Dear Parishioners, 

Let us today reflect on Faith, Healing and Salvation. When Jesus healed a person, he also saved the person by delivering him/her from sin. Before His birth, the purpose of Jesus regarding man’s sin was stated by the angel who told Joseph, “...you shall call His name Jesus, for it is He who will save His people from their sins,” (Matthew 1:21). Healing was not just physical healing but allowed the person to see who Jesus was. In doing this, Jesus was fulfilling the words of Jeremiah: “Heal me, O Lord, and I shall be healed. Save me, and I shall be saved,” (Jer. 17:14). The man born blind worships Jesus after his sight is restored and he truly “sees” that Jesus is the Messiah (John 9:38). The woman with the issue of blood touched Jesus’ garment and was healed and was told by Jesus that her faith had made her well (Matthew 9: 20-22, Mark 5:31-34, Luke 8:43-48). Faith in what? Was it Faith that she could be healed? Was it Faith that Jesus could heal? It was more, for it was faith that Jesus could heal because He was the Messiah and the woman was healed, both physically and spiritually.

In this passage about the woman with the issue of blood, the word translated as “well,” when Jesus tells her that her faith has made her well, is a word also meaning “saved.” This word is different from the word translated as “healed” in the same passage. It is the same word, in fact, as the one used by the angel speaking to Joseph about Jesus saving His people from sins. Since Jesus told the woman to “go in peace,” we can assume that she was able to do so because her faith had brought not only physical healing, but salvation, and thus peace. That is, she was given deliverance from the penalty for sins and was granted eternal life, thus made able to know the true peace of salvation.

Faith is always shown by Jesus to be faith in Him because the healing was a sign of who He was, apart from any belief in healing. Jesus was constantly reprimanding the disciples for having “little faith,” even after they had seen His miracles. Jesus stood silent before Herod who had heard about Jesus and “was hoping to see some sign performed by Him” but had no interest or faith in who Jesus was (Luke 9:9 and 23:8-9). And Jesus praised those who had faith, such as the Roman centurion who asked Jesus to heal his servant (Matthew 8:5-13).

But faith is not necessarily a prerequisite for healing, for it is not one’s faith that brings the healing, but rather faith itself is the Healer. The blind man healed by Jesus went through progressive stages of recognizing who Jesus was after he had been healed, not before (John 9). When first asked by the Pharisees to tell them who had healed him, the blind man simply says he was healed by a man called Jesus (verse 11); later, he says Jesus is a prophet (verse 17). Upon further questioning by the indignant Pharisees, the blind man states that Jesus must be from God, otherwise Jesus could not have healed someone born blind (verses 32, 33). This statement angers the Pharisees, who cast the blind man out of the synagogue (verse 34). This was a drastic action, cutting off a Jewish believer from the teachings, benefits, and protection of the synagogue. Earlier, the blind man’s parents had been afraid to testify their son had been healed, because they knew that if anyone said that Jesus was the Messiah, they could be put out of the synagogue (verse 22). (to be continued). Happy Sunday to all!