I Have Never Seen Anything Like This...

I don’t know what time it was… must have been around noon. The sun was beating down and it was hotter than blazes. I don’t usually spend much time down there in Capernaum, but I did notice that the crowds were unusually large that day. And then these lunatics came pushing their way through the busy street and then up the sidewalk to the run down home. What on earth was going on there? They couldn’t possibly be trying to get into that house – it was already full of sick people. It looked like the town clinic; people moaning in pain, others appeared to be in some sort of seizures or demon-possessed, blind people groping around tripping over the ones lying on the floor. It was mass chaos from my point of view.

I thought I’d leave and go back home, until I saw the four men carrying the paraplegic on a makeshift stretcher trying desperately but unsuccessfully to get in the front door… somehow ended up on the roof. They grabbed a crude shovel and started digging. Dirt and thatch was being thrown everywhere. “Watch what you’re doing!”, I yelled, rubbing the dust out of my eyes. After I removed the specks from my eyes, I didn’t see the paraplegic anymore. “Out of my way… c’mon, move it…”. I rushed to the door of the run-down home undoubtedly knocking a few bystanders aside. The one everyone was talking about was standing inside the dirt clay house. I had heard about the healings taking place in town. And now the crippled man lay helpless at the healer’s feet. “My son, your sins are forgiven”, I heard him say. What in the world? What kind of statement is that?!, I thought. What blasphemy! Only God can forgive sins… even I knew that – and besides, this man needed his legs fixed, not his sins forgiven. At that moment, the healer turned and gave me a piercing look. There were so many people in the room, he could have been looking at anyone, but I knew he was looking at me. “Why do you think this way in your heart?”, he asked me directly. My face went flush and I started to sweat. “What do you think is the easier thing, to say ‘your sins are forgiven’, or to say ‘get up and walk’. I didn’t even have time to process the question as I felt every eye in the place on me. “Pick up your make-shift stretcher and go home”, he said to the crippled man. Without hesitation, the lame man was instantly able to walk, and he left.

Nobody said a word for a minute or two. We all stood there in amazement looking at one another. We had never seen anything like this. This was amazing. So much so, that some people were praising the Hebrew God. Amid all the activity, I lost sight of the healer. Where did he go? Someone needs to keep an eye on him, the way he talks… but then again, he might be worth finding and following…