We have seen that the call—the special ministerial call—of Peter and the rest, was taken out of its historical place, in order to present the Lord uninterruptedly in the activity of His grace, when He entered upon His manifestation.
Now we find two remarkable miracles, which, I believe, set forth sin in two different forms. The first is under the phase of leprosy. “It came to pass, when he was in a certain city, behold a man full of leprosy.” Luke particularly mentions this symptom. It was not in an incipient stage or a slight case, but a man full of leprosy, “Who, seeing Jesus, fell on his face and besought him, saying, Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean.” The man wanted confidence in the Lord's love and good pleasure to meet his need. The Lord, accordingly, showed not only His power but His goodness. “He put forth his hand and touched him, saying, I will: be thou clean.” This was by no means necessary for healing. Love, however, does not limit itself to man's necessities, but takes occasion by them to show the great grace of God. Under law it would have been defiling: but we shall never understand the gospel unless we see that He, who was pleased as man to come under law, was really above law. And we find these two things running through the account of our Lord's life on earth—dispensationally under law, and in His own person above it. Nothing could overthrow the rights and dignity of His person. But now we find Him both displaying what man ought to be towards God and what God is towards man. In the first case He is found under law, but this course of miraculous manifestation was the display of what God is—God present and active in goodness among men, and this in the reality of a man's soul, mind, and affections. So Christ put forth His hand and touched him, and, so far from defilement accruing to Himself, the leprosy immediately departed from the man. He “charged him to tell no man: but go and show thyself to the priest.” Thus we have in the injunction a man under law, as truly as we have, in the Lord God who healed the leper, One above man and consequently above law. “Go and show thyself to the priest, and offer for thy cleansing, according as Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them.” Until the cross, Jesus rigorously maintains the authority of the law. To have been merely under law would have defeated the whole object of the gospel; it would result in leaving man under his leprosy, under the utter loathsomeness of sin, the hopeless and defiling ruin that sin produces. Therefore if grace was to be shown, Christ must be infinitely above man, must in a human body put forth a hand which is the natural emblem of its work, and touch the man that was lost in sin beyond all human remedy. “I will” —which only God was entitled to say— “be thou clean.” Divine power at once accompanies the word. “Power belongeth unto God.”
The Lord would make the healing known, but according to law. “Go and show thyself to the priest,” whose business it was to inspect. The priest would have known the reality of the leper's case, and would be the best judge among men of the reality of the cleansing. “Offer for thy cleansing according as Moses commanded for a testimony unto them.” There was no provision under law for healing leprosy, but there was provision, when a man was healed, for his purification, his cleansing. None but God could heal. When, therefore, the healed leper came and showed himself to the priest with his offering, it was a proof that God was there in power and grace. When had such a thing been known in Israel? A prophet had once, with characteristic difference, indicated a cure from God, outside Israel. But God was now present in the midst of His people. The conviction would thus be forced upon the priest that God was there in Christ above law, but yet not overthrowing the law's authority. “Go, show thyself to the priest, and offer for thy cleansing according as Moses commanded for a testimony unto them.” If that testimony were received, they would themselves (and in due time openly) enter the ground of grace. “By grace ye are saved,” as it is grace too that enables us to walk according to God. “Sin shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under the law, but under grace.” This is the Christian's ground.
Again, the more the Lord forbade his speaking, so much the more went there a fame abroad of him: and great multitudes came together to hear, and to be healed by him of their infirmities.
The Lord, however, instead of yielding to the applause of the multitude, “withdrew himself into the wilderness and prayed.” Nothing can be more beautiful than this retirement for prayer between these two miracles. However truly God, He was man, not only in maintaining the authority of the law, but also in practicing dependence upon God.
“And it came to pass on a certain day, as he was teaching, that there were Pharisees and doctors of the law sitting by, which were come out of every town of Galilee, and Judea, and out of Jerusalem: and the power of the Lord was present to heal them. And, behold, men brought in a bed a man which was taken with a palsy and they sought means to bring him in, and to lay him before him.” Now we have the other form in which sin is set forth, not so much in its defiling influence, but in the impotence which it produces—in man's total powerlessness under it. Sinful man is not only defiled and defiling, but also has no strength. The Lord accordingly proves Himself equal to meet this result of sin as much as the other. There were difficulties in the way; but what are these to the sense of need and faith? “When they could not find by what way they might bring him in because of the multitude, they went upon the housetop, and let him down through the tiling, with his couch, into the midst before Jesus.”
Wherever real faith exists, there is earnestness. Here the difficulties and obstacles only increased and made manifest the desire to meet with Jesus. Accordingly the man submits to all these efforts on the part of those who carried him. He was let down into the very midst of the crowded assembly where Jesus was. “And when he saw their faith, he said unto him, Man, thy sins are forgiven thee.” Not, Man, thy palsy is healed; but, “thy sins are forgiven thee.” This is very instructive. In order to reach the powerlessness of a sinner, he must be forgiven. There is nothing keeps a man feebler, spiritually, than the lack of a sense of forgiveness. If I am to have the power to serve the living God, I must have the assurance that my sins are forgiven. (Compare Heb. 9) Accordingly the first word of the Lord took up his deepest need, that which, if not supplied, would always leave him without strength. “Man, thy sins are forgiven thee.”
But forgiveness on earth at once aroused the incredulous opposition of the scribes and Pharisees. They “began to reason, saying, Who is this which speaketh blasphemies? Who can forgive sins, but God alone?” As God alone could heal a leper, so God alone could forgive sins; so far they were right. The great mistake was that they did not believe Jesus to be God. But then in both these miracles Jesus is man as well as God, and this comes out distinctly here. For, “when Jesus perceived their thoughts, he, answering, said unto them, What reason ye in your hearts? Whether is easier to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Rise up and walk?” One was as plain as the other. He could have said either. He had a true and a gracious spiritual motive for dealing with the real root of the evil first. The deepest necessity of man was not to rise and walk, but first of all to have his sins forgiven. “But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power upon earth to forgive sins (he said unto the sick of the palsy), I say unto thee, Arise and take up thy couch and go unto thy house.” He did not say, That ye may know that God in heaven will by and by forgive sins; but, “that the Son of man hath power upon earth to forgive sins.” Jesus is God; but here it is in His quality of the rejected Messiah, the Son of man, that He has power on earth to remit sins. He has authority from God, as indeed He is God; but still it is as Son of man, which adds immensely to the grace of His ways. The despised Messiah of Israel had authority on earth to forgive sins. Thus the strength that is imparted by the Holy Ghost to the believer is not at all the ground of the remission of his sins, nor is to be the proof to himself that he is forgiven, but “that ye may know,” &c. Others ought to know the reality of this forgiveness, and, above all, of the Son of man's authority to forgive man. This is God's great object. It is not merely doing good to man, but the display of the rejected man, the Lord Jesus Christ. God is putting honor on Him, not only in heaven but upon earth. Now He is exalted in heaven; but even as the Son of man, the rejected Christ, He has authority on earth to forgive sins: and this the gospel proclaims. Then the strength to rise up and walk imparted to the poor powerless sinner is just a witness to others of the forgiveness of his sins; but the great thing for such an one is not merely what others see and judge of; but what pertains to himself alone, what note can absolutely know outside, what is a word from the Lord to his own soul— “Thy sins are forgiven thee.”
The public fact, however, acts powerfully upon the beholders. “Immediately he rose up before them, and took up that whereon he lay, and departed to his own house glorifying God. And they were all amazed, and they glorified God, and were filled with fear, saying, We have seen strange things to-day.” They had not the sense of forgiveness, but at least they were filled with fear. It was a new thing in Israel.