Not The Healthy

I promise that I will indeed get that Bride of Christ series out---it is still being studied and written out in a Word document so I can figure out how to best divide the article into easy-to-read posts--believe me, it is WELL worth the wait on the amazing additions that this knowledge shows the love of our great God for us, His own. 

Today I am looking at the well known verse in Mark, and I will provide two translations:

"When Jesus heard this, He told them, " Healthy people don't need a doctor---sick people do. I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners." Mark 2.17 (NLT, from Joni Earekson Tada's Beyond Suffering Bible, 2015 ed. pg 1129.)

¹⁷ On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” Mk 2.17 NIV

I have always liked this passage, though I am more familiar of it with the NIV translation. I was reading the Beyond Suffering version, with its NLT, and was intrigued with the "those who know they are sinners". While both versions say it, the NLT tosses it a bit more bluntly into the open. 

When I consider the people I meet or have met, there are those who would openly say they are sinners. Some more openly would say that they were not perfect than others. But there are still today the people who say that salvation is theirs' based on the works they have done. Or they are not as bad as Joe next door. A misconception of salvation. 

In the time of Christ, the way to forgiveness was to lead a blameless life, following each of the laws of Moses as he was given them by God. There are 613 of these laws, most spinning off of the ten commandments while dealing with finer issues, from what I have read, but also including how and when to worship. The leaders of the Temple added their own laws, or interpretations of the laws, and this has continued to today. Some laws have been ousted, some added upon. It is said in most Judaic books to "try your hardest to do good works and be perfect."
Paul, if you recall, speaks of the perfection of his following the laws. 
When a law was broken, a sacrifice was made of a perfect animal, without blemish. Then, too, a sacrifice was made for the laws broken that that man or his family were not aware of. It was indeed a great amount of effort to be righteous, and to not need "a doctor". 
However, with such "perfection" comes pride. And pride in oneself, not in God, is again a sin. So we therefore find that those who think they are perfect are not perfect, but are sick without knowing it. 

The system then was so difficult, and the people felt swallowed up in sin, surrounded by pagan gods of the Romans. The teachings of Christ sounded so alive, so powerful, the people hungered for more. They cried out to Him as a healer of their bodies, but also as their souls. They saw themselves as wicked, as not quite managing the status of the Teachers of the Laws. The Teachers could not see where they were missing out---relying so on human standards and human deeds. 

Faith is what God asks of us. It was the faith of Abraham, taking Isaac to the mountaintop that pleased God. Faith in God is what He wants, to call Him "God", and to stop call ourselves god. We are sick and know we are sick when we can call out and ask God for forgiveness, that we believe in His Son who died for us. The righteous do not need a doctor, for they are not sick. But only one Man was never sick, and He was God. Those who fool themselves into thinking they are righteous (and don't we all with some pride, or some lies) are the ones who are sick and do not know it. 

Remember faith in Him, to lean on Him and not our own thinking and doing. Do what He sets before you, but not with the idea you are "earning" anything. Nothing could be done to repay what was given to us in love. What can any of us do to even repay a human deed done to us in love? How then could we repay God, the Creator of all about us? Sing Him praises in your hearts, be proud of the God of all, and rejoice that He came to you when you still said you weren't sick and convinced you you were sick after all.