Jesus, The Leper and The Touch of Love

What’s the one thing you want more than anything else? Fame? Fortune? A great tennis backhand? For most people, what they want more than anything else is to feel loved and wanted.

It is something that I longed for all of my life. But for most of my life the longing was never totally fulfilled. Then one day I read a story about Jesus that caused everything to change for me. It was a story that I had read many times before, but this time something about it penetrated deep into my heart and soul in a way it never had before. Which story? The story of Jesus cleansing the leper in Mark chapter 1.

And a leper came to him, imploring him, and kneeling said to him, “If you will, you can make me clean.” Moved with pity, he stretched out his hand and touched him and said to him, “I will; be clean.” And immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean (Mark 1:40-42).

That time that I read this story I was at one of the lowest points of my life. I was feeling acutely aware of my sin, aware of how I had let down people who loved me and depended on me, aware of how far short I’d fallen from the life of righteousness that God requires and deserves from me. I remember feeling like I’d been soaked in filth, like I was covered with open oozing sores.

Then I read that story.

                                                                                                                                                            Leprosy was a terrible, incurable disease. Having it made someone unclean and the law forbid him from contact with other people. Lepers were not allowed to live in towns. They had to live in camps outside the city. If for any reason a leper had to come into town he was required to shout “Unclean! Unclean!” to warn others to stay away. What do you think that did to someone’s self-image?

It was a terrible existence. No one was more unloved and unwanted than were lepers. Imagine going through your life like that. No one loves you, no one wants you. And if ever you happened to come close to someone they would recoil at even the thought of accidentally brushing up against you. Horrible.

That’s how I felt. Not physically. But emotionally and spiritually, I felt a leper. I felt unclean and untouchable.

Then I read this passage. Jesus wasn’t repelled by this man’s leprosy. He wasn’t disgusted. He didn’t turn away from him, as I felt people did with me.

Then I noticed, as if for the first time, what Jesus did. He moved toward the man and he touched him.

Jesus wasn't compelled to touch him in order to heal him. Though he did so many times, Jesus didn’t have to touch people to heal them. All he had to do was say a word and the man would have been cleansed.

Jesus could have said, “Okay, now you just keep your distance over there while I clean you up first.” Jesus could have backpedaled away from him while saying, “be clean” and the man would have been cleansed. But, that’s not what Jesus did. Jesus knew it had been a long time since anyone had come near this man or touched him. Jesus wasn't just interested in healing the man, he wanted to love him.

So the first thing Jesus did was he moved toward him and touched him. Even before he healed him, he touched him.

The moment I read those words something popped open in my heart. I saw that I was the leper. I was covered with oozing sores of sin that caused people to turn away from me. But that didn’t matter to Jesus. He was saying to me, “I am not repelled by you. I love you and I accept you just as you are. You don’t have to change anything for me. I come to you. I embrace you. I love you.”

Jesus loved me just as I was, sin and all. He wanted me. That’s grace. That’s the gospel.

Of course, he didn’t leave me the way I was. Just as Jesus didn’t leave the leper in his leprosy but made him well, Jesus has been making me well ever since. But I have never again, since that day, ever felt like there was no one who loved me and accepted me. I know that whatever else happens, Jesus does.

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I Can't! He Can! So, Let Him!

                I read a quote recently from Tullian Tchividjian, “Believing that simply telling sinners to ‘stop it’ … carries the power to exact lasting change is silly and unrealistic.” He’s right, of course. It’s true, people can’t just stop doing wrong things.

            And, it is also true that it is silly and unrealistic to tell sinners to “just do it” when it comes to the good things God requires. I can no more, in any long-term sense, do what is right on my own than I can not do things that are wrong.

Moral Inability

            I think about this a lot, about moral inability. I really resonate with what Paul wrote in Romans 7:15, 18 I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate…For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out.

            I’ve been particularly thinking about moral inability in regards to things I wrote a couple of weeks ago about love. Jesus said, “Love God and love others.” It’s the sum of all God’s Law. In fact, Jesus said, the One Thing, that will show others that you belong to him is the way you love one another. Elsewhere, in Romans, Paul wrote that the One Thing, the only thing, we ought to owe others is love (Romans 13:8 – 10).

            I read what Jesus and Paul said ought to be the One Thing, the most important thing, that I do with my life and I think “But, I can’t!” And, I’m right. I can’t. That’s why I need the gospel.

The Gospel

            The gospel is not just that Jesus died for my sins and has given me salvation. The gospel says that apart from the power of Jesus dwelling in me I can’t live a moral life. I no more have the power to do what is right, or not do what is wrong, than I have the power to save myself from my sins.

           

            In another place Tchividjian related Eugene Peterson’s observation about Augustine, Pelagius and Christian practice.

“Eugene Peterson draws a contrast between Augustine and Pelagius, two fourth-century theological opponents. Pelagius was urbane, courteous, convincing, and liked by everyone. Augustine squandered away his youth in immorality, had a strange relationship with his mother, and made many enemies. Yet Augustine started from God’s grace and got it right, whereas Pelagius started from human effort and got it wrong. Augustine passionately pursued God; Pelagius methodically worked to please God. Peterson goes on to say that Christians tend to be Augustinian in theory but Pelagian in practice. They work obsessively to please other people and even God.”

http://www.pastortullian.com/2015/03/25/march-madness-and-the-mathematics-of-grace-2/

            I add that Christians tend to be Augustinian when we think about salvation – which we know is by grace alone through faith alone. But, we tend to be Pelagian about the Christian life. We think we get better by trying harder. We try harder to stop doing wrong things. We try harder to do right things. We live as though the way to love God and love others is to just work at. Buckle down. Give it more effort.

I Can’t! But He Can!

            But I’ve tried. I really have. For years. And, I finally came to the conclusion, I can’t.

            A number of years ago I a heard a pastor say that the whole teaching of the Bible can be summarized by “I can’t. God can. So let him.” So simple. So profound. It reminds me of another favorite passage:

            “But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly in weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me… For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Cor. 12:9-10).

            It is only when I admit that I am weak, it is only when I admit that I can’t, I can’t love God and I can’t love others, at least not like I ought, and embrace Jesus in the midst of that weakness, that his grace then makes me able to love.

If I depend on my own ability to love I fail every time. When I admit I can’t and flee to Jesus, and trust in him, trust in his grace, then and only then, do I begin to authentically love.

I can’t. He can. So, let him. That’s the gospel, and that’s what I need.   

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