When healing missions come to impoverished nations lacking health care, the pictures show lines of people waiting to be seen by medical personnel.
When Jesus went to an area populated by Gentiles, the word went out that a healer was present. Matthew’s good news account records a similar experience as that of today’s medical missions.
After Jesus had left that place, he passed along the Sea of Galilee, and he went up the mountain, where he sat down.
Great crowds came to him, bringing with them the lame, the blind, the maimed, the mute, and many others. They put them at his feet, and he cured them,
So that the crowd was amazed when they saw the mute speaking, the maimed whole, the lame walking, and the blind seeing. And they praised the God of Israel (Matthew 15.29-31).
Isaiah prophesied that the work of Israel’s Messiah would include the granting of health to the ill and infirmed.
Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened,
and the ears of the deaf shall be opened;
Then the lame shall leap like a deer,
and the tongue of the speechless sing for joy. (Isaiah 35.5-6)
Now, deep into Gentile territory, the deeds of the Messiah are experienced by people outside of God’s covenant people.
Isaiah prophesied that Israel’s relationship with the nations would involve God’s people serving them as priests and ministers of God.
But you shall be called priests of the Lord;
you shall be named ministers of our God. (Isaiah 61.6)
Jesus perfectly modeled this service mentality when He accepted the Gentiles and released his healing power among them.
Even though the Gentiles were not part of the people of God, they recognized what the Messiah was doing in their midst, and gave praise to the God of the Israelites.
This is an important picture for all who seek to represent God. When we serve with God’s healing power, people will often praise of God’s character that is revealed through our words and deeds.
Food for Gentiles
Jesus earlier had an encounter with a Canaanite woman. She wanted his help for her daughter, but Jesus refused.
He refused to help her, attempting to draw out her great faith. He said to her, “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”
In turn, She replied, “Yes, Lord, yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their masters’ table” (Matthew 15.26-27).
In this instance, Jesus has been healing people whom Jews of that era called “Gentile dogs.” What he does next is provide food for a large crowd of Gentiles.
They get more than scraps from the master’s table. They get a banquet in the wilderness, just as he had provided at another time for Jews.
Jesus acts as the host of the event. The people came to him of their own accord, but he took responsibility for their welfare.
Then Jesus called his disciples to him and said, “I have compassion for the crowd because they have been with me now for three days and have nothing to eat, and I do not want to send them away hungry, for they might faint on the way” (Matthew 15.32).
It’s encouraging to remember that the disciples had to grow in their faith like everyone else. Even though Jesus was their constant companion, their faith had to grow.
The disciples had recently seen Jesus feed 5,000, but they were blind when it came to this crowd.
The disciples said to him, “Where are we to get enough bread in the desert to feed so great a crowd?” (Matthew 15.33).
Jesus took what the disciples had, broke it, blessed it, and gave it to the crowd. When the crowd had eaten everything they could hold, they still had seven baskets to fill with leftovers. There were 4000+ people in the crowd.
What Jesus did for these Gentiles involved two aspects of God’s work. Looking back, it was a remembrance of God’s provision for His people in the wilderness during the Exodus.
Looking forward, it’s a picture of the Lord’s Supper and, ultimately, the Marriage Supper of the Lamb.
What qualified these people for such an encounter with the Lord was their faith. Their faith was shown by a willingness to come to Jesus with their needs and trust his love and power to help.
Application
There are a couple of important applications for us as we study this passage.
(1) Faith: Faith is simply coming to the Lord with our needs and trusting His love and grace.
(2) Service: After we have experience the Lord’s grace, we are to share his loving care with others.
He has called us to be priests. A priest stands between God and another human being.
A priest brings the needs of the human being to God in prayer. They also bring the ministry of God to others through the loving words and meaningful care.
YouTube Discussion
Rudy Ross and I discussed this passage on YouTube today. It is on the Bob Spradling channel.
Real Voices 