healing and forgiveness of God? Are we lying on
the pallet hearing the words “stand up?” And if we do stand up, and walk out
that door, as healed and forgiven people, what change do we bring? What people
will know the love of God because of us? What broken systems will we put right?
How will God’s justice and mercy be seen in who we are and what we do?
“Bless the Lord, O
my soul, and all that is within me, bless God’s holy name” (Ps. 103:1). Amen.
[1] The
scripture quotations contained herein are from the New Revised Standard
Version Bible, copyright © 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of
the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
[2] Jerry
Irish, “Theological Perspective on Mark 2:1-12” in Feasting on the Word:
Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, David L. Bartlett and Barbara
Brown Taylor, General Editors (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008),
382. Luke 5:17-26 is a parallel story with only slight differences, which I don’t
discuss here.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Eunjoo
Mary Kim, “Homiletical Perspective on Mark 2:1-12” in Feasting, 383.
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