Mark 2:1–12
1 He returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that He was at home. 2 And many were gathered together, so that there was no more room, not even at the door. And He was preaching the word to them. 3 And they came, bringing to Him a paralytic carried by four men. 4 And when they could not get near Him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above Him, and when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay. 5 And when Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” 6 Now some of the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, 7 “Why does this man speak like that? He is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?” 8 And immediately Jesus, perceiving in His spirit that they thus questioned within themselves, said to them, “Why do you question these things in your hearts? 9 Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, take up your bed and walk’? 10 But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins” - He said to the paralytic - 11 “I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home.” 12 And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all, so that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, “We never saw anything like this!”
The miracle in Mark 2 is a wonderful story of faith in action. Nothing was going to stop these four men from bringing their friend to Christ for healing.
But, as we often see in the miracles of Jesus, not everyone was convinced by Him. In verse 6 we’re told that some teachers of the law were also present. In Luke’s account of the same miracle in chapter 5 he writes that Pharisees and teachers of the law from every village of Galilee and from Judea and Jerusalem were there.
So this wasn’t just a couple of Pharisees. There was a whole crowd of them there that day, but they weren’t filled with excitement, hoping to see another miracle as many others were. No, their purpose for being there was to evaluate Jesus. They were a delegation of authorities who were not very pleased about this itinerant preacher who was going around stealing their thunder.
Their mission was to evaluate Jesus’ teaching, and to come up with some kind of plan to stop Him. These men represented the spiritual leaders of Judaism, and they felt threatened and they were listening critically. They needed to decide how to deal with this young preacher who was working miracles and drawing such great crowds.
The crowds had come to hear Him, and there is an important detail in verse 2: “He was preaching the word to them.” Jesus was proclaiming the Word of God, and this was the main reason for the Pharisees and teachers of the law being there. They were listening carefully to His every word – not because they wanted to hear the truth, but because they wanted to get rid of Him. Just the slightest hint of blasphemy was all they needed.
These Pharisees and teachers of the law had undergone the rigorous training required of anyone in Judaism who wanted to become a spiritual leader. The term Pharisee was used to describe a small, dedicated core of people, who were totally committed to keeping God’s law as interpreted by the rabbis.
These men upheld what was called the oral law. They memorised interpretations of the written Law of Moses and legal rulings of earlier rabbis, as if they were the very words of God. Later they would become the enemies of Jesus, because He ignored the oral Law and their twisted interpretation of God’s Word. Jesus criticised the Pharisees for following their own rules which cancelled out the written Word of God.
The Pharisees had come to judge Jesus by their standards. It had never occurred to them that their standards might be judged by Jesus’ teachings.
And then we meet the four friends, who were there for completely different reasons. They are a picture of persistent faith. They were determined to reach Jesus, because they firmly believed He could heal their friend.
There is a powerful contrast here. The Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus to evaluate and to criticise Him. The paralytic and his friends came to Jesus for help.
The opposite to faith is unbelief. Unbelief assumes the right to judge God Himself. Those who don’t believe in God or insist He doesn’t exist think they have a right to judge Him. But they are in for a nasty surprise unless they repent of their unbelief, because if they don’t they will find themselves standing before the judge one day, and they will have nothing to say. They will have no defence, and the Pharisees that day were no different to those who judge and reject Jesus today.
Here they were, listening to God Himself proclaiming His eternal truth to them, and they rejected Him. If it wasn’t so serious, it would almost be funny. They were accusing Jesus of blasphemy, and in doing so, they were guilty of the ultimate blasphemy – rejecting Jesus Christ.
So Jesus was inside a home teaching the investigating committee. The crowd had pressed around the house outside, hoping to overhear. When the paralysed man was brought by his friends, there was no way to get through the crowds packed around the door and windows.
But they were not about to give up. They climbed the outside staircase that led to the flat roof, broke through, and lowered their friend into the room where Jesus was teaching.
Jesus recognised their faith and responded to it, as He declared, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”
This, of course, shocked the delegation of religious leaders, but it was exactly what they came for. Only God could forgive sins. Knowing what they were thinking, Jesus challenged them. “Why do you question these things in your hearts? Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, take up your bed and walk’?”
Then, to show that His words held power and authority, Jesus told the paralysed man to get up, pick up the mat he’d been carried on, and walk home.
No one who comes to Jesus with true faith goes away the same. When you encounter the real Jesus and believe that He is who He says He is, your life will never be the same.
Verse 5 says, “Jesus saw their faith.”
Faith is given to those who act decisively on the conviction that God’s help is to be found in Jesus. The persistence of the paralysed man’s friends demonstrated the reality of their faith. Biblical faith is more than wishful thinking. It is a confidence that Jesus can help, which then moves us to act according to His Word.
Is every prayer for physical healing answered? No.
Is every prayer for spiritual healing answered? Jesus answers that question in John 3:16. “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
“Son, your sins are forgiven.” He came for physical healing, which Jesus graciously granted him. But He first provided spiritual healing. Jesus would give the man what he wanted, but first He gave him what he needed. We can live with physical infirmities, as much as we’d prefer not to. But we cannot survive without God’s forgiveness. That’s the greatest miracle – that He would heal our souls.
The Pharisees though, true to form, completely missed this truth. “Why does this man speak like that? He is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”
“Who is this man?” This was the question they had been sent to answer. Was Jesus really a messenger sent by God? Might He even be the Messiah? Or was He another of those frauds who often appeared on the religious scene, gained a few moments of notoriety, and then disappeared? How should the religious establishment react to Him?
The wonder is that they needed to raise the question at all. All day they’d heard Him preach and seen Him heal.
These so-called experts on the Word of God, who should have known better, should have been ashamed of themselves.
They who were so reluctant to acknowledge Jesus’ authority simply had to know that the miracle worker had come from God, but they refused to accept the truth which was staring them in the face.
They were unwilling to accept the testimony of Jesus’ miracles about His identity, and instead focussed on their false claims of blasphemy.
Jesus then asked which is easier to say. The obvious answer is that it is easier to say sins are forgiven. It is easier because there is no way to tell whether such words have meaning. Forgiveness is a transaction that takes place between an individual and God. No one can peer into the heart to witness that inner transaction.
But if a man says to a paralytic, “Get up, take your mat and walk,” there is an immediate and sure way to tell whether his words are empty or not.
If the paralytic gets up and goes home, the words of the speaker have authority. If, on the other hand, he continues to lie there, unable to move, the words of the speaker are meaningless.
Jesus says to them, “But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins” - He said to the paralytic - “I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home.” “That you may know.”
Jesus healed this man as a witness to the investigating committee to prove who He is. Do the words of Jesus have authority? Does He have the right to forgive sins? To show how powerful His words were, He turned to the man and healed him.
The religious leaders spent their lives arguing about words. But not one of them could heal a paralytic. Yet they dared to assume they had the right to judge the teaching of a man whose words had miracle-working power.
Both Mark and Luke end their accounts of this miracle by saying that the people were amazed and praised God.
Some take this statement as a positive assessment of the investigating committee’s reaction to Jesus’ miracle, but it is not.
Most commentators agree that the phrase more likely reflects their unwillingness to give Jesus any credit at all.
No miracle has ever changed a closed heart. And this miracle didn’t change the conviction of the Pharisees or teachers of the Law that Jesus had committed blasphemy.
Mark 2:12 says the people said, “We never saw anything like this!” Luke 5:26 says, “We have seen extraordinary things today.”
When we consider what they had just seen and in who’s presence they had just been, we can’t imagine a more noncommittal expression. They just walked away, shaking their heads in amazement.
The healing of the paralytic proved that Jesus spoke with God’s authority, but the Pharisees withheld their stamp of approval.
They were convinced that a teacher whose words did not agree with their understanding of God’s plan must be wrong.
“We never saw anything like this.” Their focus, quite naturally, was on the sign they had seen.
But what Jesus really wanted them to say was, “We have never heard anything like this. We have to go through the temple and the priests and sacrifices, seeking forgiveness.”
And now Jesus is saying to them, “I am the temple. I am the High Priest. In fact, I am the sacrifice which seals your forgiveness. If I say to this man, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ they’re forgiven.”
Remember that just before Jesus healed the paralysed man, He had been preaching the Gospel to these men. The miracle, indeed all of Jesus’ miracles, point to the validity of the Gospel He preached. But they couldn’t and wouldn’t see it. And so they shook their heads and went away, and all they could say was, “Strange. Really strange.”
And strange indeed it is. Strange not that Jesus should forgive or heal, but that despite all the overwhelming evidence, people still refuse to acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Jesus performed all these miracles in order to show that He is God, so that He could say He came to forgive sinners.
The glory of the Gospel is that He came not only to forgive sinners, but to provide the sacrifice which brings that forgiveness. And He’s still doing it today. He still says to the spiritually paralysed, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”
1 He returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that He was at home. 2 And many were gathered together, so that there was no more room, not even at the door. And He was preaching the word to them. 3 And they came, bringing to Him a paralytic carried by four men. 4 And when they could not get near Him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above Him, and when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic lay. 5 And when Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, “Son, your sins are forgiven.” 6 Now some of the scribes were sitting there, questioning in their hearts, 7 “Why does this man speak like that? He is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?” 8 And immediately Jesus, perceiving in His spirit that they thus questioned within themselves, said to them, “Why do you question these things in your hearts? 9 Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, take up your bed and walk’? 10 But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins” - He said to the paralytic - 11 “I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home.” 12 And he rose and immediately picked up his bed and went out before them all, so that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, “We never saw anything like this!”
The miracle in Mark 2 is a wonderful story of faith in action. Nothing was going to stop these four men from bringing their friend to Christ for healing.
But, as we often see in the miracles of Jesus, not everyone was convinced by Him. In verse 6 we’re told that some teachers of the law were also present. In Luke’s account of the same miracle in chapter 5 he writes that Pharisees and teachers of the law from every village of Galilee and from Judea and Jerusalem were there.
So this wasn’t just a couple of Pharisees. There was a whole crowd of them there that day, but they weren’t filled with excitement, hoping to see another miracle as many others were. No, their purpose for being there was to evaluate Jesus. They were a delegation of authorities who were not very pleased about this itinerant preacher who was going around stealing their thunder.
Their mission was to evaluate Jesus’ teaching, and to come up with some kind of plan to stop Him. These men represented the spiritual leaders of Judaism, and they felt threatened and they were listening critically. They needed to decide how to deal with this young preacher who was working miracles and drawing such great crowds.
The crowds had come to hear Him, and there is an important detail in verse 2: “He was preaching the word to them.” Jesus was proclaiming the Word of God, and this was the main reason for the Pharisees and teachers of the law being there. They were listening carefully to His every word – not because they wanted to hear the truth, but because they wanted to get rid of Him. Just the slightest hint of blasphemy was all they needed.
These Pharisees and teachers of the law had undergone the rigorous training required of anyone in Judaism who wanted to become a spiritual leader. The term Pharisee was used to describe a small, dedicated core of people, who were totally committed to keeping God’s law as interpreted by the rabbis.
These men upheld what was called the oral law. They memorised interpretations of the written Law of Moses and legal rulings of earlier rabbis, as if they were the very words of God. Later they would become the enemies of Jesus, because He ignored the oral Law and their twisted interpretation of God’s Word. Jesus criticised the Pharisees for following their own rules which cancelled out the written Word of God.
The Pharisees had come to judge Jesus by their standards. It had never occurred to them that their standards might be judged by Jesus’ teachings.
And then we meet the four friends, who were there for completely different reasons. They are a picture of persistent faith. They were determined to reach Jesus, because they firmly believed He could heal their friend.
There is a powerful contrast here. The Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus to evaluate and to criticise Him. The paralytic and his friends came to Jesus for help.
The opposite to faith is unbelief. Unbelief assumes the right to judge God Himself. Those who don’t believe in God or insist He doesn’t exist think they have a right to judge Him. But they are in for a nasty surprise unless they repent of their unbelief, because if they don’t they will find themselves standing before the judge one day, and they will have nothing to say. They will have no defence, and the Pharisees that day were no different to those who judge and reject Jesus today.
Here they were, listening to God Himself proclaiming His eternal truth to them, and they rejected Him. If it wasn’t so serious, it would almost be funny. They were accusing Jesus of blasphemy, and in doing so, they were guilty of the ultimate blasphemy – rejecting Jesus Christ.
So Jesus was inside a home teaching the investigating committee. The crowd had pressed around the house outside, hoping to overhear. When the paralysed man was brought by his friends, there was no way to get through the crowds packed around the door and windows.
But they were not about to give up. They climbed the outside staircase that led to the flat roof, broke through, and lowered their friend into the room where Jesus was teaching.
Jesus recognised their faith and responded to it, as He declared, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”
This, of course, shocked the delegation of religious leaders, but it was exactly what they came for. Only God could forgive sins. Knowing what they were thinking, Jesus challenged them. “Why do you question these things in your hearts? Which is easier, to say to the paralytic, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ or to say, ‘Rise, take up your bed and walk’?”
Then, to show that His words held power and authority, Jesus told the paralysed man to get up, pick up the mat he’d been carried on, and walk home.
No one who comes to Jesus with true faith goes away the same. When you encounter the real Jesus and believe that He is who He says He is, your life will never be the same.
Verse 5 says, “Jesus saw their faith.”
Faith is given to those who act decisively on the conviction that God’s help is to be found in Jesus. The persistence of the paralysed man’s friends demonstrated the reality of their faith. Biblical faith is more than wishful thinking. It is a confidence that Jesus can help, which then moves us to act according to His Word.
Is every prayer for physical healing answered? No.
Is every prayer for spiritual healing answered? Jesus answers that question in John 3:16. “For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
“Son, your sins are forgiven.” He came for physical healing, which Jesus graciously granted him. But He first provided spiritual healing. Jesus would give the man what he wanted, but first He gave him what he needed. We can live with physical infirmities, as much as we’d prefer not to. But we cannot survive without God’s forgiveness. That’s the greatest miracle – that He would heal our souls.
The Pharisees though, true to form, completely missed this truth. “Why does this man speak like that? He is blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?”
“Who is this man?” This was the question they had been sent to answer. Was Jesus really a messenger sent by God? Might He even be the Messiah? Or was He another of those frauds who often appeared on the religious scene, gained a few moments of notoriety, and then disappeared? How should the religious establishment react to Him?
The wonder is that they needed to raise the question at all. All day they’d heard Him preach and seen Him heal.
These so-called experts on the Word of God, who should have known better, should have been ashamed of themselves.
They who were so reluctant to acknowledge Jesus’ authority simply had to know that the miracle worker had come from God, but they refused to accept the truth which was staring them in the face.
They were unwilling to accept the testimony of Jesus’ miracles about His identity, and instead focussed on their false claims of blasphemy.
Jesus then asked which is easier to say. The obvious answer is that it is easier to say sins are forgiven. It is easier because there is no way to tell whether such words have meaning. Forgiveness is a transaction that takes place between an individual and God. No one can peer into the heart to witness that inner transaction.
But if a man says to a paralytic, “Get up, take your mat and walk,” there is an immediate and sure way to tell whether his words are empty or not.
If the paralytic gets up and goes home, the words of the speaker have authority. If, on the other hand, he continues to lie there, unable to move, the words of the speaker are meaningless.
Jesus says to them, “But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins” - He said to the paralytic - “I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home.” “That you may know.”
Jesus healed this man as a witness to the investigating committee to prove who He is. Do the words of Jesus have authority? Does He have the right to forgive sins? To show how powerful His words were, He turned to the man and healed him.
The religious leaders spent their lives arguing about words. But not one of them could heal a paralytic. Yet they dared to assume they had the right to judge the teaching of a man whose words had miracle-working power.
Both Mark and Luke end their accounts of this miracle by saying that the people were amazed and praised God.
Some take this statement as a positive assessment of the investigating committee’s reaction to Jesus’ miracle, but it is not.
Most commentators agree that the phrase more likely reflects their unwillingness to give Jesus any credit at all.
No miracle has ever changed a closed heart. And this miracle didn’t change the conviction of the Pharisees or teachers of the Law that Jesus had committed blasphemy.
Mark 2:12 says the people said, “We never saw anything like this!” Luke 5:26 says, “We have seen extraordinary things today.”
When we consider what they had just seen and in who’s presence they had just been, we can’t imagine a more noncommittal expression. They just walked away, shaking their heads in amazement.
The healing of the paralytic proved that Jesus spoke with God’s authority, but the Pharisees withheld their stamp of approval.
They were convinced that a teacher whose words did not agree with their understanding of God’s plan must be wrong.
“We never saw anything like this.” Their focus, quite naturally, was on the sign they had seen.
But what Jesus really wanted them to say was, “We have never heard anything like this. We have to go through the temple and the priests and sacrifices, seeking forgiveness.”
And now Jesus is saying to them, “I am the temple. I am the High Priest. In fact, I am the sacrifice which seals your forgiveness. If I say to this man, ‘Your sins are forgiven,’ they’re forgiven.”
Remember that just before Jesus healed the paralysed man, He had been preaching the Gospel to these men. The miracle, indeed all of Jesus’ miracles, point to the validity of the Gospel He preached. But they couldn’t and wouldn’t see it. And so they shook their heads and went away, and all they could say was, “Strange. Really strange.”
And strange indeed it is. Strange not that Jesus should forgive or heal, but that despite all the overwhelming evidence, people still refuse to acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.
Jesus performed all these miracles in order to show that He is God, so that He could say He came to forgive sinners.
The glory of the Gospel is that He came not only to forgive sinners, but to provide the sacrifice which brings that forgiveness. And He’s still doing it today. He still says to the spiritually paralysed, “Son, your sins are forgiven.”