Sheepfold Ministries 2007-09-09 Touching Lepers

TOUCHING LEPERS

SERMON STARTER

INTRODUCTION:

The hot dry sun radiated a blistering heat off the roughly-fitted cobblestone roadway. It was early afternoon, and the city's marketplace was a hive of activity. Merchants had their goods on display. They called softly to passersby exhorting them to purchase their goods. Mothers held tightly to excited children that pulled them from vender to vender. Friends were visiting with friends as they purchased the day's food.

The old man hobbled stiffly on the hot stones as he approached the city’s hub of market-activity. Sweat poured from his body from the exertion. His body, even in the heat was covered with old rags. A gray, soiled rag covered his nose and mouth. Suddenly someone noticed the approach of the old man, and heard his heart-wrenching, agonizing cry:

“Unclean!” “Unclean!”

A woman shrieked,

“It^’s a leper! Make way! Make way!” There was a scurrying of footsteps. The marketplace that had been so busy became deserted: empty. The leper stood alone. But then he looked across the marketplace and saw a single man who did not run from his steady advance.

HE SAW JESUS! THE LEPER SAW JESUS!

Standing there alone in the marketplace, he saw Jesus looking at him unafraid! He ran and fell at Jesus’ feet and worshipped Him. Keep in mind, he was a leper: a vile, untouchable, unclean, contemptible leper!

Hansen’s Disease

There are over 33,000 lepers in the United States today. In this country the disease seems to be on the rise. Did you know Leprosy is caused by a germ:

Myco-bacterium Leprae. Medically described in 1874 by a man named H. Hansen. It’s called today, Hansen’s disease!

WHEN we use the word, Leprosy, it conjures up exaggerated images of stubby fingers, ulcerated wounds, missing legs, distorted facial features. In the ancient world the word,

leprosy, conjured deep-seated emotional reactions in superstitious people!

HANSEN'S DISEASE, our modern name for leprosy is not at all like other diseases. The tiny bacteria that cause the dreaded disease invade the upper layers of skin. They attack the nerve endings, particularly the cells that register pain. Think of Hansen’s disease as an anesthetic, numbing the pain cells of the hands, feet, nose, ears and eyes. Hansen’s is in reality a painless disease. For thousands of years people thought Hansen’s disease caused flesh to rot and limbs to decay.

THAT’S NOT SO! Hansen’s disease is chiefly anesthetic. It destroys only indirectly.

How Leprosy Deforms

Dr. Paul Brand, a Christian Medical Doctor who ministers to lepers in India tells us how he discovered this early in his medical practice:

^“He tried to open the door of a little storeroom, but a rusty padlock would not yield.’’ A Hansen's patient—an undersized, malnourished ten-year-old——approached him smiling.

‘Let me try, sahib doctor,’ he offered and reached for the key. With a quick jerk of his hand he turned the key in the lock. BRAND WAS DUMBFOUNDED!

How could this weak, youngster out-exert him? His eyes caught a telltale clue. Was that a drop of blood on the floor? Upon examining the boy's fingers, Brand discovered the act of turning the key had gashed a finger open to the bone; skin, fat, and joint were all exposed. YET THE BOY WAS COMPLETELY UNAWARE OF IT! To the boy the act of cutting his finger to the bone had no more sensation than picking up a stone or turning a coin in your pocket. It’s the daily routines of life that take away the leper’s hands and feet. Their pain warning system no longer alerted them to pain.

Leprosy is the perfect outward picture of what willful, deliberate sin does to us inwardly.