A reading of the holy gospel according to Saint Mark. And this is one of the most dramatic incidents in our lord's life, in my opinion. Jesus came back to Capernaum after a lapse now remember, this is that rather large city up in the Northwest corner of the lake, very very active city in the our lord's time, and probably the farthest large city away from the capital, Jerusalem. So Jesus came back to Capernaum after a lapse of several days and word got around that he was at home. At that, the people began to gather around him in great numbers.
There was no longer any room for them, even around the door of the house. While Jesus was delivering God's word to man, Some people arrived bringing a paralyzed man with them. The four who carried the man, the paralyzed man, were unable to bring the man to Jesus because of the throng, because of the crowd. So they went on the top of the house and opened up the roof over the spot where Jesus was standing. When they had made a hole, they let down the mat on which the paralytic was lying.
When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the the paralyzed man, my son, your sins are forgiven. Now some of the scribes were sitting around and asking themselves, why does this man talk in this manner? He commits blasphemy. Now there is a keyword. You see, Christ is saying your sins are forgiven, and the scribes and the pharisees sitting around say he is guilty of blasphemy.
The major premise of that syllogism is only god can forgive sin. This man says he's forgiving sin. Therefore, he makes himself out to be god, and that's the essence of blasphemy. So they this is the important point, so don't miss it. So our lord says, my son, your sins are forgiven.
Now some of the scribes were sitting around asking themselves, why does this man talk in that way? He commits blasphemy. Remember, if you committed blasphemy, you were guilty of death. Who can forgive sins except God alone? That's the major premise of that syllogism.
Jesus was immediately aware of their reason, though they kept it to themselves. They didn't speak it out loud apparently. So Jesus said to them, why do you harbor these thoughts? Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, your sins are forgiven, or to tell him, stand up, pick up your mat, and walk away. That you may know that the son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins.
He said to the paralyzed man, I command you, stand up, pick up your mat, and go home. The man stood up, picked up his mat, and went outside in the sight of everybody. They were awestruck. Everybody gave praise to god saying, we have never seen anything like this, and this is the gospel of the lord. In the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit.
Amen. Well, the least important part of this notice, this isn't a parable. Parable. This is supposed to be an actual incident from our lord's life. And the most important part of it is not what they saw in the sense of the the paralytic being cured.
That's not the main thrust here at all. The main thrust of this incident is that Christ is claiming to be God. Notice, not just an ambassador of God. Only God can forgive sins. If that statement is true, then anyone who who says I'm forgiving sins is making himself out to be God.
You can't escape it. And remember, this was the point. This is what the Jews got. By the Jews, I mean, the so called leaders of the people. This handful of the learned and I repeat this.
The ones who did not accept Jesus, the ones who rejected Jesus, the ones who seemed to be following him around all the time, trying to find cause to destroy him and finally succeeded, they put him on the cross. They were the leaders of the people. They were the educated. They were the influential. They were the men of prestige, religious and civil.
The common people heard Jesus for the most part. For the most part, it's the common people as we use that horrible word who saw and praised God when they saw these some of these wonderful things. Whereas, the critics of Our Lord, they saw the same thing, they heard the same thing, and yet their reaction was, how can we destroy? This incident from our lord's life is is extremely important when you talk about the divinity of Christ. If you ask, did Christ know who he was?
Now this is the question that's being asked, you know. Did Christ grow in consciousness of his personality? Did he grow into being the son of God? And it goes on and on. Well, what are the facts, madam?
Let's get to the what what happened? And the Jews were perfectly right in saying this man blasphemes. They were right if he wasn't God. They were totally wrong if he was god, and I said was and not were. It's not a contrary to fact condition.
And I you see, what impressed the people was the cure of the man. And it's extremely dramatic, even if I don't think it's necessary to get the picture of what happened to see a bunch of men on the top of the house with pickaxes or jackhammers putting a hole through the roof. Many houses in The Orient have good openings on the roof because the roof is, as many instances, practically another room. As soon as the sun goes down, people congregate up there. Plenty of houses, they have flat roofs, and in many instances, they have a rather large opening to let the air and the coolness of the night get in.
Not many houses were air conditioned in those days, that is with General Motors, products, or General Electric, or RCAs. So we don't need to make a big deal out of that, but the point is the the throngs, the crowds of people that were coming around Jesus, This is extraordinary. Now this is his country, remember. He came from Nazareth. Nazareth is just west as it is today.
It's less than an hour's ride. So the work he was known as the son of Joseph the carpenter, and here is making it's becoming extremely popular in the lake area, around the water, around this this vigorous and active city of Capernaum. He's taking his he's taking his stand on the Sabbath day in the synagogue of Capernaum and doing it on a regular basis apparently. And crowds are coming around. Why did they come?
Well, why do crowds go any place? You can get a crowd today anytime by just looking up in the sky. Just try it. You'll see it. A lot of people are gonna stop looking, they're gonna stop and they're gonna start looking up at the sky where you're just looking too.
It's it's not too difficult to get a crowd. It's not too difficult to get a crowd to follow you. We know this, how fickle the crowd is. Said the said Horace. So the but the point I make is this, how our blessed lord turns these popular events into something extremely profound.
He doesn't emphasize the curing of the paralytic. What our blessed lord emphasizes is forgiving forgiving sins. Only god can forgive sins. You forgive sins. You're making yourself out to be god.
Before the law, you are guilty of death. And remember, this was the charge that put Jesus on the cross. Because while the Jews had had autonomy in their religious at the the exercise of their religion and also as regards the application of their law to civil life, the Jews could not enforce the death penalty. That's why they had to go to Pilate. But it was on the charge that he made himself out to be God.
And just to make that a little more attractive to Pilate, they said, yeah, he claimed to be king because it there were plenty of people claiming to be God in those days. That wasn't anything new. But for a man to say, I am a king, that was pretty serious when Pilate thought he was it, and especially if Rome got news of this. So this was this is a tremendously important event in our Lord's life. The the text is clear.
There's no question of about its authenticity. The the the language is perfectly clear. There's no argument about that. None at all. And as I've said so many times, the best kind of testimony you have is the testimony of a man's enemies.
And our enemies today say, you are making yourself out to be God. That's what they thought Jesus was saying. That's what they thought he was doing. That was the implication and the explicit implication of his action of forgiving sins. And then you ask, did Jesus know who he was?
He claimed to be God because he was. The name of the father, and the son, and holy spirit. Amen.