Today's passage: Matthew 8:1-17
Helpful thoughts:
- We are officially past the “Sermon on the Mount” and today are moving into a series of healings that teach us more about King Jesus.
- The miracles were used to authenticate Jesus' teaching. The crowds were astonished that He taught with such authority…but then he did the miracles to back it up. He spoke with authority because He possessed all authority!
- The Jews were not allowed to touch a leprous person. It would make them “unclean” and expose them to the disease. But, when Jesus touches the unclean…they become clean!
- In response to the faith of the Roman centurion, Jesus declares that there are Gentiles who are in the Kingdom of God and Jews who are not. Jesus was not surprised by this fact of course…but His Jewish audience probably was!
- Matthew again points out Jesus' fulfillment of prophecy from the Old Testament. This time from Isaiah 53.
Questions to consider:
- If you were alive in the first century in the Middle East, and had to guess which three people an important Jewish religious leader would give his attention to…would it have been a leper, a Gentile and a woman?
- What did the Roman centurion have that made him say what he did to Jesus? By what do we gain entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven?
- Why does it make sense that healings would have been more commonplace during the ministry of Jesus and not normal now? What was the purpose of healing?
- When Jesus healed these people, how healed were they? How healed are we when we put our faith in Christ for the forgiveness of our sins?