Quarantined

 

Little Things, part 6

 

Introduction

In 2020, planet Earth experienced one of the most devastating pandemics in its history. One of the governments’ solutions to this was for everyone to be in lockdown, or quarantine, for a period of 30 or more days. To be inside the same four walls day-in and day-out for any length of time can be tasking on the mind, body, and spirit.

Imagine in the days of the bible; those who had leprosy. They were quarantined indefinitely, and with other lepers, as a cure was not available; aside from a miracle. Our “little thing” focuses on Jesus and a certain leper in Mark 1.

 

Lepers according to the Old Law

I’ll spare the details of describing leprosy and those who had it. Rather, let’s turn to the Old Testament and see what The Law had to say. Leviticus 13 and 14 gives a detailed breakdown of the disease and what was to be done with the individuals. Let’s look specifically at Leviticus 13:46, "He shall be unclean. All the days he has the sore he shall be unclean. He is unclean, and he shall dwell alone; his dwelling shall be outside the camp.

As an unclean person, he cannot be touched by anyone else. This is explained in Leviticus 5:3, 'Or if he touches human uncleanness-whatever uncleanness with which a man may be defiled, and he is unaware of it-when he realizes it, then he shall be guilty. A person is ceremoniously unclean and must bathe both body and clothes and be considered unclean until evening (Lev. 15:5-7).

 

Jesus and the 10 Lepers

One of the miracles Jesus performed is found in Luke 17:12-19 in which he cleansed ten lepers. The focus of this scene is on the one leper who, after finding himself cleansed, turned back, thanked God, and fell at Jesus’ feet. But let’s focus on verses 12-14, Then as He entered a certain village, there met Him ten men who were lepers, who stood afar off. And they lifted up their voices and said, "Jesus, Master, have mercy on us!" So when He saw them, He said to them, "Go, show yourselves to the priests." And so it was that as they went, they were cleansed.

From these verses, let’s looked at a couple of things. First, in verse 12 it said the lepers stood afar off. This shows that they are outcasts and were apart from the others. In verse 14, Jesus simply said, "Go, show yourselves to the priests." They were cleansed by His command.

 

The Leper He Touched

In an earlier story, we see Jesus encounter a leper in the area of Galilee.  Here it is in Mark 1:40-42, Now a leper came to Him, imploring Him, kneeling down to Him and saying to Him, "If You are willing, You can make me clean." Then Jesus, moved with compassion, stretched out His hand and touched him, and said to him, "I am willing; be cleansed." As soon as He had spoken, immediately the leprosy left him, and he was cleansed.

As we stated before, it is forbidden for anyone to touch an uncleaned person; they become ceremoniously unclean. Also, we note that Jesus has healed people with a simple statement. The question is, why did Jesus touch this man? That is our “little thing”.

The man knew that Jesus could heal him; he had faith. From that, Jesus, being moved with compassion, healed the man, and touched Him in reassurance that he was indeed healed and completely cleansed of the leprosy. This would have been the first human contact that the man experienced since he became a leper for months; maybe years.

 

Fear the Lord!

When a person has a panic attack or is afraid of illness or touching someone who is ill, that’s person’s immune system is lowered and their resistance to any illness becomes lower. Fear is a common emotion but also a common enemy of the body’s own immune system.

If people spent less time fearing the pandemic and more on fearing God, they would be able to withstand what comes their way. This is not to say that they will be completely immune to any and all disease but, rather, that with faith in God, they know He’ll get them through anything. As it is written in Proverbs 1:7, The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, But fools despise wisdom and instruction.

 

Conclusion

When we put our faith in God, we can do many things. We can resist the devil (James 4:7) and we can survive the worse of any pandemic. Remember to put on the whole armor of God (Ephesians 6) every day.