All of the apostles were in a boat crossing the Sea of Galilee when a storm hit. Even though some of these men were seasoned sailors, the tempest proved to be too much for them. Despite heroic efforts to stay afloat, the vessel sank and everyone died.
—or at least that’s what the apostles imagined.
It’s hard to blame them. Everything about the situation pointed to a dark ending. Desperate to stay afloat, they bailed water and wrestled with the sails, clinging to any thread of hope that they might still survive. Yet, despite being incredibly busy trying to stay alive, they did find time to wake up Jesus.
Clearly, He was blind to the situation. It wasn’t time to sleep. It was time to panic.
But as you well know, Jesus did the unexpected. Instead of trying to help maintain the integrity of the ship, He went to the source of their troubles. He shut down the storm. “He got up and rebuked the winds and the sea, and it became perfectly calm” (Matthew 8:6). Stunned (just like the storm), the apostles asked themselves, “What kind of a man is this?” (Matthew 8:7).
With their mortality still fresh in their minds, they reached the shore. Here they met another tempest, but this time in human form. A madman who had haunted the area for some time, came at them to help them contemplate mortality some more. But again, Jesus didn’t handle the trouble as expected. Instead of setting up an impromptu line of defense, He simply shut down the madness (Matthew 8:32). One thing about Jesus, when troubles came along, He didn’t deal with them the way anyone expected.
The apostles were certainly amazed at witnessing such authority and power. It seems likely they must have still been discussing the storm and the madman even when they got back to Capernaum. But they hadn’t seen anything yet. What Jesus did next was even more incredible.
By now, the news was out—Jesus could heal anyone of anything. And so people from every direction began to hobble their way to Him.
One guy couldn’t even do that. He was paralyzed. However, he had four friends who put together a pallet and they carried him to the house where Jesus was staying. When they arrived, there was a crowd blocking their way. Going through the front door wasn’t an option.
So these four men created another option. They took their friend up onto the roof and fashioned a temporary skylight. And soon, their friend was presented to Jesus, ready to be healed.
But as usual, Jesus did the unexpected. “Seeing their faith, Jesus said to the paralytic, ‘Take courage, son; your sins are forgiven’” (Matthew 9:2).
What? This wasn’t why they brought the paralytic to Jesus. Just the fact that the Bible calls him “the paralytic” pinpoints the essence of the problem. Even so, instead of handling the prevalent affliction, Jesus focused on another issue.
This not only seemed off-topic, His words were highly offensive to some of the exceptionally religious people in the crowd. They asked, “Who can forgive sins, but God alone?” (Luke 5:21). They didn’t think Jesus had the authority to say such a thing.
While they discussed this, the paralytic remained “the paralytic.” But then Jesus moved things forward by asking His own question. “Which is easier, to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Get up, and walk’?” (Matthew 8:5).
This is a great question. And the answer is implied. It would be easier to make this paralyzed man walk again than to take away his sin.
Jesus was taking the time to point out something significant. Everyone crammed into and around that house thought the paralytic only had one problem. But the truth was, there are two problems. In fact, one problem was so serious, that by comparison, the other problem didn’t really matter.
But graciously and effortlessly Jesus solved the lesser problem in order to draw attention to the bigger problem. “‘But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins’—then He said to the paralytic, ‘Get up, pick up your bed, and go home.’ And he got up and went home. But when the crowds saw this, they were awestruck, and glorified God, who had given such authority to men” (Matthew 9:6-8). Jesus solved the lesser problem to show He had the authority to solve the greater problem.
Forgiving this man’s sins was bigger than calming the storm, bigger than taming the madman, bigger than making “the paralytic” not “the paralytic.” Jesus didn’t come to earth to defy the weather system or to restore sanity or even to repair muscles and damaged nerves. He came here to remove sin. And that’s what he did for “the paralytic.”
The ex-paralytic probably walked home with a smile. He may have even skipped home. But hopefully, he also considered the fact that all his mistakes were stricken from the record. His body had been restored, but so had his innocence.
Something significant happened in that house with the new skylight. Almost everyone there was trying to solve the wrong problem. This is worth our attention because we do the same thing. When troubles come our way, we seek the wrong solution.
Just like that the guys who brought their friend who was paralyzed, our diagnosis is often shallow. We have a tendency to think of diseases of the body as a bigger concern than diseases of the soul.
Right after He healed the man who was paralyzed, Jesus met another man with a terrible affliction. This man wasn’t paralyzed. He wasn’t blind and he didn’t have leprosy. He had a horrible case of tax-collecting.
You might already know this—tax collectors were a notoriously crooked lot. They were essentially legalized thieves. Matthew was a walking stigma, but Jesus gave him a chance (Matthew 9:9). Just like Jesus did for the paralytic, He forgave Matthew of his sins.
Even so, people still saw Matthew as tainted. And there was Jesus walking right next to him as if Matthew was a human being. To top it off, Matthew apparently triggered something among his colleagues. More tax collectors showed up. And they did what normal people do. They sat down and had dinner. “Then it happened that as Jesus was reclining at the table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were dining with Jesus and His disciples.” (Matthew 9:10).
When you’re a tax collector like Matthew, no one hangs out with you except other tax collectors. So here they are—a bunch of sinners and there’s Jesus right in the middle, eating with them. Per usual the Pharisees arrive at the scene to criticize. “When the Pharisees saw this, they said to His disciples, ‘Why is your Teacher eating with the tax collectors and sinners?’” (Matthew 9:11).
Jesus told them, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick” (Matthew 9:12). At first this might sound like, “You guys are good, but these guys need a doctor.” But the Pharisees were just as ill as the paralytic and the tax collectors. The only difference was the Pharisees didn’t know they were sick.
If anyone comes to the Great Physician, the first and most important step is to know you’re sick. And it’s not just a slight case of the common cold. Sin is a ravaging disease that infects 100% of you. Isaiah describes the affliction in gruesome terms. “From the sole of the foot even to the head there is nothing sound in it, only bruises, welts and raw wounds, not pressed out or bandaged, nor softened with oil” (Isaiah 1:6). The gist of it is this: any of us who are infected with sin is so far gone, there’s no healthy part left.
Being sick is one thing. Being sick and not knowing it makes the sickness all the worse. And this is the problem for many of us. The problem is—we don’t understand the problem. When it comes to the condition of our lives, we are really bad at the diagnosis. And so we have a tendency to try and fix the wrong problem. It’s only when we realize how sick we are that the Great Physician can help us get well.
