Matthew 8.14-17

We are in the midst of a section of the book of Matthew that is showing what Jesus' ministry consists of. We have seen him heal a man with leprosy, heal a centurion's son, and now we see him heal a mother-in-law. I don't know which one is worse!!

Just kidding, I love my mother-in-law.

Anyhow, this is the first set of three miracles that Matthew presents in chapters 8-9, and he ends this first set of three with Jesus healing Simon's mother-in-law who was in bed with a fever. Let's read this passage:

¹⁴ When Jesus came into Peter’s house, he saw Peter’s mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever. ¹⁵ He touched her hand and the fever left her, and she got up and began to wait on him.
 ¹⁶ When evening came, many who were demon-possessed were brought to him, and he drove out the spirits with a word and healed all the sick. ¹⁷ This was to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet Isaiah:
   “He took up our infirmities
   and carried our diseases.”


I know that this is a short passage, but I think it has some huge implications. First of all, Jesus healed Simon's mother-in-law from a fever. Now this, to us, does not seem like that big of a deal, I mean I even had a fever last week, and I took some aspirin and got over it in twenty-four hours. Yet to the ancient world, this was a big deal. Luke even refers to it as a "great fever" in his account. So Jesus goes and just touchers her hand and she is healed. Now if that weren't enough, the entire town seems to come to Jesus late into the night, bringing to him the demon-possessed and sick, and he goes through one at a time, healing them and casting out demons. 


I imagine Jesus opening the door to all these voices outside, chattering among themselves, wandering if he was going to come out. And when he opens the door, a hush falls over the entire crowd. And they are just staring at him, then next thing you know, Jesus moves to the little crippled boy on crutches, and he touches his legs, and the boy tosses the crutches aside. Then Jesus saw the woman lying on a mat, paralyzed her entire life, and he touches her and she runs away for joy leaving the mat behind. Or the elderly man possessed by demons that cause him to cut himself, so that he has bandages all over his arms, Jesus moves over to him and says, "Be gone!!!" and the man tosses down the bandages that are no longer needed. 


And one by one, Jesus moves through the crowd, healing the sick and casting out the demons, and I imagine that after this went on late into the night, after he healed the last person, he turned around, and what was lying there still were the crutches and mats and bandages that are no longer needed because of Jesus. 


Then Matthew shows that this was what part of Jesus' ministry was supposed to be. He quotes Isa. 53, which says, 


⁴ Surely he took up our infirmities
   and carried our sorrows,
yet we considered him stricken by God,
   smitten by him, and afflicted.
⁵ But he was pierced for our transgressions,
   he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
   and by his wounds we are healed.
⁶ We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
   each of us has turned to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
   the iniquity of us all.


Jesus is the suffering the servant, the king who takes on our suffering for us, who gives of his life to pay the penalty of our sins so the we don't have, the master who stays up late into the night meeting the physical needs of people. This is where Jesus' ministry is lived out in our day to day lives. Sure sometimes we are called to the mountaintop experiences, asking whether we are going to die for our faith or not, but this may happen once in our lives or so, but the majority of our time on this earth is spent living out Jesus' ministry, day in and day out. It is the grind of the everyday ministry that we sometimes ignore. Yet this is what the majority of our life is supposed to be doing. 


We are supposed to leave trails of crutches and bandages and mats that are no longer needed because we have met the needs of people. We need to put divorce attorneys out of business, cause the homeless shelters to get bored and the orphanages to be empty. We are called to meet the needs of everyday people in our everyday lives, every day. 


So how is God calling you to do this today?