Over the next six weeks, I’ll be posting a series of devotional reflections for children on Matthew, chapter 8. These are free for your use as devotionals for your family. Here is the first.
Can you think of a time that you needed help—help with homework, help with learning a new skill, or even simply help to reach something that’s high on a shelf? Maybe you got lost and needed help to find your way home. Perhaps you fell and needed someone to lift you up or help you put on a band-aid. In today’s passage, we find a man who desperately needed help.
Read Matthew 8:1–4
In Matthew 8:1–4, Jesus encountered a man who suffered from leprosy. Leprosy, or Hansen’s disease, is a chronic infection caused by bacteria in a person’s skin that causes it to develop whites sores, lose feeling, and eventually waste away. In Bible times, a person with leprosy was considered cursed by God (Num. 12:10, 12; Job 18:13), and they were required to live away from God’s people—outside a city or camp. Healings from leprosy were rare (Num. 12:1–15; 2 Kings 5:9–14) , so being diagnosed with this terrible condition could force a person to live apart from his family for his entire life.
The man with leprosy bowed down before Jesus and said, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.” Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” Immediately the man was cured of his leprosy.
The man with leprosy had heard stories about Jesus’s miracles, and he was confident that Jesus had the power to heal him. His only concern was that he’d be passed by. When Jesus answered, “I am willing,” he showed us that his will, his desire, his want-to is what matters. Jesus’s will is decisive. As D. A. Carson observes, “He already had the authority and power and only needed to decide and act.”
Game: Can You Eat It? Do You Want To?
Here is a game you can play to help kids distinguish between ability and will. Read each item from the list below and then ask your kids, “Can you eat it? Do you want to?”
Broccoli Casserole
Vanilla Ice Cream with Sprinkles
Pimento and Cheese Ice Cream
A Blue Whale (If the kids say they can eat it, ask if they can eat all of it.)
Hamburger and Fries
Steak and Potatoes
Dirt with Earth Worms
Say: We aren’t able to eat everything. But just because we are able to eat something doesn’t mean that we will also want to eat it.
In the Bible passage we read today, Jesus was able to heal the man with leprosy, but the man wondered if Jesus would also be willing to heal him. Jesus said, “I am willing.” Jesus does not choose to heal every sick person. He is able, but for reasons we don’t always understand, he is not always willing.
But whenever people confess and turn from their sins, Jesus is always willing and able to forgive them. 2 Peter 3:9 says, “The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.”
Think, Pray, and Apply
Jesus was willing to heal the man with leprosy and he did so right away. After the miracle, Jesus told the man to do two things that might not make a lot of sense to us at first.
First, Jeus told the man to keep this miraculous healing a secret. He didn’t want people to come to him and pressure him to do miracle after miracle. Jesus didn’t work wonders so that he could be popular with people. Instead, the miracles were meant to be a testimony about his mission to save people from the sickness of sin through his death on the cross.
Second, Jesus told the man to go to the temple, show himself to the priest there, and then offer the gift that Moses had commanded (Lev. 14). When a leper was healed from the terrible disease, the priest would check his body to make sure that all of the sores were gone. Then, he would offer a sacrifice to God to give thanks for the healing.
When Jesus was alive, a cure and treatment for leprosy hadn’t been discovered. So I imagine this was a part of God’s law that hadn’t been obeyed very often. When the healed man went to the temple to be checked out by the priest, he had an amazing story to tell. This law—so rarely fulfilled— was now obeyed as a testimony to Jesus’s power.
Did you know that your obedience can also be a testimony to Jesus’s power? After Jesus rose from the dead, he gave his Holy Spirit to his followers. The Holy Spirit helps believers by living within them and making them willing and able to obey his commands—even commands that you may have rarely followed before!
Think about something God has commanded that is difficult for you. It could be not complaining about school work, having a good attitude about chores, or being kind to a brother or sister. Take a moment to confess this to your parent.
Pray and ask God to make you a willing and able testimony to his great power. Ask the Holy Spirit to strengthen you to obey God and do what is right even when it is difficult.
Gospel-Centered Family’s mission is to help parents and church leaders share Jesus with the next generation. Below you’ll find information about our upcoming coaching cohorts as well as this week’s links.
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Thanks again for subscribing and reading!
Jared Kennedy
Registration Is Open for 3 Fall Cohorts!
There’s nothing like doing ministry to expose our anxiety and weaknesses. We feel it on those days when the stalled check-in computer or the missing medical release form stresses us out. But in the midst of our weakness, there’s great glory in knowing and sharing Jesus with the next generation.
One of the most helpful ways to keep your leadership and ministry centered on and—more importantly—shaped by the gospel is to get help through coaching. Our coaching cohorts will help you improve your personal leadership health as well as your ministry capacity. Opportunities are open for children’s ministry, special needs ministry, and student ministry leaders this Fall.
This Week’s Links
Sandra Peoples wrote at The Gospel Coalition about 4 ways churches can be welcoming to special needs families. She wrote, “I’m confident every church can move from ‘We think people with disabilities would be welcome’ to ‘We know they would be welcome.’”
Children’s ministry veteran Jim Wideman wrote for Church Leaders on signs of spiritual life to look for in kids. He concludes the post this way, “To me, the proof of the discipleship process is in the living. It’s not what you know or feel or think; it’s knowing Christ, walking by faith, thinking the Word and doing exactly what it says.”
Lifeway Kids gave some encouragement for when things get tough in ministry. This is a practical post that applies to more that just ministry; it’s really a way to look at life as we near the end of COVID. If you’ve ever wanted to quit, and we’ve all been there, this post is for you.