Trinity 19 [Matthew 9:1-8] (6-Oct-2013)

This sermon was preached at St Paul's Lutheran Church, Darnum (9am), Good Shepherd Lutheran Church, Traralgon (11am) and Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Bairnsdale (3pm).

Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our Father, and from our Lord Jesus Christ.

Text: (Matthew 9:1-8)

Which is easier, to say, “Your sins are forgiven,” or to say, “Rise and walk?”

Prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable to you, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.

 

In our Gospel reading today, Jesus heals a paralytic man and forgives his sins. Just before our reading, Jesus had shown his great power in his teaching, in cleansing a leper, in healing a centurion’s servant, in calming a great storm simply by speaking a word, and also when he cast out demons into a herd of pigs. Now, in our Gospel reading today, he heals a paralytic man, but he also shows his power in the greatest way of all: he forgives this man’s sins, and by doing this, he shows to the scribes who grumbled against him that he is equal to his Father. Together with the Father, Jesus actually has the authority to forgive sin.

This is the reason why Jesus sets out in our Gospel reading. We read: And getting into a boat he crossed over and came to his own city. We know that on another occasion, Jesus walked on the water and didn’t need a boat. But he uses a boat here simply because he chooses to. He doesn’t want to take away from the reality that he is a true man, and took real flesh from the Virgin Mary. We learn here that when we read about Jesus’ times of weakness, we know that this is because he chooses to be weak, and does this in love for us.

When Jesus was on the cross, the priests said: Let him come down from the cross, and we will believe in him. Jesus would very well have done this if he wanted to, but he chooses to stay there with the nails through his hands, because otherwise he wouldn’t be the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. It’s his love for us that keeps him there. So in the same way, Jesus takes a boat today, simply because he wants to, and he wants to show us that he really is a true man.

We read: [He] came to his own city. Just think! Jesus is the Creator of the world, he is the ruler of all things, all the countries and lands and cities and towns of the world belong to him, and yet our Gospel reading says that he came to his own city. As a real man, Jesus is not embarrassed to be a citizen of his own country and to call a certain city his home-town. He created Mary and Joseph, and yet he was happy to call them his mother and father. Jesus is always showing to us in so many different ways that he is approachable, that he is friendly, loving, kind, and gentle. He wants people to come to him, so he always comes to us first to meet us.

The city here is Capernaum. Bethlehem was where he was born, Nazareth was where he grew up, but Capernaum was where he continually lived. Matthew 4:13 says: And leaving Nazareth he went and lived in Capernaum by the sea.

So we read: And behold, some people brought to him a paralytic, lying on a bed. This man was lying on a bed because he couldn’t walk. And because of this, some people had to bring him to Jesus. Actually, they didn’t have to, but they chose to. They were this man’s friends, and they wanted Jesus to do something for him.

 
Often when a person is sick, there are some Christians who like to say to people, “If only your faith were strong enough, you would get well again.” Now there are many places where Jesus rebukes his disciples and says to them: You of little faith! And every day of our lives as Christians, Jesus rebukes us for our little faith, and every day we need to pray: I believe! Help my unbelief! Increase my faith! On one occasion, the disciples ask Jesus why they couldn’t cast out a certain demon from an epileptic boy. He said to them, Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.
 
On the other hand, there are false prophets everywhere today who go around doing miraculous healings. And if a person doesn’t get healed by these faith healers, what do they say? “It’s because you don’t have enough faith.”
 
Now we know that we are saved by faith. But there are people who say that you have to be saved by your amount of faith, and instead of telling you to put your trust in Jesus and his death and his suffering and his blood, and in his resurrection and in your baptism, they teach you to put your faith in your faith. Your faith isn’t worth anything if you put your trust in it. We are not saved by faith in our faith. We are saved by faith in Jesus. There’s a big difference.
 
Now there were many sick people in Galilee and Capernaum in the time of Jesus—Jesus didn’t heal them all. And Jesus didn’t heal only the ones with a great amount of faith, or with a strong faith.
 
But in our Gospel reading today, Jesus doesn’t heal this man because of his own faith. We read: When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven.” Not the sick man’s faith, but their faith.
 
Maybe this man had a great faith too—never mind: it isn’t mentioned. If this man didn’t have a great faith, why does Jesus reward him with a healing? Why him, and not someone else who is more deserving of it?
 
Never mind: Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Glory be to you, O Lord!
 
But Jesus shows us that our anxieties and worries about other people aren’t in vain. When we bring our friends and our neighbours and those we care about and place them at Jesus’ feet, he doesn’t turn us away because the person we bring to him doesn’t have any faith. Jesus wants to teach us that our faith is worth something when we bring unbelieving friends to him in prayer, it is precious in Jesus’ eyes, and he notices it, he cherishes it, he values it. You might have heard about Monica, who was the mother of St Augustine, a great bishop and a wonderful teacher in the church during the 4^th and 5^th centuries. For a long time, Augustine was part of a completely different religion, but his mother prayed for him every day. It was not up to his mother to make him a bishop: that was for the Holy Spirit to work out. But she commended her son, and her son’s future—which she might not have even lived to see—into Jesus’ hands. 
 
So Jesus shows us here that when he gives us good health or heals us from bad health, this is completely by his free grace, and without any merit or worthiness in us. Also, Jesus values our prayers for other people and he wants us to bring our friends and carry them on stretchers to him and place them at his feet.
 
We read: When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, “Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven.” Listen to what Jesus says to him: Take heart, my son; your sins are forgiven. There were plenty of priests and Levites that wouldn’t even touch him. But Jesus calls him: my son. In Greek, it says: child. Through these words, Jesus shows us deep into the heart of our heavenly Father. Jesus says in John’s gospel: He who has seen me has seen the Father. And just as God the Father calls this man his child, so also Jesus himself calls this man his precious and beloved child.
 
But what does Jesus want to do with this child? He wants to encourage him, he wants to cheer him up, he wants to strengthen his faith. So he says to him: Take heart, my son. And not only that, but Jesus also gives him the most wonderful gift that can be given this side of the grave. He says: Your sins are forgiven. He gives this man the forgiveness of his sins, a clean conscience, a new heart, a fresh slate, an open door into heaven, the gift of eternal life. This is what the forgiveness of sins is: it is the open door of heaven. And Jesus doesn’t just want to make this man hope for it as if might exist maybe somewhere off in the future, but he wants to give it to him now, ahead of time, right into his lap, with his cup running over. The same goes for us in the church now: Pastors speak the words of absolution on behalf of Christ, and through these words Jesus gives us the forgiveness of sins right here in this life, ahead of time.
 
The gift of healing and the forgiveness of sins go together—because every time we receive the forgiveness of sins from God’s hand, whether through baptism or the Lord’s Supper, or through hearing God’s word, or through absolution or preaching—there are so many ways to receive this forgiveness!—we receive in this life the promise of the complete healing of our bodies in the next life. This paralytic man will die again someday, and in the resurrection, his body will be healed 100 times more than it was on that day. So often, we get obsessed with physical healing in this life, because we lack faith in that complete healing in the next life! When we are sick or paralysed, remember that Jesus is with us in the flesh uniting us to himself through our own crosses, just as he was paralysed on the cross and stuck himself there, bearing our griefs and carrying our sorrows, bearing our illnesses and carrying our diseases.
 
Let’s see what happens next in our reading. There were some scribes who grumbled against Jesus, and they wanted to go around and spread a bad report about him. So we read: And behold, some of the scribes said to themselves, “This man is blaspheming.” They completely rejected Jesus’ authority to forgive sin, because they said he is a man: only God can forgive sins. That’s true, but Jesus is true God. In fact, because they didn’t believe that he was true God, they called his words “blasphemy”. They believed that Jesus’ words of forgiveness were actually sinful.
 
But Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said, “Why do you think evil in your hearts? For which is easier, to say ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise up and walk’? But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he then said to the paralytic—“Rise, pick up your bed and go home.” And he rose and went home.
 
Jesus wants to say: If you want to know whether I have the authority to forgive sins, just look at this miracle. Jesus says: Even if you do not believe me, believe the works. What do you think about it? I said, “I forgive you”, and at the same time I say, “Rise, pick up your bed and go home.” If you doubt the forgiveness, then trust the healing miracle.
 
Now, if you struggle to believe in the healing of this paralytic man, then believe in an even greater miracle again. Jesus himself was dead and lying in a grave, and he arose, took up his mat (as it were) and went home. He ascended to his Father in heaven, so that he could be with his church in all times and places and breathe out upon us his Holy Spirit. How’s that for an even better: “Rise, pick up your bed and go home!” Jesus didn’t just rise and pick up his deathbed, he rose and destroyed the deathbed forever for all those who believe in him.
 
We read: When the crowds saw it, they were afraid, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to men.
 
It says here that they glorified God who had given such authority to men. But of course, he didn’t give this authority to just anyone. He gave it to this particular man, Jesus Christ. The Father sent him for this particular purpose to purchase and win the forgiveness of sins for the whole world with his own blood. But also, on the day of Easter, Jesus said to his apostles: As the Father sent me, so also I am sending you. Receive the Holy Spirit! If you forgive anyone their sins, they are forgiven. If you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld.
 
Just as the Father sends Jesus to forgive sins, so also Jesus sends his apostles and pastors out into the world to preach this same message, and also to apply forgiveness to people and or to withhold forgiveness. Jesus applies this forgiveness because he can read people’s hearts. In our reading, he forgives the paralytic, but withholds forgiveness from the scribes, because he knew their thoughts. But in the church, pastors speak and apply the forgiveness of sins, not on the basis of what people think or because pastors read hearts, but on the basis of what people say. That’s the reason why we confess our sins in the church before receiving absolution. Pastors can’t apply the forgiveness of sins to those who are unrepentant of their sin and cling to their sin. They can only apply it to them if they confess it. And this absolution in the church is not the pastor’s word, but it is the word of Jesus himself. We examine ourselves against the word of God, and then we receive the forgiveness of sins on the basis of the word of God. As Luther writes in the Small Catechism: Confession has two parts. First, that we confess our sins, and second, that we receive absolution, that is, forgiveness, from the pastor as from God Himself, not doubting, but firmly believing that by it our sins are forgiven before God in heaven.
 
What a tragedy it would be if when Jesus ascended into heaven he took the forgiveness of sins with him, so that you could never know if you were forgiven until you reached heaven! What do you think the church is here for, if not to preach and apply and speak that pure forgiveness of sins to you! What do you think pastors are here for? That’s why Jesus says: As the Father sent me, even so I am sending you. St Paul says: How will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent?

 So, to all of you who know your sin and so desperately want to be free of it, I say in the name of Jesus Christ: Take heart, God’s children, children of Jesus: your sins are forgiven. And long for that day when Jesus will call you out of your grave and say: Rise, pick up your bed and [come] home. Amen.

 
 
Lord Jesus, cheer our hearts with your words of forgiveness. Put away from us all unrepentance and unbelief and everything that would reject your grace and forgiveness, like that of the scribes. Comfort us with your absolution and strengthen us with your sacrament that our joy may be full. Amen.