JESUS, AND THE MAN WITH THE WITHERED HAND

Mark 3:1-7

Morning Meditation 9/24/2014

Verse 1-7 says, “And he entered again into the synagogue; and there was a man there which had a withered hand. And they watched him, whether he would heal him on the sabbath day; that they might accuse him. And he saith unto the man which had the withered hand, Stand forth. And he saith unto them, Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath days, or to do evil? to save life, or to kill? But they held their peace. And when he had looked round about on them with anger, being grieved for the hardness of their hearts, he saith unto the man, Stretch forth thine hand.. And he stretched it out: and his hand was restored whole as the other. And the Pharisees went forth, and straightway took counsel with the Herodians against him, how they might destroy him. But Jesus withdrew himself with his disciples to the sea: and a great multitude from Galilee followed him, and from Judaea.”

Jesus was constantly running into people who needed help desperately. He still does. The man was in a good place, “the synagogue,” where the Scriptures were studied, and he “ran into” the right Person. Amen. You would think that this story of healing would not have a bad side to it. It would appear that everyone would be thrilled to see a miracle of gigantic proportions wouldn’t you? But that doesn’t happen in this case. Let’s study and see the Lord’s reactions to unreasonable men.

THE ANGER

There are those who cannot conceive of Christ as having this emotion. There is a cure for that. It is simply believing what the Bible says about Jesus instead of developing rosy philosophical christ to believe in. Now I spelled that deliberately with a little “c” because that christ is not the CHRIST of the Bible..

When Jesus entered the synagogue and saw the man with the withered hand, our text says, “they watched him, whether he would heal him on the sabbath day.” There is no doubt in my mind that they had learned enough about Jesus to have good grounds to believe that the sabbath would not get in His way of responding to the need of this crippled man. Who are the “they” who watched? We discover it was the Pharisees from chapter 2 and verse 24.

Mark says in verse five, “And when he had looked around about on them with anger . . .” The words “And when he had looked around” translates one word, “ ”periblepo,” an aorist middle participle. The aorist tense could suggest a sudden look all around and the middle voice means that He was affected by what He saw. The effect that this look had on Him was “anger.” The word “anger” translates “orge” and means, “the movement or agitation of the soul, impulse, desire, any violent emotion, but esp. anger.” With Jesus, anger is under His control. It is an emotion that causes all kinds of violence. Some people control their anger because what it would cause them to do would result in a penalty much worse than the satisfaction they would get in exercising it. Others go out of control and pay the consequences. Jesus was never controlled by an emotion. He was controlled by His Father. John 5:17 says, “But Jesus answered them, My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.” Then again in John 8:28, “Then said Jesus unto them, When ye have lifted up the Son of man, then shall ye know that I am he, and that I do nothing of myself; but as my Father hath taught me, I speak these things.”

This means that the Father was in control of this situation not His anger. But we do need to see that Christ had anger. It helps us to see that His righteous reaction to the Pharisees was not a passive, “It’s ok for you to have this attitude toward the sabbath.” It wasn’t ok. They were wrong and were not justified in their attitude by the law of Moses. They were judging Jesus by their INTERPRETATION of the law and not the law itself. That is a sin of our day. Jesus was ANGRY at their attitude arrived at as a result of a wrong interpretation of the Bible. Next let’s look at,

HIS GRIEF

Out text says, “And when he and looked round about on them with anger, being grieved . . .” The word “grieved” translates, “sullupeo” (present participle) and means, “to affect with sadness, cause grief, to throw into sorrow.” Robertson quotes Swete, “The anger was tempered by grief.” Then Robertson says, “Jesus is the Man of Sorrows and this present participle brings out the continuous state of grief whereas the momentary angry look is expressed by the aorist participle above.” Grief is a word used in association with love. You love your children and they can grieve you at their actions. Others anger you over the same things but you feel no grief. Jesus loved those who angered Him and proved it by dying on the cross for them. Many would be saved later. But at the time of our text, they were hypocrites. He was angered and grieved. Next let’s look at,

HIS REASON

Our text says, “. . . being grieved for the hardness of their hearts . . .” The word “hardness” translates “porosis” and means, “the covering with a callus.” Robertson says, “Their own heart or attitude was in a state of moral ossification like hardened hands or feet. Porosis was used of a kind of marble and then of the callus on fractured bones.” Can you imagine the heart literally becoming hard? How could it beat? It could not. The hardness would cause it to stop. The Pharisee’s condition of heart had caused them to cease to have compassion on men like Jesus healed. And their hardness of heart was the result of the wrong application of the Word of God. It is not enough to have the Word of God. We need the wisdom of God for a correct understanding and application of it. There is a right way to stand against wrong. But never at the expense of losing our burden and compassion for needy souls. Next lets look at,

HIS WORK

Our text says, “. . . he saith unto the man, Stretch forth thine hand.” The word “stretch” is an aorist active imperative verb. Jesus operated with authority derived from His Father. The imperative mood is a command that expresses urgency. Verse one says the hand was “withered.” The word “withered” translates “xeraino” and means “to dry up.” It is a perfect passive participle. The perfect tense means that it happened in the past with the result that it remained in that condition. The passive voice means that there was some cause that affected this result. Robertson suggests that this means that he was not born this way. It could have been caused by a disease or accident. But nevertheless, whatever the cause, it withered away. There was no help for this man from the physicians. I pray for my doctors. They do much good. But they are limited. Jesus wasn’t. He had the power to preform a creative miracle. Would He? We have the Pharisees who were the fundamentalist’s of the day. It would not be good to get in trouble with them. Their interpretation of the law said the healing of this man should not take place on the sabbath day. To them it would be such a serious violation of the sabbath to deserve death (see vs 6).

Jesus had a needy man before Him. He also had those who would immediately accuse Him of breaking the sabbath if He healed the man. Breaking the sabbath was a capital crime (see Num. 15:32-36). Jesus knew that this was not breaking the sabbath. So He said, “Stretch forth thine hand. And he stretched it out: and his hand was restored whole as the other.” Now to do this was not just a repair job on a “whole hand.” It involved creating new flesh. Jesus worked this miracle in the presence of the critics and they missed an opportunity to rejoice that THEY WERE OBSERVING THE WORK OF THE LONG PRAYED FOR MESSIAH. And all because, they had their faith in their own interpretation of the Scriptures instead of the Scriptures themselves. Next let’s look at,

THE ENEMIES

Verse 6 says, “And the Pharisees went forth, and straightway took counsel with the Herodians against him, how they might destroy him.”

Briefly, the Pharisees were not friends of the Herodians at all. It is amazing how two opposing forces can get together to fight a common enemy. It is also interesting that they considered Jesus the enemy. The healing of the man was not a violation of the law of Moses. Jesus is the ONE WHO GAVE THE LAW. He came to fulfill it. Had it been a violation of the law, Jesus would have said to the man, “sit down, I’ll take care of this tomorrow.” The truth of the matter is that the Pharisees would have found something wrong with it the next day. Have you noticed that the enemy is always unreasonable? They wanted to kill Jesus because His CORRECT INTERPRETATION OF THE LAW exposed their wrong interpretation of it.

The enemies of Jesus still exist. They hate Him and His Word. Read Roman chapter one to a homosexual and listen to his violent objection and appeal to sympathy by saying, “I was born this way,” which is a LIE in the face of the UNDENIABLE REVELATION OF GOD. Then next let’s look at,

HIS WITHDRAWAL

After Jesus refused to yield to the Pharisee’s wrong interpretation of the law and healed the man, verse 7 says, “But Jesus withdrew himself with his disciples to the sea . . .” He did not stay to debate the issue. He did not withdraw as a coward. He came to die for the very ones who wanted to kill Him. But the time was not right. So He withdrew.

We are reminded that God in His sovereignty can withdraw never to give one an opportunity to repent. He did this in Noah’s day. Gen. 6:3 says, “And the LORD said, My spirit shall not always strive with man, for that he also is flesh: yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years.” It also says in Proverbs 29:1: “He, that being often reproved hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, and that without remedy..”

Someone has said, “This is a line over which a man can step beyond which there is no return.” We do not know where that line is but we do know that Jesus said in John 6:44: “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him . . .” Therefore, we should immediately respond to His call. It is always a call of mercy and love.

May the Lord bless these words to our hearts.

In Christ

Bro. White