His Healing Power

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Jesus& departed into the coasts of Tyre and Sidon. And,
behold, a woman of Canaan came out of the same coasts, and
cried unto him, saying, Have mercy on me, O Lord, thou son of
David; my daughter is grievously vexed with a devil. But he
answered her not a word. And his disciples came and besought
him, saying, Send her away; for she crieth after us. But he
answered and said, I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the
house of Israel. Then came she and worshipped him, saying, Lord,
help me. But he answered and said, It is not meet to take the chil-
dren s bread, and to cast it to dogs. And she said, Truth, Lord: yet
the dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from their masters table.
Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O woman, great is thy
faith: be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made
whole from that very hour
Matthew 15:21-28
Do you not love to plunge your hands into the Bible, that casket
of rarest gems, and bring them up dripping with sapphires of eternal
truth, emeralds of undying hope, and flashing faith diamonds?
D
God s throne rests on a pavement of sapphire, a rainbow& like
unto an emerald encircles it. (Rev. 4:3.)
Out of what darkness these diamonds are mined oftentimes.
Here is one, a Kohi-noor, Great Mogul, and Eastern Star, all in one
blazing, flashing, gleaming, glittering, glowing, sparkling, scintil-
lating, a star of the first magnitude in the gospel firmament, a
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His Healing Power
treasure of darkness, mined out of the broken heart of a woman
of Canaan.
A woman of Canaan! An alien from the commonwealth of
Israel, a stranger from the covenants of promise, without Christ,
having no hope, and without God in the world. (Eph. 2:12.)
A woman of Canaan! A devotee of the most ferocious and licen-
tious forms of heathenism that ever blotted the pages of history with
crime and tears and blood.
A woman of Canaan! Yet destined to wear forever on her
bosom, placed there by the Son of God Himself, an order of merit
beside which all earthly decorations and distinctions are but tinsel,
and the very stars of heaven fade into dimness! O woman, great is
thy faith! (Matt. 15:28.)
Everything was against her. There was absolutely nothing in her
favor. Very possibly she had never met a follower of the Lord Jesus
Christ or heard a Scripture passage read. But somehow a word of
God had been borne to her by the wind (that) bloweth where it
listeth. (John 3:8.)
Maybe a neighbor said, as he returned from a trip to Galilee, I
saw the man of Galilee yesterday.
You saw Him? What was He doing?
Healing sick children. A mother laid a little, pale, puny baby in
His arms; and He just patted it gently and looked up; and the baby
laughed and crowed with glee and began to play with Him. He
surely loves children.
Did He say anything?
Yes, He stretched out His arms and said, Come unto me,
all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.
(Matt. 11:28.)
Are you sure that He said that? Just that exactly?
Just that.
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A Woman of Canaan
He didn t say, Come unto me all Jews that labor and are
heavy laden ?
No, He said all. But where are you going?
To Him. He said for me to come, didn t He? If anybody is
heavy laden, I am sure I am with that poor, tortured, writhing girl
of mine.
But when she comes to Jesus she is met with silence! How can
He refuse to answer her when He bade her come? When the disci-
ples beg Him to get rid of her they are ashamed to be in her
company He answers in a way that seems to close the door of
hope to her forever: & I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the
house of Israel (Matt. 15:24). He was only teaching the baby to
walk by faith.
But when she presses to His very feet He uses language so appar-
ently harsh that one would think she would flee, affrighted and
affronted & It is not meet to take the children s bread, and to cast
it to dogs (v. 26). He called her a dog, a type to the Oriental mind
of everything unclean and loathsome, to bring her to a realizing
sense of her exceeding sinfulness.
Her path was beset with difficulties, but difficulties are the food
on which real faith thrives best. It must be tried as gold is tried in
the fire. The Lord Jesus saw in her true metal that would stand the
fire and come out gleaming brighter than ever. So He plunged her
into the furnace because He loved her and longed to see her shine as
the stars, forever and ever.
The way up is down, and before honor is humility. Jesus
brought her to a sense of sin; and when she had taken her place as
a poor, wretched sinner, a vile dog, He was able to exalt her to the
place of highest privilege and put the key of His treasure house into
her hands.
Nobly she met the test. See the faith-gold gleam in her simple
answer! Truth, Lord (v. 27)& Thy Word is truth. And may we not
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His Healing Power
imagine her saying to her own heart, I take the place it assigns to
me. Yet I will not despair. A dog, but even a dog has provision made
for him. And then to the Master: Thou wilt not deny to me the
dog s portion, the crumb that falls from the Master s table. It is all I
crave. Thou canst not deny it!
And He could not. He places in her outstretched hand an unlim-
ited order on His unsearchable riches.
Be it unto thee even as thou wilt, and with it bestows an
encomium worth more than all the plaudits ever received by earth s
greatest ones: & O woman, great is thy faith: be it unto thee even as
thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour
(v. 28).
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Chapter 3
The Man With the Withered Hand
It is only by faith that we can please God and fulfill His will. To
believe on Jesus Christ is the work of God, that is, the work that He
requires of us, from which all lesser works necessarily flow (John
I
6:28,29). They, the lesser works, are inevitable, however, for & faith
without works is dead (James 2:20).
You can t get to heaven in a rocking chair,
The Lord won t have no lazy folks there.
This is the work of God that you believe, and it is work and
not play.
If ever a man was certain of numerous progeny, Isaac to whom
offspring as the dust of the earth and the stars of heaven had been
promised, and upon whose betrothed wife, Rebecca, the blessing
Be thou the mother of thousands of millions (Gen. 24:60) had
been invoked was that man. Yet, it was not till the Lord was
intreated of him (Gen. 25:21) for his wife, who was barren for
twenty years, that Esau and Jacob made their appearance upon the
stage of human history. Isaac had to take the blessing by faith.
Yes, to turn promises into facts, as Dr. Northcote Deck puts
it, you have got to work the work of God, walk the walk of faith,
and it takes two feet to walk it, to pray and take. You may hop
around forever on one foot, praying, praying, praying, and get
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His Healing Power
nowhere. If that is your case, put down your take foot this
moment and march on to victory. Even Isaac had to do it; it is the
only way through.
In Luke 6:6-11 we find a flashing faith diamond, a gem of
purest ray serene, a man who took, though his right hand was
withered and he had nothing to take with. Jesus was teaching in a
synagogue and saw him with his withered hand, powerless, no grasp
to appropriate, no grip to retain, no punch to fight.
Dr. A. B. Simpson commented on this passage: So many [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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