I am willing; be cleansed

 And so it was, when Jesus had ended these sayings, that the people were astonished at His teaching, for He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.

When He had come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed Him.  And behold, a leper came and worshiped Him, saying, "Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean."  Then Jesus put out His hand and touched him, saying, "I am willing; be cleansed."  Immediately his leprosy was cleansed.  And Jesus said to him, "See that you tell no one; but go your way, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, as a testimony to them."

- Matthew 7:28-8:4

In yesterday's reading, Jesus concluded the Sermon on the Mount:   "Many will say to Me in that day, 'Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?'  And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!'  Therefore whoever hears these sayings of Mine, and does them, I will liken him to a wise man who built his house on the rock:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it did not fall, for it was founded on the rock.  But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand:  and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, and it fell.  And great was its fall."

 And so it was, when Jesus had ended these sayings, that the people were astonished at His teaching, for He taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.   As Jesus concludes the Sermon on the Mount, people are astonished at His teaching.  This is not because of the things He teaches, but rather because of the impact of His Person in teaching.  That is, He teaches as one having authority, and not as the scribes.  He possesses authority within Himself.  The scribes would cite famous rabbis for their teachings, and speak in the third person; but Jesus teaches the doctrine of His Father in heaven.  In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus speaks of the Law and the Prophets, but also adds, "I say to you."

When He had come down from the mountain, great multitudes followed Him.  And behold, a leper came and worshiped Him, saying, "Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean."  Then Jesus put out His hand and touched him, saying, "I am willing; be cleansed."  Immediately his leprosy was cleansed.  And Jesus said to him, "See that you tell no one; but go your way, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, as a testimony to them."  My study bible explains that the biblical law which concerned leprosy is found in Leviticus 13 and 14.  Deuteronomy 24:8 is a description of the purification of lepers and leprous houses, a duty entrusted to the priests.   It adds that leprosy was considered to be a direct punishment for sins, and as lepers were designated unclean, they were not permitted to live in the community or to worship in synagogues or the temple.  Although touching the unclean was forbidden (Leviticus 7:21), Jesus touched the leper.  This is an expression of God's compassion, and also an extension of Christ's authority perceived by the crowds who heard Him preach the Sermon on the Mount.  My study bible calls it an expression of the fact that He is not subject to the Law but over it.  It adds, "To the clean, nothing is unclean."

One thing that we can note about Jesus is always His impulse to expand community.  The sort of guidelines or limits or barriers around community that might form expectations or understanding are abolished in Him.  They are reshaped, reformed, redefined.  In this case, a leper, who is considered to be unclean under the Law, comes to Him in faith.   As the verses that form this story of the leper indicate, Jesus has just come down from this elevated high place on which He's given the Sermon on the Mount.  Great multitudes, the text says, are following Him, and it is in this context that the leper approaches Him to worship Him.  This word for "worship" in the Greek literally indicates a position of prostration, bowing one's head to the ground.  Perhaps the leper hid himself in the crowd to hear Jesus speak; perhaps he has heard of Jesus' teaching from these crowds.  But whatever the reason, Jesus has just finished expressing His own "fullness" of the Law and the Prophets (see especially 5:17-48).  In that context, we might consider this action of healing the leper to be one more extension of "you have heard that it was said to those of old . . . but I say to you . . .."   For although the Law prohibits touching what is unclean, Jesus reaches with His touch to heal the leper.  Note that this is an expression of the fulfillment of the Law, for Jesus does not say, "I am willing; be healed," but "I am willing; be cleansed."  If the true objective of the Law is for the community to be clean, Jesus' action of touching and healing achieves this goal in ways the Law could not envision.  He changes our entire perspective on community by doing so, for the unclean has become the clean through a forbidden touch.  It reminds us of the ultimate mystery of Christ's Passion, death, and Resurrection, by which death is destroyed through death.  Jesus' boundaries are those of the divine and not the earthly.  His extension of community happens through divine work in the world, through adoption via faith.  His expansion of definition of community is given to us in the story of the Good Samaritan, in which it is the one who acts as a neighbor who is truly a neighbor.  It is a foreign female, a Samaritan woman, and one who is a sinner, with whom He breaks all taboos by first speaking to her alone, and to whom He first fully reveals Himself as Messiah in John's Gospel.  She then becomes, in effect, the first evangelist to her own neighbors (John 4:1-42).  We should keep in mind that Jesus upholds the Law by instructing the healed leper to follow the precepts of the Law by showing himself to a priest, and offering the gift that Moses commanded.  But Jesus fulfills the Law also by inviting into the world His own expressions of rules, laws, boundaries, and expansion of community.  This is a fulfillment of the Law that works through faith and the power of grace which He brings into the world.  We are expected, in turn, to pay attention, to come to understand, and to be willing ourselves to be changed through His power and grace and through faith.  Let us remember that we get there not so much through remembering rules as we do via a prayerfully lived life, in which each new encounter must be approached with our own willingness to be changed and healed through the perception He offers us.   Keep in mind that Jesus teaches that those who are with Him gather, and those who are against Him scatter (12:30) -- even as He castigates the leadership for their failure to accept His teaching.  So we are led to cast off things of which we were certain, and to accept that which we might have excluded, through a life of prayer and growth in His teaching and grace.