Intro

Welcome!

[[[ BABYLON BEE ]]]

Passage — Mark 1:40–45

40 Now a leper came to him and fell to his knees, asking for help. “If you are willing, you can make me clean,” he said. 41 Moved with indignation, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I am willing. Be clean!” 42 The leprosy left him at once, and he was clean. 43 Immediately Jesus sent the man away with a very strong warning. 44 He told him, “See that you do not say anything to anyone, but go, show yourself to a priest, and bring the offering that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.” 45 But as the man went out he began to announce it publicly and spread the story widely, so that Jesus was no longer able to enter any town openly but stayed outside in remote places. Still they kept coming to him from everywhere.

Prayer

Study

Verse 40

Now a leper came to him and fell to his knees, asking for help. “If you are willing, you can make me clean,” he said.

“Now” is another “and then”. Like I’ve said before: Mark’s Gospel is like a snowball rolling downhill. It just keeps gaining mass and momentum until we reach the zenith of the story. “And then”, “and then”, “and then”…

And now we have another “and then”. So coming off the heels of what Gert shared last week. IN verses 35–39 we see that Jesus goes to pray alone and the disciples – led by Peter, of course – because Mark is the disciple of Peter and is recording these events from Peter’s perspective… anyway, the disciples come find Jesus and say “everyone is looking for you”.

Jesus’ response?

He leaves! “Let’s go somewhere else”, He says!. Why? Why did Jesus give these people who have come to see him the cold shoulder? He goes off to continue preaching throughout Galilee. But let’s drop that in our pocket for now, because we will be coming back to it later on.

So anyway, Jesus slips away from the crowd and preaches throughout Galilee and then this leper comes to him. Now, I should quickly mention that the word leper as used in the Bible does not necessarily refer to the same disease we refer to as leprosy today. Modern leprosy is included in this ancient definition, but so are many other skin ailments. So, this man is afflicted with some kind of skin disease and he comes and falls to his knees before Jesus.

“If you are willing, you can make me clean”.

There are two key words in this sentence.

The first one we’ll be looking at is actually the last word in the sentence; “clean”. This man would have been UNclean under Jewish law. Let’s take a look at Leviticus 13:45–46.

45 “As for the diseased person who has the infection, his clothes must be torn, the hair of his head must be unbound, he must cover his moustache, and he must call out ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ 46 The whole time he has the infection he will be continually unclean. He must live in isolation, and his place of residence must be outside the camp.

So you can see this man was socially ostracized. An outcast with no genuine hope of being part of the community as long as his disease endured. In fact, curing the leper was thought to be as difficult as raising someone from the dead!

…

But what’s interesting to me is that this man never asks Jesus to heal him. Rather, he asks Jesus to make him clean. The clean-ness was the issue. The clean-ness was what kept him out of the community. The clean-ness was what kept him away from that live-giving experience. 

Not his disease.

So this man, ostracized from his community, comes before Jesus. This miracle-worker. This caster-out of demons. And says, “If you are willing, you can make me clean”.

Which brings us to our second key word.

“IF”. That’s right, if. So the natural follow-up is, “what does this contentious if mean?”

Good question. But let’s hit pause on that one for a second and come back to it in just a minute, because it is actually important to the next part of our study this morning. With that in mind, let’s keep reading…

Verses 41–42

Moved with indignation, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I am willing. Be clean!” The leprosy left him at once, and he was clean.

When we started this series I highlighted a few of the reasons why I chose the book of Mark for our first all-staff series. I love the momentous writing style. I love the relative brevity compared to the other Gospel accounts. I love that it was first. But something I did not highlight before is that Mark presents MOST the events of the Gospel is the rawest possible form. It’s not nicely ordered, it’s not nicely worded, and it’s not trying to meticulously craft an overall picture. It’s just laying out the story in Peter’s typical just-blurt-it-out-and-hope-it-gets-sorted-later style. Mark just wants to get these accounts recorded to make sure there is a written record of these events.

In fact the Gospel of Mark is go good at leaping from story to story to story without even taking a breath that I almost didn’t call this series “Follow Me: The Gospel of Mark”. I almost titled it…

[[[ the Gospel According to Mark: Episodes From the Life of Jesus ]]]

Now, I’m not sure how many of you saw this, but I posted on the Surrey Christian Life Assembly Facebook page this week asking, “What motivates Jesus in your Bible’s translation of Mark 1:41?”

Let’s take a look at some of these… the NLT says “compassion”, the ESV says “pity”, the King James says “compassion”, so does the NKJV, and the NASB. But the NIV and the NET say “indignation”.

Well… that’s quite a gulf between those words, isn’t it?

But the real question is… which word is the correct word? It is compassion? Is it pity? Or is it indignation?

But Conrad, you approachably, yet professionally dressed buffoon, I hear you cry, “just see what it says in the original language!”

Ahhh, but therein lies the problem. Let me give you a coarse and simplistic overview of how scholars translate the Bibles we read.

[[[ AUSTIN POWERS – NERD ALERT ]]]

See, the fact of the matter is that we simply do not have the original letters penned by Mark, Matthew, Luke, John, or Paul. It may surprise you to know that our earliest complete copy of the New Testament is called the Codex Sinaiticus which dates to around 350 AD. We have complete copies of Philippians, Colossians, and Ephesians from PAPYRUS 46 dating to between 200–225 AD. The rest is made of up multiple thousands of overlapping fragments that scholars study and compare to reconstruct the original text.

Just as a brief side note for those suddenly facing a crisis of faith because we cannot go see the original Gospel of John or Paul’s original letter to Rome. We have ye olde translations of the Bible like the King James and it matches extremely well with the Codex Sinaiticus and the new… old?… early! And the EARLY fragments that we find also pair up extremely well. We have yet to find any fragments that tell us Jesus is still dead, or that sin was all made up. And with such an incredible wealth of material to draw from we have a level of certainty about the content of the Biblical books that other ancient writings can only dream of!

So then, with that pre-amble out of the way… what word does the original language use?Compassion or indignation?

Well, the vast majority – I mean, almost ALL – New Testament manuscripts contain the word “compassion”. But the earliest (and what scholars consider to be the best) manuscripts contain the word “indignation”. The words are somewhat similar in the Greek, but not enough that it would be confusing to who could read and write Greek. Perhaps a similar analogy could be made in English for words like “Caught”, “Sought”, and “Bought”. These words are similar, but hardly confusing for those who understand the language.

With that in mind, it seems much more likely that overzealous scribes – equally as unsure about Jesus’ motives as you may be this morning – decided to soften indignation to compassion, rather than the other way around.

[[[ SIMPSONS S10E05 HOMER TO THE MAX – THAT’S THE END OF THAT CHAPTER ]]]

So with it now established that the word is indeed “indignation”…

Firstly; what does indignation mean? Anger or annoyance provoked by what is perceived as unfair treatment.

Secondly, with that in mind, what do we make of this passage? Let’s read it again.

Moved with indignation, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, “I am willing. Be clean!” The leprosy left him at once, and he was clean.

Why is Jesus indignant when this man asks to be made clean? There are 3 theories which I will put to you. I will explain why I favour the one I do, and why I am unconvinced by the ones I don’t. But feel free to adopt whichever theory you think best suits the Biblical context.

Theory #1 – The Sin Theory

Our first proposed approach to Jesus’ indignation is to make the subject of that indignation not the man himself, but rather the sin that has so corrupted his creation. Remember Jesus is being absolutely sieged by throngs of people who are sick and want healing, people who are demon-possessed and need rescue. The ravages of sin is taking its toll on his creation. The basic idea behind this theory is – I think – illustrated in this classic scene from The Godfather.

[[[ GODFATHER – LOOK HOW THEY MASSACRED MY BOY ]]]

Now a lot of preachers like this theory because it seems to be “nice”. Jesus is mad at sin for keeping us down and holding us back. It’s all that sin’s fault!

Why, officer, I was just an innocent bystander! It was the sin that done it!

You see the problem I have with this theory. It “seems” nice if you don’t think too deeply about it. But what is sin, if not OUR selfish choices coming home to roost? But there is a very serious problem with this theory because I believe it absolves us of responsibility for our actions. If I am not responsible for my sin who is? And if Jesus is angry at what sin has done to his creation, He is ultimately angry at our decision to reject Him in pursuit of our own goals.

So what do I think of this theory?

[[[ REN & STIMPY (Stimpy’s Big Day S01E01) – NO SIR, I DON’T LIKE IT #1 ]]]

Theory #2 – The Doubt Theory

This is a popular theory. It basically comes down to the idea that this man, this leper lacks faith in Jesus’ willingness to heal. Not Jesus’ ability, just his willingness. The idea behind this is that Jesus sees this as some of an affront to his demonstrated goodness, or possibly that this fellow thinks Jesus wants some people to be sick.

In fact, I remember going to a church where the pastor talked about praying for healing and watching someone pray for healing if it be God’s will. And the pastor – indignant – loudly proclaimed, “IF!? IF!? How are you going to pray for the healing of God when you don’t even know IF he wants to heal! Of course he wants to heal!

I think this theory might be summed up with this classic piece of pop culture.

[[[ More Cowbell (SNL, April 8, 2000) – Never Question Bruce Dickenson! ]]]

Truth be told, I have a couple of problems with this theory. Firstly; we can see (even today) that God – though capable of healing anyone and everyone – chooses only to heal some. I remember years ago in this very church we had a man named Casey who played guitar. And his wife, Lucy, became very sick. And we prayed and we prayed and we prayed. I distinctly remember that time. We even had people prophecy that Lucy would be healed.

Lucy died.

Now, I want to be clear, that Jesus does desire to make us whole, and to heal and restore us completely. But our perspective is skewed toward this temporal meat suit we’re wearing, so we neglect to take into account the restoration of our bodies at the end of this life when we are welcomed into his presence in the new heaven and earth. Because you know what?

I still believe Lucy will be healed.

Amen?

Because when Jesus comes to collect us – like we read in 1 Thessalonians 4:16–17 – we will be fully restored, totally renewed, completely incorruptible.

The second problem I have with this theory is the whole idea that this man doubted Jesus at all. This is where we un-pause that contentious IF from earlier. So I guess the idea is that Jesus is supposed to be all like

“I say! Don’t you know how magnanimous I am!?”

This theory, to me at least, sort of feels like this fellow is trying to manipulate Jesus, and it works… like Jesus doesn’t realize he’s being manipulated? Reminds me of this…

[[[ Aladdin – Aladdin Tricks Genie ]]]

But we need to remember that this man was essentially socially isolated. And over the last two years we’ve seen what social distancing can do to our mental health. Who remembers Christmas 2021? Not being able to see our families? I know personally that the last two years have been terrible for me. That was this guy’s life. But he was alone. He could not even commiserate about his isolation, because he was alone in experiencing it.

I think this man, came humbly to Jesus. The healer, the caster-out of demons, the worker of miracles and with no preconceptions, threw himself down at the mercy of this healer, likely his last hope.

So overall, what’s my take on this theory?

[[[ REN & STIMPY (Fire Dogs S01E04) – NO SIR, I DON’T LIKE IT #2 ]]]

Theory #3 – The Distraction Theory

Which leads us to our third theory. Our third attempt to make sense of the indignation of Jesus. And this theory also revolves around our meat-suit obsession. And it is essentially this: the healings – while a good thing – were becoming a distraction from what Jesus had actually come to do.

You might think of it this way:

[[[ OFFICE – CHAIR MODEL ]]]

But! In order to properly understand this theory we need to take a little look at the before-and-after. So let’s pop this theory into a thought bubble over here, we don’t want to put it away, but we also don’t need it front-and-centre right now. Alrighty, now, let’s take a look at the before, before the after. Previously… in Mark…

• Jesus returns from the wilderness and goes to Galilee to preach. (1:14)
• Jesus calls some disciples then goes to the Synagogue to preach. (1:21)
• A demon bursts into the Synagogue and Jesus casts the demon out and shuts its mouth. (1:25)
• Jesus quietly heals Peter’s mother-in-law off in a side room (1:31)
• The whole town shows up at the door looking for healing (1:33) and continues even into the morning (1:37)
• So Jesus did what? Let’s pull that thought back out of our pocket from earlier. Jesus, seeing the horde who’ve come to see him, takes off in the other direction to what? Let’s take a look at verse 38:

So that I can preach… for that is what I came out here to do.

And while he is out preaching, this leper comes to him and Jesus… indignant, angry, frustrated, annoyed… reaches out and touches the man, healing him completely. Side note: Not only is Jesus NOT defiled by this unclean man, the man is actually UN-defiled by Jesus’ clean-ness! Amen.

Anyway, let’s continue our brief survey of the before & after of this event by taking a look at the after. Picking up in verses 43 and 44.

Verses 43–44

Immediately Jesus sent the man away with a very strong warning. He told him, “See that you do not say anything to anyone, but go, show yourself to a priest, and bring the offering that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.”

So this man comes to Jesus. Heal me. Jesus – annoyed – heals the man then issues a “strong warning”. It actually reads “harsh warning” in the original Greek. Jesus’ – strong –preference is that this guy say nothing.

You may remember that last time I said at the end of my message that I would better explain the Messianic Secret. Mike briefly talked about it last time he shared with us. And he presented the idea that Jesus was concerned that the people were going to try to make him a military leader rather than let him fulfill his own mission.

And I think Mike was absolutely correct… but not totally correct. By that I mean that Jesus’ concern about being forced into the headship of some sort of a rogue nation-state within the Roman Empire certainly well-founded, but it did not account for the TOTALITY of his concern.

See, Jesus has a very specific goal in mind. And a very specific methodology he wanted to employ in pursuit of that goal. But people had their own ideas about what a Messiah should be. The problem is everyone had their heart set on their own desires. As is so often the case with us. We are often not looking to God to provide us with what we need, we expect God to ask us what we want so he can provide that. Because the sad truth is we frequently put our meat-suit at the centre of our lives instead of Jesus!

• The world’s a mess! I want a military leader-messiah!
• The country’s a mess! I want a political leader-messiah!
• My back’s a mess! I want a healer-messiah!
• I have no snacks! I demand the messiah bring pretzels!

Let’s finish reading our passage for today to examine what happens next.

Verse 45

But as the man went out he began to announce it publicly and spread the story widely, so that Jesus was no longer able to enter any town openly but stayed outside in remote places. Still they kept coming to him from everywhere.

Why is Jesus here? What is his aim right now? What did we read in verse 38?

To preach! He is trying to share the good news, but instead he’s found something to distract him from ever sharing the good news. The people start coming and…

[[[ SMASH MOUTH – AND THEY DON’T STOP COMING ]]]

And instead of Jesus getting to preach the Gospel, he has all these people, obsessed with their meat-suits mobbing him for what they want rather than ask what he is offering.

And Jesus, being all-knowing, is fully aware of what this man will do. So is Jesus filled with compassion (as so many Bibles, scholars, and pastors would have us believe)? Yes! But he is also angry, annoyed, frustrated, and indignant because he knows that this man marks the end of his preaching ministry in the bustling city centres.

And that… is the Distraction Theory… out of the thought bubble and back into the forefront… and what do I think of it?

[[[ REN & STIMPY – YES SIR, I LIKE IT ]]]

Conclusion

So what then do we make of this?

So often today we hear skeptics tell us that if God was real He should stage such-and-such a sign, or perform a certain miracle, or product a specific wonder. But the fact of the matter is that signs and wonders and miracles are an evidence for the power of God, but they are not the Gospel.

Works are a part of God, but they’re not the heart of God.

People who claim that if there was just enough evidence, they would believe are lying. Either to us or to themselves. The evidence is there if you want to see it. And it will never be there if you don’t want to see it. And it was no different in Jesus’ day. Look no further than Matthew 23:37–39:

37 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those who are sent to you! How often I have longed to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you would have none of it! 38 Look, your house is left to you desolate! 39 For I tell you, you will not see me from now until you say, ‘Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord!’”

But the people of that day did not want a servant king. They wanted this:

[[[ RAPTOR REAGAN ]]]

And we see, even in the cleansing of this leper, that Jesus has come to do away with the Old Testament BY FULFILLING IT! But not as Ronald Reagan with a Raptor, and RPG, and automatic weapons. Jesus is fulfilling the Old Testament, but he is doing so in a subversive way.

We love works. I mean we LLLOOOOVVVEEEE works. Because we can see them and touch them and point to them. Because they are easy. Because they are concrete. Because they meet the felt needs of our meat suits.

Jesus loves the Gospel. Jesus puts the Word first. Jesus puts a primacy on preaching.

Because preaching the Gospel always leads to Jesus. But signs, wonders, and miracles are only evidence if you want them to be. 

Because preaching the Gospel leads to our salvation, while works may simply be signposts on the road to nowhere.

Let’s pray.