How Love Responds to Leprosy

“While Jesus was in one of the towns, a man came along who was covered with leprosy. When he saw Jesus, he fell with his face to the ground and begged him, ‘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!’ And immediately the leprosy left him. ” —Luke 5:12–13 (NIV)

Some things about love and leprosy seem to be diametrically opposed. For several millennia, people with leprosy have been regarded as “unclean,” even in the Levitical law of the Old Testament (see Leviticus 13).

Our natural response to anything characterized as unclean is to avoid it. Even more so, we naturally avoid that which is unsightly to our own eyes, whether it has been labeled “unclean” or not.

If we are willing to be excruciatingly honest with ourselves, we must confess that association with disease, especially if it is disfiguring, is something that we naturally want to avoid and that we may go out of our way to avoid.

This is undoubtedly the case with Jesus’ encounter with the leper described by Dr. Luke.

Why do you suppose that Luke included this account in his record of the Jesus’ ministry?

Because Luke was a doctor? That doesn’t seem likely. Because Matthew and Mark recorded the event (see Matthews 8 and Mark 1)?

Because it was a miracle? When we consider that Jesus healed many people of many diseases and that John said that Jesus did so many more wonders (in just three years!) that it would have been impossible to record them, this, too, seems unlikely. There must be something more.

The leper’s healing demonstrates the power of God revealed in His Son. But Jesus did two other things that even the leper didn’t expect.

He reached out, and He touched him. Jesus could have—actually, He did—healed the leper by willing it to be so. But even before he revealed His power, Jesus showed His love by doing what no one else would even think to do by reaching out and touching him.

The Apostle Paul explained that love “does not dishonor others” (I Corinthians 13:5 NIV). Matthew, Mark and Luke included this critical act because Jesus demonstrated His love as love should be demonstrated. He did not ignore the leper or his disease. He expressed compassion flowing from the same love that would take Him to the Cross for all of us.


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