If you wanna turn in your Bibles
with me, please. Matthew 14, and near the end
of that chapter, we're gonna read a couple verses there. And
after you get to Matthew 14, hold your place there if you
would. And we're also gonna turn to Luke chapter nine and read
a couple verses in Luke and go back to Matthew 14. So Matthew
14 and Luke chapter nine. The message of freedom is a message
about a price paid for freedom, isn't it? When we think about
that in our country, think of the thousands of lives lost to
enable the government of this country to remain in place and
to hold up the life we now enjoy at the expense of the lives of
others. This is all by God's providence, of course. But it
is a principle that bears true in the physical world much, much
more true in the spiritual. Because in order for us to be
free from the one thing that we did against God, then the
Lord Jesus Christ had to do something. He had to pay a price infinitely
higher. than the lives of all the men
who died in all the wars of all of history. And so that's the
message that I was getting from Rommel's survey of freedom in
scripture. What a blessing it is to be free
because of the price paid by our Redeemer, isn't it? But back
in Matthew chapter 14, all of scripture really conveys the
same message. And this one is about being made
whole or being made perfectly whole, as we're going to see.
Matthew 14, picking it up at verse 34. It says, and when they were gone
over, they came into the land of Gennesaret. And when the men
of that place had knowledge of him, that Jesus was there, they
sent out into all that country round about and brought to him
all that were diseased. They brought to Jesus all who
were diseased. And besought him, they made their
plea, they begged him, imploringly speaking to him. They besought
him that he might only touch, that they might only touch the
hem of his garment, and as many as touched were made perfectly
whole. Now I want to also read in Luke
chapter nine, a very similar account. And the setting here
in Luke 9 is similar to what happened in Matthew at another
place. The setting was that John the
Baptist had been beheaded. And after Herod, the Tetrarch,
had beheaded him for the sake of his wicked wife, who had previously
been the wife of Philip, his brother, John the Baptist had
spoken against Herod, said, it's not lawful for you to have her.
So at this time when it was Herod's birthday, Herodias, the wife
that I'm speaking about, this wicked woman, had a daughter
who danced for Herod and Herod was pleased and promised to give
that girl whatever she asked for, up to half his kingdom.
And her mother instructed her to ask for the head of John the
Baptist. What a wicked thing. I mean, we think when I was younger,
as a young boy, there were seven boys in our family and the two
girls came last. I thought girls were not sinful. But scripture has something else
to say about that, doesn't it? In any case, the disciples were
greatly distraught over this, that John the Baptist was beheaded.
and so they came to Jesus. And it also corresponds to the
same time when Jesus had sent his disciples out to preach,
and they returned to tell him what they had done. So that's
what's happening here in Luke, where we pick it up in Luke chapter
nine, and let's see, in verse, I think it's in verse 10 here.
And the apostles, when they were returned, told him, told Jesus,
all that they had done, and he took them, And he went aside
privately into a desert place belonging to the city called
Bethsaida. So this was a place Jesus took
his disciples by himself. And the people, when they knew
it, just like back in Matthew 14 in Gennesaret, they followed
him and he received them and spake to them of the kingdom
of God. And listen carefully, and he healed them that had need
of healing. So, at this time, when the disciples
came and told Jesus all they had done in preaching, and he
had sent them, and how Herod, who beheaded John the Baptist,
thought that Jesus was John, risen from the dead again, at
that time, after they returned by Jesus' commission to them
to preach, and after Herod beheaded John, Jesus took them apart with
himself, And when they were there with him, the people heard of
where he was, and they brought all, according to Matthew 14,
all who were diseased, they brought them to him that he would heal
them. It says that he healed all who
had need of healing, and they asked that they might only touch
the hem of his garment, and as many as touched were made perfectly
whole. So what we have here is all who
heard of Christ brought to him all that were diseased and implored
or besought him that the diseased might but touch the hem of his
garment and all who touched the mere hem of his garment were
made perfectly whole. Think of that. Perfectly whole. Perfectly whole. I have entitled
this message, Made Perfectly Whole. I want to be made perfectly
whole, don't you? I want to know that all my sins
are taken away. I want to know that. I want to
appear in the presence of God in all of his glory, in all of
his glory, knowing with certainty that there is nothing between
my soul and the Savior. Nothing that God himself can
find fault with. but that he is pleased with me
in perfect harmony with his holy nature and his righteousness. Now, based on what is written
here, based on what is written here in scripture in Matthew
14, it says that as many as touched but the hem of Christ's garments
were made perfectly whole. I know from this scripture that
he who is God and man can make it so that I am made perfectly
whole. That's what he says here in Matthew
chapter 14, that they all who touch were made perfectly whole. And I also know that Christ who
alone does this, so does it in one way only. He can only make
us perfectly whole in one way. And so I want the Lord Jesus
Christ to heal me by his touch, don't you? And I want to touch
him, the hem of his garment, as these sick folk did when Jesus
walked on this earth. Don't you want Jesus, the Son
of God, to heal you by his touch and to know in touching him that
you were made perfectly whole? There's a close connection in
scripture between sickness and sin. That's just the nature of
it. God has set it up this way. Sickness
affects how we feel. It affects our outlook, similar
to the way that sin affects us. We all know something about feeling
sick. When we're sick, we feel weak,
don't we? When we are sick, we feel anxious.
And if the prognosis of the doctor is that our disease will last
long or that we don't have a certain outcome, then we despair, don't
we? We fear. And so scripture uses
physical sickness and healing from sickness to teach us about
our condition as sinners and teach us about salvation from
sin. Haven't you felt those things that sickness causes as the effects
of your sin against God? Hasn't your sin and your knowledge
of your sin against God made you weak and confused, wondering
after all if you are the Lord's or that you're His and that He
is yours? And with anxious and troubling
thoughts, you feel despair and fear because of your sin, just
like you feel only in a physical sense with sickness. And so scripture
teaches that sickness is the consequence of our sin. Look
at Isaiah chapter one, if you want to turn there. Isaiah chapter
one shows this. The children of Israel were notorious
for their disobedience. They were no different than we
are. And so when we read this, don't think of them. Think of
yourself, he says in Isaiah 1, verse 4, ah, sinful nation, a
people laden with iniquity, a seed, or children, of evildoers. Children
that are corrupters. They have forsaken the Lord.
They have provoked the Holy One of Israel unto anger. They are
gone away backward. That describes us as sinners,
doesn't it? A very graphic description. And
notice, why should you be stricken anymore? You will revolt more
and more. In other words, God's chastening
hand on them wasn't producing any effect. They were so hardened
in their stiff-necked rebellion against him. And then he describes
their sin in this way, the whole head is sick and the whole heart
faint. From the sole of the foot, even
onto the head, there is no soundness in it. And so you see from that
scripture, how God overlays our sin and sickness so that we can
see the effects that sin has on us. Because sickness is tangible
and grievous and felt trouble, the Lord helps us know that our
sin is our real problem. When we get sick, it consumes
us, doesn't it? I mean, if you're a man especially,
you just stop functioning. I can't do it. I'm sick. Wait
on me. And sin is the underlying root
cause of all of our confusion and despair and anguish that
we know. It's sin. And it's more real than physical
sickness. That's the Lord teaching us this
through physical sickness, that sin is more real. Like physical
sickness and all trouble, our physical sickness and all
trouble is meant to direct us to the great doctor of our souls. That's why we get sick. To teach
us about our sin. When we're sick, we seek a doctor.
I don't know what's wrong. I don't know what's wrong. It
just doesn't seem right. There's certainly got to be something
the doctor can do. Call them up. Make an appointment.
Go in. The doctor looks at you. Does whatever. Makes a diagnosis. You're hoping that they come
up with the root cause and can give you a pill, a shot. Do something. Change my behavior or my diet. Do something to fix this problem.
And that's the way we are with sin. God directs us to the doctor
of our souls. Sin is a physical condition and
sickness mirrors our spiritual condition. In scripture, every
disease, every plague, every sickness that Jesus healed teaches
salvation from sin. When Christ healed the sick,
they were made perfectly whole. He opened blind eyes. He unstopped
deaf ears. He made the mute speak, the crippled
and lame walked. Lepers were perfectly cleansed. Those who were paralyzed carried
their beds. A bent over woman unable to stand
up was made straight. A mother-in-law's fever was cooled.
A woman's unclean flow of blood was stopped. A man's withered
hand was perfectly restored, and lunatics were put in their
right mind. Demon-possessed men and women
and children were delivered from Satan. The hungry were fed, infants
were blessed, the dead were raised. Jesus Christ healed every physical
malady, sickness, disease, and plague of body and mind. And
all of these ailments describe the condition of our heart as
sinners, a condition from which only Christ can save us. That's
the message here. that Jesus could, he's able,
and did, because he was willing, heal all manner, all kinds of
sickness, and all who came to him, who were sick, is intended
to lift him up and shine the light of the gospel on him in
our eyes to give us immeasurably compelling expectation that we
who are diseased by sin will find him full of compassion towards
us and will heal us of all of our sins in coming to him. You see, that's exactly what
happened here in history. He is the great physician of
men's souls. And what comfort we will find
in the compassion of the great physician of our souls, knowing
he knows us and cannot fail to make us perfectly whole. He alone can take away our sin.
Jesus said this, the whole do not need a physician. If you're
healthy, you don't need a doctor, but the sick do. He said this, I am not come to
call the righteous, not those who have a self-conceited view
of themselves as capable of providing to God what will make them acceptable,
that their sin isn't really all that bad. Not them, but sinners
to repentance. Listen to what Peter said about
how Jesus Christ heals our souls in 1 Peter 2 and verse 24. Listen
to these words. And I'm gonna give you kind of
a literary thing here that I wasn't aware of, and it's kind of a
fancy word, but it helps me appreciate how God wrote scripture. And
the word is an anaphora, anaphora. Now, an anaphora is when someone
in literature or in rhetoric uses the same word or phrase
or pronoun to heighten an emphasis. Listen to how this anaphora is
used here. In 1 Peter 2, verse 24, he repeats
the pronoun, speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ, and he does
it for a good reason. Who his own self, that's the
anaphora, what does it do? It turns on the spotlight here,
and here, and here, and the one in the spotlight is the Lord
Jesus Christ. Listen, who his own self bear
our sins in, again, his own body on the tree. Wait a minute, that
we, being dead to sins, how could that possibly be? He died, and
now God says we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness,
that's the freedom, by whose stripes you were healed. This tells us everything about
the Lord Jesus Christ as our Physician. He bore our sins in
His own body, and by His stripes we were healed. Christ heals
our souls from sin by burying our sins in His own body under
the curse of God's law. The purpose for Christ's coming
is clearly explained here. It was to heal us from the sickness
of our sin. We saw him doing this in the
physical sickness in Matthew 14, but the underlying message
here is not the miracle of physical healing. It's what was necessary
and what happened when he took our sins to heal us from our
sins. How he does that is clearly explained
by this one verse. He bore our sins in his own body,
carrying them in his body up to the cross, and suffering with
those sins the punishment of God against those sins in himself. He took the beating. My sins
deserve. God beat him for my sins, made
his. He was plagued with my sins and
for my sins. In 1 Corinthians 15, talking
about death, it says that the sting of death is what? Sin. So the sting of death is what
Christ suffered, which was sin. When he was in agony, why was
he in agony? Sin was made his, mine. He died without relief from that
sting. He bore its full force and venom. Having borne the plague and sickness
of the sins of God's people as his own sins, he himself, bearing
that sting of death that was for their sins, that is how he
took, that is how he did heal sick folk. It wasn't merely divine power.
If the Lord Jesus Christ could have healed us of our sins by
merely speaking, He would never have come. He would never have
been just taken our nature. He would never have walked this
earth under the dread and agony of bearing our sins. It was infinite
divine justice that was measured out in proportion to our offense
against God that He bore. And that justice fully satisfied. That's the reason that Christ
made satisfaction. That's the reason that now from
His throne, He is able to dispense relief to sinners because he
died and made that satisfaction. I want to read Isaiah 53 verses
4 through 8 to you and I want to read it from a translation.
I like to stick to the King James Version and I appreciate the
fact that Ramel is trying to do that too. But I want to read
this because it's like a, this is called a literal translation.
And so it tries as closely as possible to give a word-for-word
literal translation of the original language, which is what the King
James Version is also doing. But this is a different view
from someone who went through, who understood the original language,
and went through and did this. His name was J.P. Green, Sr.
But let me read it to you from Isaiah 53, and you can follow
along in your King James or whatever version you have. In verse four,
it's speaking about the Lord Jesus here. He is despised and abandoned
of men. Remember the disciples all forsook
him? A man of pains. Notice how the words here reflect
the corresponding physical pain, but it wasn't physical as much
as it was soul pain and mind. a man of pains and acquainted
with sickness, and, as it were, hiding our faces from him, he
being despised, we did not value him. Surely He has borne our
sicknesses, and He carried our pain. Yet we esteemed Him plagued,
smitten of God, and afflicted. But He was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement, the beating
of our peace was upon him. And with his wounds, we ourselves
are healed. All we, like sheep, have gone
astray. We have each one turned to his own way. And Jehovah,
the Lord, made to meet in him the iniquity, or laid upon him,
charged to him, imputed to him, accounted to him the iniquity
of us all. He was oppressed. And he was
afflicted, but he did not open his mouth. He was led as a lamb
to the slaughter and as a ewe, or a feminine sheep. Our sins,
like the wife of Christ. As a ewe before her shearers
is dumb, so he opened not his mouth. He was taken from prison
and from justice, and who shall consider his generation? For
he was cut off out of the land of the living. For the transgression
of my people, the stroke was on him." Now, that's the end
of that reading from the literal translation. But notice how when
we read in Luke 9, verses 10 and 11, it says that Jesus healed
all who had need of healing. And so it is. Christ saves all
who have a need. And having a need to be healed
from sin is therefore a gift of God's grace. The affliction
of sin is a gift. of God's grace. That awareness
of our standing before God, polluted and foul and filthy and helpless
in our sins, that's a gift of God's grace because then we understand
something about our need. Jesus told the Pharisees in John
chapter 9 verse 41, if you are blind, you should have no sin. But now you say, we see, therefore
your sin remains. So needing Christ is the gift
of God and the sign of life. It's the sign of life to need
Christ because of your sin. He heals all who have a need.
Remember the publican? God, be merciful to me, the sinner. Christ is the great physician.
He's the Lord Jehovah who became my salvation. In Isaiah 12 it
says, the Lord Jehovah has become my salvation. The one who was
angry with me no more is angry because he himself took my sin
and bore it too to appease the wrath of God. And so Christ is
the great physician. It says in Jeremiah chapter 17,
verse 14, the prophet Jeremiah says, heal me, O Lord, and I
shall be healed. Save me, and I shall be saved,
for thou art my praise. So the attitude of the believer
is constantly throughout his life, Lord, save me. And that's
the healing that we need. Christ heals all. who came to
him for healing. None were turned away. Amazing! Can you find one case in all
of the New Testament where Jesus turned a sick person away or
turned away a needy sinner? In fact, he said this, Him that
cometh to me I will in no wise cast out. in John 6, 37. So if
you come needy in all of your sin, not in all of your righteousness,
but in your sin, He will not cast you out. And here's another
fact. If you look at Revelation chapter
5, look at this with me. This is incredible. In Revelation
chapter 5, beginning at verse 9, it says, they sung a new song
saying, thou art worthy. Speaking about the Lord Jesus,
the Lamb of God, thou art worthy to take the book and to open
the seals thereof in order to fulfill the whole eternal will
of God. for thou wast slain, and hast
redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue,
and people, and nation, and hast made us unto our God kings and
priests, and we shall reign on earth. And notice, and I beheld,
and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne,
and the beasts, and the elders, and the number of them was 10,000 times 10,000 and thousands of
thousands. What's 1,000 times 1,000? It's
a million. What's 10,000 times 10,000? It's
100 million, isn't it? It means that the Lord who heals
saves untold millions by His blood, saves them from their
sin. One Savior. How could a man do
that? Only the One who is God and man
could do that. So Christ healed not only multitudes,
He healed not only all those who came to Him for healing, who had a need of healing, but
notice this, that the Lord Jesus also healed all manner of sickness,
all kinds of sickness. He takes away and he forgives
every sort of sin, and sin in every degree, whether small or
great. That God who is holy, and that
God who is holy could even pardon my one iniquity. or all of my
iniquities, that's great. But for him to pardon great sin
is great mercy and great grace. Listen to this in Psalm 25, verse
11. I have to turn there because
I didn't write it down. Psalm 25, 11, one of my favorite
verses. He says in Psalm 25, 11, for
thy name's sake, Oh Lord, pardon mine iniquity
for it is great. My iniquity is great. If you
pardon it, Lord, that's great. And I don't use great like we
use it in today. Oh, that's great. Everything's
great today. No, I'm talking about when God doesn't use adjectives
and adverbs as hyperbole. He doesn't stretch the truth.
Most of the time he'll use a simple word like better, when actually
it means infinitely better. But here when he says great,
he means great, great beyond comprehension. My iniquity is
great, infinitely great because it's against an infinitely holy
God. And therefore his holiness, Somehow,
God could pardon my great sin against him. That is great, isn't
it? So he says here, Lord, for your
name's sake, pardon my iniquity. Do it for your sake. Find a reason
in yourself and do it for your glory. Make known your holiness,
all the perfections of your nature in harmony, in perfect harmony
at all times. Do it according to your righteousness
and justice by your grace. Pardon my iniquity because my
iniquity is great. It's only against you and only
you can do it. Notice how in Ephesians, if you
read Ephesians chapter one, everything is done to the praise of the
glory of his grace. Now some in Jesus' day had one
kind of sickness and some another. Like sheep, it says in Isaiah
53, each one of us went our own way. Like sheep, every one of
us have turned to our own way. Each one of us have a special
bent toward evil that seems uniquely to be our own, don't we? My mom
used to have these little things she'd point out about me and
it really stung when she pointed out what I really was. Ricky,
you're so stubborn. That hurts, Mom. You know why
it hurt? Because it was true. Each one of us have gone our
own way. We have a special bent that seems uniquely to be our
own. But know this, Christ alone can make us whole. Only he can
take away our sin sickness. He came to save what? Sinners. All we, all of us, without exception,
all we like sheep, according to God's estimation, have gone
astray. We have turned every one of us
to his own way. That's idolatry. And the Lord
has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He follows it up in
verse eight of Isaiah 53, for the transgression of my people. was he stricken. It's important
to understand when the Lord Jesus took the sins of sinners, he
was taking the sins of those people that God gave to him.
All of them were born by him, therefore they bear them no more,
therefore they are healed and made to know their need of the
doctor, the Lord Jesus. In Jesus's day, each person usually
was healed of only one sickness. But each of us have the full
combination of every sin in our heart, don't we? Every sickness
described in the gospel is in each one of us in totality. And that's a scary thing, isn't
it? He says in Jeremiah 17, nine,
the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. The very heart of man. And he
says in Isaiah 64, 6, that you are all as an unclean thing.
We are all as an unclean thing. And our righteousnesses, the
very best that we do, is filthy rags. And we can't even describe
what that word means without being revolting. It's ugly and
revolting. We are spiritually blind. Our
natural heart is unable to see our own blindness. We can't see
the glory of God in Jesus Christ. We are deaf. We can't hear the
truth of the gospel because the gospel is spiritual to spiritual
people. And we can't believe that we
are as bad as God says we are and that God is as holy as he
is. because we're deaf to the truth. We can't speak because
the truth of Christ is not in our hearts by nature. There's
no abundance in our heart of Christ and him crucified so that
out of the abundance of our heart we can speak. We're spiritually
mute. And we're plagued in heart. 1
Kings 8, verse 38, King Solomon says, if anyone prays toward
this temple, speaking of Christ and Him crucified, knowing the
plague of his heart, that's the gift of God. We know the plague
of our heart only by grace. We are unclean before God because
of our sins, as we read in Isaiah. He says in Isaiah 1, verse 18,
come now, let us reason together. Though our sins be as scarlet,
they shall be white as snow. Though they be red like crimson,
they shall be as wool. We are withered, lame, crippled,
and paralyzed. We cannot do the will of God.
We are bowed down like the woman who couldn't stand up. We are
bowed down by the weight of our guilt under God's law. God's law requires us to suffer
that curse and we cannot lift ourselves up. We have a fever. God's law condemns our guilty
conscience with a scorching heat. We are in darkness under the
deception of Satan. We are deceived concerning God
and concerning ourselves and especially concerning his salvation.
We were studying in Jonah, just as a sidebar. And the mariners
on the ship with Jonah, about to perish in the sea, asked Jonah,
what should we do? And he said, you're going to
have to take me up and throw me in. And they said, oh, man, they
didn't want to do that. So they rowed as hard as they
could. Finally, they had to cast him in. They didn't, like us,
they didn't understand that God could only save a perishing sinner,
could only find satisfaction in the substitute. We're dead
in sins. We're unable to perform any functions
of spiritual life. Dead in sins. Our disease is
not limited to a single sickness. Sin has affected and infected
our entire body, our nature, and our soul. Though most whom
Christ healed had but one affliction, we are guilty of every sin and
we have a full nature. We have a nature full of sin.
All those the Lord Jesus healed had a condition that only he
could heal. Remember the woman who had an
issue of blood 12 years? She came up behind Jesus to touch
the hem of his garment. 12 years she had suffered at
the hand of physicians. She found no doctor on earth
who could help her. That's talking about us. No one
can heal us but Christ. Everything that we try to do,
every doctor that tries to heal the sickness of our sin only
makes it worse. That's what she experienced.
All whom the Lord Jesus healed, notice in Matthew chapter 14,
were made perfectly whole. You know, doctors today, you
see the advertisements, it's humorous and shameful, on TV
about this or that medication. I'm not sure who they're advertising
to, because you can't go prescribe those things. But they all have
this, now make sure that you understand if you take this medication,
which is for a, let's say a medium level sickness, it could cause
death and lack of blah, blah, blah. You know, your kidneys
might fail, your heart might fail, and you might get cancer.
But this will really help the way you feel. But all whom the Lord healed
were made perfectly whole. Remember Naaman the Syrian who
came and Elisha told him what to do to go dip in Jordan seven
times? His skin was made fresh like
a child's skin. The blind that Jesus touched
or healed, they could see all things clearly. They didn't have
to go to the laser doctor. The lame man went walking and
leaping and praising God. When the leper went to the high
priest who represented the law, that high priest could find no
spot on the leper that Jesus cleansed. And the woman who couldn't
stand up because she was bowed together for 18 years was made
perfectly straight. The paralyzed man carried his
bed. The deaf man, who had a speech impediment, both heard and spoke
clearly. And the man's withered hand was
restored just like the other. Christ therefore cleanses from
all sin. I want you to see this. Look at 1 John 1. In 1 John 1, this is such a,
I remember reading a tract one time about a woman who was dying,
and a preacher came and read this to her, and she, God bless
that verse, and she completely looked to Christ. It says this,
in 1 John 1, verse 7, but if we walk in the light as he is
in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood
of Jesus Christ, his Son, cleanses us from all sin. He clothes with the garments
of salvation. He covers us with the robes of
his own righteousness. You can read that in Isaiah 61
verse 10. God finds no sin in his people
because Christ has healed them. I want to read a couple of verses
to you from the Old Testament. In Jeremiah chapter 50 and verse
20, listen to this beautiful result of Christ's healing. In
those days and at that time, saith the Lord, the iniquity
of Israel shall be sought for, and there shall be none. And
the sins of Judah, and they shall not be found, for I will pardon
them whom I reserve. Listen to also this other scripture
in Numbers chapter 21, or 23, if I can find Numbers. Numbers chapter 23 and verse
21, he says this. He hath not beheld iniquity in
Jacob. How is that possible? How can
God not, when he said there's none righteous, no not one. There's
none that doeth good. They're all guilty. And yet he
says he has not beheld iniquity in Jacob. Because the blood of
Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin. That's how. How the
Lord Jesus healed sick people in the Gospels shows how he saved
sinners from their sins. I'm gonna say that again. How
the Lord Jesus healed people in the Gospels shows us how he
saved sinners from their sins. First, he healed them by his
will. In Matthew chapter eight, the
leper came to Jesus and he says, Lord, if you will, you can make
me clean. He knew that all that had to
happen was the Lord Jesus Christ just had to want to do it, had
to have a purpose to do it, a will to do it, and it would happen.
And so he laid himself in the hands and at the mercy of Christ,
if you will, you can make me clean. And Jesus said, I will,
be thou clean. And he was immediately healed.
Christ is the absolute sovereign. He must will my salvation. He
is willing to save, and he is able, and he alone can. I must
come to him as guilty, like the leper, covered, head to foot,
or yeah, foot to head, guilty with no excuse, owning my sin.
It's all my fault. I did it against clear revelation.
I did it again. And I can't help myself. Lord,
if you will, you can make me clean. All my fault against Christ,
who is absolutely sovereign. I can't motivate him. I can't
influence him. He has to will it. Therefore
have only one plea. Lord, have mercy on me, the sinner. I come in my sin, looking to
Christ, who alone can heal me. Lord, find reason in yourself,
and pardon and cleanse me by your grace. And here's the second
way in which the Lord Jesus healed people. He healed by his word.
Remember? All creation leaped out of nothing,
void, darkness, into perfect completion at his command. Remember
in creation? And the scripture says in Ecclesiastes
8, 4, where the word of the king is, there is power. He upholds all things by the
word of his power. And the gospel is the power of
God unto salvation. Why? Well, he must speak the
gospel to our heart and he must command the light of the knowledge
of the glory of God to shine in us because he is the word
of God, and we're saved by his word, he has to speak it, he
has to will it. But notice here, in this text
of scripture that we're talking about here, we're healed by his
touch. We're healed by his touch. And
I want you to consider this. healed by His touch. At Gennesaret
they went throughout the whole region and carried the sick to
Jesus, and they begged Him that they might touch the hem of His
garment, and all who touched were made perfectly whole." Here's
the question. How was Jesus able to heal sinful
people? Could He have just continued
on earth, walking around, healing and raising the dead, without
going to the cross? Would that have been possible?
The Lord sent his son into the world just to walk around healing
people? That's not possible. We have
a sin problem. We've offended God. Our sin is
actually against God and God must receive his due. He will
by no means clear the guilty. God's law must be honored and
full obedience must be rendered. His justice must be compensated. The guilty must be punished.
Man has failed to glorify God. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. Before any man can be healed
or raised to life from the dead, God must be honored by a perfect
and continuous obedience in heart, mind, soul, and strength, and
he must receive full satisfaction for our sin. For God to be just
and to forgive a man's sin, Christ must take that man's sin and
die under God's curse for us. If that, and he must do it as
that sinner's substitute. Sin cannot be dealt with apart
from the cross of Christ. Grace in the heart without Christ
on the cross cannot save. In other words, Christ had to
die. It is not the work of grace in
you that makes you righteous before God. It is the work of
Christ for you. In Galatians 2.21, it says that
if we're justified by works, then Christ died for nothing.
He died in vain. That's not possible. Therefore,
we are not justified by works, but we're justified in the death
of Christ by his blood. Romans 8.34 says, who is he that
condemneth? Brings an accusation that causes
God to hold us under that judgment that we deserve. Who? Who? No
one for whom Christ died because he says, it is Christ that died. Christ could not heal men by
coming to earth only. He couldn't heal men by walking
around and telling them to be healed only. He could only heal
them by dying. Only the death of a substitute
could take away sin. If God could have made men righteous
by infusing grace into them, then Christ died for no reason.
God would have never afflicted his son needlessly and God required
his death. Therefore God could not save
one sinner unless Christ died for them because it violated
his holy self, his nature. It says, and I quoted that verse
to you in Galatians, The law can't make us righteous, not
even the word of God apart from Christ coming in our nature and
dying could make us righteous. And this is the crux of the matter.
This is the issue. There's only one way that God's
justice can be satisfied. There's only one way God can
justify the ungodly. Christ must die as our substitute. Christ had to take the place
of those he saved. He must be holy in his person
and in his life. He must obey all that God required
of them. And after yielding that perfect
obedience, he himself must bear the punishment for all the sins
of all those he came to save. God removed his people's sins
from them, and he laid them on his Son. And Jesus Christ, who
did no sin, and was not guilty of any sin, yet he was made sin
for us." 2 Corinthians 5.21, he who knew no sin was made sin. He is holy, he had no sin, he
did no sin, yet God made him sin for us. He bore our sins
in his own body. His Father and our God made his
soul an offering for sin. For the transgression of my people
was he stricken. He became guilty. He was not
only guilty of our sins, but he was affected. by our sins. I want you to hear this. He experienced
agony. The agony of our sin made his. He took our infirmities and therefore
he knew the feeling of our infirmities. It says in Hebrews 4.15. He's
not a high priest who cannot be touched with the feeling of
our infirmity. He carried the sins of his people
in his own body up to the tree. The flood of God's wrath came
into his soul, and he drank the cup of indignation of the wrath
of God. He drank damnation dry. He felt
it. All that God's law required to
be poured out on sinners was poured upon him in his body and
his soul. His soul was made an offering
for sin. He was wounded for our transgressions. Yes, by men,
but in soul by God. Remember when the mariners threw
Jonah into the water and the sea became calm? To them it was
calm, but it was not calm for Jonah. He was bruised for, and
they couldn't tell what was going on under the water at that point,
could they? God was afflicting him. We can't tell what God did
to his son, but we can hear the cries of Christ under that affliction. And he tells us he was bruised
for our iniquities. You hear those cries? You see
that beating of his soul? By God the forsaken? That's for
your sins. The chastisement of our peace
was upon him, and with his stripes we were healed. He himself bore
our infirmities, he took our sorrows, our griefs, our diseases,
and he bore them in himself. Thus, Christ heals the sin of
his people by his touch. When scripture says Christ touched
someone to heal them, it means he took their sin to himself
and owned it before God as his. And he answered God for it, too.
Himself took our infirmities and bare our sicknesses. Matthew
8, verse 17. What Jesus did to heal any teaches
us what he must do to save us from our sins. When Jesus touched,
we must understand it as him because of his compassion. That's
when he touched people, because of his compassion. The funeral
procession was going along. The young man, the only son of
his mother, whose husband had already died, and the funeral
procession was going on. And Jesus stopped the procession,
and he touched the coffin. because of his compassion. It's
because of his compassion that he takes the defilement and plague
of our sin to himself. He touched the blind man in compassion. He touched the leper. He put
his finger into the ears of the deaf. He touched the tongue of
that mute man, and he put his hands on the back of that woman
who was bowed together. He touched the coffin of the
widow's dead son. Why? Because his touch is his
compassion towards sinners in which he willingly takes our
sins. There's no way to adequately
describe the compassion of Christ towards sinners. What does a
touch do? We know what that is, don't we?
A touch calms, doesn't it? Have you ever seen a mother just
leave its baby crying? Falls down and hurts itself?
Mom just says, nah. No, she picks it up. She soothes
it. How? By touching and holding
her child, speaking softly. A touch soothes us, it calms
us, it comforts us. How many times did your own mother
touch and comfort you as a child when you were afraid of the dark
or some other fear? Even grown men welcome their
mother's tender compassion. Babies are said to recover more
quickly and more completely if they're held in hospitals where
they don't have a mother. Compare that to those who are
sick and have a mom. Christ's touch was a touch of
compassion. And compassion means to be affected
with the same feeling as another one, to sympathize with them.
Compassion is a tender concern of a sympathetic sorrow for someone
who is suffering, coupled with an urgent aid and given to relieve
them. We can have sympathy, but we
can't do anything, really. You can tell me about your sickness,
and I might sympathize with you in a small measure, but what
can I really do? Compassion towards the guilty
is mercy freely granted to forgive and spare them of the punishment
they deserve. That's compassion. When you or
I have compassion, there's little more than we can do but convey
our deepest sympathy. But when the Lord Jesus Christ
has compassion, it's vicarious compassion. In other words, it's
a compassion of substitution where he actually takes our sin
and the sorrow resulting from our sins and he makes it his
own, removing it from us. He not only felt the feeling
of our infirmity, he took it from us so that it was no more
ours but his. And he was affected by it. He
was plagued and stricken, it says in Isaiah 53, stricken by
God. And his touch was a touch of
compassion. It was a compassion with power to relieve us. His power to relieve suffering
came to him at a great cost. His own cost, he bore it all.
He bore the full cost to God to heal us from our sin and bore
it in his own person. He didn't create a world and
punish the world to save us from our sin. He himself came and
bore our sin in his own body. He suffered the stroke of God.
He was smitten. He was afflicted. He felt anguish
and sorrow of soul. He suffered. He was forsaken,
and he died. He experienced the full payback
for sin that God required in his law against the guilty sinner. And so he cried, my God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me? In Gethsemane, before any man
laid hands on him, he began to be sore amazed and to be very
heavy. No one touched him because God
was afflicting him. He said to them, to his disciples,
my soul is exceeding sorrowful. There's no hyperbole here. My
soul is exceeding sorrowful unto death. That's the wrath of God
on his soul. My sins, the sting of death I
deserve." That's what caused his soul such exceeding sorrow.
He prayed that if it were possible, the cup of suffering would be
removed from him. It says in Luke 22, 44, Luke 22, 44, being
in an agony, he prayed more earnestly and his sweat was as it were
great drops of blood falling to the ground, bloody sweat.
drawn from him by the heat of the holy eye of God upon him
with our sins as his own and God's holy wrath against sin.
You know what sin makes you feel like? Confused, dismayed, despair,
fear, separation, guilt. That's what it is. That's what
he felt. He who is the beloved of the Father prayed, if there's
any other way, O Father, take this cup from me. He who is well-pleasing
in his Father's sight and who is always heard prayed to Him
with whom nothing is impossible. But it was not possible. He could
only take away our sins by bearing them under the just wrath of
God. He who had compassion on men's
bodies and souls asked if there was any other way that this cup
of God's indignation against sin could be taken from him.
There wasn't. He therefore felt all the consequences
of sin and its punishment in his body and in his soul, and
he knew sin's guilt. Isaiah, I mean, Psalm 40, verse
12 said, The Lord Jesus, this is a prayer of the Lord Jesus,
listen, he says, mine iniquities have taken hold upon me so that
I am not able to look up. They are more than the hairs
of my head, therefore my heart faileth me. Do I see how Christ
was affected by my sins? unto you. He said, O God, thou
knowest my foolishness, and my sins are not hid from thee. That's
Psalm 69 verse 5. He cried, My loins are filled
with a loathsome disease, and there is no soundness in my flesh.
In Psalm 38, Christ healed by his touch. His compassion moved
him to stand in the place of sinners that he healed. To heal
any, he must bear their sins, and to make a sinner perfectly
whole, he must bear all their sins and take them away forever.
And so he says in Matthew 8, he healed all that were sick,
that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet,
himself took our infirmities and bear our sicknesses. And
secondly, and this is the last part, he healed all who touched
him. Jesus not only touched sinners
to heal them, but He healed all who touched Him. When anyone
touched Christ, it meant that the person came into contact
with Him in a way that His virtue entered into them. This is what
happened to the woman who had an issue of blood 12 years. She
came behind Him in the crowd, in the press, and she touched
the hem of His garment. And when she did, virtue, it
says in Scripture, left Christ and entered into her. the issue
of her blood was stopped. She felt in herself that she
had been made whole. And then here in Matthew 14,
all those who were sick begged the Lord to touch only the hem
of his garment, and all who touched were made perfectly whole. What
does it teach? It teaches us that when we come
to Christ, when the Spirit of God when by the Spirit of God
we're enabled to believe Him and behold and receive in ourselves
the effects of His salvation for us, we receive them in us. That's what it means. So that
when we believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, it's the result not the
cause, but the result of His redeeming blood that enables
us to take from Him saving and cleansing virtue to ourselves
as our very own. He touched us taking our sins,
we touch Him, we take the consequences of what He's done for us. And
so in Numbers chapter 15, I want to read this to you, but you
might want to turn there. Look at Numbers chapter 15. This is
a very interesting place, and I think it really clarifies a
lot of truth about this. Numbers 15 and verse 38. I'm
fascinated by this. Perfectly whole. It says, the
Lord, in verse 37, Numbers 15, 37, the Lord spake to Moses.
He says, speak to the children of Israel and bid them that they
make them fringes in the borders of their garments throughout
their generations, that they and that they put upon the fringe
of the borders a ribbon of blue, and it shall be unto you for
a fringe that you may look upon it and remember, notice, all
the commandments of the Lord, and do them that you seek not
after your own heart and your own eyes after that which you
used to go a-whoring. OK. What is this saying? It's saying here that if we remember
and do all the commandments of the Lord to be holy to our God,
we do that, and that was the purpose of putting this blue
ribbon, the fringes, on their garments. Notice here, in the
law, to be holy, a sinner had to obey God's law completely. everything had to be kept so
that we were made holy in the law as a result of doing all
of the law. Now how much discouragement does
that bring to you and me? The blue band on the fringe of
the garment reminded them of God's commandments that they
were to keep to be holy before God, but since no one can be
holy by his own personal obedience, because we're sinners, plus God's
law. Just think about it. What's the first and greatest
commandment? Is it not to love the Lord your God with all your
heart, soul, mind, and strength? Have you ever done that one time?
No, of course not. So you failed to do the most
important commandment one time. You've broken them all. If you're
guilty of one, you're guilty of them all. And you failed to
do the most important one. Therefore, none of us have ever
and can ever look on these garments that they were supposed to put
this border on the hem of their garment and see that to remind
them to do the law and to be holy by it. But here's the interpretation,
you see. Since we could never be, the
law was always pointing forward to the Lord Jesus Christ. The
Lord Jesus Christ honored God's law by keeping it. He honored
God's law by enduring its punishment. And by our union with him, his
union with his people, he stood in their place before God. And all that God requires of
believers has been met by Christ's obedience in his death. All that
he did is ours. In Luke chapter 24, Jesus came
to two on the road to Emmaus and he said, beginning at Moses
and all the prophets, he expounded to them and all the scriptures
the things concerning himself. In Luke 24, 25 through 27. All things in the Old Testament
therefore ultimately point to Christ. So the blue ribbon on
the fringe of the garments reminded Israel what God required of them
to be holy. Fulfillment of the law. But in
the fulfillment of that law, according to the Lord Jesus,
He made Himself holy as our High Priest. He sanctified himself
and he sanctified his people. In his high priestly prayer,
he said this, for their sakes, on behalf of his people, John
17, 19, he said to his father, for their sakes, I sanctify myself,
I set myself apart as the high priest, making myself holy, that
they also might be made holy or sanctified through the truth.
How did he sanctify himself? He did the will of God. His father's
will was that he take the sins of his people and offer himself
in suffering and death under the law, so that their sins became
his very own. That's the way he sanctified
himself. He fulfilled God's will. And it was by his obedience to
this will of God, as our substitute, that the Lord Jesus Christ sanctified
us. Listen to this. In Hebrews chapter
13, Hebrews chapter 13 verse 12, by the which will, now this
is actually chapter 10 verse 10, by the which will we are
sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once. In all time and for all eternity,
we are made holy by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ.
The gospel reveals, in contrast to the law, that we are made
holy not by our own doing all of the law, but by Christ doing,
by shedding his blood. It says in Hebrews 13, 12, Jesus
also that he might sanctify the people with his own blood suffered
without the gate. That's the truth of the gospel.
This is the truth by which Christ's people are sanctified. Jesus
Christ himself, sanctified himself to God for his people and therefore
they are made holy. They're sanctified in him. The
truth by which believers are sanctified is the truth of the
gospel because it declares how Christ sanctified his people
by offering himself to God. That's the truth. He said sanctify
them by the truth. What is that? How Christ sanctified
his people by his own blood. Believing this truth honors God's
law. It honors Christ's sacrifice.
It honors His obedience. Faith glorifies God because faith
points away from itself to Christ. As the hem of the garment reminded
Israel what God required of them to be holy, so the hem of Christ's
garment signifies what He must do by His obedience in life and
death to make His people holy. He didn't live for himself. He
obeyed God to establish an everlasting righteousness for his people.
He did not die for himself. He died with the sins of his
people to satisfy God in justice and put their sins away. And
he suffered and died with the guilt of those sins under the
curse of God. And he repaid their debt to God's
justice in their place instead of them suffering eternal wrath
by substituting himself as their surety. So thus we see the significance
of touching the hem of Christ's garments. First, he touches us. His compassion moves him to take
our sin upon himself and make it his and suffer for it and
take him away. Second, the second thing, we
touch him. He gives us faith to come to
him and touching him, what do we find? We find first, by his
grace, that we're sick. And second, we find that He fulfilled
all things for us to God. When you and I are unable to
touch Christ by faith, we receive to ourselves the virtue of His
obedience and His death. That's what faith is. We know
the forgiveness of sins in our conscience when we touch Him.
By faith in His blood, we receive that. He has made us holy by
the offering of himself to God, and we stand on this by faith.
He perfected us forever, his word tells us, and we believe
it in our hearts, and we're comforted by his compassion. And by touching
him, we have joy and peace in believing. Romans 15, 13. All who touch the hem of Christ's
garments were made perfectly whole. It is his righteousness
that makes us perfectly whole before God. I will clothe them
with the garments of salvation. I will give them the robe of
my righteousness, Isaiah 61.10. Remember Ruth? In the Old Testament,
she asked Boaz, spread your skirt over me. To spread his skirt over her
was asking Boaz to cover her. And in doing that, she received
that comfort, knowing that that's what faith does in coming to
Christ. Lord, spread your skirt over us. Spread your skirt over
me. Take my sins and cover me with
your righteousness, your obedience. That's all my coming to God.
And having received that in my conscience, I lay hold upon him
by faith. I come to him and I find it to
be, I find him to be all. of my cleansing, all of my healing,
I'm made perfectly whole. Before God, in my conscience,
no guilt, because Christ took it all. That's the gospel, isn't
it? I will greatly rejoice in the
Lord. My soul shall be joyful in my God, for he hath clothed
me with the garments of salvation. He has covered me with the robe
of righteousness. As a bridegroom, decketh himself
with ornaments, and as a bride, adorneth herself with her jewels. We're adorned with Christ's beauty.
Let's pray. Thank you, Lord Jesus, that your
touch, by your compassion, took our sins to yourself. and you
in great obedience to our God, the one we offended, stood in
our place and answered all, in satisfaction and in obedience
fulfilled the law, and now you tell us that you heal all who
have need of healing, all who come and touch you, are made
perfectly whole. And we are enabled by your grace,
through your Spirit, in looking to Christ to find him to be our
all, and what peace it gives us, and joy. In Jesus' name we
thank you and praise you. Amen.