In this chapter we want to explore what the Gospels are teaching us about illness and health. Being more precise: we want to ask the question of Christ’s position in this regard. What has been his attitude toward the sick he encountered with their various ailments? How does he handle this? The various Gospel writers have informed us about such matters, each from his own perspective.

It is noteworthy that when Jesus begins his public ministry from Nazareth it does not take long before he is confronted with various people who are ill. Jesus travels through the northern portion of Israel. There he calls his disciples who are fully involved with their work — they are fishermen — and then he travels through Galilee, all the while giving instruction in the synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom. And then Matthew, who informs us of all this, follows up at the end of the fourth chapter of his Gospel with Jesus’ activity: “healing every disease and every affliction among the people” (4:23).

With three key verbs the evangelist characterizes Jesus’ work: teaching, proclaiming and healing. The proclamation comes first. That is his essential work. This proclamation of the gospel presents Jesus as the Messiah. But besides this his work consisted also of healing. In this also Jesus manifested the dawn of the Messianic era of salvation. In these days the coming of the Messiah is generally connected to the healing of the sick. The satanic forces with its disillusionment of life must make way for the power of the Messiah. The salvation that would be inaugurated with the coming of the Messiah appears to be all-comprehensive: the totality of human life is restored by it.

Matthew speaks of “every disease and every affliction”. The healing work of Jesus did not concern every instance of sickness, but rather all types of diseases. There was no category which Jesus’ power was insufficient to meet.

The evangelist also mentions some of the categories: people oppressed by demons, those having seizures, and paralytics (see v. 24). We meet many of the first category. They were people who were no longer controlled by themselves, through their thinking power and willpower, but who were tormented by evil spirits. We have to think about people who are unwillingly used as a tool by the dark forces. They were there then, and they are still there in our time: the addicts, the materialists, people who are controlled by the prince of darkness, i.e., the devil, who is still fully active. With the second group, those experiencing seizures, we can think about people suffering from epilepsy. Paralytics were those who through symptoms of paralysis of their hands or legs had ended up outside of the labour pool and were relegated to the sidelines of life, completely dependent on others.

Jesus does not ignore these people. He does not go out of their way in big semi-circle, but he heals them: those who are possessed, who have seizures, the lame, the deaf, the blind and the lepers. Every time we meet these people with their ailments in their own environment.

Manner of Healing⤒🔗

The manner in which Jesus heals varies greatly. Sometimes it happens by making use of spittle and mud (Mark 8:23; John 9:6). Often it happens by touching the person who is standing in front of him. For instance, that is how it happens to a leper who approaches the Saviour and who kneels down before him. Jesus then touches the leper (in a manner of speaking, he attracts the impurity upon himself) and his will is sufficient to heal this man instantly from his leprosy (Mark 8:3).

It is remarkable that this healing is recorded right after Jesus has said, in the Sermon on the Mount, that he had not come to abolish the law and the prophets, but instead to fulfill them (Matt. 5:17). While the crowds who hear him are constantly asking themselves by what authority Jesus has such power, the leper proves to attach true faith to his words. When he has come to fulfill the law and the prophets, it is also possible for him to do what no priest of the old covenant could do: to cleanse a leper. The priest had the ability to determine whether a man or woman was clean again; this had to be reinforced with sacrifices and solemn rituals; however, they could do no more. But when Jesus heals this leper it shows that he has truly come to change the negative balance of the Old Testament into the gain of the kingdom of heaven (J. vanBruggen).

As with touching, a special healing takes place in the house of Peter in Capernaum. There Jesus meets Peter’s mother-in-law who lay ill with a serious fever. Matthew informs us briefly of what is happening (Matt. 8:14-15): Jesus touches her hand (there is no mention of a pronouncement) and this simple touch is enough. The fever departs and the woman is free to stand up and go. She has been healed in a remarkably fast fashion: the same moment she can take up all her functions in the house again. It states that she served Jesus. It results in subservience to the Master. With this miracle Jesus shows his care for the “home front” (J.P. Versteeg). In that house of Capernaum people likely brought sacrifices on account of Peter’s absence since having been called as a disciple. Jesus revealed his Messianic power in that particular house so that those sacrifices could be made.

This healing of Peter’s mother-in-law signals the beginning of a series of events in which demons are cast out. “That evening they brought to him (in the house) many who were oppressed by demons”, Matthew writes, “and he cast out the spirits with a word and healed all who were sick”. In these words of the evangelist we can see a picture of the totality of Jesus’ power over the demons. With a single command Jesus was their sovereign commander and drove them out. All who were badly affected by this demonic possession were healed. The therapy is sovereign; the result is without limits.

I want to stress the point that it states that Jesus drove out the spirits with his word. He needed no rituals or magic incantations. He did it with a single word, but it was at the same time a power-word of him as the Messiah. In this, Matthew sees the fulfillment of prophecy. He intended to make it clear to his first readers with their Jewish background that through these miracles of healing Jesus identified as the promised Messiah. The prophecy that is involved here and which Matthew points out is from Isaiah 53. It deals with the Servant of the Lord, he who “took our illnesses and bore our diseases”.

In the expression that “he took this upon himself” we find the idea both of “taking it over” as well as “taking it away”. “Taking it over” was often seen in the repeated mention of Jesus’ touching of people, and it would be fully revealed in his suffering and death. The “taking away” shows us how in Jesus the time of salvation has arrived, which will result in the ultimate future in which all tears will be wiped away from people’s eyes (Rev. 21:4).

Sickness and Sin←⤒🔗

A question that definitely requires our attention is the one about the relationship between sickness and sin. Is sickness a consequence of one’s own sins, and does an accident imply a certain transgression? When struck by an illness, do I need to conclude that I have failed utterly in my life, much worse than others?

In Jesus’ days many people thought along these lines. But the Saviour breaks through this thinking pattern. He does not deny that there can be a correlation between sickness and sin. His words to the lame man in Bethesda make that clear. After Jesus has healed him, he says, “Sin no more, that nothing worse may happen to you” (John 5:14). There you meet a possible connection between sin and sickness. But what we wish to point out especially in this regard is that Jesus repeatedly resists the acceptance of an automatic correlation between sin and sickness (see Luke 13:3, 5; John 9:3). However he does share the viewpoint that man’s physical and spiritual needs belong together.

The latter is illustrated in the healing of another lame person, once again in Capernaum. After a tour throughout Galilee Jesus once again returns to this town. Apparently he lived there and had his house in this place. It does not take long before people come from all directions to hear his instructions. And then we hear of these four men carrying their lame friend on a bed. You can imagine it happening: there they come, through the street, up the outside stairs, and next lowering their friend through the roof with ropes. When this man ends up in front of Jesus, having been let down from the roof, he hears Jesus say, “Son, your sins are forgiven” (Mark 2:5).

We may ask: was that truly the liberating word for which this paralytic was waiting? Would his friends have gone through all their efforts to hear this? In such a case, would you not have been terribly disappointed? But Jesus confronts the paralytic (and in him, all those present) with the most important matter for which he has come. This is the core problem: your sins. That is the root of all evil. Behind the physical need of this person Jesus detects the primeval fact of sin and guilt. That is why he addresses it first. The Saviour heals radically; he goes all the way to the root of the problem. As none other he knows that any other approach will only deal with treating the symptoms. Jesus knows he is dealing with a man who not only needs to be freed from this or that disease, but one who needs to be given true liberty. That explains the forgiveness of sins. His divine ability to forgive sins is powerfully underscored by Jesus in that he also factually heals the lame man.

Jesus rejects the widespread notion that sickness is an automatic consequence of committed sin, which clearly comes out also in the healing of a man who had been born blind. John goes into great detail here. We find the man begging, likely near one of the temple gates in Jerusalem (see Acts 3:8). His situation appears hopeless. It is then that the disciples raise the old theological issue: is sickness the punishment for sin? But in this case, who sinned? Was it the man himself, or possibly his parents?

Jesus rejects this problem definition. “It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him,” Jesus says in John 9:3. For and through this man it will become evident that Jesus is the Light of the world. That is why the Saviour takes action. He spits on the ground and anoints the blind man’s eyes with a mixture of mud and saliva. He then commands him to go and wash in the pool of Siloam.

This manner of healing is not through a magic act, yet Jesus transgresses a Sabbath command by his action: making mud was specifically named as one of the prohibitions. After the man has obeyed Jesus’s words and returns, he can see. Again a sign has been issued of Jesus’ saving glory. We can say: a sign that results in different reactions.

Isolation Breached←⤒🔗

I ask your special attention for the healing of the man in Bethesda. We can find this described also in John’s gospel. There is a pool which has intermittent healing power, surrounded by five colonnades. It is a place in Jerusalem where the lame, blind and paralyzed people are gathered. If nothing else could help anymore people would say: “send him off to Bethesda”. A beautiful name: house of mercy. However, the one was even more selfish than the other. Helpfulness was altogether lacking. This is where Jesus enters. And among all these unfortunate people he discovers the most unfortunate one: somewhere in a corner, on a paltry mattress, lies a man who has been ill for 38 years.

Just imagine for a moment what this means. Thirty-eight years an invalid: you would be inclined to give up all hope and courage, maybe no one pays attention. Being sick for 38 months: sporadically someone might come for a visit. But 38 years! Your parents have passed away, your friends have moved on, no one who calls you by your first name, no mortal being who cares for you. Have you ever seen pity that could last for 38 years?

And now Jesus goes straight to this one man. “Do you want to be healed?” “Sir, I have no one...” What a harrowing loneliness, do you not think? Greater isolation is hardly imaginable. But then the mighty word of Christ issues forth: “Get up, take up your bed, and walk” (John 5:8). And then it follows immediately: “Now that day was the Sabbath.” John understood. Through this healing Jesus wants to demonstrate how what he is doing here is a foretaste of the eternal Sabbath. Only then will our isolation, caused by sickness, be truly breached. This healing, and all the others that are related to us by the evangelists, is the sound of a clarion: this brokenness is going to end; a total renewal is about to come. The time of salvation is here, the fulfillment of the prophetic word, “And no inhabitant will say, ‘I am sick’; the people who dwell there will be forgiven their iniquity” (Isa. 33:24).

Signs Of the Kingdom←⤒🔗

It will be clear that Jesus is not concerned about the miracles as such. The healings have only temporary significance. The blind Bartimaeus — to name just one example — received his sight; yet when he died his eyes were closed again.

The people who were healed by Jesus could get sick again, and would eventually die. All that Jesus is doing here is subject to the proclamation of the gospel. After he has healed many in Capernaum and the crowds come thronging to see more, he withdraws to a lonely place. And when his disciples urge him to return, because everyone is looking for him, he replies, “Let us go on to the next towns, that I may preach there also, for that is why I came” (Mark 1:38). Jesus is clearly speaking about the goal of his Messianic mission. His first and foremost objective is not to heal as many people as possible and in this way to reveal the kingdom of God, but his actual task is the preaching. The healings are only secondary in nature, signs that the kingdom of heaven has come near. The time of the great turnabout has come. But these signs are understood only through faith.

Nowhere in the Gospels do we observe that the miracle of healing had an independent function, removed from the preaching of the gospel or rising above this (H. Ridderbos). It is also in that sense that we must understand that Jesus gives authority to his disciples to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers and cast out demons in his name (Matt. 10:8). They may show the signs of Christ’s absolute authority and power that he has received from the Father, and in this way they may proclaim and confirm faith in the coming of the kingdom in Jesus Christ. That is where it is headed, also for us: the entire renewal of heaven and earth. Then the promise will be fulfilled: “God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away” (Rev. 21:3, 4).