The Unforgivable Act of Forgiving Sins
When Jesus saw their faith, he said, “Friend, your sins are forgiven.” Luke 5:20
Read the story in Luke 5:17-26, Mark 2:1-12, Matthew 9:1-8,
The crowds squeezed into the house in Capernaum where Jesus was staying. They looked in through the doorway and windows; they overflowed into the streets straining to catch any word that would drift their way. People had come from all over to hear God’s Word taught by God’s own son. They didn’t realize that was what they were experiencing – they only knew this Jesus knew things they didn’t know about God and His Kingdom.
There in the front row sat a handful of their religious leaders: the Pharisees and the teachers of the Jewish law. They had come to hear this man’s teaching for themselves. Rumors of this unusual rabbi pulling rabbits out of hats had spread far and wide. If they were lucky, they just might see him perform one of his unusual tricks for themselves.
There was a scraping noise above them as roof tiles were lifted away. Sunlight poured into the room; dust drifted down in a soft cloud. From above a paralyzed man was carefully lowered down into the room before Jesus.
I imagine Jesus looking first to the man and then looking up to see the expectant hope-filled faces of his four friends. And what he saw was faith. Great faith. These men who interrupted the teaching of Jesus were convinced that Jesus could and would heal their friend.
Jesus looked intently at the paralyzed man and said the strangest thing:
“Friend, your sins are forgiven.”
What? Wait a minute, Jesus – you misunderstand what we are hoping for here! We want the man to walk again! We want the muscles to regain their strength! We want his brain to successfully transmit through those damaged nerves the message to move again! That’s what his friends are thinking.
What are the religious leaders thinking? They are not as concerned about the possibility of a physical healing because they are so offended by Jesus’s outrageous statement that he has just forgiven the sins of this man. How dare he? That is the job of the priest to go before God with great sacrifices and ask for forgiveness that can only be granted by God. This Jesus is claiming the ultimate ability of God alone! Forgiveness! How dare he? The religious leaders are the closest ones in the room to God and they wouldn’t dare even think such a thing!
Jesus knows exactly what they are thinking. This is the beauty of Jesus - he sees into our selfish hearts; he reads the intentions of our thoughts as if they are words on a page. He knows the hard reasoning that trickles into our human sense of justification; we think if someone has something horrible happen to them, God is withholding His blessings from that person. They must deserve it. “What great sin brought on God’s punishment?” they silently wonder about their afflicted neighbors.
Jesus knows this. So he has gone to the heart of the matter. Sin. “Friend, your sins are forgiven.”
That didn’t go over well. So he directs his next words to the unhappy leaders; “Which is easier? To say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, take up your bed and walk’?”
Don’t you love this? Both are impossible! With Jesus in town, people were hoping for a miracle, they were expecting a miracle… a physical one. But a spiritual miracle of forgiveness? Who would have possibly expected something like this? Nobody.
Yet Jesus knew we needed an outward sign to tell the story of inward spiritual healing. Still looking at the religious leaders, he clearly states; “So you will know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins" and with this, he turns to look into the eyes of the paralyzed man on the mat, "I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home."
And he did.
Slow down a moment and think before you start celebrating this glorious miracle with the crowd. Look closely at what Jesus said about himself; “…the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins…”. Each word here is a powerhouse filled with meaning.
Jesus referred to himself as the ‘Son of Man’. He is referencing Daniel’s vision of ‘one who looked like a son of man who was able to stand before the Ancient of Days and was given all power and all of God’s glory’. (Daniel 7:13,14). Remember that guy?
Jesus is also claiming to have ‘authority on earth’. That will be something those religious leaders would be asking Jesus about later; “Who has given you this authority?” They weren’t going to like the answer.
And here’s the kicker: Jesus had come to do more than make a paralyzed man walk. He had come to heal the ultimate problem – the problem of sin.
Remember that pesky problem that Satan had enticed Eve with; “Take a little bite of this pride… it is just so good… you won’t be able to take just one bite. Never mind all that stuff God said about it being the death of you – He is just trying to keep you under his thumb. Go ahead… you’ll like it.” And it had been a problem ever since.
Sin: it becomes death embedded deep within our souls and there just doesn't seem to be any way to get it out. God had provided a release from the guilt and sorrow – the blood of an innocent animal instead of our own – but it was always a temporary fix. Give us a few days and we were right back at it. Sin. Yep, it was a problem.
And forgiveness? Standing righteous in the eyes of a righteous God? He could always see into our hearts and read our thoughts and there was no hiding the separation we felt from Him. But here is Jesus saying something so outrageous; “But that you may know the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins… I will do something you can see with your own eyes that is equally outrageous, I will make a paralyzed man walk just by saying the word ‘rise’.” (My interpretation of the scripture.)
Luke tells us the crowd was seized with amazement. Everyone glorified God. They were filled with awe. “We have seen extraordinary things today.” And what was unseen was even more amazing.
If you hear folks say that Jesus was a ‘good teacher’ or a ‘moral man’ or a ‘spokesman for God’ and leave it at that, they couldn’t be more wrong. Jesus seemed to be convinced he was more than that. He wasn’t content to entertain the crowds with magic tricks and physical healings. He seemed to have something much bigger in mind. Something that addressed the healing of their souls. Something about sin and forgiveness. Who, but God, could do such a thing?
If Jesus kept this up, those Jewish priests were going to be out of a job.
This Is Amazing Grace by Phil Wickham | Cover by Venture Worship featuring Lexi Eller