Matthew 11:5 the blind receive their sight and the lame walk, lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear, and the dead are raised up, and the poor have good news preached to them (ESV)
How many times do we read about the miracles of Jesus over and over. And yet I would be willing to bet it is one of the sections we almost look over, or don’t finish the verse. We don’t let the things he did take a hold of us and captivate us. I am sure that if we took a little while to meditate on the miracles of Jesus they would come alive, we would see them all the more, holding the meaning and power he intended for them to have. One of the miracles in this verse that is of interest to me, because of the deeper meaning within is the lepers are cleansed. We can better learn about the origin of Leprosy from Leviticus 13 and 14. A book that we refer to as boring. But when we look at the Old Testament for what it is, the New Testament concealed, then it brings a new life to it. Leprosy is a disease of the skin, that starts off slow, on the outside of the skin, taking root into the body, eventually killing the infected. What it better represents is sin in the human life, the scars its leaves and its ability to spread throughout our body, leading to death. When raw flesh is seen he is considered unclean, but if it has all turned to white he is clean. This verse comes alive in the sense of sin when Isaiah 1:18 is considered, “though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.” We are washed white as snow from our sin, just as the raw flesh of the leper turned to white rendering him clean. Verse 45 says this of a leprous person who has the disease, “shall wear torn clothes and let the hair of his head hang loose, and he shall cover his upper lip and cry, ‘unclean, unclean.’ He shall remain unclean as long as he has the disease. He is unclean. He shall live alone. His dwelling shall be outside the camp.” This sounds a lot like the effects sin can play our life. Lepers were social outcasts, they were not welcomed by the rest of society. This section holds its importance in the New Testament when Jesus cleanses a Leper. This is not the first miracle, but it is the first recorded healing in the Gospel of Matthew. This is more then a healing, it is a cleansing. It is a symbol of Jesus reaching out, to what society has deemed as worthless, outcast, unaccepted and unfixable. Reaching out, associating with the most lowly of the earth, healing what was thought to be incurable. I think there are a few meanings with in, one being that no matter how great of sin (paralleled with leprosy) entangles us, God is bigger then that, he can heal us. Two is that God is compassionate, and loving, not deeming one as less than another. Third is that we see the humanity of Jesus, that he would bring himself to the lowest of places and lay hands on the rejected. I wonder what the rest of the miracles of Jesus reveal to us about human nature and his character, I know much more!
Application:
Today I will read Leviticus 13 and 14 finding more parallels to leprosy and sin.
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