Be Whole

Matthew 9:22 (KJV) - But Jesus turned him about, and when he saw her, he said, Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole. And the woman was made whole from that hour.

“Be Whole”  Psalms 107:20 tells us, “He sent His word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destruction.”    God is not sitting on His throne plotting our demise.  He is not sending destruction to our lives, cities, or nation.  Far to often we hear the oracle of the day proclaiming that God has sent a flood, hurricane, tornado, or the latest deadly disease as judgment on the sins of the world.  These proclamations are like rudderless ships that have lost their way.  The so called enlightened people that are so quick to condemn the world have forgotten the very foundation of why Jesus came to this world.  “For God so loved the world”  that is the sinner, the outcast, the murderer, the sexual deviant, the liar, the adulterer, and the list could go on and on.  When the woman who was caught in the act of adultery was brought to Jesus He didn’t comdemn her and pass judgment but instead He told her, “Neither do I condemn thee go and sin no more.”  There is only one that has the right to judge the world and those that are captured by sin’s dark hold but He came not to condemn the world but that the world through Him might be saved. 

This woman had pressed through the crowd, her faith bringing her to this man who loved the unlovely, touched the untouchable, and spoke life to the dead.  She reached out in faith to touch that blue tassel that represented the Word of God on his tallit.  This man’s hem was not worn in hypocrisy and pride but in faith and in love.  If anyone could help her He could!  And the response of Jesus rings through the ages “Daughter, your faith has made you whole.”  That is why God became man.  That is why Jesus was walking by that day.  That is why He came to this earth.  Not to condemn us but to restore us, to make us whole.  The word used for “whole” here is sozo in the original language.  It is the word Jesus spoke to this woman and it is the word He spoke to blind bartimaeus and the leper that returned to praise Him.  In all three places it is translated “thy faith has made thee whole.”  But it is also the word spoken to the sinner woman who came to Jesus and wept at his feet washing them with her tears.  Jesus, after rebuking the disciples for the judgment and condemnation of her, told her, “Thy faith has saved thee.”  This is the picture that we need to keep in our mind, Jesus reaching out to the lost and hurting of this world, those that are blind, corrupt, and decaying because of sin.  Destruction is upon them not because God has sent it but because they have wondered far from Jesus and are perishing from within.  “But God, who is rich in mercy, for his great love wherewith he loved us.” Eph 2:4  has come to make us whole.   That is the message we should be speaking to our world.