Matthew 8:14

Matthew 8:14

In our last Bible study we saw that Jesus had healed a leper and the paralyzed servant of the Roman centurion. This time it is Peter’s mother in law. Matthew 8:14-15 says, "And when Jesus was come into Peter’s house, he saw his wife’s mother laid, and sick of a fever. And he touched her hand, and the fever left her: and she arose, and ministered unto them."

When Jesus healed the leper and the centurion’s servant, they came to Him. But when Jesus healed this person, He came to her. The spiritual lesson that we can learn from this is that when we are touched by Jesus, it is both He who comes to us and we who come to him. There is cooperation between God and man that must take place. It is really God who initiates any spiritual awakening, but it will not take place unless people cooperate and respond properly with faith in Him.

It is also worth noting that Jesus healed both men and women. There was no difference. Here is the best basis for true equality: recognizing the common spiritual condition and need of both men and women. “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” Jesus died for all and is not willing that any should perish. This is equally true for both male and female, black and white, old and young.

Matthew 8:16-17 says, "When the even was come, they brought unto him many that were possessed with devils: and he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were sick: That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses."

Jesus has total power over all of the evil forces of the earth, and that is why He so easily cast demons out of people. This is of great comfort to those of us who are believers. We have nothing to fear as long as we walk in fellowship with the Lord. The forces of evil are powerless because of the power of Christ. If you are a believer, when the worst of things happen you can be sure that God permitted it for a reason, and when the final result is known; it will be for good and it will glorify God.

It is important to note that Jesus cast out the evil spirits with His word. We can never underestimate the importance of keeping ourselves in God’s Word. The word of God is alive and powerful. Don’t miss out on the power of God’s Word to improve the quality of your life and to give you victory over the forces of evil. There is such a thing as being possessed by an evil spirit. This should not be hard to believe for anyone who lives in our day and age, not when you consider some of the horrendous crimes that are being committed: from Jack the Ripper to other serial murderers. Man has made much progress in the study of human behavior; but one of the sources of psychopathic behavior is when an evil spirit takes control of the mind of a human being. It should be of great comfort to the believer to know that these evil spirits are totally powerless when faced with the Word of God through Jesus Christ.

Isaiah chapter 53 is quoted here, and it is one of the astounding prophetic chapters of the Old Testament that describes in detail the sufferings of Christ for us even though it was written hundreds of years before His birth. There were at least 3 reasons that Jesus healed every sick person that He ever met. The first reason was because He empathized so greatly with human suffering. If someone suffers, Christ suffers with them. He cares about us greatly. Another way that Jesus demonstrated His empathy for humans was the fact that the term that He most often used for Himself was Son of Man.

A second reason that Jesus healed everyone who crossed His path was to prove who He was. No one before or since has had such a power to heal and perform miracles, and that is because He is the only begotten Son of God. He is unique, one of a kind, and the miracles that He did was among the proofs of who He is.

A third reason for the healings was probably to remind us all that in His kingdom to come there will be no disease or suffering of any kind. Our ultimate hope is not in what will happen in this life, but what will happen in the next, when we are in the kingdom of God and of Christ. Knowing this can comfort us greatly when we are called to suffer something according to His will.

The Lord can still cure any disease, but He does not always choose to do so. The apostle Paul prayed 3 times that the affliction of his eyes would be healed but it was not God’s will to do it. Sometimes He does not cure our afflictions in order to show us how His power can be manifested in spite of our limitations. This was certainly the situation with Fanny Crosby, who wrote a great many of the old spiritual hymns even though she was blind, such as: “Tell Me the Story of Jesus”, “To God Be the Glory”, “Redeemed”, “He Hideth My Soul”, and “Blessed Assurance”. There are no physical handicaps that can keep a person from serving God. Anyone can have a ministry of prayer, and can have the same challenge that we all have to live by faith and to be led by the Spirit.

Matthew 8:18 says; "Now when Jesus saw great multitudes about Him, he gave commandment to depart unto the other side." Jesus came to save the world, but He saves us one at a time. The multitudes will probably never be able to truly worship Jesus Christ. These multitudes had heard about the miracles that Jesus was performing and had come to see a sideshow, but Jesus would not stand for that and so He left. There are some today who create sideshows in their worship services in order to draw a crowd. They could learn a lesson from the attitude of Jesus towards such things.

Matthew 8:19-20 says, "And a certain scribe came, and said unto him, Master, I will follow you wherever you go. And Jesus said unto him, The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man has not where to lay his head." What is being taught here is the cost of true discipleship. This person had the correct attitude. Anyone who desires to be a follower of Jesus Christ must be willing to go anywhere that God wants him to go. Jesus said that if you think that you are ready to begin such a journey, you might need to sit down and count the cost. During the time of His 3-year ministry, He was often on the road traveling from town to town, and at such times did not have His own home to stay in. You had better count the cost before you claim that you are willing to do anything for the Lord, because He just might take you up on it.

Matthew 8:21-22 says, "And another of His disciples said unto him, Lord, allow me first to go and bury my father. But Jesus said unto him, Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead." Again this teaches us that in order to be a follower of Jesus, our allegiance to Him must be greater than any human ties. This was probably not a situation where someone simply wanted to attend a funeral, but was a person who wanted to put off following the Lord because of an attachment to a human father and a desire to stay with that father throughout the rest of the father’s natural life. Only then would this person consider following Jesus. Remember when Jesus had said in the Sermon on the Mount that no one can serve two masters? That applies to human relationships, as well as to material possessions. Jesus will say this same thing again a little later in Matthew 10:37, "He that loves Father or Mother more than me is not worthy of me: and he that loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me."

Matthew 8:23-27 tells us one of the very well known incidents in the life of Jesus, when He quieted the wind and the waves. Starting in verse 23 the Bible says, "And when he was entered into a ship, his disciples followed him. And, behold, there arose a great tempest in the sea, insomuch that the ship was covered with the waves: but he was asleep. And his disciples came to him, and awoke him, saying, Lord, save us: we perish. And he said unto them, Why are you fearful, O you of little faith? Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm. But the men marvelled, saying, What manner of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him?"

When the disciples became afraid of the waves and asked the Lord to save them, He said to them, "O you of little faith." This exact same phrase the Lord had used in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 6:30 when He admonished His followers to not worry about their material needs. A true believer should never worry, and a true believer should never fear anything. We must be careful or the attitudes of the unbelievers will creep up on us. A believer should be the bravest of all people. After all, are we not relying upon the great and all-powerful God, who will do anything for us? What is there to fear, anyway? God has given to us eternal life and we will live until He is finished with us, and then we will go to be with Him where it is much better. Paul said, "For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain."

Meteorologists do have a tough job. Even with Doppler radar, satellites, and computerized equipment; it is very difficult to predict the weather even 24 hours ahead of time. But Jesus can do more than predict it; He can control it. If you do not like the weather, just ask Jesus to change it. He is the only one who can do so. He used this storm to teach the disciples a lesson about their own fear and lack of faith in contrast to His own power and ability to take care of them.

The men marveled and said, "What manner of man is this, that even the winds and the sea obey him?" They were just recently with Him when He healed so many sick, and cast out demons. Should it be a surprise that even the winds and the sea obey Him? What manner of man is He? If you know the answer to this question, then you understand the way to eternal life. Jesus would ask the disciples the same question later, when He said to the disciples "Whom do men say that I am?" The answer is that He is more than just a man. He is the God-man. He is the eternal Son who came from eternity with the Father to live in the form of a man and to have the compassion to die for our sins.

The winds and the sea that rose up against the disciples are symbolic of the trials and tribulations that will arise from time to time against each believer. We have this wonderful source of comfort, knowing that we also can come to the Lord and ask for His assistance, and He can quiet any storm and solve any problem.

In Matthew 8:28-34 is the remarkable incident of the demons at Gadara. Earlier in this chapter the Bible says that Jesus cast out demons with His Word. Now perhaps the best known of those incidents is explained with quite a bit of detail. In verse 28 the Bible says, "And when he was come to the other side into the country of the Gadarenes, there met him two possessed with devils, coming out of the tombs, exceeding fierce, so that no man might pass by that way. And behold, they cried out saying, What have we to do with thee, Jesus, thou Son of God? Are you come here to torment us before the time? And there was a good way off from them a herd of many swine feeding. So the devils besought Him, saying, If you cast us out, permit us to go away into the herd of swine. And he said unto them, Go. And when they were come out, they went into the herd of swine: and, behold, the whole herd of swine ran violently down a steep place into the sea, and perished in the waters. And they that kept them fled, and went their ways into the city, and told everything, and what was befallen to the possessed of the devils. And, behold, the whole city came out to meet Jesus: and when they saw Him, they besought him that he would depart out of their coasts."

Several things can be learned about demons in this passage. The first is that they are very much afraid of God. They are afraid because they have no power against Him, and because they know that their doom is assured. If demons had knees, their knees would have been knocking together. They knew who Jesus was, and they addressed Him as the Son of God. One could say that the demons believed, just as James says that the demons "believe and tremble." But this kind of belief is only an intellectual knowledge. Make sure that you have the right kind of belief, and not simply the kind that the demons have.

In verse 29 the demons said, "What have we to do with you, Jesus?" It’s a rhetorical question and the answer is obvious: the demons have absolutely nothing in common with God or Christ. Jesus easily cast out the demons because of His power as the Son of God, and also because it is impossible for the spirit of evil to co-exist with the Spirit of God. When a person becomes converted to Jesus Christ, they obtain the spiritual birth and the Spirit of God actually comes and dwells within them. That’s why it is called the baptism of the Spirit, and that is also why the forces of evil can no longer have access to such a person. Those who have the Spirit of Christ within them have this great protection, but those who do not have the Spirit of Christ are easy targets and are capable of unimaginable evil.

Once the demons recognized Christ, they knew that they would be cast out. If they could not inhabit a human, they sought permission to inhabit a herd of swine. It appears as though the demons are compelled to seek a living creature to inhabit.

In seeking permission from the Lord to enter into the herd of swine, we are once again presented with the omnipotence of God. It is God who controls all things. Absolutely nothing is done without His divine oversight and permission. What is so amazing is that God will hold the evil responsible for their evil deeds, but will at the same time use the final outcome of their evil deeds to accomplish His will and glorify His name. The best example of this was the death of Jesus Christ. Satan inspired cruel and deceitful men to put Jesus to death, but God permitted it and used it all for the possible salvation of every member of the human race.

This wonderful truth of the omnipotence of God is important for faith and for peace of mind that can allow you to accept anything that comes your way. God is all-powerful. He sees, and knows, and permits, and controls every event that takes place. The book of Isaiah in the Old Testament has some passages that spend a good deal of time talking about this great power of God. If you want to be comforted by this truth, read Isaiah starting in chapter 40 and going to the end of the book of Isaiah. It is a section of the Bible that can fill you full of joy and confidence in the almighty power of God. For example Isaiah 40:28 says, "Have you not known? Have you not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, faints not, neither is weary? there is no searching of his understanding." Isaiah 42:5 says, "Thus says God the Lord, he that created the heavens, and stretched them out; he that spread forth the earth, and that which comes out of it; he that gives breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them that walk in it." Another good example is Isaiah 45:5-7 that says, "I am the Lord, and there is none else, there is no God beside me. I girded you, though you have not known me. That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the Lord, and there is none else. I form the light and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil. I the Lord do all these things." Without such a doctrine, how else could we keep our faith when horrible things happen? Was not God’s own Son murdered by cruel men? Even if someone that you love becomes a victim of murder, God permitted it; because it was their time to go and because He is using the entire situation somehow for His glory.

We must not miss the fact that in these 8 verses about the demons at Gadara, Jesus said only one thing to them and it is recorded in verse 32. As a matter of fact He said only one word to them, "Go." And the demons left the humans, entered into the swine, and ran into the sea where the swine perished.

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