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Holy Trinity Anglican Orthodox Church
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Deliverance |
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Matthew
9:18-26 Twenty-fourth
Sunday after Trinity November
14, 2010 We
are in the final days of Trinity season, which closes our annual cycle of
prayer and worship. We close with meditations on two important Biblical
themes. Today, and this week,
the theme is deliverance. Next
Sunday and week the theme is fullness, or, abundance.
These are wonderfully appropriate themes to end the yearly cycle,
and to prepare us for the opening of the new one on the first Sunday of
Advent. The
word, "deliverance" makes us think of a need or danger. We may
think of war or pestilence, hunger or poverty, or the myriads of problems
and temptations that face us every day and, sometimes wear us down so much
that we begin to realise we cannot carry our load by ourselves.
We want to be delivered from these burdens.
We either want them removed from us, or, if we absolutely have to
bear them, to be strengthened in some way that will enable us to bear them
and carry on with life, or death, or whatever God's providence holds for
us. The Scripture for today
shows two people who need deliverance. First
is the woman with an issue of blood.
We have all known people who suffered from a continual loss of
blood, and we know the health issues that brings to a person.
This woman had been to many physicians, to no avail.
She had probably been prayed over many times, to no avail, and her
health continued to decline over the twelve years of her affliction.
But this woman had another need for deliverance.
According to the Old Testament ceremonial law a woman was unclean
during her issue of blood. This
was not sexist or oppressive; it was a lesson about God. Blood signifies
life, and life belongs to God. So to shed blood, especially from the womb
and cradle of life, was to be unclean before God.
The unclean could not go to the synagogue or Temple, nor could they
participate in the everyday life and faith of Israel.
So this was a serious thing, and this woman wanted deliverance. Second is the ruler's daughter.
Here is a life lost, and a family touched by death.
Here is grief and loss. Here
is sorrow and suffering. Here
are all the emotions and questions of a family suffering the loss of a
young, beloved child, and they all need deliverance.
Yet, there is another need in this house, for this family is also
unclean through their contact with death.
Like the woman with the issue of blood they needed to be
symbolically purified, for in their present condition they were cut off
from participation in the civil and religious life of the people of God.
They needed deliverance. The
girl needed deliverance. Death
is the ultimate uncleanness, and it symbolises the condition of the soul
apart from God. Those without
Christ are dead in trespasses and sins.
There is no life in their soul.
They are bound for an eternity in abject separation from God, which
is a fate so horrible it can only be described as living in death forever.
It
is easy to look at these people and see that they need deliverance, but
what about us? Do we carry
burdens that seem too heavy for us? Does
life seem to wear us out? Do
we have burdens of guilt, or grief, or loss, or temptation?
Do we need deliverance? One
thing we have to notice in our reading is the way these people came to
Jesus with their problems. The
woman touched the hem of His garment.
The girl's father bowed at His feet in worship.
What would they have received if they had not come to Jesus?
What if the woman had simply watched Jesus pass by?
What if the man had simply stayed away from Jesus?
What if neither had reached out to Him or called out to Him or
sought His mercy or His deliverance?
They would never have been delivered, would they?
The woman would have died in her condition.
The man's daughter would have remained dead, and he and his whole
family would have died without knowing whether Jesus would have really
helped them or not. But they
came and they found a willing Saviour. Like
these people, we need to bring our uncleanness to Jesus.
How can we touch the hem of Christ's garment?
How can you and I seek out Jesus, and kneel before Him in worship,
and seek His help and deliverance? It
won't happen if we don't move ourselves.
We can't sit on the sidewalk and watch Jesus pass by.
We have to get up and go to Him.
And then, think about this for a moment. How is Jesus going to move in our lives, heal our infirmities
and feed our souls? How is
God going to deliver us? Through
the means of grace "applied" in faith.
I truly believe the major cause of much disappointment on the part
of so many Christians today is that they expect God to answer their
prayers in a great storm of Divine power instead of through the means of
grace. They pray for strength
in the face of their trials, and they expect God to suddenly infuse them
with supernatural power. They
pray to be delivered from their trials and they expect God to send fire
from Heaven to consume their problems like the sacrifice on Mt. Carmel.
They do not expect God to make them strong through the dedicated,
faithful use of the means of grace. They
ask God to draw them close to Him, and they expect a sudden feeling and a
sign that He is with them. They
do not themselves draw close to Him by a faithful use of the means of
grace, nor do they even suspect that the means of grace are the means by
which God draws near to them. They
do not have a clue that it is through the means of grace that God
accomplishes His will and His deliverance in their lives.
So they make their requests, and they go their merry way, chasing
their worldly distractions and neglecting God's appointed means, and they
are shocked and disappointed when the fire doesn't fall, the feelings
don't come, and their problems aren't consumed in Divine fire.
At this point many of them turn to emotionalism in religion, trying
to get such an emotional experience from worship that it will blot out
their problems and pains until they can get back to church for another
recharge. Many turn to worldly interests, again trying to take their
minds off their problems long enough to let them avoid the pain, and long
enough to help them forget that they are not really following Christ.
These people either live defeated, miserable, disappointed lives of
"quiet desperation," or they allow themselves to be satisfied
with half a faith and half a God. Dearly
beloved, there is no deliverance in that. Before
we close today we need to remind ourselves that the real deliverance of
God is not from physical illness or even death.
It is deliverance from the prison of sin and unbelief.
The uncleanness of the issue of blood and the dead girl were not
things that would really separate a person from God.
So they were not "really" unclean, their uncleanness was
symbolic. Like much of the
Old Testament ceremonial law, they were object lessons designed to teach
that each of us has an inborn uncleanness before God.
But, unlike the symbolic uncleanness, which can be purified by
offering a sacrifice or other ritualistic act, real uncleanness cannot be
purified by anything we can do. Only
God can make our true uncleanness clean and pure.
He did this by offering Himself as the sacrifice for our sins. And He tells us that all who believe in Him and receive His
forgiveness by faith, are clean before God, now and forever.
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