Jesus Power over Death

Matthew 9:18-26

Matthew 9:18-26, While He spoke these things to them, behold, a ruler came and worshiped Him, saying, “My daughter has just died, but come and lay Your hand on her and she will live.” 19 So Jesus arose and followed him, and so did His disciples. 20 And suddenly, a woman who had a flow of blood for twelve years came from behind and touched the hem of His garment. 21 For she said to herself, “If only I may touch His garment, I shall be made well.” 22 But Jesus turned around, and when He saw her He said, “Be of good cheer, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And the woman was made well from that hour. 23 When Jesus came into the ruler’s house, and saw the flute players and the noisy crowd wailing, 24 He said to them, “Make room, for the girl is not dead, but sleeping.” And they ridiculed Him. 25 But when the crowd was put outside, He went in and took her by the hand, and the girl arose. 26 And the report of this went out into all that land.

Jesus did not heal them for their own sake only, but that He might demonstrate His power. He did not heal all of them because they all had faith. He did not heal all of them because they were all worthy. He healed all of them in order that He might show that He could heal all disease. But there was no limit to His capacity.

Matthew 9:35, Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.

Matthew 11:5, The blind see and the lame walk; the lepers are cleansed and the deaf hear; the dead are raised up and the poor have the gospel preached to them. so it was that He demonstrated that He was God, the Messiah, the King.

This is what Matthew wants us to understand, that He is the King.

• Matthew has told us about His ancestry.
• He has the lineage of a King.
• His arrival He had the birth of a King, a virgin-born Son.
• His adoration, other kings bowed to Him.
• His anticipation, the Old Testament prophesies fulfilled in His birth.

• His royal herald, His announcer, John the Baptist.
• His affirmation, where the Father spoke at His baptism.
• His advantage when He conquered Satan in temptation.
• His activity of healing and preaching.
• His authority in His sermon in chapter 5 through 7.

Now Matthew tells us about His authentication, His miracle power. Matthew chapter 8 and 9, we see 9 miracles of Jesus. Matthew gives us three groups of three miracles. Matthew 8, the first group of miracles dealt with disease.

Matthew 8:21-9:8, the second group deal with disorder in the physical, spiritual, and moral world.

Now the third group. Today we are going to be looking at power over death. Disease, disorder, and death. This is the climax. Jesus can raise the dead. In this section, we have three miracles. The first one has a miracle in a miracle, but there are three separate miracles.

The first, raising the dead The second, giving sight to the blind The third, speech to the dumb.

First, Jesus raises the whole person from the dead, and then he shows how it is that He can raise her whole, by showing you how He can give life to the dead parts. He who can give sight to dead eyes and give speech to a dead tongue can also raise the dead, for that’s only the sum of the parts.

Jesus has power over that which is dead. It has a miracle within a miracle. But the miracle inside the miracle of resurrection, that is the one dealing with the issue of blood, is really part of the resurrection miracle, for it provides the delay that is necessary for the death to occur and to make the resurrection as dramatic as possible.

So, you really have a miracle within a miracle. Jesus was accessible. V 18, While He spoke these things to them, behold, a ruler came and worshiped Him, saying, “My daughter has just died, but come and lay Your hand on her and she will live.”

Who is Jesus talking to about what? Jesus came back to Capernaum, where Peter lived, when He came back to that village after the incredible incident in Gadara, He was staying in Peter’s house.

The disciples of John the Baptist came and said, “Why aren’t you fasting? What are all of you disciples and the Lord eating like this? This speaks to me of Jesus’ accessibility. People could get to Him. He’s not a religious guru who’s 18 feet up with lilies all around Him. He doesn’t live in a monastery. There’s no hierarchy.

He moved among the people. He was God in the world of men. He was in the streets. He was in the villages. He walked the dusty roads. He was in the synagogues. He was in the homes, because it was all He had, to stay in a home. He didn’t have His own. He bumped into people in the temple ground. He was accessible.

He moved in a crowd.

Mark 8:2, “I have compassion on the multitude, because they have now continued with Me three days and have nothing to eat.

Can you imagine? Do you think they brought Him all their problems? He was counselling. He was healing. He was teaching. He was in the midst of people.

The Creator of the universe, the King of Kings, and the Lord of Lords, walking the rolling hills of Galilee, little children running in and around, and people stopping Him and talking. God is accessible. Because this is God displaying Himself. He was accessible to the crowds.

In this occasion, two people are in the crowd.

• One is a ruler,
• Other a sick lady.
• One is kind of up in the society.
• Other is downcast of the society.
• One was wealthy, and
• Another was poor.
• The Pharisees who were trying to trip Him and trick Him and condemn Him.
• The people who were just trying to analyse Him.
• All the hurting people, sick, beggars, poor, outcasts, slaves, captives were there.
• All the hurting people were there as well, trying to have all their needs met.

Jesus accessible to the crowds. That you can get to Him.

Jesus was not only accessible, and He was also available. Jesus was not so concerned with the crowd as the individual. Jesus was sensitive to who was in that crowd, and He would move to that person with real availability.

V 18, While He spoke these things to them, behold, a ruler came and worshiped Him, saying, “My daughter has just died, but come and lay Your hand on her and she will live.” A ruler.

Mark 5:22, And behold, one of the rulers of the synagogue came, Jairus by name. And when he saw Him, he fell at His feet Luke says he was rosh ha keneseth, which means he was the chief elder of the synagogue. His name was Jairus. He was number one representative of the religious establishment in Capernaum. He is the chief elder. Not in the temple in Jerusalem, but in the synagogue in Capernaum. Synagogues were ruled by elders. They were the spiritual leaders. They had the administration of the place. They were to coordinate and make sure everything was conducted

properly, all the public worship. They were men of great influence. Out of their group they would elect someone to be the head man who would preside, who would supervise and appoint people. He will be responsible to appoint the preacher, the one who prayed, and the one who read out of the law. They were responsible to administrate the whole synagogue.

This is the epitome of the religious establishment. The Gospels, portrays to us that that the religious establishment was dead set against Christ. Jairus may have even been a Pharisee, but we don’t know. But he had a lot of peer pressure to be a faithful, Jewish, traditional religionist. He comes to Jesus.

We might expect him to come and say, hello, I am the chief elder of the synagogue. I would like to speak to You. Could we please have a private conversation? That’s not what he did. He didn’t protect himself at all.

V 18, While He spoke these things to them, behold, a ruler came and worshiped Him, saying, “My daughter has just died, but come and lay Your hand on her and she will live.” The word in the Greek, to worship, means to prostrate oneself before someone and either kiss his feet, kiss the hem of his garment, or kiss the ground in front of him.

The Pharisees are after Him, and the religious establishment is after Him. Jairus does what you only did in that culture to a deity, someone who was divine, someone who was holy in an unhuman way. You didn’t do this to human beings unless they were in some sense supernatural.

Matthew loves to use the word “worship.” Matthew uses it 13 times because it fits a King! The man worshipped. How could you ever get somebody to do that like him? V 18, While He spoke these things to them, behold, a ruler came and worshiped Him, saying, “My daughter has just died, but come and lay Your hand on her and she will live.”

Matthew’s account is brief. Mark and Luke’s are larger.

The other Gospel writers tell us that the first time the man spoke to Jesus, he said, “My daughter is dying.” Later, he was informed that she was dead, and he told Jesus she was dead. Matthew just condenses it all, leaving out some of the preliminaries.

Mark 5:23-24, and begged Him earnestly, saying, “My little daughter lies at the point of death. Come and lay Your hands on her, that she may be healed, and she will live.” 24 So Jesus went with him, and a great multitude followed Him and thronged Him.

Luke 8:42, for he had an only daughter about twelve years of age, and she was dying.

The other Gospels tell us that the little girl was 12 years old. 12 years and 1 day in the Jewish culture meant that you were a woman. For a man, it was 13 years and 1 day. She had just reached the flowering of womanhood. She had just bloomed. Twelve years of sunshine had turned into the shadow of death.

Do you know why he came? He didn’t care about social pressure. He didn’t care about prestige.

He didn’t care about religious establishment. His daughter was dead, and there were no resources within his system to deal with that.

Luke 8:49, While He was still speaking, someone came from the ruler of the synagogue’s house, saying to him, “Your daughter is dead. Do not trouble the Teacher.” V 18, While He spoke these things to them, behold, a ruler came and worshiped Him, saying, “My daughter has just died, but come and lay Your hand on her and she will live.”

God had already been working on his heart because his faith is incredible. He swallowed his pride. He turned his back on social pressure. He said goodbye to the religious establishment, and he came to Jesus, and he fell flat on his face and probably kissed His feet. He said, “My daughter’s dead.”

Jairus had a deep need. If you have deep need then people come to Christ. You don’t have a need and you are not going to come. When his daughter was dying, and now dead, he came in desperation. His motive wasn’t totally pure!

• He didn’t come just because of the wonder of Jesus Christ.
• He didn’t come just because he had some great love for Christ.
• He came because he was hurting, and he was hurting deeply.

There was a hurting that was not like anything else, and there was no alleviation. This was so final. His heart was literally crushed. It is the people with need that come. That is why the Gospel is preached with the reception to the poor, the sick, the weak, the captives, and the prisoners.

Jairus made him come. He really did believe that Jesus had the power to do this. Matthew 8, there was a centurion who said his servant was home sick with a paralysis. The centurion said, “If You speak a word, my servant will be healed.”

Jesus said, “I have not seen so great faith anywhere in Israel.” Jesus is in the big crowd, and another miracle happens. Jesus isn’t even involved in the miracle. it’s involuntary.

God did that to delay the whole move down to the house to make sure the girl was dead. How did Jesus respond to his need and his faith? V 19, So Jesus arose and followed him, and so did His disciples. Jesus up and followed him.

There are times when there is a tremendous need in an individual’s life. Jesus ever sensitive to that.

John 6:37, All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out. So, this mass of humanity now starts moving toward Jairus’ house. There is a big crowd pressing around Him. V 20, And suddenly, a woman who had a flow of blood for twelve years came from behind and touched the hem of His garment. Women basically didn’t go around touching men. She had a problem. She had been diseased with an issue of blood for ¹² years. A 12-year-old girl and a woman with an issue of blood for ¹² years. Jairus had a little girl, gave him ¹² years of sunshine.

This lady had known 12 years of shadow.

• Twelve years of laughter.
• Twelve years of tears.

An interruption that becomes an opportunity. What is it to have an issue of blood? For 12 years this woman could not stop bleeding, perhaps due to a fibroid tumour in the womb, something that would be readily treated today by surgery.

But she was perpetually unclean, unable to deal with this. Luke says she could not be cured. Incurable. Mark says she spent all her money on doctors and was worse. From the Jewish point of view, you couldn’t imagine anything worse than being a woman with an issue of blood. It was humiliating beyond anything perhaps, except leprosy.

Leviticus 15:25-27, ‘If a woman has a discharge of blood for many days, other than at the time of her customary impurity, or if it runs beyond her usual time of impurity, all the days of her unclean discharge shall be as the days of her customary impurity. She shall be unclean. 26 Every bed on which she lies all the days of her discharge shall be to her as the bed of her impurity; and whatever she sits on shall be unclean, as the uncleanness of her impurity. 27 Whoever

touches those things shall be unclean; he shall wash his clothes and bathe in water, and be unclean until evening. What Leviticus said was, “This is an unclean woman with an issue of blood. Every bed she touches is unclean. Everything she sits on is unclean. Everything she wears is unclean. And every person who touches her is unclean. Therefore, she was excommunicated from the synagogue. She was divorced by her husband. She was ostracized from all human relationships.

For 12 years, this dear woman lived in utter isolation, to say nothing of the medical things complicated by this problem. Never able to go to the temple, never able to go to the synagogue. No longer able to meet with her husband or her family. A sad lady.

She touched Jesus.

Why?

The same two reasons

She had a deep need, and She believed. Jesus was also touchable. He was touchable. The crowd had heard. The individual man had worshiped. Now we meet a woman who touched.

Verse 20, “Behold, a woman, who had been diseased with an issue of blood twelve years, came behind Him,” and literally, grabbed or clutched the tassel hanging from His garment. She had had an issue of blood. A desperate condition, shut off from family, friends, fellowship, the synagogue. No one could touch her without being defiled. But she had heard about Jesus, and she too had a desperate need, and she too had faith.

She kept saying to herself. V 21, For she said to herself, “If only I may touch His garment, I shall be made well.” A Jew had four little tassels hanging from an element on his robe, and they were made of blue, and they symbolized – according to Numbers 15 and Deuteronomy 22 – they symbolized the identification with the law of God, and they marked a Jew as a Jew.

As Jesus moved through the crowd, the little tassel would flap back and forth on His back. She lunged out and grabbed that and held on. V 22, But Jesus turned around, and when He saw her He said, “Be of good cheer, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And the woman was made well from that hour.

He responded to that. He was touchable. He was sensitive and responsive. The woman didn’t want to be exposed in her embarrassment and shame. She just wanted to reach out and touch, but she had the faith to believe that that was all that was necessary, because there was so much power.

The ruler had somewhat of an inadequate motive. He really wanted his little girl alive. The lady had somewhat superstitious. But Jesus took them where they were, redeemed them both.

Luke 8:44, came from behind and touched the border of His garment. And immediately her flow of blood stopped. She was healed instantly.

When Jesus turned around to get involved with this one woman. But we all have this in common, we have a sense of desperate need, and we have faith to believe. There is neither male nor female, Jew nor Greek, bond or free, rich, or poor. All are one.

So, Jesus Christ pulls everything to a halt to deal with the outcast woman. As He deals with her, He doesn’t deal with her from a distance. Watch what He says to her. V 22, “Be of good cheer, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And the woman was made well from that hour.

“Daughter” So intimate, personal, familial, and tender. She had already been healed. This is in addition to that. She was healed the minute she touched, but when Jesus called her out, He said, “There’s something else. Your healing didn’t have anything to do with your faith, not really. That was a sovereign act of God.”

If you study the gospels and the record of Christ, you will find multitudes upon multitudes of people who were healed, and it says nothing about whether they believed or not. Did the little girl who was raised from the dead have faith?

No! Paralyzed servant of the centurion who was healed, did he have faith? No.

When we study the gospels, we find many places where people were healed, and there is no indication that they particularly had faith. Healing was a sovereign act on God’s part as Jesus demonstrated His deity, and healing is still a sovereign act on God’s part.

But in addition to the physical healing, He said, “Your faith has made well physically. He used the word sōzō, which is the New Testament word to be saved. “‘Your faith has saved you.’ There was a more than a physical healing.

He was powerful. V 23, When Jesus came into the ruler’s house, and saw the flute players and the noisy crowd wailing The interlude has taken so long, the girl’s dead. Jesus came and He saw the musicians and the people making a noise.”

Have you ever gone to a funeral home?

When someone I dead it is so quiet. Everybody walks around whispering, black suits, very quiet. You go sneaking down little halls and in little rooms, little quiet caskets, little organs playing very quiet. Somebody drops something everyone turns. Our culture is that you get quiet.

Their culture real noisy. Like our Tamil culture! By the way, the girl’s been dead long enough for the funeral to start, so they knew she was very sick, and they have already been on call ready to move in. So, you have professional mourners, and they came in.

They screamed and shrieked and wailed and all this. Three basic things went on in a Jewish funeral. 1. Rending of garments. You were supposed to rip your clothes. That was symbolic of your grief, and they had 39 different rules and regulations on how to rip your clothes, according to the Talmud.

You had to do it while you were standing up. You had to do it over your heart or near your heart.

If you were a mother and father, it had to be right over your heart. If you were not the mother or father, it could be anywhere near. You had to rip it big enough to stick your fist through. You had to leave the rip for seven days.

For the next 30, you could stitch it with big stitches, but you couldn’t sew it permanently, so people would know you still felt bad. In order for women not to expose themselves in an indiscreet manner by ripping their clothes, they would rip their undergarment and then wear it backwards.

Everybody is somewhere ripping their clothes. This would have been a big funeral, because this was a very important man. They are all in there tearing their clothes. 2. Wailing. The professional women would come in and begin to wail.

They would have been paid.

They would have learned the domestic history of the whole family, so they would be bringing up the names of everybody who had ever died in that family and erupting old sorrows long ago buried. They would bring everything up, and they would wail and shriek and scream and make all this racket. Trying to touch every tender cord they possibly could for every person who had ever died.

3. Flute players. They had all different kinds of flutes, but they would come in and play flutes. The Talmud says this, “The husband is bound to bury his dead wife and to make lamentations in mourning for her according to the custom of all countries. Also, the very poorest among the Israelites will not allow her less than two flutes and one wailing woman.”

Even if you were in abject poverty, you had to hire one wailing woman and two flutes. If you were wealthy, the Talmud said, it should be in accord with your wealth.

So here is a man who probably had a lot of means, and the place was filled with flutes. We could imagine what a mess, ripping, tearing, screaming, shrieking, wailing, and people all over the place playing flutes. Jesus saw the musicians and the people making all this noise.

V 24, He said to them, “Make room, for the girl is not dead, but sleeping.” And they ridiculed Him. Jesus tells them go away.

Why? According to Talmud this is required of them. We are doing what we are supposed to do. The girl is not dead. She is sleeping. They laughed in His face.

Doesn’t Jesus know? Of course, He knows she’s dead. Been reported already that she’s dead, and He knows He is going to raise her from the dead. Of course, He knows she is dead. But what He is saying is you cannot treat her death as death.

You must treat it as sleep because it is so temporary.

You must treat her as if she’s just asleep. The implication is, because I am going to raise her from the dead, and that’s why they laughed. They laughed in His face. He is going to wake her up. A little bit about the fact that they were paid mourners.

When their weeping turned to laughing that fast. They could cry for this child, or they could laugh at Jesus in an instant. So, they mocked Him in the face. In fact, the verb means they laughed hard. They really laughed hard.

This verb is only used in this story, and it is used in this story three times. It is the kind of scornful laughter reserved for mocking a fool. Only a fool would think He could raise her from the dead. And they had seen other miracles. This crowd in Capernaum, but they still didn’t believe.

Luke 16:31, But he said to him, ‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.’ ”

V 25, But when the crowd was put outside, He went in and took her by the hand, and the girl arose. Jesus got rid of them all. ‘Talitha cumi.’” Little girl, arise. Jesus told them not to tell anybody, but they couldn’t resist it, and they just put more pressure on Him as His enemies moved in closer.

Luke 8:55, Then her spirit returned, and she arose immediately. And He commanded that she be given something to eat. That means that she was truly dead, and her spirit came to her again, and she arose. Jesus didn’t have to touch the little girl, didn’t have to reach out His hand to her. Could have just said the word, but it is the way of God to be tender.

It is the way of God to be gentle. It is the way of God to be affectionate and loving. It is the way of God’s people to greet one another with a holy kiss as an extension of His affection toward them. V 26, And the report of this went out into all that land.

Do you know what they said about Him? He has power over disease. He has power over disorders. He has power over death. He can redeem. Matthew reaches a pinnacle in his presentation of the power of Jesus Christ. A young preacher was called upon suddenly to preach a funeral sermon. He decided that he would hunt the gospels to try to find one of Christ’s funeral sermons, but he searched in vain. He found that every time Christ attended a funeral, He broke it up by raising the person from the dead, and so He never gave a funeral sermon. When the dead heard His voice, they immediately sprang to life.

We should rejoice in death because we have conquered death. He will not leave His Holy One to see corruption. He will show us the path of life. In His presence is fullness of joy, and at His right hand are treasures forevermore.

Picture a crowd of grieving caterpillars, all wearing black suits. All these caterpillars are crawling along mourning. They were carrying the corpse of a cocoon to its final resting place. The poor distressed caterpillars were weeping. Above them is

fluttering around this incredibly beautiful butterfly, looking down in utter disbelief. Christ gives us hope.

Can Jesus overcome death?

G. B. Hardy, the Canadian scientist, one time said, “When I

looked at religion, ‘I have two questions.

Question 1: Has anybody ever conquered death? Question 2: If they did, did they make a way for me to conquer, too? He said, I checked the tomb of Buddha, and it was occupied. I checked the tomb of Confucius, and it was occupied.

I checked the tomb of Mohammad, and it was occupied. I came to the tomb of Jesus, and it was empty. I said, ‘There is one who conquered death.’ I asked the second question, ‘Did He make a way for me to do it?’ I opened the Bible, and He said, ‘Because I live you shall live also.’”

Jesus, can you conquer death?

Are you the one who can reverse the curse? Do you, as it says in Revelation 1, hold in your hand the keys of death and hell? If you are that one, show us. Demonstrate it. The same Jesus who stood at the grave of Lazarus and groaned, who wept with Mary, was the same Jesus who said to Martha.

John 11:25-26, Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me, though he may die, he shall live. 26 And whoever lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this?”