Oh. The words to which I would direct
your attention this morning are to be found in the chapter that
we read in the first chapter of the Gospel according to Mark,
verse 41. Gospel according to Mark, chapter
1, verse 41. Mark chapter 1 verse 41, and
Jesus moved with compassion, put forth his hand and touched
him, and saith unto him, I will be thou clean. And Jesus moved
with compassion, put forth his hand and touched him, and saith
unto him, I will be thou clean. when we come to the Gospel according
to Mark, we see in perhaps a more obvious way than in any of the
other books of the Bible that though every word of the Bible
is inspired by God and is the word of God, yet we see the characters,
don't we, of the individual writers in what they write. Mark writes
in a very different way to John. He was probably a very different
kind of man to John. And we're not to think that the
writers of the Bible were men who wrote as if they were almost
robots, just dictating and writing down what was dictated to them.
No, they wrote from their own experience. They wrote from the
things that they had handled and tasted and felt. And so as
they write, we see their own character coming out in the language
that they use and the way in which they phrase things. That's
very true in the case of the Gospel of Mark. As we read through
this Gospel, we get the impression of a man who's very active. How often he uses the word immediately
and forthwith and straightway. Did you notice it as we read
through this first chapter? This word keeps coming up time
and time again. It starts in verse 10, where
Mark is describing the baptism of Jesus Christ, and he says,
straightway, coming up out of the water. And then in verse
12, he says, immediately, the spirit driveth him into the wilderness.
And then as he considers the calling of the apostles, in verse
20, speaking of the calling of James and John, he says, straightway,
he called them. Again and again he uses this
word. It's remarkable, really, the word that's translated in
that way. It appears just as many times in this one gospel
as it does in the rest of the New Testament put together. We
see a man who, as it were, is urgent, who's rushing to set
down all those things that he wants to write about concerning
the Lord Jesus Christ and his life and his ministry. Straightway,
he says, immediately, forthwith, Nine times in this one chapter
he uses that same word. We see the character of Mark,
and there are those who have said that Mark really, his Gospel
was intended to be read by the Gentiles, whereas some of the
other Gospels were written for a Jewish audience. There are
those who tell us that Mark really wrote his Gospel for the benefit
of the Gentiles, and we can see indications of that as we look
through the Gospel of Mark. For example, as you read through
the other Gospels, you'll very frequently find the writers saying
that such and such happened in order that the Scripture might
be fulfilled. That's true in Matthew's Gospel. Time and time
again he describes the things that happened in the life of
Jesus Christ, and he says, well, this happened in order that the
Scripture might be fulfilled, in order that this prophecy might
be fulfilled. We don't really find that. in
the Gospel according to Mark. Very few times he refers to the
Gospels of the Old Testament. And then the second thing is
that he doesn't give us any detail, does he, of the birth of the
Lord Jesus. He doesn't give us any history
of the family of the Lord Jesus. Both Matthew and Luke, they give
us detail, don't they, of the ancestors of the Lord Jesus,
Matthew especially. He goes right back to Abraham
and he traces through the generations, through Isaac and Jacob, and
he comes eventually to Jesus Christ. And again in the Gospel
according to Luke, we have that same history related to us. the descendants of Adam all the
way down to the Lord Jesus. But when we come to this Gospel,
it's a very abrupt and a very striking opening, isn't it? Mark,
just as it were, launches into it. He says, the beginning of
the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. And then he just
begins this account of the life and the ministry of the Lord
Jesus. It was written for a Gentile audience primarily, And there's
an emphasis, isn't there, and it's very obvious in this chapter
that we've read, there's an emphasis upon the miracles of the Lord
Jesus, and especially those healing miracles that he performed. There's
three of them, aren't there, in this one chapter. We read
of him in verse 25, healing that man who had an unclean spirit
in the synagogue, who cried out and said, let us alone, what
have we to do with thee, thou Jesus of Nazareth? I know thee
who thou art, the Holy One of God. And Jesus rebuked him saying,
hold thy peace and come out of him. And the unclean spirit came
out of him. Then in verse 30 we read the
account of Simon Peter's mother-in-law, how he lay sick of a fever in
the house of Simon and Andrew. And Jesus comes and takes her
by the hand and lifts her up. And immediately again, immediately
it says, the fever left her and she ministered unto them. And
then the final miracle is the one that I want to consider together
with you this morning. This miracle relating to this
leper that we see coming to the Lord Jesus in verse 40 and that
we see being sent away from the Lord Jesus in verse 43. And yet
how much has changed in the life of that leper in just those three
verses. He comes as a leper. He goes
away as a clean man. Matthew and Luke, they give us
the same account. They both give us a description
of this miracle. And when they come to introduce
this miracle, they use the word, behold. In Matthew chapter 8,
you can read of the same occasion. Behold, Matthew says, there came
a leper and worshipped him. And then I think it's in Luke
chapter 5. Again, Luke gives the same account
of the same miracle. And he says, it came to pass
when he was in a certain city, behold, a man full of leprosy. It's a very important word, that
little word, behold. What does it imply? Well, it
doesn't imply that the words are any more the word of God
than the rest of scripture. But what it does imply is that
here is something remarkable. Here is something that the writers
seek to draw our attention to in a special way. Behold, says
Matthew, and behold, says Luke, concerning this miracle that
Jesus performed with this leper. Here is something striking, something
unusual, something that ought to amaze us and to fill us with
wonder. And it's important, isn't it,
that when we come to consider the miracles of the Lord Jesus,
that we don't just think, well, this is an amazing thing that
Jesus did in healing this leper. These miracles are signs. They're
there to show us something greater, something even more important.
Jesus didn't just perform these miracles in order to impress
the people with his power. No, it was part of his teaching,
it was part of his ministry to teach the people certain things. That's very striking, isn't it,
in the 9th chapter of John. In the 9th chapter of John we
have that account of the man that was born blind. Jesus is
passing by, he sees a man which was blind from his birth and
we can read about the account of how Jesus heals that man and
eventually that man is brought into the council and the Jews
question him concerning the healing that he's experienced. and eventually
they reject him and they throw him out. He's excommunicated
from the Jewish church because he confesses that Jesus Christ
is of God. He says this, if this man were
not of God, he could do nothing. And the Pharisees and the Jews,
they say, thou wast altogether born in sins and dost thou teach
us? And they cast him out. But what
was the purpose of all this account? What was the purpose of that
miracle that Jesus performed with that blind man? Well, when
we come to the end of that chapter, we see the Lord Jesus speaking
to the Pharisees concerning spiritual blindness. Jesus says, for judgment
I am coming to this world that they which see, that they which
see not might see, and that they which see might be made blind. Now, in that verse, he's not
talking about natural blindness, and he's not talking about natural
seeing, he's talking about spiritual blindness. And so some of the
Pharisees, when they hear him saying these words, they say,
are we blind also? Jesus said unto them, if ye were
blind, ye should have no sin. But now ye say, we see. Therefore
your sin remaineth. It's as if Jesus says, yes, I
have healed this man who was naturally blind. But you Pharisees,
you need healing in the same way, in a spiritual sense. Just
as he was blind from his birth naturally, so you Pharisees,
you are blind spiritually. and you have just as much need
of me to heal you in that way as that man did in a natural
way. Jesus said unto them, if you
were blind you should have no sin, but now you say, we see,
therefore your sin remaineth. All these great miracles that
the Lord Jesus performed in healing the sick and in raising the dead,
giving sight to the blind, unstopping the ears of the deaf, and in
cleansing this leper, all of these miracles they teach us
something spiritual, They're like parables, aren't they? They
give us details of things that happened in providence, earthly
things, things that we can understand, things that we can visualize.
But the teaching that's underneath it is spiritual truth. There
came a leper to him, beseeching him and kneeling down to him
and saying unto him, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. Well, there are three things.
that I'd just consider this morning with you in this account of this
miracle. And the first is this. Who is
it that came? Why is this man coming? Who is
he? What's his problem? Why is he coming to the Lord
Jesus Christ? How could we describe him? That's the first thing.
Who came? And then secondly, how did he
come? We're told certain things concerning the way in which he
came, aren't we? There came a leper to him, beseeching him, and kneeling
down to him, and saying unto him, if thou wilt, thou canst
make me clean. And then finally, in the third
place, what the outcome was, what he received, what the Lord
Jesus did for him. Jesus moved with compassion,
put forth his hand, and touched him, and saith unto him, I will. Be thou clean. Well, the first
thing that we notice from this account is that this man was
a leper. there came a leper to him. Now what is a leper? Well,
a leper is a man who is afflicted with leprosy. And we can read
all about leprosy, can't we, in those two chapters in the
book of Leviticus? It was something that the Lord
gave a great deal of teaching on to the Old Testament Jews.
That 13th chapter, it goes through and it teaches them how they
are to respond to a man who is suspected of having leprosy,
how they are to treat him, what they are to do. Leprosy is a
disease that we don't really hear very much about today, is
it? Not many years ago, it was a fairly widespread disease in
many countries. Now, to a large extent, it's
more or less been eradicated. There are still cases, even in
this country, that they tend to come in from overseas. It
would be unusual to meet someone with leprosy today. This man
had leprosy. He had a physical disease, but
it teaches us, doesn't it, something concerning spiritual truth. Leprosy
is a physical disease. But just as this man comes to
the Lord Jesus Christ with his physical disease, it shows us
something of how sinners come to Jesus Christ with a spiritual
disease. And the first thing that strikes
us concerning this disease of leprosy is this. If you read
the writings of those who have understanding concerning the
disease of leprosy, you'll find this, that leprosy is a disease
that a man can have for many years without knowing it. We're
told if you read that the disease of leprosy, a man can catch it,
but it can be anywhere up to 20 years before he has really
any symptoms of it. So a man could have leprosy in
him for 20 years and yet not really be aware of it. Well, that's something like sin,
isn't it? That's something like the disease of sin that afflicts
men and women today. We all have it. We all have this
disease of sin within us. We all have this problem that
lies within us. But men and women generally,
and all of us by nature, we don't really realise it. And when we
hear of sin, we think perhaps of other people primarily. If
people speak to us about sin, well, we tend to think to ourselves,
well, of course, other people are sinners. We might think of
a drunkard or an adulterer or a murderer, and we say, well,
there's a sinner. But if someone was to say to us, you are a sinner,
we would perhaps naturally be offended. So a man can go many
years with this disease of sin in him, but really be unaware
of it. So if you think that the problem
of sin is not really a problem that affects you, well, no doubt
there were many people who had the disease of leprosy in the
days that we read about in this chapter, but they didn't know
it. It was that incubation period that we call it, where a man
has the disease, but there are no symptoms yet. So, no doubt
there were many people in the time of Christ who had the disease
of leprosy in them, but they weren't aware of it. Well, this
man was aware of it, wasn't he? He didn't just have leprosy,
he knew he had leprosy. And that's what brought him to
the Lord Jesus Christ. Then the second thing that we
might say about leprosy is this. Leprosy is a disease that is
more than skin deep, isn't it? It shows itself in the skin of
a person who has it. They have certain deformities
in their skin and in their hands and in their face. But there's
no use just treating on the surface, is there? There's no use trying
to treat leprosy just by doing things to the face of the person,
to the skin of the person. You have to tackle it at its
source. You have to tackle the root cause of the problem. It's
a little bit like you might have a house, and perhaps many of
us in our houses, we have those times when we have problems with
damp. And you might get patches of
paint that start peeling off on the walls. Well, what's the
issue? The issue is not so much that
the paint is peeling off. The issue is that there's a problem
that underlies it. There's something that's causing
it. And so there's no point really just scraping the paint off and
putting another coat on, is there? because you get the same problem
recurring, showing itself again. Well, it's just like this man
here with his leprosy. There were certain things about
him that showed that he had leprosy, but the problem really was very
deep within him. That's very much like sin, isn't
it? Sin is something that lies deep within us, and it shows
itself outwardly in certain things that we do and certain things
that we say. and certain ways that we might
think, how we might speak to other people, things that we
do that we know that we should not do, and things that we leave
undone that we know that we should do. But really the root of the
problem lies very deep within us. If you think your problem
is sins, but really you fail to understand the nature of sin,
our problem really isn't sins as such, it's sin. It's something
that lies deep within us. This is what Isaac Watts understood
when he wrote that hymn that we have in our book. He speaks
of himself as vile and conceived in sin. And then he says this
in verse 3 of hymn 1004. He says, Behold, I fall before
thy face. My only refuge is thy grace. Not outward forms can make me
clean. The leprosy lies deep within. It's not outward forms that can
make a man clean from sin. It's not outward things that
can cleanse a man from sin. No, you have to tackle his heart.
It's something that lies within him. It's something that lies
deep within him. So our problem is not so much
with the sins that we commit. It's with the sin that lies deep
within us, that shows itself in those things that we do that
we should not do. Surely that's what the publican
understood. You remember that parable that the Lord Jesus spoke
concerning the Pharisee and the publican? And what do we read
about the publican as he comes up to the temple? We read of
him smiting upon his breast, don't we? He was conscious that
the problem really was in his heart, it was something in here.
It was not so much in the things that he did. Yes, those things
troubled him and those things were things that he mourned over,
no doubt, but it was his heart that really was the problem.
Again, that's what we find as we come to that Psalm of David.
You remember that time in David's life when he committed that sin
with Bathsheba, and then Nathan the prophet comes to him and
he's suddenly convicted of his sin, and he writes that 51st
Psalm. But what does he say in that
51st Psalm? He says, Behold, thou desirest
truth in the inward parts, and in the hidden part thou shalt
make me to know wisdom. That's why he says, create in
me a clean heart and renew a right spirit within me. He doesn't
just pray that God would keep him from committing the same
sin again. No, he says, it's my heart that needs to be changed.
It's my spirit that needs to be renewed. That's what this
man who comes to the Lord Jesus Christ would no doubt have been
conscious of. His disease was something that
was much deeper than his skin. There was something that was
seen of it, yes, but there was a lot more that was not seen.
It was an infection. There was something in him that
was causing all these outward symptoms. Well, that's the same
with sin. We see it outwardly, and we do
things that we shouldn't do, and we say things that we shouldn't
say, but really they're the symptoms of the disease. The root cause
of it is what lies within the heart. It's something that lies
deep inside us. And until and unless we understand
that, then we won't come in the same way that this man comes.
We won't come seeking the same cleansing that he comes seeking.
Yes, we may pray to be kept from certain outward sins, but even if we are kept from
those sins, if our heart is unchanged, really we're no better off. If
this man had come to the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Lord Jesus
had said to him, well, what I'll do is I'll take away your symptoms,
so you won't look like a leper anymore, that wouldn't really
have solved his problem, would it? If he'd gone away looking like
a clean man, a man with no leprosy, and yet the disease was still
there within him, it wouldn't really have addressed his problem.
That's not what he wants. He wants to be cleansed. He wants
to be delivered entirely from this disease of leprosy. This
disease is more than skin deep. Sin is something that lies not
just on the surface, but it is deep in the heart of men and
women today. And it's the heart that needs
to be addressed, and it's the heart that needs to be changed.
Your problem in your life you may think is sins. Well, if that's
what you think, you haven't understood what the apostle understood.
When he writes to the Romans, He says, I see another law in
my members. That was what troubled him. It
wasn't the fact that he did things that he shouldn't. It was the
fact that he had a heart that was still sinful, that was still
at enmity to God. And he wanted to be delivered
from it, just as this man wanted to be delivered from his leprosy.
There came a leper to him. Well, it's obvious then, isn't
it, that we can say that there would have been two types of
lepers in the days of the Lord Jesus? There would have been
those who realised that they were lepers and there would have
been those who didn't realise that they were lepers. There
would have been those who were conscious of their leprosy and
those who were not conscious of their leprosy. Well, that's
true of sin today, isn't it? And we can take the whole of
mankind and we could divide them up into those two categories.
Those who were conscious that they were sinners and those who
were not conscious that they were sinners. We could do it
with those in this chapel this morning, couldn't we? If we had
the wisdom to look into their hearts, which of course we don't,
that's something that's reserved only for God. But if we had that
wisdom, and if we had that discernment, we could set people on one side
or the other, and we could make a group of people who were conscious
of their sin, and a group of people who were not conscious
of their sin. There would have been two types
of lepers, and there were two types of sinners. Well, which
type of sinner are you? Are you a sinner who is conscious
that you are one? Or are you a sinner that is not
conscious that you are one? Well, this man was conscious
that he was a leper, and that's what brought him. That's what
brought him to the Lord Jesus. And yes, there are two types
of sinners in the world, but there is only one kind of sinner
that comes to the Lord Jesus Christ. There is only one kind
of sinner that will come as this man came. Only the man who sees
himself as a sinner, who realizes that he is a sinner, will come
in the same way that this man came to the Lord Jesus. This was the man that came to
him. He was a leper. He had a disease that was a long-standing disease.
It was a serious disease. It was a deep-rooted disease.
And that's what brought him to the Lord Jesus Christ. And he saw hope in the Lord Jesus,
didn't he? He saw the Lord Jesus as one
who could make him clean. It reminds us of that woman with
the issue of blood. You remember that account that
we have given to us in some of the Gospels of the woman with
the issue of blood? And what are we told concerning her? Well,
she'd spent all her money on physicians that really couldn't
help her. She'd been to lots of doctors, and no doubt she'd
done what they'd told her, but her disease really was unaffected. There was no improvement. She
grew no better, but rather grew worse. But what was the turning
point in her life? Well, it was this. Just in those
few words it says that she heard of Jesus. Well, this man must have heard
of Jesus, mustn't he? And he must have heard of him
as one who could heal. And that's why he came and that's why he
said, if thou wilt thou canst make me clean. Surely this is
a very important point. Have we heard of Jesus in the
same way that these people have who came to him while he was
here below? Have we heard of him as the saviour of sinners,
as the only one who can forgive sin, as that one mediator between
God and men? Surely this is one of the primary
purposes of preaching, is to set Jesus before people as someone
who can help them, as someone who can address that most fundamental
and that most basic need that they have, that one thing needful,
the forgiveness of sin. Behold the Lamb of God, said
John the Baptist as he saw Jesus walking on that occasion that's
recorded in the first chapter of John's Gospel. John seeth
Jesus coming unto him and saith, Behold the Lamb of God which
taketh away the sin of the world. And again, the next day after
John stood, and two of his disciples, and looking upon Jesus as he
walked, he saith, Behold the Lamb of God, behold the substitute,
behold the sacrifice, behold the one who comes to suffer on
the behalf of others and to give his life a ransom for sin. This
man, this leper, he had heard of Jesus, and so he comes, conscious
of his need. And that woman with the issue
of blood, she heard of Jesus, and so she comes, conscious of
her need. and sinners today, if they are
conscious of their need and if they hear of the Lord Jesus Christ
as the one who can address that need, they will be attracted
to Him. They will inevitably be attracted to Him. There came a leper to Him, beseeching
Him and kneeling down to Him and saying unto Him, if thou
wilt, thou canst make me clean. Well, we've looked at who it
was that came. Let's in the second place look
at how he came. What are we told concerning the
way that he approached? Well, there's three things, aren't
there, that we're told about the way in which he came in this
40th verse. And the first thing is this,
he came beseeching him. He came beseeching him, that's
a strong word, isn't it? To beseech someone. This man
didn't just come half-heartedly, thinking, well, I suppose I may
as well go and see what happens. No, he came with an urgency. He came beseeching him. He was conscious of this problem
that he had. He was conscious that this was his main problem
in his life, wasn't he? This was the thing that spoiled
everything. If we'd gone to this man and
said, well, surely you can just go and enjoy your life. Surely
you just try and forget about this disease of leprosy. See
if you can distract yourself from it. It would have been hopeless,
wouldn't it? It would have helped him not
one bit. No, he would have said, this is the primary need that
I have. Without this, nothing is of any value. Without this,
I cannot enjoy life. Without this, life seems to be
empty. And you can give me whatever
you like. You can give me all the money in the world and all
the possessions in the world. But while I have this disease
of leprosy, really it's meaningless. It doesn't give me anything.
It doesn't address my primary need. Well, just as the leper
comes in that way, so the sinner comes in that way. The man who
is truly conscious of his sin, he won't take anything else. What does the Sami say concerning
himself in that 42nd Psalm? He compares himself to a heart,
to a deer. And what does he say, as the
heart does the deer panteth after the water brooks, so panteth
my soul after thee, O God. My soul thirsteth for God, for
the living God. When shall I come and appear
before God? Well, the heart, the deer who is panting after
the water brooks, nothing else will do, will it? It's water
that he needs, it's water that he's looking for. And David in
that psalm, he's looking for God, he's thirsting for God,
for the living God. And no matter what else you would
have set before him, it wouldn't have satisfied him. No matter
what else you could have set before this leper, it wouldn't
have satisfied him. This is the thing that he comes
beseeching. This is the thing that he comes
with urgency concerning. He wants this one thing. And
that's what draws him, that's what brings him. But what about your sense of
sin? Is it the thing that draws you to the Lord Jesus Christ?
And does it draw you to come in the same way that this leper
comes? Do you come beseeching? Do you
come with urgency? Do you come with the hymn writer
when he says, give me Christ or else I die? There came a leper to him beseeching
him. That's the first thing that we see concerning the way in
which this leper came. And then we see this, that he
comes kneeling down to him. He comes kneeling down to him
in the account that Mark gives us. He tells us that this leper
came and fell on his face. He comes kneeling down, he comes
falling on his face. What does it represent? What
does it show us? Well, Matthew puts it in even
stronger language. He tells us that this leper came
and worshipped him. Behold, he says, there came a
leper and worshipped him. There was worship in the way
in which he came. That worship is something that is only acceptable
to give to God, isn't it? You can read through the Acts
of the Apostles and more than one occasion you can read the
times in the early church there were those who tried to worship
the apostles. There was that time when Peter
went to the house of Cornelius and Cornelius sees him coming
and he falls down at his feet. What does Peter say? He says,
get up, stand up. I myself also as a man, don't
worship me, he says. Then again, when Paul is in a
certain place, there are those who seek to worship him. And
again, he says, no, don't worship me. And even when we come to
that account that we have in the last book of the Bible, as
John sees those visions, those visions of heaven, those visions
of things to come. On more than one occasion, we
see him falling down to worship before the feet of the angel,
which showed him these things. But what did the angel say unto
him? He said, see thou do it not. For I am thy fellow-servant,
and of thy brethren the prophets, and of them which keep the sayings
of this book. Worship God. Worship God. Well, it's a remarkable thing,
isn't it, that we never read of the Lord Jesus saying, don't
worship me. Time and time again we read of
men and women coming to the Lord Jesus and they worship Him. And
not one time do we read of Him saying, no, don't worship me.
Worship God. He never rejects their worship.
This leper came worshipping. And all those who come to the
Lord Jesus Christ, they will come and they will worship Him,
because they will see Him as He is, not just an ordinary man,
not just someone who was brought into this world in the ordinary
way, but God manifest in the flesh. Great is the mystery of
godliness, says Paul to Timothy. God was manifest in the flesh.
This man, this man that this leper came to, was not just an
ordinary man, though he appeared so outwardly. Though in that mysterious way,
it was God manifest in the flesh. There came a leper to him, beseeching
him and kneeling down to him, falling on his face before him,
worshipping him. And then in the third place he
comes with faith, doesn't he, this man? He comes believing
something concerning the Lord Jesus Christ. He says, if thou
wilt, thou canst make me clean. Now, leprosy in those days, it
was an incurable disease. There was no treatment. Really,
until the 1940s, there was no treatment for leprosy. No effective
treatment, no guaranteed treatment. This man knew that he had an
incurable disease, and yet he comes and he says, if thou wilt,
thou canst make me clean. He sees this man, this glorious
man, this God-man manifest in the flesh. He sees him as one
who is able to do the impossible, who is able to accomplish what
no other man can accomplish. He has no doubt heard of the
other miracles that the Lord Jesus has performed, of those
that he has healed just with a word, of those devils that
he has cast out just on his own authority. We read of faith,
don't we, that faith cometh by hearing. No doubt this man had
heard. And that's what had worked in
him, this faith that he demonstrates in the way in which he comes.
If thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. This was what the woman
with the issue of blood experienced. She had heard of him. She heard
of Jesus. She heard of him as one who could
heal, as one who could satisfy that need that she had. Her faith
came by hearing. This man's faith came by hearing.
Well, what about your faith? What is it that you believe concerning
the Lord Jesus Christ? Do you believe that He is able
to heal you of your primary need and to address that need that
you have which lies so deep within you, that need for a new heart,
a right spirit? What David desired, create in
me a new heart and renew a right spirit within me. This leper believed that Jesus
could make him clean. Do you believe that Jesus can
make you clean? Has your faith come by hearing? Have you read of him? Have you
heard of him? Have you seen him in the Gospels as that one who
is able to do the impossible? To do for you what you cannot
do for yourself? Look at him in the next chapter.
In that well-known account we have of those four friends who
have a friend that's sick of the palsy. And they try and bring
him to Jesus, but it's so busy they can't get into the house.
And so they go up to the roof. They're not to be defeated. They
don't give up. They break up the roof, they let down the bed.
What does Jesus say? He said unto the sick of the
palsy son, thy sins be forgiven thee. Here is a man who claims
to be able to forgive sin and he demonstrates his ability to
forgive sin. But that ye may know, he says
to the Pharisees, and the scribes, that that ye may know that the
Son of Man hath power on earth to forgive sins. He saith to
the sick of the palsy, I say unto thee, arise and take up
thy bed and go thy way into thine house. And immediately, straight
away, he arose, took up the bed, and went forth before them all,
insomuch that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, We
never saw it on this fashion." They were all amazed and glorified
God. Have you seen what they saw? That here is a man who has
power on earth to forgive sins, a man who has power on earth
to do the impossible. There came a leper, beseeching
him, kneeling down to him, and saying unto him, If thou wilt,
thou canst make me clean. What else do we see about the
way in which this man comes? Well, he comes despite being
a leper, doesn't he? In these days, lepers really
would have been outcasts. They wouldn't have been permitted
to mix in polite society. Like that woman with the issue
of blood, really she would not have been allowed to mix with
normal society. And this man, he wouldn't have
been permitted, it would have been incorrect, it would have
been unacceptable for him to mix. Lepers, they were outcasts,
weren't they? We can read more than once in
the Bible of lepers how they were outcasts, how they were
not permitted to mingle with the normal people. And this man,
no doubt, would have felt the same. And it would have been very understandable
if he had said to himself, well, I cannot come to this man in
this state. I cannot come to the Lord Jesus.
I'm too much of a leper. I won't be welcome. He won't
receive me. But he comes because he has to
come, doesn't he? He comes because he has a need that nowhere else
can address. To whom else can we go, said the disciples to
the Lord Jesus, thou hast the words of eternal life. One of
the hymn writers speaks of those who tarry till they're better. He says to us, well you know
some people when they become conscious of their sin, They
have such a deep sense of sin that they feel, well, I cannot
come to God in this state. I cannot come to God feeling
to be such an undeserving sinner. And they say, well, I must try
and improve myself. You can read about it in the biographies of
so many of the Christian saints who have gone before us. Conscious
of their sin, they think, well, I must do something about this.
I must stop committing that sin or I must keep myself from falling
in that way. and they deceive themselves into
thinking that if only they can keep themselves and make themselves
a little better then they will be able to come. What are they doing? Well really
they're looking for the Lord to accept them because of what they
have done and who they are. They're not coming in the spirit
of that hymn writer who said, nothing in my hand I bring. Though
this leper he comes despite what he feels to be. He doesn't tarry till he's better.
And the hymn writer's quite right in what he says. He says, if
you tarry till you're better, you will never come at all. The
man who thinks that he can improve himself, really it's not humility,
it's pride that's working in that man. He thinks that he can
do something in order to make the Lord Jesus approve of him. Well, this man had learned that
he could do nothing. He knew that he, and he understood that
it was out of his hands. He comes despite being a leper,
despite being unclean. Perhaps you say to me, well,
I don't think I know how to come. Perhaps you say, I'm not sure
how to come. I don't know what words to come with. Well, if you don't know any other
words, the words of the hymn writers are sometimes a help
to us in our prayers, aren't they? What does Charles Wesley
say in that hymn 1076? They're good words for anyone
to pray, really. But they have to be prayed honestly,
don't they? What does he say concerning himself? Wrothful,
impure, and proud I am, nor constancy nor strength I have. And what
does he pray? Enter thyself, he prays. Enter
thyself, Lord Jesus, and cast out sin. More of thy purity bestow. Touch me, and make the leper
clean. Wash me, and I am white as snow. This is how that leper came. Touch me and make the leper clean.
Wash me, and I am white as snow. If thou wilt, thou canst make
me clean. What was the question for this
man? The question wasn't so much about whether the Lord Jesus
could make him clean, was it? He knew that he could. He'd realised
that he could cleanse him. What was the question? The question
was this, if thou wilt. He knew he was able. He came
to see if he was willing. If thou wilt, thou canst make
me clean. And of course we know the outcome and what an encouragement
it should be for us, those who are conscious of their sin and
who are seeking to come to the Lord Jesus in the same way that
the hymn writers come. If thou wilt, thou canst make
me clean. If thou wilt, if you want to, thou canst make me clean.
and what encouragement there is in what the Lord Jesus does
for him. That's what we're going to consider
in the third place. What's the outcome? We've seen
who it is that comes, and we've seen how he comes. What was the
response of the Lord Jesus? Well, they're beautiful words,
aren't they, that we have in verse 41. We're told that Jesus
was moved with compassion, and Jesus moved with compassion. And if you're conscious of your
sin, perhaps you are in the same place that this man was in. And
your uncertainty is not so much about his power to forgive sin,
but in his willingness. And perhaps you have to come
with the same words and you have to pray, if thou wilt thou canst
make me clean. Or set your mind upon the response
of the Lord Jesus to this leprous man. Look at the way in which
he responds to him, look at what he does for him. Look at how
he's described. He is moved with compassion.
Not just filled with compassion. He doesn't just feel sorry for
this man. No, he's moved with it. He's moved. He does something
for him. We read about it. We sung about
it in our opening hymn, didn't we? What does the hymn writer
say concerning this God that this leper comes to? Tell of
His wondrous faithfulness and sound His power abroad. Sing
the sweet promise of His grace and the performing God, the God
who does things, the God who does things for His people, who
does things for sinners. This is what strikes the Prophet
with wonder, isn't it? As we come towards the close
of the Old Testament, we have that short prophecy of Micah.
What does he say in the closing chapter of his prophecy? Who
is a God like unto thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth
by the transgression of the remnant of his heritage? He retaineth
not his anger for ever, because he delighteth in mercy. Here
is a God who delights in mercy. Here is a God who is mindful
of man. The psalmist said, didn't he, what is man that thou art
mindful of him? If thou wilt, thou canst make
me clean. And Jesus moved with compassion. And this Jesus is the same today
as he was then. He's described, isn't he, as
Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and today and forever. And all those who come in the
same spirit as this leper comes, all those who come conscious
of their sin, All those who have been shown by the Holy Spirit
of God that they need something done for them that they cannot
do for themselves. Those who it is true what the
Apostle says to the Galatians, the law was our schoolmaster
to bring us to Christ. The law was our schoolmaster
to bring us to Christ that we might be justified by faith.
This man had been taught things that meant he had to come to
the Lord Jesus. And God teaches His people today.
And He makes them see that they need something that only the
Lord Jesus can give them. And they will come in the same
way that this leper comes. They will come worshipping, they
will come beseeching, kneeling down to Him and saying unto Him,
if Thou wilt, Thou canst make me clean. And all those who come
in that way, just as Jesus was moved with compassion towards
this leper, He is moved with compassion towards those who
come conscious of their sin. Jesus moved with compassion.
He puts forth his hand and he touches him. He touches the leper.
Difficult for us to understand what that would have meant in
those days. What it would have meant for this man, this leper,
to be touched. People would have turned away
from him generally, wouldn't they? They would have said, well,
I'll not touch you. Don't come near me. But Jesus
puts forth his hand, he's moved with compassion. He didn't need
to touch this man, did he, to heal him? It was his word that
healed him, that's what we read in verse 42. As soon as he had
spoken, immediately the leprosy departed from him, and he was
cleansed. He could have healed this man
without touching him, but he was moved with compassion. He
put forth his hand, he touched him. We read of him, don't we, in
one of the epistles, as that great high priest who is touched
with the feelings of our infirmities. Jesus moved with compassion,
put forth his hand and touched him and said unto him, I will. The leper comes saying, if thou
wilt, if you want to, you can make me clean. Jesus says, I
will, I want to. Be thou clean. He gives him exactly
what he comes looking for, doesn't he? He doesn't half heal him. He gives him exactly what he
needs. In verse 40, the leper comes
saying, If thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. In verse 41, Jesus
says, I will be thou clean. And in verse 42, immediately
the leprosy departed from him and he was cleansed. He comes
seeking cleansing. The Lord Jesus gives it to him
and he was cleansed. Yes, these are real events that
we're reading about. These things really happened.
This man, the Lord Jesus, really came and did this for this leper.
But it's a picture, isn't it? It's a parable. It's almost a
parable in real life. Jesus is moved with compassion.
He puts forth his hand and he does for this man exactly what
he needs, exactly what he desires. Or do you come with the same
desire that the hymn writer comes with? Touch me and make the leper
clean. Wash me and I am white as snow. Create in me a clean heart and
renew a right spirit within me. He gives cleansing from sin's
guilt. He takes away the guilt of sin. He has taken it upon
himself. So the hymn writer, he says,
my sins, oh the bliss of this glorious thought, my sins not
in part but the whole. He has nailed to his cross, I
shall bear them no more. My sins owe the bliss of this
glorious thought. Jesus moved with compassion,
put forth his hand and touched him and said unto him, I will,
be thou clean. Though of course the analogy
is not quite perfect, is it? We're not to suppose that the
man who comes to the Lord Jesus troubled by sin will go away
from the Lord Jesus and will never be troubled by sin again. We're not to believe that a man
who once comes to the Lord Jesus with a sense of sin and knows
the forgiveness that's represented by this healing in this account
here, will therefore be a man who's careless about sin and
will go about saying, well, of course, sin doesn't really have
anything to do with me anymore. That's not true of David, it
wasn't true of the Apostle Paul, was it? It wasn't true of any
of the disciples. None of them felt lightly about sin, even
after their sins had been forgiven. It's not sinless perfection. Even John in his first epistle,
what does he say? If we say that we have no sin,
he says, we deceive ourselves. And the truth is not in us. If
we say that we have not sinned, We make him a liar and his word
is not in us. This man only had to come once,
didn't he, for this healing. But the Christian has to come
time and time again. It's not a once-in-a-lifetime
experience for the Christian to come as this man came. Now
it's constant cleansing, isn't it? It's daily cleansing. Daily,
says the hymn writer, I'll repent of sin. Daily washing Calvary's
flood. daily feel that peace within. If you've known this peace once,
if you've known this healing once, you will want it daily,
and you will be conscious of your need of it daily. What does
the hymn writer say in that 237th hymn? Again, he compares sin
to this disease of leprosy. He asks the question, what it
is. Let us ask the important question, what it is to be a
Christian. And one of the ways in which he defines it is this,
"'Tis to feel the fight against us, yet the victory hope to gain,
to believe that Christ has cleansed us, though the leprosy remain."
That's why Paul still has to cry out as he does, O wretched
man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?
To believe that Christ has cleansed us, though the leprosy remain. Well, this man had a great and
a serious disease, didn't he? But men and women, as they're
born into this world, and you and me amongst them, we have
a disease which is far more serious, and which can affect us not only
for this life, but for the life to come. Have we realized this? Are we like this leper? He didn't
just have leprosy, he knew he had leprosy. And so he came to
this man who could do for him what no other man could do. And
have you come in the same way? The hymn writers speak so often
of this, there's so many of the hymns that we could look at as
an example of this spirit in which the Christian comes to
the Lord Jesus. And we're going to sing one example
in a few minutes, in that 977th hymn. A hymn writer speaks of sin as a disease,
as something that wounds. as something that we need to
be cured of. It's like a raging fever, she says. This poison
spreads to the heart. And then she says, there is a
great physician here, there is a great physician near, and we
see him in this account. If thou wilt, thou canst make
me clean. There is a great physician near,
she says. Look up, O fainting soul, and
live, seeing his heavenly smiles appear. What must it have been
for this leper to see the way in which the Lord Jesus looked
at him and turned to him and felt compassion and was moved
with compassion and stretched out his hand and touched him
and said, I will. Be thou clean. What must it have
been? Well, the hymn writer says, Look up, O fainting soul, and
live. See in His heavenly smiles appear such ease as nature cannot
give. See in the Saviour's precious
blood life, health and bliss, abundant flow. Tis only this
dear sacred flood can ease thy pain and heal thy woe. If you're
conscious of your sin as you come up to the house of God this
morning, and if you're looking for that deliverance from sin,
Well, here it is in this man, in this glorious man, in this
Jesus who has moved with compassion, who put forth his hand and touched
the leper and saith unto him, I will be thou clean. Again, Joseph Hart, he gives
this advice to the man who feels this sense of sin. He says, leprous
soul, press through the crowd. In thy foul condition, struggle
hard and call aloud on the great physician. Wait till thy disease
he cleansed. Begging, trusting, cleaving,
that's what this man did. Beseeching, kneeling down, saying
unto him, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. And he wasn't
going to go away until he got what he wanted, was he? begging, trusting and cleaving
when and where and by what means to his wisdom, leaving. There
came a leper to him, beseeching him and kneeling down to him
and saying unto him, If thou wilt, thou canst make me clean. And Jesus moved with compassion,
put forth his hand and touched him and saith unto him, I will
be thou clean. And as soon as he had spoken,
Immediately the leprosy departed from him and he was cleansed.
Well, may we know this same cleansing in a spiritual sense that this
man knew in a physical sense. And may we know that same rejoicing
that he must have felt as he left the Lord Jesus and went
out and began to publish it much and to blaze abroad the matter.
This wasn't something that he was careless about. It wasn't
something that he just said, well, now I'm cleansed and I
can just carry on with my life. This was something, it was a
life-changing experience for him, wasn't it? He would never
be the same again. He went out and began to publish
it much and to blaze abroad the matter. Jesus moved with compassion,
put forth his hand and touched him, and saith unto him, I will
be thou clean. May God bless his word to us
for this morning. Amen. Our closing hymn is that 977th
hymn, number 977. The tune is Whitburn, 435. Deep
are the wounds which sin has made. Where shall the sinner
find a cure? In vain, alas, is nature's aid. The work exceeds all nature's
power. Hymn number 977. Keep all the words which sin has made,
which shall deceive. In vain alas, with nature's aid,
The work exceeds all nature's power.