Matthew 9 - Faith
In contrast from the previous chapter, this time Jesus Christ demonstrated & was teaching the disciples & the followers, the crowds, the unbelievers, scribes & Pharisees about faith & belief. When Jesus Christ began His ministry, He knew that the people have yet to see His power & authority, so He allowed the miracles & healings to take place with or without faith. Just my personal thoughts. However after they have heard & seen it, He increased the levels of faith or rather He revealed the levels of faith in people’s hearts. A paralyzed man was healed because of their faith. Back then they must have heard about a healer that can perform miracles & they carried him to Jesus Christ.
Those who already have faith & believed that He can heal went to Jesus Christ. It’s like when we heard about a testimony how God heals someone or rebuild a broken life or restore someone’s properties, materials, reputations, status; out of human methods and ways, we make that one serious prayer speaking directly & face to face to Jesus Christ, “Help me, heal me, restore me”.
Faith comes by hearing, and by hearing the word of God. So there’s a way to help believers of Christ to increase faith, it’s to listen to the word of God consistently & daily, doesn’t matter if it sounds like a broken record. There are times when that one verse strike the chord in our hearts then it started to grow & bear fruit, then it shall be that we know that we know deep inside that God spoke to us.
The calling of Matthew, the tax collector was one of the ways that Jesus Christ wanted to show the Pharisees & the disciples of John, the baptist that He calls even those whom are despised by community. It is to disarm the judgmental mindset according to appearance, this is not to mix with the teachings of Paul in already at apostolic church’s settings where there were multiple false teachings & false prophets with abominable lawlessness going on. If it’s already a church, then the leaders must judge accordingly within the fellowship when choosing leaders as it will affect the safety & wellbeing of the sheep flock of Christ. So Jesus Christ said that “I desire mercy, not sacrifice” & showing that God is merciful to sinners, wanting them to repent & turn to Him.
Then the disciples of John & the Pharisees started to find more faults with Jesus Christ, so He answered them using common sense of wedding moods, repairing a teared cloth & storing new wine with new wine skin. It’s not appropriate to fast in celebration, as it’s normal to fast when one is mourning. Common sense overrule religious rites. It reminds me of AI or programming…or robots, they don’t have common sense unless the programmer code them that way & then sometimes conflict happens because they can’t discern. I’m grateful to God for the gift of common sense & discernment. Doesn’t mean that I had it and I can only give glory to God for the Holy Spirit’s work in me. There were times when I used to asked my former pastor about each rule & then annoy them with my questions. Those days were painful to the former leaders as to me so I can empathized with those who are yet to be free in Christ because I was like that, I wanted to know & I did not want to make one more mistake, it was out of fear. It was burdenful to me & to the former leaders but thank God that Jesus did not give up & kept on working in my heart until it changes by experiencing His mercy & love thru breaking & molding.
This next part is one of my favourite scene, a woman suffering from blood flow, which means she was deemed unclean for twelve years. One can only imagine the trauma of isolation from that until one day Jesus Christ came. She thought, just one touch, not even His body but just the tip end of His cloak then I’ll be healed. This happened without Jesus Christ touching her nor had any verbal conversation at all, but He knew once He sensed His power went out and proceed to bless the woman. When the funeral staff (funeral procession included flute players or hired cryers) laughed at Jesus, He chased them out & proceed with healing the leader’s daughter as he was the one that went to Him in faith. The healing of the blind men was also according to their faith but Jesus Christ warned them not to tell anyone though they did not listen. When Jesus Christ healed a mute demon-possessed man, the Pharisees accused Him of being demonic but in Mark 3:22-30 Jesus Christ countered with “How can Satan cast out Satan?” and called them to be a blasphemer of the Holy Spirit due to their continuous unbelief.
Jesus Christ’s intention of the healing, casting out demons, performing miracles is to display the Kingdom of God, to proclaim the good news of the kingdom & it was done out of compassion for the helpless. In summary, there are different levels of faith & it’s vital to keep on listening or reading the word of God to increase our faith, then keep holding on to that faith in Christ. I ask that God bless us all to always be drawn to Him & be in His presence, help us to continue to be faithful according to His will, in Jesus Christ’s name. Amen.