Monday, Second Week of Advent

There are times in our lives when we need physical healing because we are physically unwell. There are other times in our lives when we feel the need for spiritual healing because we sense that our relationship with God is not all it could be. The paralytic in today’s gospel reading needed to be physically healed of his paralysis. Jesus also recognized that he needed to be reassured that he stood within God’s favour. That is why Jesus not only said to him, ‘pick up your stretcher and go home’ but firstly said to him, ‘My friend, your sins are forgiven you’. There were two issues to be addressed in his life and Jesus was able to address them both. Yet, without the presence of those who carried the paralytic, Jesus could not have healed the man in this complete way. Their faith, as much as their physical strength, carried the man to Jesus. It was when Jesus saw their faith that he began to address himself to the man’s physical and spiritual healing, according to the gospel reading. We are all a little bit like the paralytic and a little bit like those who carried him. We all need the faith of others to carry us to the Lord and to open us up to his healing presence. We are also all called to carry others into the Lord’s life-giving presence through our faith. None of us goes to the Lord alone. We need one another’s faith to help us to reach the Lord. There are many obstacles in today’s world to our coming to the Lord. The crowd around Jesus were an obstacle to those who wanted to carry the paralytic to Jesus to be physically healed; the scribes and Pharisees were an obstacle to the paralytic being spiritually healed by Jesus, complaining that Jesus had no authority to forgive anyone’s sins. Yet, the combination of the Lord’s power and the faith of a small group meant all these obstacles could be overcome. As a result the paralytic was renewed in body and spirit. The same combination of the Lord’s power and the presence of people of faith who journey with us will overcome today’s obstacles that threaten to block us from encountering the Lord’s life-giving presence.