Saturday, February 29, 2020

Jesus Christ the Great Healer

Luke 5:31-32 (NKJV)
31 Jesus answered and said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. 32 I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners, to repentance.”

Whenever we have a problem about something, normally we call an expert to help us.
e.g. if you have clogged sink, you have to call a plumber to fix it, or someone who knew how to fix it.
if you are physically sick, you go to a doctor to help you find cure for your illness.

The same idea can also be applied with our spiritual condition, that we're sick, we're spiritually sick because of sin (sinfulness) and we need to cure it, and only the Lord Jesus Christ is the spiritual physician who can cure it (He is the cure). His ministry was to heal not only physical sickness but most importantly spiritual sickness (SIN). Because man can't cure its own sinfulness, and Jesus Christ has the cure.

Our spiritual condition:
Romans 3:23
for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,

Romans 3:10-17
10 As it is written:
“There is none righteous, no, not one;
11 There is none who understands;
There is none who seeks after God.
12 They have all turned aside;
They have together become unprofitable;
There is none who does good, no, not one.”
13 “Their throat is an open [a]tomb;
With their tongues they have practiced deceit”;
“The poison of asps is under their lips”;
14 “Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness.”
15 “Their feet are swift to shed blood;
16 Destruction and misery are in their ways;
17 And the way of peace they have not known.”

Jesus Mission (Healer and Savior):

PHYSICALLY:
Isaiah 35:5-6
5 Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
And the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped.
6 Then the lame shall leap like a deer,
And the tongue of the dumb sing.
For waters shall burst forth in the wilderness,
And streams in the desert.

Luke 5:15
However, the report went around concerning Him all the more; and great multitudes came together to hear, and to be healed by Him of their infirmities.

SPIRITUALLY:
Jeremiah 3:22
22 “Return, you backsliding children,
And I will heal your backslidings.”
“Indeed we do come to You,
For You are the Lord our God.

Isaiah 53:5
5 But He was wounded[a] for our transgressions,
He was [b]bruised for our iniquities;
The chastisement for our peace was upon Him,

And by His stripes[c] we are healed.

1 Peter 2:24
24 who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness—by whose [a]stripes you were healed.

John 3:17 
17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.

Verse 32, This is not the Godly righteousness but self-righteousness, these are the people who don't see their sinfulness and faults (e.g. Pharisees)
People who doesn't take responsibility for their actions, instead of seeing and admitting their fault, they blame others or make excuses.

Illustration:
Most of us have gone to a doctor's checkup?
In order for the doctor to administer the right prescription of medicine:
1. We need to acknowledge that we're sick and we need help for a cure.
2. Normally the doctor will ask questions and we have to answer it with all honesty.

Luke 18:9-14
The Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector
9 Also He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: 10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.’ 13 And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ 14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be [a]humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

What is Repentance?
In the New Testament, the key term for repentance is metanoia - It has two usual senses: a "change of mind" and "regret/remorse."

Repentance means "to turn from evil, and to turn to the good.", turning away from evil and returning to God.

It is the free sovereign act of God's mercy, and a conscious decision to turn to God (a turning that goes beyond sorrow and contrition).

.True repentance leads a person to say, "I have sinned" and prove it with a 180-degree change of their direction.
- Requires true brokenness.
- Repentance is NOT asking the Lord for forgiveness with the intent to sin again.
- Repentance is an honest, regretful acknowledgement of sin with commitment to change.
- Repentance leads us to cultivate godliness while eradicating habits that lead into sin.
- Repentance is only a condition of salvation and not the reason for salvation. 

Jesus can heal us physically, but most importantly we need to be healed spiritually.


Dr. Will Mayo, one of the brothers who founded the world famous Mayo Clinic, claimed to have seen  patients that by all standards were dead. “We knew they could not live. But I have seen a minister come to the bedside and do something for them that I could not do, although I had done everything in my professional power, but something touched some immortal spark in them and in defiance of medical knowledge and materialistic common sense, that patient lived!” (Source Unknown).