We started looking in the last devotion at the four friends who brought another to Jesus for healing. Jesus focused on his spiritual healing rather than his physical healing. This daily devotional looks at getting our priorities straight.
Nuggets
- Jesus knows what we are thinking because He has access to our hearts.
- Jesus is more concerned about our inward spiritual condition than our outward physical condition.
- Salvation requires more than just our acceptance; we have to implement it into our lives.
- Everyone was amazed at Jesus’ power to heal.
Devotions in the Faith and Forgiveness series
Spiritual Healing versus Physical Healing
Sometimes, it feels as if God has a totally different focus than we do. That is probably because He does.
God’s main concern is not our lives here in this world. He is more concerned about our spiritual lives.
That was evident in the story about the four friends bring the paralytic to Jesus. Let’s jump back into the story.
Let's Put It into Context
“Seeing their faith he said, ‘Friend, your sins are forgiven.’ Then the scribes and the Pharisees began to think to themselves, ‘Who is this man who speaks blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?’” (Lk. 5: 20-21 CSB)
It seems like it was a common occurrence for the Pharisees and teachers to be in the audience when Jesus was teaching. They saw that He had the power to heal, but they didn’t believe He was the Messiah.
It wasn’t just the means of getting the paralytic to Jesus that He gained His approval. Jesus rewarded their faith. Faith is the conviction that the doctrines revealed in God’s Word are true, even if we do not understand all aspects of them, a belief which impacts our lives.
Nothing the friends did saved the paralytic. But everything they did got him to the point where he could be saved. Salvation is deliverance from evil and the consequences of sins to replace them with good and eternal life.
Jesus’ focus is always on saving us from our sins. Healing the man from paralysis was secondary.
Luke didn’t record any words passed between the five men and Jesus. It is probably a safe bet to say the man and his friends had prayed for healing in the past. Jesus was gauging their faith on what was in their hearts.
That spiritual healing was not expected was of no consequence to Jesus. God will look at the overall picture — our overall plan — and answer our prayers accordingly. He will answer them in the best way for us.
The Pharisees thought Jesus had committed blasphemy because they believed only God could forgive sins. They were correct isn’t thinking that no mere human can forgive sins. They were incorrect because Jesus was no mere human.
Which Is It Easier for God to Heal — Spiritual or Physical?
“But perceiving their thoughts, Jesus replied to them, ‘Why are you thinking this in your hearts? Which is easier: to say, “Your sins are forgiven,” or to say, “Get up and walk”?” (Lk. 5: 22-24 CSB)
Jesus knows what we are thinking because He has access to our hearts.
It wasn’t just intuition that Jesus could discern what the Pharisees were thinking. The whole crowd probably had a pretty good clue that they were not buying what Jesus was selling.
Jesus knew what everyone in the crowd was thinking because He is God. God knows our thoughts. “You know when I sit down and when I stand up; you understand my thoughts from far away” (Ps. 139: 2 CSB).
Oh, yeah. Jesus can not only see into our minds, but He also can see into our hearts. He knows the condition of our hearts. He knows if He is in them or not.
Shedd discussed this concept, equating it to our own self- evaluation. He wrote, “… we will make the extreme supposition that he [mankind] arrests every thought as it rises, and looks at it; that he analyzes every sentiment as it swells his heart; that he scrutinizes every purpose as it determines his will; even if he should have such a thorough and profound self-knowledge as this, God knows him equally profoundly and equally thoroughly.”
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The thing is, God knows us better than we know ourselves. We may not recognize something as a sin. Sins are actions by humans that disobey God and break one of His reasonable, holy, and righteous laws and commandments, goes against a purpose He has for us, or follows Satan’s promptings.
God does.
Ooo, baby. That can be a scary thought at times, can’t it? We can’t hide anything from God.
But doesn’t that present hope also? As Shedd wrote, God has seen us at our worst and deemed us forgivable anyway. Perfect God has looked at imperfect man and said, “I can not only forgive you, but I can make you clean again.”
Glossary
That is what Jesus was offering to the paralytic that day.
Spiritual Healing v. Physical Healing
Jesus is more concerned about our inward spiritual condition than our outward physical condition.
I have always thought that Jesus’ question was interesting. “Which is easier: to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up and walk’?” (Lk. 5: 23 CSB). Parker pointed out the fearlessness Jesus exhibited in asking this question of the Pharisees.
When Jesus healed the many people, how many times did He specifically say that their sins were forgiven? I don’t remember many others — maybe once.
That means the two are not interconnected. Jesus can heal the physical without healing the spiritual. He is able to start at either end.
To me, it also means Jesus did not just hand out forgiveness of sins. There had to be something more than the person showing up for physical healing.
They had to have faith that Jesus was the Messiah and could save them from their sins. Parker wrote, “His answer to the faith of man was always in proportion to the fulness and courage of that faith.”
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This man made the choice to believe, and His sins were forgiven. Healing his body showed that he was obedient. Spurgeon wrote, “He did his Lord’s bidding, and he did it accurately, in detail, at once, and most cheerfully. Oh! how cheerfully; none can tell but those in like case restored. So, the true sign of pardoned sin, and of paralysis removed from the heart, is obedience.”
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Get Up and Walk
But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins’ — he told the paralyzed man, ‘I tell you: Get up, take your stretcher, and go home’” (Lk. 5: 23 CSB)
Salvation requires more than just our acceptance; we have to implement it into our lives.
Notice Jesus wanted the paralytic to immediately get up. He was asking for a visual indication that he accepted the healing. Cox wrote, “He bids us ‘arise and walk,’ to prove our victory over sin, to show that we have found new life in Him.”
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The Crowd Responds
“Immediately he got up before them, picked up what he had been lying on, and went home glorifying God. Then everyone was astounded, and they were giving glory to God. And they were filled with awe and said, “We have seen incredible things today’” (Lk. 5: 25-26 CSB)
Everyone was amazed at Jesus’ power to heal.
Smyth thought Jesus went about His ministry in the right way. Forgiving mankind of their sin is harder than healing them of their physical ailments.
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But that is and always was Jesus’ focus. Our spiritual condition is much more important than our physical condition.
Parker brought up a good point. If the Pharisees were amazed at Jesus’ power, it didn’t last long. Pretty soon, they went back to seeing Jesus as the enemy.
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Making the Connections
I love how Pentecost described faith. He wrote, “Faith is not merely a sentiment which believes something to be, but a vitalized affection which starts all our faculties into action and sets us to work to accomplish something.
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Faith isn’t just an attitude. We may believe something to be true. That belief has to give us strength and devotion to impact our lives.
A couple of devotions ago, we said that knowledge is the precursor to faith, and faith is the precursor to salvation. It all hinges on free will.
To read a related devotion, click the button below.
I think we need to modify that to knowledge is the precursor to faith; faith is the precursor to forgiveness: and forgiveness is the precursor to salvation.
How Do We Apply This?
We can’t say this enough. Cox wrote, “There must be faith before there can be healing; the man’s sins must be forgiven before he can be made whole from his disease. But then, when our sins are really forgiven us, forgiveness implies a free restoration to health.”
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That means we must ABCD if we haven’t already.
The ABCDs of Salvation
If you have not become a believer in Christ, please read through the
Plan of Salvation and prayerfully consider what God is asking you to do.
A – admit our sins
B – believe His Son Jesus is our Redeemer
C – confess God as Sovereign Lord
D – demonstrate that commitment by making any changes needed in our lives to
live the way in which God has called us
The Disciple’s Job Description
Foote told us to be a friend such as these four were to those in need.
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More importantly, we need to bring the lost to Christ. We need to be more concerned about their spiritual condition than their physical condition.
Eternity is more important than this temporary world. God has the right priorities. We need to adopt them.
Father God. You love us so much. You don’t want to spend eternity without us. That is why You designed the Plan of Salvation. That is why You sent Jesus to be our Savior. May we have Your priorities. Help us focus on You and bringing others to know You. Amen.
What do you think?
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