Confidence in Jesus

Today’s gospel from Mark 1:40-45 is about Jesus curing a leper. It is interesting to note that, according to Mark, this incident takes place very early in Jesus’ ministry. He has barely begun to teach and perform miracles and this leper believes that Jesus can cure him! It seems that the leper’s faith in Jesus comes from some intuitive sense that this man from Nazareth has special powers. That is why he says to Jesus, “If you want to, you can cure me.” It is almost like he is taunting or challenging Jesus. “I dare you to use the power I believe you have.” Mind you, by exercising his divine powers of healing Jesus could make it difficult for himself to move freely around town. Still, Jesus naturally responds by saying, “Of course I want to! Be cured!” He asks the man who had been cured to go and show himself to the priest so that he can be officially recognised as having been cured. This would also give the former leper the right to move freely around town because there was no longer any danger of him spreading leprosy. Unfortunately the man also went about telling everyone about this miracle even though Jesus had also asked him not to say anything to people. As a consequence, while the leper became clean and permitted to walk freely among the people of the town, Jesus had to leave the town and live out in those places where lepers and “unclean” people lived. Still, people came looking for Jesus. I suppose this is a text that challenges us to trust in Jesus and to believe that he can heal us. But the real healing is that which breaks down the barriers between the so-called “clean” and “unclean”. So, this text also challenges us to reach out to those others may avoid, even at the risk of being judged “unclean” ourselves.