LEPER HUGGING

To recap a little, so far in our study of Mark, we see how Yeshua was first introduced to those reading this Gospel. Paul’s letters had been circulating among the various congregations for some time, as they preceded the writing of the Gospels, and actually provide the first glimpses into the believer communities. Mark’s Gospel is the first written account, though, of Yeshua’s ministry.  Imagine if this was all new to you and you hear about this Man for the first time this way.  He’s not like anyone else you’ve ever heard about or known. He does things no one ever has.  Who exactly is He?

One of the first things He does is stir up a demon who has evidently been resident in a man with this unclean spirit all along but no one knew it. Though I do wonder if that didn’t explain some of this man’s personality quirks. Not only does this demon speak through this man probably for the first time, but the demon knows who Yeshua is – He’s “the holy One of God!” (1:24).  What in the world does that mean to those people witnessing this in the synagogue that day?  Holy One of God? This is a first, for sure.  

Have you ever been somewhere when a demon manifests its presence and starts talking? It’s pretty creepy. But Yeshua calmly takes charge, though nothing like this has ever happened to those folks in the synagogue that day. Having once been an angel before the demon joined Lucifer’s rebellion, he (it) would certainly know Yeshua by His Spirit. (Much to think about there.) As we know, Yeshua tells him (it) to be quiet and leave the man.  No priests or Pharisees were able to do that!    Then He heals Peter’s mother-in-law, so they learn that He also has healing power over sicknesses.  This results in many others in the village showing up at Peter’s front door who were healed as well. 

If that isn’t enough, Yeshua is then encountered by….. a dreaded leper!  This horrendous disease meant excruciating social isolation besides the pain of disfigurement for a victim of the disease. Somehow the news of Yeshua has come to this man of all that He has done and he takes the risk to come to Him with the great hope that he too can be healed.  Can we even imagine what this man must have been through, from the first evidence of the disease and then undoubtedly having to leave his home, and his livelihood, with no one, even his loved ones, wanting to come near him. Was he a poor peasant? Or perhaps he was even a Pharisee. Whatever identity he once had was no longer his. Now he was only a leper.   

The man asks Yeshua, with much trepidation I would think, not really knowing how Yeshua would respond, “If You are willing….”   My bible says, “Yeshua reached out His hand as He touched him and said to him, “I am willing, be cleansed” (1:40-41). Can you just picture the inhaled gasp of those around them when Yeshua reaches out and touches the man, as they all back up together as if it was choreographed?  

Whenever I read that story, I always hear Yeshua kind of choke up a little as He says that He is willing. This poor man would have been relegated to being an “unclean” person by everyone he knows, and certainly by the priests and religious folk.  Was he once maybe even one of them? We don’t know. He certainly couldn’t go near anything having to do with the Temple. 

But this Son of God who is devoid of “religion” in all the ways in which He reveals the true Heart of God, reaches out to the man in what in Hebrew is called Rachamim.  It’s my favorite Hebrew word. Pronounced as rakh-a-meem, it means compassion. 

Despite the fact that at least one of my English translation bibles uses the word pity right there, rachamim  is not pity but compassion.  The difference is that pity looks down on a person with a kind of sad “tsk-tsk, that’s really a shame for them” perspective, while compassion gets down in the mud with the person to help lift them out of it.  Compassion gets in there, wherever there is, to lend a hand, to be there for them, to help. Whoever he was, he was a man whom Yeshua regarded as a man like anyone else in great need, and responded to him with God-like compassion.  Isn't that what Yeshua did for us all ultimately - He got down in the muddy soil of the earth in every sense to lift us out of all that has kept us victimized by the “fall” of mankind into sin and unbelief. 
 
Yeshua wasn’t just feeling sorry for the man, He didn’t have to touch him; He healed others without touching them.  But the touch was part of the healing.  I wonder how long it had been since this man had felt any human touch.  Reaching out and putting His hand on the man was a way of saying “I accept you as the person you are.  I don’t see you as a diseased man, I just see you as a man whom God considers worthy of His love.” A tender touch, as that must have been, means I care about you. Human touch goes a long way to bring comfort and encouragement to any of us.

Needless to say, the man was entirely, completely and immediately healed. Can you picture what it would have been like for that man to be given back his life.  Or to witness all that happening – nothing you would have ever expected. I'm guessing once whole again he gave Yeshua one very big hug and I can just hear Yeshua laughing in delight with him. After all, what would Yeshua have felt in all this? Joy, I would imagine. And a great sense of godly satisfaction to have been able to restore the man to wholeness. He may have been the one who was the most blessed. We’re rarely told of His responses to much of went on. You have to get those insights from the Holy Spirit when you give them some prayerful pondering.  

I wonder, could this now healed person have been the man whose house Yeshua later went to for the famous dinner when He was anointed by a woman who poured a jar of precious oil over His head (Mark 14:3)?  That dinner was held in the home of a man who was obviously healed but, unfortunately, was still identified as “Simon the leper.”  Was that him? If so, did Yeshua remain friends with this man after He healed him? This possible relationship causes me to wonder what other kinds of relationships Yeshua maintained in His travels and experiences. He and His men had to eat somewhere, or rest somewhere. How would you like to have had them drop by for a while when in the area where you lived?  Oh yeah! I often think He was a lot more human than we imagine Him to have been. 

In a sort of related way, this all brings to mind how useless religion can be when it is devoid of the godliness of compassion.  Keeping all those religious rituals which were added to what God gave Israel in the Torah, actually distanced those from God who were seeking God’s approval for their piousness. They entirely missed what God wants for and from His people. Sometimes a simple hug is being Lord-like and pleasing to God. 

Perhaps the Holy Spirit might make you aware of someone who just might need a touch, or a hug and to be told that God knows just what they’re going through and that He’s there with them. I met the sweetest lady in her 70’s in the Dollar Store last week. She was obviously trying to make a decision about what to buy and seemed perplexed. I started to chat with her and soon she told me about her adult son who ill who lives with her and she wasn’t sure what would be a good juice for him as he is now a diabetic. I showed her how to see how much sugar is in the jars of juices and I wound up praying with her about this son she was so concerned about. She was a believer and said she felt like God had sent His love and comfort to her right there in the Dollar Store. What a joy that little encounter was – for both of us. And yes, we did share a hug.

If you’ve done things like that for someone, then you know that the person isn’t the only one to be blessed. The Lord lets us know He’s pleased by sharing a moment of His joy with us. Yeshua who must have had a great many moments like that, just quiet-like inside, just between Him and His Abba.  

The End of Life ~ The Beginning of Glory

About two months ago, I had someone on my mind I hadn't seen for years. He was a boyfriend of many long years ago. The romance lasted for quite a while but in time I realized he was not someone I wanted to build a life with. On occasion, throughout the years, we would reconnect for a brief, "How are you" or a "What's happening in your life?" But he, being Jewish, was not the least bit interested or receptive in hearing about my Yeshua on any level. I suspect it was his lifestyle more than his Jewishness, but his attitude made it difficult to talk at all. We lived in two very different worlds. Still I continued to pray for him, asking God to rescue him and save him throughout the years. I had known he wasn't entirely well when we last connected several years ago. Nothing life threatening, but still....


Then here he was, on my mind again. I decided to send him a copy of my book, Heaven is Beyond Your Wildest Expectations, hoping he would at least be curious enough to read it and consider his own eternity. One of the last things I did the day before I left for Israel was see that the book was in the mail. Then I forgot about it and about him. Back home again six weeks later I sat at my dining room table and confronted the stack of mail that awaited me. I began sorting through the pile when there was the envelope I had sent to him. What? Didn't it get there? Did he refuse it? Then I saw the words someone had written above the address: "DECEASED".

I sat there and stared at those words. They seemed so final, so absolute. He was now dead, and he had never gotten the book. To my knowledge, he had never come to know the forever-hope there is in Yeshua. He never knew the freedom of forgiveness and the cleanliness of soul that comes from exchanging our pride for acknowledging our need for the Lord. And now, where was he? I was afraid I knew. How sad. How very sad. I'm sure he would have let me know if he had come to Yeshua. But he never did. I don't know why we pray and pray for someone and there seems to be no answer, at least to what we are asking for. Should I have prayed differently? Should I have prayed for him to realize the peril of his self-sufficiency or self-aggrandizement that he rejected any thought of needing God? Should I have asked God to bring him to a place of fear of his own pride and arrogance and to somehow be made aware of what it would be to stand before a holy God? I had simply prayed, "Lord, save him; rescue him; help him know he needs You." No long prayer, not a really empathetic prayer,just a sort of perfunctory concern for his eternal well-being. I am not taking on any kind of guilt here. I had committed him to the Lord long ago, and who knows but God, what his last moments on earth consisted of? I may yet find him greeting me at the gates in heaven. Hope springs eternal, as the saying goes. I must leave his destiny to God and move on.


In the here and now, though, I have another friend who possibly faces death -- wait, no! That word does not apply. Death is such a dark and sinister word, so wrapped in a shroud of emptiness and desolation. Tthe end of life here on earth is not at all death for those who are "in Messiah Yeshua" or "in Christ," as many would prefer to say. There is no death in Yeshua, only life. "To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord," Paul said, who himself had been to heaven and brought back a report, that there is no sting in death for those of us whose sins have been washed away by the blood of Yeshua. For that we are grateful beyond expression.


My friend may well be dying nonetheless, at least her body may be coming to an end. She has cancer and unless the Lord heals her miraculously, she may not have long to live, though if you looked at her today, you would not think that is the case. Her faith is high, she is trusting God to heal her. She has been given many "words of knowledge" or supposed "prophesies" of God's healing hand upon her life. But so far, though she has been doing well and has beaten the doctor's predictions of the expected duration of her life, the prognosis now isn't matching the "words" and the "prophesies." Were they truly "words" from the Lord, or were they uttered with wishful thinking or declarations of hope without having heard specifically from the Lord about her situation? Now she questions why God would have spoken those words to her if He wasn't going to heal her. I do wish that before we say, "Thus saith the Lord..," we be sure it is really what He is saying in that specific circumstance. Even believers do die. It is a reality in this life that our bodies do give out sooner or later. That may just be a reality that we all need to accept.


My dear friend Igal Hoffman, an Israeli, died of cancer a number of years ago after a bold attempt at alternative medical resources to keep him alive. But in the end he succumbed anyway. But through it all, Igal was yielded to God, that whatever proved to be His will, Igal would trust Him and love Him and rely on His goodness to get him through. He saw himself as a lamb in the arms of the Lord. I once asked Igal how he relates to God through all he was suffering, and suffer he did. I remember his words clearly. He said, "Underneath the pain and the confusion (of why God allowed this to happen), there exists a joy. I know He is with me and I know there is an even greater eternal joy to be had in His presence." Igal was entirely secure in the Lord that God's goodness was with Him and toward Him and that His goodness would be fully manifested to him either in this life or the one to come. He gave no place for the devil in his trust in God and in that he had the Lord's peace. The day after he died, having had my own experience of heaven I told God I wished I could see Igal when he entered heaven and experienced the joy he so anticipated. Suddenly I had an experience I cannot give you chapter and verse for, but I sensed Igal's presence with me, so real, and so there! I "felt" as if he was beside me, even to "feeling" his Israeli accent though I heard nothing. The more amazing thing was that I sensed he was more alive than I had ever known him or anyone to ever be. It was as if God allowed him to come to me to assure me of how real life after death is and that once we are free from these limited bodies in this fallen world, we are indeed fully and completely alive!!


Many years later, the day after my mother went to be with the Lord, I was awakened that morning hearing the Lord say to me, "She's been before Me." At that very moment I had a mini-vision of my mom, who seemed to be about age thirty or so. She was beautiful, the fullness of joy radiating on her face and once again, I sensed she was more alive than I had ever seen her. I kept thinking of God's words to me: "She's been before Me." My mom had been before Yeshua!! What made it even more precious to me was that I had led her to the Lord. I believe God allowed me those experiences to prepare me to write the book about heaven in order to assure people of eternal salvation and that whatever we experience here on earth, it is a momentary light affliction compared to the glory that God has prepared for us who are Yeshua's in life eternal.


I'm not facing cancer and an early death as my friend may be. What I do know is that being yielded, submitted and utterly trusting of the Lord in whatever situations we may find ourselves, can never be wrong. God is good and in Him there is nothing that is not good. There is no darkness, no abandonment, no hopelessness. There is only glory ultimately ahead for any who are His. My brief experiences of life in the eternal realm changed me, it changed my whole view of life here on earth and eternally, and gave me an assurance of the goodness of the Lord in all situations. He is, after all, Lord of all there is! I have felt the joy of heaven's atmosphere until I thought I would explode, the power of it is entirely overwhelming to these earthly bodies we presently live in. And I "felt" the joy, the overarching joy - the indescribable joy - of the oneness, the unity, the love between fellow believers and the safety which is the normal atmosphere of heaven.


Should we not be sharing this reality with others, to make real to them as we are able - and that they allow us to - that we must all come to realize that there is a choice in the here and now that will affect our forever. Would it not be good to ask the Holy Spirit to lead us in how to pray specifically for the people we care about. Romans 8:26 says that when we don't know how to pray the Spirit will lead us. And may we each come to the place, even today, of entire surrender to the Lord, confident of His goodness and His faithfulness to lead you where He will keep you in His love and goodness always. Amen.