Just think about it for a moment – God in three persons enjoyed one another’s company for more than a gazillion years before there ever were years – for an eternity they were perfectly content. At some point they decided to create the universe and to populate our world. They also decreed to permit sin, and to save a few of those sin-corrupted creatures. So “in the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that (that a few of us) might receive the adoption of sons.” That is the theological explanation for the incarnation – the coming of the Messiah – our Saviour. It is impossible to explain the divine motive which was the catalyst for God’s creation/salvation program, but we can grasp a few of its out-workings.
There are a couple of Holy Spirit-inspired declarations for the purpose of Christ’s incarnation. For example, a couple weeks ago I referred to John’s statement in chapter 3 of his first epistle – “For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.” Another better known statement was given through Paul in I Timothy 1 – “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.” I will come back to this thought later, but rather than what the Apostles say, I am more interested in what the Lord Jesus has said about the purpose of His incarnation. There are about a dozen scriptures where Christ made reference to this purpose, but I think that we can tie some of them together.
Here in our text, Jesus implied that He came TO HEAL THE SICK.
“And when the Pharisees saw (that Christ dined with Matthew and his friends), they said unto his disciples, Why eateth your Master with publicans and sinners? But when Jesus heard that, he said unto them, They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.” I know that this is not the only scripture that they quote… But at this point, our Charismatic friends, need to be careful not to misuse the Lord’s words and intentions. When He referred to Himself as a “physician,” He was not talking about physical doctoring.
Christ Jesus is clearly “the Great Physician,” but He never graduated from Johns Hopkins Medical school and He was never enrolled with the American Medical Association. Yes, as we are beginning to see here in Matthew, Christ healed a great many people. There was not a person whom He attempted to heal but that person went home disheartened and still diseased – a failure. On the other hand, Christ did not attempt to heal every sick and crippled person who passed His way. Each miraculous cure was supposed to be perceived as an indication and illustration of the far more important healing which all of us desperately need – salvation from our sin.
Jesus’ new disciple, Matthew, invited his Master to meet a group of his old friends and co-workers. They were a relatively wealthy group of people, who ate well and could afford to see the physicians whenever it was necessary. If any of them were sick, it was due to over-indulgence rather than poor nutrition and related diseases. Amongst that crowd, when the Lord referred to the sick, it had nothing to do with physical disease, and obviously so, since there is no record of a miraculous healing on that day.
Christ was speaking metaphorically about the common and deadly malady of sin. It infests every person on the face of the earth – “for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” And it is ultimately fatal – “for the wages of sin is death.” Everyone who had ever lived up to that point either had died or were dying, because every one born since Adam came into the world a sinner. And that includes you – you are sinner, dead before God, and dying before the world.
One of the major problems with this spiritual disease is that it is usually accompanied by spiritual blindness. There are millions of people who live in denial of their problem and therefore they never seek the Physician. Like those Pharisees in Jesus’ day, most of us are filled with self-righteousness – at least to some degree. The Pharisees had no idea that they were already spiritually dead before God. They were like blind men, who had no idea that anyone else could see. They were oblivious to their blindness, sinfulness and spiritual death. Christ was far more interested in spending time with people who were more likely to know of their spiritual disease – known sinners. More Publicans knew that they needed a physician than the Pharisees. The Pharisees could see that the Publicans were sinners, but they couldn’t see that they were as well.
And how about you? Are you in need of the Great Physician? I can tell you with absolute assurance that you are desperate need of this special Physician. But can you see your need? Christ Jesus came into this world to heal spiritually sick souls – the healthy have nothing in Christ.
More specifically, Christ said that He came TO CALL SINNERS TO REPENTANCE.
This was the Lord’s explanation for His medical analogy. Healthy people don’t need a doctor; only sick people do. Righteous people don’t need to repent, but sinners must repent before the God against whom they have sinned. Sadly, those who foolishly think themselves to be righteous never picture themselves in need of repentance. “God commandeth all men everywhere to repent,” but the self-righteous reply “Who? Me?” Christ came to call sinners to repentance.
In this regard, there is an important statement recorded in John 9:39 – “And Jesus said, For judgment I am come into this world, that they which see not might see; and that they which see might be made blind. and some of the Pharisees which were with him heard these words, and said unto him, Are we blind also? Jesus said unto them, If ye were blind, ye should have no sin: but now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth.” “But when Jesus heard that, he said unto them, They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.” Not only did the Son of God become incarnate in order to call sinners to repentance, but a part of His purpose was to provoke that repentance.
Picture a man who had been born blind and who had lived in a family where every member was also blind. He lived in a community where every resident was completely blind – he never met a sighted person. This man had never see the flight of a bird, or the light of a rainbow. He had certainly heard things – the wind blowing in the trees and rain falling into the dust, but he had no way to visualize such things, because no one had ever even been able to explain them. But now, along comes the Great Physician – “for judgment did He come into the world that they which see not – might see.” He came to reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment. When the Pharisees took exception with Christ about blindness, He replied metaphorically, “because you can’t see your blindness, you remain blind.” “But now ye say, We see; therefore your sin remaineth.”
There is a related statement which Jesus makes before Pilate. The governor mentioned that people were whispering that Jesus was some sort of king. The Lord replied, “Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth. Every one that is of the truth heareth my voice.” I think that this melds with what the Saviour said about calling sinners to repentance. He came to bear witness to the truth – of course that is truth in a great many areas. But one especially important area is the truth about our natural depravity – our sinfulness – our blindness. “They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.” An important part of Jesus’ life and ministry was to bring people to the point of seeing their blindness – their sinfulness.
And it continues to be a part of the gospel ministry today. Have YOU ever heard the voice of Christ’s Spirit whispering to your heart that – you are a sinner? Have you felt that special conviction of God reminding you of sin, righteousness and coming judgment? Christ came into the world for that purpose.
I said earlier that most of us know the answer to my first question: “What was the purpose of the incarnation?” Before I get to that, I should remind you of something which the Saviour has told us earlier in Matthew 5.
Christ came TO FULFILL THE LAW.
“Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.” Some ignorant people had been thinking, saying and perhaps even hoping that Christ was in the process of overturning the Old Testament law. They hated its precepts and demands, which cut so deeply into their daily lives. “Here is a man,” they thought, “who is come from God,“ “for no man can do these miracles that he doest, except God be with him,” “and yet he seems to overturning the Old Testament law (as interpreted by the scribes and Pharisees).” Jesus was eating and drinking with sinners; not even washing his hands in the legalistic manner. He was working miracles on the Sabbath, and telling those healed to break the Sabbath laws – as interpreted by the Pharisees. “Hurrah, this man is finally doing something about the archaic laws of Moses.”
“Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.” Part of what the Lord said was that He was not abrogating, overturning, expunging or otherwise erasing the moral law of God. To worship an idol was, and will always be, a sin. As lying had been forbidden, it will always be a sin against God, “and all liars shall have their part in the lake of fire.” Adultery and fornication will always be sin. To covet thy neighbor’s property will always be lust and a form of idolatry. Christ Jesus didn’t come to undo or cancel the true law of God.
But that was not entirely what Jesus meant when he said, “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil.” From its inception, the purpose of the law was to prove to mankind that they were blinded sinners. It was designed to show us how completely alien we are to the righteousness of the holy God. In other words, “The law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ.” The purpose of Christ, as we shall see in a few moments was to save those wretched, unholy people. But first, this Christ, this Son of God, must fulfil the demands of the law.
This is where I need a couple more sermons, but I am trusting the Holy Spirit to make my point for me. First, Jesus of Nazareth obediently obeyed every tiny precept and principle of the moral law of God. “He did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth.” “He knew no sin that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.” “We have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.”
In addition to thoroughly and completely obeying every precept of the law, Christ went a step farther. And this the last and most important point in my message. Jesus Christ, then fulfilled the law by willingly becoming the last and highest of all God’s sacrifices for sin.
Christ Jesus came into the world to SEEK and to SAVE THAT WHICH WAS LOST.
As Paul said I Timothy 1 – “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.” This was not a theological statement made by a deluded follower of Jesus, in an effort to establish some sort of new religion. This was a reiteration of what Christ Himself had said on several occasions.
In Luke 19 Christ was passing through Jericho where He confronted Zacchaeus the Publican. He confronted the Publican, not the other way around. I was wondering whether or not this Zacchaeus had been acquainted with Matthew. Had he been at the dinner in our opening scripture? Considering the distance, and the circumstances in his story, it is unlikely. In any case, Jesus met Zacchaeus and they had a private dinner together. The conversation between them ended with Jesus’ words, “This day is salvation come to this house, forsomuch as he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” What was the purpose of the incarnation of Christ? To seek and to save that which was lost.
Some of the disciples were arguing one day about who would be the greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven. Without intending to repeat His purpose in the world, Jesus repeated His purpose in the world. “Jesus called them unto him, and said, Ye know that the princes of the Gentiles exercise dominion over them, and they that are great exercise authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you: but whosoever will be great among you, let him be your minister; And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant: Even as the Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give his life a ransom for many” – Matthew 20:25-28. Christ came into the world to die – but not in the same way that it is appointed unto all men to die. No, Christ was born in order to become the last and perfect sacrificial Lamb of God – the Passover Lamb.
In John 3 Jesus was in a night-time conversation with the Pharisee Nicodemus – one of the best of his breed. Nicodemus began by beating around the bush, but like the bush in the desert, Jesus set it on fire. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again. Nicodemus answered and said unto him, How can these things be? Jesus answered and said unto him, Art thou a master of Israel, and knowest not these things? Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and testify that we have seen; and ye receive not our witness. And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved. He that believeth on him is not condemned: but he that believeth not is condemned already, because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.” Christ Jesus in this passage did not crisply say, I am come into the world “that the world through me might be saved.” He said, “It was the decree of the God-head, and the will of my Father that I come into the world to save sinners.”
In John 10 Christ said “Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep. All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture. The thief cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy: I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.”
With that I come back to our text in Matthew 9 – “And when the Pharisees saw (that Christ dined with Levi and his friends), they said unto his disciples, Why eateth your Master with publicans and sinners? But when Jesus heard that, he said unto them, They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.” The Lord has sheep scattered throughout the pastures of this world, and everyone of them are sick, maimed, blind and dying. Not a single one of them could ever crawl its way to Heaven or back to the Shepherd. There is no sinner dead in trespasses and sins which could heal itself and convey itself to God. There is only one way for any of us to be healed, delivered from our sins – to be saved. Jesus said, “I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly. I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the sheep.”
Has the Lord given you the ability to see your true spiritual condition? Can you see that you are poor, halt, blind and spiritually dead? There is hope – there is a Saviour. The eternal Son of God came into this world to save sinners like you. Remember, “they that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick.” Are you able to see your sickness well enough to repent before God? Will you reach out to the only hope available to your soul? Put your trust in the Lord Jesus Christ – the lamb of God who gave his life a ransom for many.