In that day the deaf shall hear the words of the book,
And the eyes of the blind shall see out of obscurity and out of
darkness.
The humble also shall increase their joy in the LORD,
And the poor among men shall rejoice
In the Holy One of Israel.
Let the LORD heal you
Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician,
but those who are sick.” Jesus is the Master Physician. But who will
go and see Him? I've heard people claim to be so healthy that they
rarely see a doctor. That may be true for some, but I have a hunch that
some people just don't want to see a doctor. Seeing a doctor is
admitting that something is wrong. That can be hard to take.
Though Jesus is the Master Physician, who can heal any disease, He only
heals those who know they need it. Imagine a blind or crippled man
coming to Jesus and saying, “Hey, I just want to borrow a dime.”
Jesus can give so much more than a dime. He wants to. How sad that
anyone should miss out on His greater gifts because they won't admit
that they need them!
But it's hard to admit that we need help. I should know. I almost
always prefer to do things myself, because I really don't like asking
for help. But with Jesus, the stakes are too high. We all need
spiritual healing, and Jesus alone can do it. So let the LORD heal you.
For we all need it
What disease are we talking about here? It's described in various ways
in the Bible. The miracle in the Gospel lesson is a living parable of
that disease and its treatment. Do you remember that miracle? There's
a picture on the bulletin. Jesus healed a deaf man. But the man's
deafness also shows us something about ourselves.
We are all spiritually deaf in ourselves. At one point, Jesus said,
“My sheep hear my voice.” Well, we're not His sheep by
nature, and we don't hear His voice. Without a miracle, we can't hear
Him or believe His Words. We can't know the truth that He tells us.
When you hear me say this, you can hear it in two ways. Intellectually,
it's merely true or false, like a fact in an encyclopedia. But when
you're sensitive to some fact, you don't want it to hurt you. You want
to keep it in your head, and not let it sting your heart. So we
insulate our hearts from the harsh facts that Jesus wants us to face.
But we have to face them. We must let the Holy Spirit do His work. We
have to realize our disease.
So let me say it again. You are deaf to God's Word by nature. You
don't hear it, and you don't want to. We were all born that way, and
even though we may be Christians, we sometimes still ignore God's Word.
How long has it been since you read a book or chapter of the Bible?
Even if you don't read much otherwise, you ought to read the Bible. But
we don't, and when we do, we do it so quickly, and without proper
reverence for what we read.
We are deaf to God's Law, which accuses us. We keep that insulation
around our hearts to avoid being stung. God's Word says, “Now
the works of the flesh are evident, which are: adultery, fornication,
uncleanness, lewdness.” Are your cheeks burning yet? If you
realized who can see into your heart, they would be. But his list
continues, “idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies,
outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies.” God
runs a tight ship. Maybe you are not a sorcerer, but you have
been jealous and selfish. God puts them on the same level. Even
heresies, or unbiblical doctrines are just as evil as idolatry or
hatred. But his list continues, “envy, murders, drunkenness,
revelries, and the like.” This list of evils is like a roll call,
and we are all present and accounted for. So why are we not hanging our
heads in shame? Because of that layer of insulation. We don't want to
be stung, so we prefer to be a little deaf to God's Law. But God said,
“those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of
God.”
You don't want to hear me tell you that you are evil by nature, because
I'm no better than you, after all. But I'm not asking you to listen to
me. The clerical collar I wear, and this robe and stole have one
purpose: to remind us that our God is speaking to you now, not me. I
am only His instrument. His Word is meant for you. He wants to help
you, but by His own rules, He will not do it, if you will not admit your
disease.
The other reason it's hard for us to confess our sins without holding
back is because we don't see them. Not only are we deaf to God's Word,
but we are also spiritually blind. We don't see things the way they
truly are. Now, this is also part of God's plan. Jesus appeared to be
a normal man. “He has no form or comeliness; And when we see
Him, There is no beauty that we should desire Him.” God works this
way on purpose, to leave room for faith.
But without faith, we have very little to go on. Have you ever been
blind? Maybe not literally, but perhaps you have wandered through a
strange room in the dark, feeling your way with hands and feet. That's
exactly what our natural spiritual condition is like! We misjudge the
obstacles in our path. We misidentify the things we feel. We are
surprised at the top and the bottom of a staircase. It's possible to
live your whole life in spiritual blindness, never really knowing the
true nature of things. There are even teachers in the church who live
in that blindness, and teach it to others. Jesus said this about the
Pharisees in his day: “They are blind leaders of the blind. And
if the blind leads the blind, both will fall into a ditch.”
Now, the Pharisees were offended that Jesus had shown them their disease
of sin. Will we also be offended? Will we deny it? I wouldn't be
surprised, because it's in the nature of our disease. But the Holy
Spirit works through His Word, and He's working in us right now. He is
making us poor so that we may become rich. We need the healing that
only our LORD God can provide. So confess it as true, and let Jesus
heal you.
For He alone can do it
We all need it. He alone can do it. That's the promise of today's
sermon text. It says, “In that day the deaf shall hear the
words of the book, And the eyes of the blind shall see out of obscurity
and out of darkness.” That's good news. We are the deaf, but we
“shall hear the words of the book.” We are the blind, but
our eyes “shall see out of obscurity and out of darkness.”
If you believe that Jesus is your Savior, then you know what I mean.
Already, we have begun to hear and see better.
While in unbelief, the Law of God was hatefully bitter to us, but now
it's not so bitter. The sting is gone, because Jesus took it all upon
Himself. When we die, we will merely be translated to paradise. Death
is not the same, and life is not the same.
When Jesus died for us, He did everything needed to redeem us from our
sins. That work is done, and we are fully justified before God through
faith in His Word. That's now our status, and Jesus has done it.
Yet though we are saints before God, we still have our sinful flesh to
contend with. It's like a stain in our bodies and souls, which will not
come out. God no longer sees this stain in Christians, because by faith
we wear the white robes that Jesus prepared for us. But under the
robes, we still have to deal with our sinful flesh every day. It still
influences our hearing of God's Word. It still dims our spiritual
vision. It still afflicts us, together with the devil and the
wickedness of the world around us. We will only be rid of this stain
when we have left this world behind.
I know well what it's like to live with this sinful flesh. Any
Christian knows, because we still do the works of the flesh. Remember
the list I read? “Adultery, uncleanness, idolatry, jealousy,
selfish ambitions,” and all the rest? Even as Christians, we do them.
These are the works of the flesh, and the flesh we still have. That's
why we still need the master Healer every day, and every week.
If you are tired of hearing the Gospel, or if you are avoiding the prick
of the Law, then you need it all the more. If you've been brought low,
and hardly dare to hope in God's mercy, or if you've been discouraged in
your battles against the flesh, then take heart. Jesus can and will
help. The second part of our text says, “The humble also shall
increase their joy in the LORD, And the poor among men shall rejoice In
the Holy One of Israel.”
Today, the Holy Spirit again heals your eyes and opens your ears. So
see God's love! Hear His Word! Let the LORD heal you. He has again
taken all your sins away, and gives you a fresh garment of pure
righteousness. He lifts you up and calls you His child. Hear his
voice. See His mercy. Know that you are redeemed; know it by the very
body and blood of our Lord Christ, the medicine from heaven that gives
eternal life. Amen.