LA LLAVE DE DAVID: ADORACIÓN CONTINUA
"Escribe al ángel de la Iglesia en Filadelfia: esto dice el Santo, el verdadero, el que tiene la llave de David, el que abre y ninguno cierra y cierra y ninguno abre" Apocalipsis 3:7.
Mucho se ha escrito sobre el Apocalipsis y mucho sobre la llave de David. Yo sólo daré un enfoque o apreciación particular. Mi opinión personal es que Dios le entregó a David una llave de sabiduría que le abrió puertas enormes de autoridad espiritual.
David fue rey de Israel por aproximadamente 40 años. En este largo reinado, ningún enemigo por numeroso o fuerte que fuera, pudo hacerle frente. David fue sentado en niveles muy altos de autoridad y poder terrenal. Creo que todo esto fue posible sólo porque él como vidente (profeta de Dios), aprendió a influenciar el ámbito espiritual, el cual posteriormente afectaría el mundo natural (las circunstancias que le rodeaban).
David tenía un secreto revelado por Jehová que le garantizaba en sus batallas la intervención divina y por ende, la derrota de sus adversarios.
Su secreto movía a Dios; activaba el ejército celestial y destruía la fuerza contraria. David tenía una llave por gracia. El Padre Dios le había revelado que las batallas las gana Dios. El rey debía afectar el mundo espiritual y sus enemigos caerían. El rey David aprendió a enternecer a Dios y mover Su corazón a favor de Su pueblo. El rey tenía una llave; la llave de David. Esa llave o secreto davídico asentó el trono de Dios por años en Israel y lo envolvió con Su gloria. Esa llave abrió la puerta de la victoria y de la prosperidad. Atrajo hacia él fama, renombre y honor entre los pueblos. En realidad, el Señor le dio todo esto al activar la llave, "la llave de David".
Cuando el Espíritu de Dios impulsó a Juan a escribir la carta a la Iglesia de Filadelfia, presentó al Señor como el dueño de la llave de David. Desde luego que David sólo fue un receptor de la revelación divina; pero es Dios quien tiene la llave en Su mano santa. Es obvio que con esa llave se abren puertas que nadie puede cerrar. Esa puerta son bendiciones divinas, influencias sobre ciudades y naciones y el poder apostólico para hacer la tarea misionera en los confines de la tierra.
Dios dijo a Filadelfia, a su Iglesia establecida en esa ciudad: "Yo conozco tus obras; he aquí, he puesto delante de ti una puerta abierta, la cual nadie puede cerrar" (verso 8a).
La Iglesia de Filadelfia recibió de manos del Poseedor de la llave de David; de Aquel que abre y ninguno cierra y cierra y ninguno abre, la protección y unción para las misiones en el mundo. Aunque ésta fue una Iglesia humilde y sin muchos recursos económicos, guardó la Palabra y el testimonio. Esa Iglesia, Filadelfia, guardó la Palabra y la practicó; por ello Dios la ungió. Aleluya.
Cada iglesia en las naciones puede recibir incrementos impresionantes en sus niveles de autoridad, cuando Dios abra la puerta a través de la llave de David.
Esa bendita llave es la "Alabanza de Alto Nivel" o la "adoración de Excelencia" al Gran Rey. Como profeta, David fue ministrado profundamente por el "Espíritu de Sabiduría" en lo concerniente a la adoración celestial, la cual activaría la mano de Dios a su favor y atraería Su Presencia.
Dios puso en su mano una llave. Si aprendía a usarla, Jehová estaría siempre en su reinado y edificaría su reino, David fue diestro en usar la llave; de él aprendimos los principios más sencillos pero trascendentes de la exaltación de la Divinidad.
En el Tabernáculo de Moisés se ofrecía cada tarde y cada mañana holocausto a Jehová. Estas ofrendas se conocían como el "Sacrificio continuo". Era necesario a través de esta práctica ceremonial mantener el fuego y la ofrenda constantemente. Este seria un anuncio profético de la perpetuidad del sacrificio de Cristo y su extraordinada eficacia.
David, bajo "el manto de la revelación profético", entendió el simbolismo y recibió del Espíritu que estos sacrificios u holocausto continuo (de animales) dejarían de ser para dar paso a otro tipo de sacrificio continuo: el de la alabanza y la adoración al Dios Viviente.
David descubrió que estableciendo una alabanza continua, adoración verdadera al Señor las 24 horas del día, era como llevar a la esfera del cumplimiento profético todo lo anunciado en las ofrendas y ceremonias de Moisés. Esa adoración continua, durante todo el día, atraería la Presencia Divina entre el pueblo de Israel. David estableció turnos sacerdotales para llenar la nación y el santuario de alabanza . Instituyó el servicio de músicos y cantores para ministrar continuamente ante el Arca del Señor.
Este adorar de continuo entronizó a Jehová en el Campamento de Israel. Dios quiso estar allí; David y su pueblo le ganaron el corazón. Jehová gozaba de estar allí ante un pueblo contrito y humillado. La adoración fue la llave de David. Su meta era el Arca del Pacto. Solo anhelaba a Dios en Israel. Aleluya.
Después de 15 años de haber escrito el libro titulado "El Tabernáculo caldo de David", he visto con honda tristeza a miles de creyentes caminar ignorando la verdad de la revelación dada al profeta y rey.
El Tabernáculo de David, lamentablemente, ha terminado siendo interpretado como un simple modelo de alabanza, un manual de música y canto.
No y mil veces no. David nunca quiso establecer un molde rígido de alabanza o una única forma de dañe canción y música a Dios.
No. La meta de David no eran formas de alabanza o estilo de música o tipo de instrumentos. Su meta era más elevada; era elevadísimo. Su meta era Dios mismo.
David sólo escudriñó la Escritura; sólo buscó sabiduría en el secreto del Señor para acercar a Dios y perpetuar Su Presencia en Israel.
Bajo esa búsqueda ferviente de Él y bajo ese anhelar continuo de Su Presencia, el rey se encontró con la llave que desató sobre él la más elevada autoridad delegada.
Esa llave, la adoración en espíritu y verdad, lo llevó a proclamar que hay un sin fin de formas a través de las cuales yo puedo glorificar al Padre. Su intención era practicarlas todas con tal de que Jehová viniera a Sión. Aleluya.
David nos dio el mensaje: lo más importante de todo es tener a Dios con uno; hagan todo lo que deban hacer para atraer Su Presencia y cuando la tengan, no lo dejen irse, denle alabanza continua cada hora del día. Túrnense, organícense y tome cada uno su instrumento y el corazón en la mano y mantengan con su alabanza y ofrendas de adoración, el fuego encendido en el altar.
Esa es mi llave, nos enseñó David. Si quieren victoria continua, renombre, bendición, prosperidad y unción, úsenla de inmediato.
Esa es la llave; actívenla. Reconozcan su grandeza entre los pueblos Amén.
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
The Touch of God
The Touch of God
By Max Lucado
A Compassionate Heart
May I ask you to look at your hand for a moment? Look at the back, then the palm. Reacquaint yourself with your fingers. Run a thumb over your knuckles.
What if someone were to film a documentary on your hands? What if a producer were to tell your story based on the life of your hands? What would we see? As with all of us, the film would begin with an infant’s fist, then a closeup of a tiny hand wrapped around mommy’s finger. Then what? Holding on to a chair as you learned to walk? Handling a spoon as you learned to eat?
We aren’t too long into the feature before we see your hand being affectionate, stroking daddy’s face or petting a puppy. Nor is it too long before we see your hand acting aggressively: pushing big brother or yanking back a toy. All of us learned early that the hand is suited for more than survival—it’s a tool of emotional expression. The same hand can help or hurt, extend or clench, lift someone up or shove someone down.
Were you to show the documentary to your friends, you’d be proud of certain moments: your hand extending with a gift, placing a ring on another’s finger, doctoring a wound, preparing a meal, or folding in prayer. And then there are other scenes. Shots of accusing fingers, abusive fists. Hands taking more often than giving, demanding instead of offering, wounding rather than loving. Oh, the power of our hands. Leave them unmanaged and they become weapons: clawing for power, strangling for survival, seducing for pleasure. But manage them and our hands become instruments of grace—not just tools in the hands of God, but God’s very hands.
Surrender them and these five-fingered appendages become the hands of heaven.
That’s what Jesus did. Our Savior completely surrendered his hands to God. The documentary of his hands has no scenes of greedy grabbing or unfounded finger pointing. It does, however, have one scene after another of people longing for his compassionate touch: parents carrying their children, the poor bringing their fears, the sinful shouldering their sorrow. And each who came was touched. And each one touched was changed. But none was touched or changed more than the unnamed leper of Matthew 8.
When Jesus came down from the hill, great crowds followed him. Then a man with a skin disease came to Jesus. The man bowed down before him and said, “Lord, you can heal me if you will.”
Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man and said, “I will. Be healed!” And immediately the man was healed from his disease. Then Jesus said to him, “Don’t tell anyone about this. But go and show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded for people who are made well. This will show the people what I have done.” (vv. 1–4)
Mark and Luke chose to tell this same story. But with apologies to all three writers, I must say none tell enough. Oh, we know the man’s disease and his decision, but as to the rest? We are left with questions. The authors offer no name, no history, no description.
The Ultimate Outcast
Sometimes my curiosity gets the best of me, and I wonder out loud. That’s what I’m about to do here—wonder out loud about the man who felt Jesus’ compassionate touch. He makes one appearance, has one request, and receives one touch. But that one touch changed his life forever. And I wonder if his story went something like this:
For five years no one touched me. No one. Not one person. Not my wife. Not my child. Not my friends. No one touched me. They saw me. They spoke to me. I sensed love in their voices. I saw concern in their eyes. But I didn’t feel their touch. There was no touch. Not once. No one touched me.
What is common to you, I coveted. Handshakes. Warm embraces. A tap on the shoulder to get my attention. A kiss on the lips to steal a heart. Such moments were taken from my world. No one touched me. No one bumped into me. What I would have given to be bumped into, to be caught in a crowd, for my shoulder to brush against another’s. But for five years it has not happened. How could it? I was not allowed on the streets. Even the rabbis kept their distance from me. I was not permitted in my synagogue. Not even welcome in my own house.
I was untouchable. I was a leper. And no one touched me. Until today.
I wonder about this man because in New Testament times leprosy was the most dreaded disease. The condition rendered the body a mass of ulcers and decay. Fingers would curl and gnarl. Blotches of skin would discolor and stink. Certain types of leprosy would numb nerve endings, leading to a loss of fingers, toes, even a whole foot or hand. Leprosy was death by inches.
The social consequences were as severe as the physical. Considered contagious, the leper was quarantined, banished to a leper colony.
In Scripture the leper is symbolic of the ultimate outcast: infected by a condition he did not seek, rejected by those he knew, avoided by people he did not know, condemned to a future he could not bear. And in the memory of each outcast must have been the day he was forced to face the truth: life would never be the same.
One year during harvest my grip on the scythe seemed weak. The tips of my fingers numbed. First one finger then another. Within a short time I could grip the tool but scarcely feel it. By the end of the season, I felt nothing at all. The hand grasping the handle might as well have belonged to someone else—the feeling was gone. I said nothing to my wife, but I know she suspected something. How could she not? I carried my hand against my body like a wounded bird.
One afternoon I plunged my hands into a basin of water intending to wash my face. The water reddened. My finger was bleeding, bleeding freely. I didn’t even know I was wounded. How did I cut myself? On a knife? Did my hand slide across the sharp edge of metal? It must have, but I didn’t feel anything.
“It’s on your clothes, too,” my wife said softly. She was behind me. Before looking at her, I looked down at the crimson spots on my robe. For the longest time I stood over the basin, staring at my hand. Somehow I knew my life was being forever altered.
“Shall I go with you to tell the priest?” she asked.
“No,” I sighed, “I’ll go alone.”
I turned and looked into her moist eyes. Standing next to her was our three-year-old daughter. Squatting, I gazed into her face and stroked her cheek, saying nothing. What could I say? I stood and looked again at my wife. She touched my shoulder, and with my good hand, I touched hers. It would be our final touch.
Five years have passed, and no one has touched me since, until today.
The priest didn’t touch me. He looked at my hand, now wrapped in a rag. He looked at my face, now shadowed in sorrow. I’ve never faulted him for what he said. He was only doing as he was instructed. He covered his mouth and extended his hand, palm forward. “You are unclean,” he told me. With one pronouncement I lost my family, my farm, my future, my friends.
My wife met me at the city gates with a sack of clothing and bread and coins. She didn’t speak. By now friends had gathered. What I saw in their eyes was a precursor to what I’ve seen in every eye since: fearful pity. As I stepped out, they stepped back. Their horror of my disease was greater than their concern for my heart—so they, and everyone else I have seen since, stepped back.
The banishing of a leper seems harsh, unnecessary. The Ancient East hasn’t been the only culture to isolate their wounded, however. We may not build colonies or cover our mouths in their presence, but we certainly build walls and duck our eyes. And a person needn’t have leprosy to feel quarantined.
One of my sadder memories involves my fourth-grade friend Jerry. He and a half-dozen of us were an ever-present, inseparable fixture on the playground. One day I called his house to see if we could play. The phone was answered by a cursing, drunken voice telling me Jerry could not come over that day or any day. I told my friends what had happened. One of them explained that Jerry’s father was an alcoholic. I don’t know if I knew what the word meant, but I learned quickly. Jerry, the second baseman; Jerry, the kid with the red bike; Jerry, my friend on the corner was now “Jerry, the son of a drunk.” Kids can be hard, and for some reason we were hard on Jerry. He was infected. Like the leper, he suffered from a condition he didn’t create. Like the leper, he was put outside the village.
The divorced know this feeling. So do the handicapped. The unemployed have felt it, as have the less educated. Some shun unmarried moms. We keep our distance from the depressed and avoid the terminally ill. We have neighborhoods for immigrants, convalescent homes for the elderly, schools for the simple, centers for the addicted, and prisons for the criminals.
The rest simply try to get away from it all. Only God knows how many Jerrys are in voluntary exile—individuals living quiet, lonely lives infected by their fear of rejection and their memories of the last time they tried. They choose not to be touched at all rather than risk being hurt again.
Oh, how I repulsed those who saw me. Five years of leprosy had left my hands gnarled. Tips of my fingers were missing as were portions of an ear and my nose. At the sight of me, fathers grabbed their children. Mothers covered their faces. Children pointed and stared.
The rags on my body couldn’t hide my sores. Nor could the wrap on my face hide the rage in my eyes. I didn’t even try to hide it. How many nights did I shake my crippled fist at the silent sky? “What did I do to deserve this?” But never a reply.
Some think I sinned. Some think my parents sinned. I don’t know. All I know is that I grew so tired of it all: sleeping in the colony, smelling the stench. I grew so tired of the damnable bell I was required to wear around my neck to warn people of my presence. As if I needed it. One glance and the announcements began, “Unclean! Unclean! Unclean!”
Several weeks ago I dared walk the road to my village. I had no intent of entering. Heaven knows I only wanted to look again upon my fields. Gaze again upon my home. And see, perchance, the face of my wife. I did not see her. But I saw some children playing in a pasture. I hid behind a tree and watched them scamper and run. Their faces were so joyful and their laughter so contagious that for a moment, for just a moment, I was no longer a leper. I was a farmer. I was a father. I was a man.
Infused with their happiness, I stepped out from behind the tree, straightened my back, breathed deeply … and they saw me. Before I could retreat, they saw me. And they screamed. And they scattered. One lingered, though, behind the others. One paused and looked in my direction. I don’t know, and I can’t say for sure, but I think, I really think, she was my daughter. And I don’t know, I really can’t say for sure. But I think she was looking for her father.
That look is what made me take the step I took today. Of course it was reckless. Of course it was risky. But what did I have to lose? He calls himself God’s Son. Either he will hear my complaint and kill me or accept my demands and heal me. Those were my thoughts. I came to him as a defiant man. Moved not by faith but by a desperate anger. God had wrought this calamity on my body, and he would either fix it or end it.
But then I saw him, and when I saw him, I was changed. You must remember, I’m a farmer, not a poet, so I cannot find the words to describe what I saw. All I can say is that the Judean mornings are sometimes so fresh and the sunrises so glorious that to look at them is to forget the heat of the day before and the hurt of times past. When I looked at his face, I saw a Judean morning.
Before he spoke, I knew he cared. Somehow I knew he hated this disease as much as, no more than I hate it. My rage became trust, and my anger became hope.
From behind a rock, I watched him descend a hill. Throngs of people followed him. I waited until he was only paces from me, then I stepped out.
“Master!”
He stopped and looked in my direction as did dozens of others. A flood of fear swept across the crowd. Arms flew in front of faces. Children ducked behind parents. “Unclean!” someone shouted. Again, I don’t blame them. I was a huddled mass of death. But I scarcely heard them. I scarcely saw them. Their panic I’d seen a thousand times. His compassion, however, I’d never beheld. Everyone stepped back except him. He stepped toward me. Toward me.
Five years ago my wife had stepped toward me. She was the last to do so. Now he did. I did not move. I just spoke. “Lord, you can heal me if you will.” Had he healed me with a word, I would have been thrilled. Had he cured me with a prayer, I would have rejoiced. But he wasn’t satisfied with speaking to me. He drew near me. He touched me. Five years ago my wife had touched me. No one had touched me since. Until today.
“I will.” His words were as tender as his touch. “Be healed!”
Energy flooded my body like water through a furrowed field. In an instant, in a moment, I felt warmth where there had been numbness. I felt strength where there had been atrophy. My back straightened, and my head lifted. Where I had been eye level with his belt, I now stood eye level with his face. His smiling face.
He cupped his hands on my cheeks and drew me so near I could feel the warmth of his breath and see the wetness in his eyes. “Don’t tell anyone about this. But go and show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded for people who are made well. This will show the people what I have done.”
And so that is where I am going. I will show myself to my priest and embrace him. I will show myself to my wife, and I will embrace her. I will pick up my daughter, and I will embrace her. And I will never forget the one who dared to touch me. He could have healed me with a word. But he wanted to do more than heal me. He wanted to honor me, to validate me, to christen me. Imagine that … unworthy of the touch of a man, yet worthy of the touch of God.
The Power of The Godly Touch
The touch did not heal the disease, you know. Matthew is careful to mention that it was the pronouncement and not the touch of Christ that cured the condition. “Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man and said, ‘I will. Be healed!’ And immediately the man was healed from his disease” (Matt. 8:3).
The infection was banished by a word from Jesus. The loneliness, however, was treated by a touch from Jesus. Oh, the power of a godly touch. Haven’t you known it? The doctor who treated you, or the teacher who dried your tears? Was there a hand holding yours at a funeral? Another on your shoulder during a trial? A handshake of welcome at a new job? A pastoral prayer for healing? Haven’t we known the power of a godly touch?
Can’t we offer the same?
Many of you already do. Some of you have the master touch of the Physician himself. You use your hands to pray over the sick and minister to the weak. If you aren’t touching them personally, your hands are writing letters, dialing phones, baking pies. You have learned the power of a touch.
But others of us tend to forget. Our hearts are good; it’s just that our memories are bad. We forget how significant one touch can be. We fear saying the wrong thing or using the wrong tone or acting the wrong way. So rather than do it incorrectly, we do nothing at all.
Aren’t we glad Jesus didn’t make the same mistake? If your fear of doing the wrong thing prevents you from doing anything, keep in mind the perspective of the lepers of the world. They aren’t picky. They aren’t finicky. They’re just lonely. They are yearning for a godly touch. Jesus touched the untouchables of the world. Will you do the same?
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.
james 1:22–24 niv
By Max Lucado
A Compassionate Heart
May I ask you to look at your hand for a moment? Look at the back, then the palm. Reacquaint yourself with your fingers. Run a thumb over your knuckles.
What if someone were to film a documentary on your hands? What if a producer were to tell your story based on the life of your hands? What would we see? As with all of us, the film would begin with an infant’s fist, then a closeup of a tiny hand wrapped around mommy’s finger. Then what? Holding on to a chair as you learned to walk? Handling a spoon as you learned to eat?
We aren’t too long into the feature before we see your hand being affectionate, stroking daddy’s face or petting a puppy. Nor is it too long before we see your hand acting aggressively: pushing big brother or yanking back a toy. All of us learned early that the hand is suited for more than survival—it’s a tool of emotional expression. The same hand can help or hurt, extend or clench, lift someone up or shove someone down.
Were you to show the documentary to your friends, you’d be proud of certain moments: your hand extending with a gift, placing a ring on another’s finger, doctoring a wound, preparing a meal, or folding in prayer. And then there are other scenes. Shots of accusing fingers, abusive fists. Hands taking more often than giving, demanding instead of offering, wounding rather than loving. Oh, the power of our hands. Leave them unmanaged and they become weapons: clawing for power, strangling for survival, seducing for pleasure. But manage them and our hands become instruments of grace—not just tools in the hands of God, but God’s very hands.
Surrender them and these five-fingered appendages become the hands of heaven.
That’s what Jesus did. Our Savior completely surrendered his hands to God. The documentary of his hands has no scenes of greedy grabbing or unfounded finger pointing. It does, however, have one scene after another of people longing for his compassionate touch: parents carrying their children, the poor bringing their fears, the sinful shouldering their sorrow. And each who came was touched. And each one touched was changed. But none was touched or changed more than the unnamed leper of Matthew 8.
When Jesus came down from the hill, great crowds followed him. Then a man with a skin disease came to Jesus. The man bowed down before him and said, “Lord, you can heal me if you will.”
Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man and said, “I will. Be healed!” And immediately the man was healed from his disease. Then Jesus said to him, “Don’t tell anyone about this. But go and show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded for people who are made well. This will show the people what I have done.” (vv. 1–4)
Mark and Luke chose to tell this same story. But with apologies to all three writers, I must say none tell enough. Oh, we know the man’s disease and his decision, but as to the rest? We are left with questions. The authors offer no name, no history, no description.
The Ultimate Outcast
Sometimes my curiosity gets the best of me, and I wonder out loud. That’s what I’m about to do here—wonder out loud about the man who felt Jesus’ compassionate touch. He makes one appearance, has one request, and receives one touch. But that one touch changed his life forever. And I wonder if his story went something like this:
For five years no one touched me. No one. Not one person. Not my wife. Not my child. Not my friends. No one touched me. They saw me. They spoke to me. I sensed love in their voices. I saw concern in their eyes. But I didn’t feel their touch. There was no touch. Not once. No one touched me.
What is common to you, I coveted. Handshakes. Warm embraces. A tap on the shoulder to get my attention. A kiss on the lips to steal a heart. Such moments were taken from my world. No one touched me. No one bumped into me. What I would have given to be bumped into, to be caught in a crowd, for my shoulder to brush against another’s. But for five years it has not happened. How could it? I was not allowed on the streets. Even the rabbis kept their distance from me. I was not permitted in my synagogue. Not even welcome in my own house.
I was untouchable. I was a leper. And no one touched me. Until today.
I wonder about this man because in New Testament times leprosy was the most dreaded disease. The condition rendered the body a mass of ulcers and decay. Fingers would curl and gnarl. Blotches of skin would discolor and stink. Certain types of leprosy would numb nerve endings, leading to a loss of fingers, toes, even a whole foot or hand. Leprosy was death by inches.
The social consequences were as severe as the physical. Considered contagious, the leper was quarantined, banished to a leper colony.
In Scripture the leper is symbolic of the ultimate outcast: infected by a condition he did not seek, rejected by those he knew, avoided by people he did not know, condemned to a future he could not bear. And in the memory of each outcast must have been the day he was forced to face the truth: life would never be the same.
One year during harvest my grip on the scythe seemed weak. The tips of my fingers numbed. First one finger then another. Within a short time I could grip the tool but scarcely feel it. By the end of the season, I felt nothing at all. The hand grasping the handle might as well have belonged to someone else—the feeling was gone. I said nothing to my wife, but I know she suspected something. How could she not? I carried my hand against my body like a wounded bird.
One afternoon I plunged my hands into a basin of water intending to wash my face. The water reddened. My finger was bleeding, bleeding freely. I didn’t even know I was wounded. How did I cut myself? On a knife? Did my hand slide across the sharp edge of metal? It must have, but I didn’t feel anything.
“It’s on your clothes, too,” my wife said softly. She was behind me. Before looking at her, I looked down at the crimson spots on my robe. For the longest time I stood over the basin, staring at my hand. Somehow I knew my life was being forever altered.
“Shall I go with you to tell the priest?” she asked.
“No,” I sighed, “I’ll go alone.”
I turned and looked into her moist eyes. Standing next to her was our three-year-old daughter. Squatting, I gazed into her face and stroked her cheek, saying nothing. What could I say? I stood and looked again at my wife. She touched my shoulder, and with my good hand, I touched hers. It would be our final touch.
Five years have passed, and no one has touched me since, until today.
The priest didn’t touch me. He looked at my hand, now wrapped in a rag. He looked at my face, now shadowed in sorrow. I’ve never faulted him for what he said. He was only doing as he was instructed. He covered his mouth and extended his hand, palm forward. “You are unclean,” he told me. With one pronouncement I lost my family, my farm, my future, my friends.
My wife met me at the city gates with a sack of clothing and bread and coins. She didn’t speak. By now friends had gathered. What I saw in their eyes was a precursor to what I’ve seen in every eye since: fearful pity. As I stepped out, they stepped back. Their horror of my disease was greater than their concern for my heart—so they, and everyone else I have seen since, stepped back.
The banishing of a leper seems harsh, unnecessary. The Ancient East hasn’t been the only culture to isolate their wounded, however. We may not build colonies or cover our mouths in their presence, but we certainly build walls and duck our eyes. And a person needn’t have leprosy to feel quarantined.
One of my sadder memories involves my fourth-grade friend Jerry. He and a half-dozen of us were an ever-present, inseparable fixture on the playground. One day I called his house to see if we could play. The phone was answered by a cursing, drunken voice telling me Jerry could not come over that day or any day. I told my friends what had happened. One of them explained that Jerry’s father was an alcoholic. I don’t know if I knew what the word meant, but I learned quickly. Jerry, the second baseman; Jerry, the kid with the red bike; Jerry, my friend on the corner was now “Jerry, the son of a drunk.” Kids can be hard, and for some reason we were hard on Jerry. He was infected. Like the leper, he suffered from a condition he didn’t create. Like the leper, he was put outside the village.
The divorced know this feeling. So do the handicapped. The unemployed have felt it, as have the less educated. Some shun unmarried moms. We keep our distance from the depressed and avoid the terminally ill. We have neighborhoods for immigrants, convalescent homes for the elderly, schools for the simple, centers for the addicted, and prisons for the criminals.
The rest simply try to get away from it all. Only God knows how many Jerrys are in voluntary exile—individuals living quiet, lonely lives infected by their fear of rejection and their memories of the last time they tried. They choose not to be touched at all rather than risk being hurt again.
Oh, how I repulsed those who saw me. Five years of leprosy had left my hands gnarled. Tips of my fingers were missing as were portions of an ear and my nose. At the sight of me, fathers grabbed their children. Mothers covered their faces. Children pointed and stared.
The rags on my body couldn’t hide my sores. Nor could the wrap on my face hide the rage in my eyes. I didn’t even try to hide it. How many nights did I shake my crippled fist at the silent sky? “What did I do to deserve this?” But never a reply.
Some think I sinned. Some think my parents sinned. I don’t know. All I know is that I grew so tired of it all: sleeping in the colony, smelling the stench. I grew so tired of the damnable bell I was required to wear around my neck to warn people of my presence. As if I needed it. One glance and the announcements began, “Unclean! Unclean! Unclean!”
Several weeks ago I dared walk the road to my village. I had no intent of entering. Heaven knows I only wanted to look again upon my fields. Gaze again upon my home. And see, perchance, the face of my wife. I did not see her. But I saw some children playing in a pasture. I hid behind a tree and watched them scamper and run. Their faces were so joyful and their laughter so contagious that for a moment, for just a moment, I was no longer a leper. I was a farmer. I was a father. I was a man.
Infused with their happiness, I stepped out from behind the tree, straightened my back, breathed deeply … and they saw me. Before I could retreat, they saw me. And they screamed. And they scattered. One lingered, though, behind the others. One paused and looked in my direction. I don’t know, and I can’t say for sure, but I think, I really think, she was my daughter. And I don’t know, I really can’t say for sure. But I think she was looking for her father.
That look is what made me take the step I took today. Of course it was reckless. Of course it was risky. But what did I have to lose? He calls himself God’s Son. Either he will hear my complaint and kill me or accept my demands and heal me. Those were my thoughts. I came to him as a defiant man. Moved not by faith but by a desperate anger. God had wrought this calamity on my body, and he would either fix it or end it.
But then I saw him, and when I saw him, I was changed. You must remember, I’m a farmer, not a poet, so I cannot find the words to describe what I saw. All I can say is that the Judean mornings are sometimes so fresh and the sunrises so glorious that to look at them is to forget the heat of the day before and the hurt of times past. When I looked at his face, I saw a Judean morning.
Before he spoke, I knew he cared. Somehow I knew he hated this disease as much as, no more than I hate it. My rage became trust, and my anger became hope.
From behind a rock, I watched him descend a hill. Throngs of people followed him. I waited until he was only paces from me, then I stepped out.
“Master!”
He stopped and looked in my direction as did dozens of others. A flood of fear swept across the crowd. Arms flew in front of faces. Children ducked behind parents. “Unclean!” someone shouted. Again, I don’t blame them. I was a huddled mass of death. But I scarcely heard them. I scarcely saw them. Their panic I’d seen a thousand times. His compassion, however, I’d never beheld. Everyone stepped back except him. He stepped toward me. Toward me.
Five years ago my wife had stepped toward me. She was the last to do so. Now he did. I did not move. I just spoke. “Lord, you can heal me if you will.” Had he healed me with a word, I would have been thrilled. Had he cured me with a prayer, I would have rejoiced. But he wasn’t satisfied with speaking to me. He drew near me. He touched me. Five years ago my wife had touched me. No one had touched me since. Until today.
“I will.” His words were as tender as his touch. “Be healed!”
Energy flooded my body like water through a furrowed field. In an instant, in a moment, I felt warmth where there had been numbness. I felt strength where there had been atrophy. My back straightened, and my head lifted. Where I had been eye level with his belt, I now stood eye level with his face. His smiling face.
He cupped his hands on my cheeks and drew me so near I could feel the warmth of his breath and see the wetness in his eyes. “Don’t tell anyone about this. But go and show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded for people who are made well. This will show the people what I have done.”
And so that is where I am going. I will show myself to my priest and embrace him. I will show myself to my wife, and I will embrace her. I will pick up my daughter, and I will embrace her. And I will never forget the one who dared to touch me. He could have healed me with a word. But he wanted to do more than heal me. He wanted to honor me, to validate me, to christen me. Imagine that … unworthy of the touch of a man, yet worthy of the touch of God.
The Power of The Godly Touch
The touch did not heal the disease, you know. Matthew is careful to mention that it was the pronouncement and not the touch of Christ that cured the condition. “Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man and said, ‘I will. Be healed!’ And immediately the man was healed from his disease” (Matt. 8:3).
The infection was banished by a word from Jesus. The loneliness, however, was treated by a touch from Jesus. Oh, the power of a godly touch. Haven’t you known it? The doctor who treated you, or the teacher who dried your tears? Was there a hand holding yours at a funeral? Another on your shoulder during a trial? A handshake of welcome at a new job? A pastoral prayer for healing? Haven’t we known the power of a godly touch?
Can’t we offer the same?
Many of you already do. Some of you have the master touch of the Physician himself. You use your hands to pray over the sick and minister to the weak. If you aren’t touching them personally, your hands are writing letters, dialing phones, baking pies. You have learned the power of a touch.
But others of us tend to forget. Our hearts are good; it’s just that our memories are bad. We forget how significant one touch can be. We fear saying the wrong thing or using the wrong tone or acting the wrong way. So rather than do it incorrectly, we do nothing at all.
Aren’t we glad Jesus didn’t make the same mistake? If your fear of doing the wrong thing prevents you from doing anything, keep in mind the perspective of the lepers of the world. They aren’t picky. They aren’t finicky. They’re just lonely. They are yearning for a godly touch. Jesus touched the untouchables of the world. Will you do the same?
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.
james 1:22–24 niv
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)