The little story at the end of Mark 1, in which Christ heals a leper, is very simple. Our suffering brings us to God, he pours out blessing, then we forsake him. That could be the end of the post. But, of course, our sinful hearts like to make things complicated. I suppose we could blame the devil, he certainly doesn’t help simplify things, but we can do plenty on our own. So evil complicating hearts often require complicated solutions. We need to always be sorting out the new lies piled on top of old truths. We need to refresh the stories.
A stained glass window depicting Jesus curing the leper, Church of Christ the Consoler, Skelton Cum Newby, North Yorkshire
This man has been brought to Jesus by his suffering. There is no reason to assume it was not genuine. The language is all about cleanliness and invokes our hearts to the Levitical reality that this man does not have access to the temple. So Jesus was moved and healed him. The man runs away and forgets Jesus. It is a timeless tale. Repeated over and over in Scripture. It is the story of Israel and it is our story. It’s the story of creation, man was placed in a a perfect garden everything was available to him except for one tree. He didn’t appreciate the blessing, he forgot God, he ate the fruit. One of the most stark examples of this is the people of Israel in Exodus 32. The Lord heard the cry of his people suffering in Egypt Exodus 3:7-10 So he freed them from their Egyptian oppression, by a series of miraculous plagues. Then he led them through the sea and they watched as Pharaoh’s entire army was drowned, while they were saved. Yet they think Moses might be taking a little too long on the mountain and decide it’s time for a new god. Then they rewrite history and attribute everything good to this golden calf that they watched Aaron make. “And they said, ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt’ ” vs. 4. Seriously people? Of course we never do anything like this. We don’t ever attribute blessed historical events to persons other than god? I know I’ve never heard anyone attribute our blessings to deists, or technology, or French or Enlightenment philosophers. No, we all get that the unprecedented blessing enjoyed by this country are all from God. And we appreciate them every day. Unfortunately you get the point. We are so forgetful of our blessing we assume that they are normal. We allow our blessing to be referred to as racial or imperial theft because we forget that this is not normal. Poverty and despair are normal on this planet. And why are they normal? Because when we are freed from poverty we forget God. Beware of taking our blessed position for granted and writing God out of our history and writing our arrogant selves in.
Jesus healing the Leper. Codex de Predis, Turin Italy, 15th Century
Our Heavenly Father is trying to bless us and we don’t let him, we forget him and choose our own way. We see this at the end of this episode, leading into the next episode. The healed man incites a riot that crowds the streets of those small ancient towns to the point that the sick and injured get trampled trying to get to Jesus. They can’t get to him. They must be lowered through the roof. It is an interesting literary reversal. Lepers were cast outside the city for their uncleanness. Jesus takes the place of the unclean and is cast outside the city. He tells the ex-leper to go inside the city, though the priests were to come outside the city. I doubt they could be bothered.
This is a great instance of Christ fulfilling the Law and not abolishing it. He tells the man to go the the temple and follow the Law of Moses, so that he may be a testimony to the priests of Jesus. This is a common theme in the New Testament. The religious teachers think they are sons of Moses, but they prove by their misapplication of the law that they are sons of Belial. Jesus by fulfilling the law to the letter and applying it to real life proves he is the true son of Moses. And even this law was not about judgement or creating a social hierarchy, as our modern humanist history tell the story. The law protected people from contagious disease. It also protected people from being falsely excluded from society. The priest had to make a determination after patiently waiting. As we see the law was in harmony with Jesus’ healing, it made provision for people being cured. The Law was grace.
Jesus healing a leper. From 15th Century gradual.
There was a huge lottery payout recently. Huge, because lots of people donated money to the cause by buying tickets. “A tax for people who can’t do math.” as Doug Wilson says. But they don’t see it that way, they see it as a chance to strike it rich with very little effort. But what happens to people who strike it rich? In Florida there is a counseling center for such people called The Sudden Money Institute. Because the reality is that people who get rich quick destroy their lives. When need is no longer a factor, immorality runs rampant, unchecked we forget God. This is the story of the leper. This is why God allows suffering and hardship. It is his blessing, preventing us from destroying ourselves.