February 15, 2009

Jesus' Touch Brings New Life
Mark 1:40-45
Epiphany 6 – February 15, 2009

Jose Ramirez was 20 years old in 1968. He had a large, close-knit family, he was in love with his high school sweetheart, Magdalena. But for some time, Jose had been having strange symptoms. His hands and arms were losing all feeling. He had a fever that came and went. He had sores on his arms and legs. This had been going on for a while, but no one could tell him what was wrong. His parents took him from doctor to doctor, and even once took him across the border into Mexico to see a healer, who took one look at him and told him he had a “disease of the Bible.” That didn't make any sense to Jose, until finally he went to a doctor who diagnosed him with Hansen's disease – modern day leprosy. In no time at all, health officials whisked Jose away from his family & friends in Laredo, Texas, & shipped him off to quarantine in a leprosarium in Carville, Louisiana. He made the long trip there in the back of a hearse, because as those health officials said, “Ambulances are for the living; hearses are for the dead.”

Hearses are for the dead – and with a diagnosis of leprosy, just like that, Jose Ramirez found himself one of the living dead, cut off from everyone & everything that mattered to him, because the powers that be feared his disease would spread if he was not removed.

People who had leprosy in Jesus' day were among the living dead too. Leprosy could be any of a number of different skin diseases, not just what modern science classifies as leprosy. Leprosy was feared, because it was contagious, and there was no known treatment, no cure. For the safety of the community, anyone who was diagnosed with leprosy was, like Jose, forced to leave that community. There was no hearse to drive you out of town, but you had to leave your house & family and go live out of bounds, out beyond the borders of the town. You couldn't work or earn a living, so you had to rely on the kindness and generosity of others. There was no hiding the fact that you were a leper, either, because lepers had to wear torn clothing & cover their mouths & cry out “Unclean, unclean!” whenever someone approached, a warning that you were approaching a member of the living dead. Having leprosy was not just a physical disease. As if the physical symptoms were not enough, on top of that, you had to deal with the anguish of being alone in your suffering, of being cut off from everyone that you loved, being isolated from all that might offer mental or emotional support. There was little hope left for a person who had leprosy, no hope of human dignity, no hope of companionship, no hope of a future, because they had become untouchable, the living dead.

Nowadays, we don't worry too much about leprosy. This story seems kind of far removed from us. We can't quite imagine making whole groups of people live away from the rest of the town. But while we may not have huge issues with leprosy, although it is still a big issue in places like India, we still lepers walking among us, people we treat like the living dead. They are the ones we try to push to the outside borders of our lives, the ones we fear to touch, to be in relationship with, out of an almost unnamed, unrecognized fear that if we dare to reach out, if we dare to make contact, we will catch whatever they have – their disease, their pain, their hurt. When someone is diagnosed with HIV/AIDS or cancer or mental illness, if we are able, we keep our distance. We conveniently forget our elderly homebound or the homeless or the hungry. We push them to the outer edges of our lives, forgetting that they are people just like us who desperately long for human contact, for a sign that they are still here, that someone still cares. And we have all felt at least a little bit like a leper at some times in our lives. Maybe it was only during junior high, but we all know what it is to be an outsider, to feel cut off from the people who are important to us, to feel that we are somehow untouchable, unlovable, invisible. We all know what it is to long for a loving touch, a sign that we matter, that we are still here. Even if only for a fleeting moment, we have felt isolated and alone as Jose Ramirez felt in the hearse on the way to Carville. We have felt the desperation that the leper in Mark's gospel felt, the desperation that led him to Jesus, daring to approach him, begging and kneeling before him, saying, “If you choose, you can make me clean,” hoping against hope that this man he has heard about, the one who has been healing the sick and casting out demons, might be able to do something for him to, might be able to bring him back from the living dead, to make him feel human again. “If you are willing, you can make me clean.” “If you are willing...” he says to Jesus.

Now Jesus was a busy man, at the beginning of his mission, ready to go into the towns of Galilee and preach the good news of God's love to all who would listen. Jesus could have chosen to ignore this leper, to pretend he wasn't there and go on about his merry way. But face to face with this man, Mark tells us that Jesus was moved with pity. And even then, Jesus could have healed him just with a word, as he had healed others with the power of his word. Touching the man with leprosy would make Jesus himself ritually unclean, unable to enter the town himself, unable to carry out his identified ministry until he was able to go through the purification rituals. But Jesus was moved with pity, moved with compassion, moved with love for the man before him, and “he stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, 'I do choose. Be made clean!'” He saw the living dead before him, the man who society said was untouchable, and he did the unthinkable – he reached out his hand, and touched him. And with that touch, the man's leprosy left him, immediately (one of Mark's favorite words!). Jesus takes the leper's uncleanness on himself, and leaves the leper clean – a leper no more! And this is not just a physical healing, but a promise of wholeness, of life restored! No longer does this man have to be among the living dead. Jesus' touch brings him back to life!

Isn't that what Jesus always does? The good news for us this morning is that even when we sometimes wonder to ourselves if Jesus is willing to make us clean, if he will choose to heal us and make us whole, Jesus sees us as we are, unclean & untouchable as we may be, and he is moved with pity. He is moved with compassion, and he is willing to stretch out his hand and give us new life. I'm not saying that he always heals our physical hurts the way we would define healing – if that was the case, no one would have cancer or diabetes or arthritis – but in his touch, there is always the promise of new life, of life restored, life lived in connection with him and with each other. Jesus wants us to have wholeness of life, abundant life, and that goes beyond physical healing. And because Jesus is willing to touch us, to cross all of the boundaries that separate us, we can reach out with that same love to others, sharing the good news that Jesus is more than a miracle man, but one who has the power to restore us to true life. Thanks be to God!