Christ The Great Physician.

Adapted From A Sermon By

George Burder

But when he heard it, he said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.

(Matthew 9:12)

Our text this is the 12th verse of Matthew 9: But when he heard it, he said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. And our theme will be Christ as The Great Physician.

The Scriptures of truth uniformly represent Jesus Christ as the supreme object of every believer's love, as being precious to every believer (1 Peter 2:7)—“distinguished among ten thousand and altogether desirable.”(Song of Solomon 5:10, 16) He is described as “the pearl of great value,”(Matthew 13:45-46) to obtain which the spiritual merchant gladly parts with all that he is worth; and the apostle Paul goes so far as to say, “If anyone has no love for the Lord, let him be accursed.”(1 Corinthians 16:22)

But, is the Savior so highly esteemed by all who profess and call themselves Christians? Is the Gospel of his grace, his righteousness, his salvation, supremely prized by all who are called by his name! Sadly! it is far from the case. Like Gallio of old, many “pay no attention to any of these things;”(Acts 18:17) and others satisfy themselves with an occasional and careless attention to them. Like Pilate, they “find no guilt in this man,”(Luke 23:4) but their hearts are engaged in the pursuits and enjoyments of the present world, and they “set their minds on the things of the flesh,”(Romans 8:4) on earthly things.

How can we account for this? How is it that any, with the Scriptures in their hands, should forsake their own mercies in this way, and have so little esteem for the source and foundation of their salvation? The text resolves the difficulty. Here we find an answer—“Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.”

It is obvious to all, that a man in perfect health, who feels no pain, and is conscious of no disease, will not call on a physician. Whatever reports he may have heard respecting him, or whatever opinion he may have of his skill, he sees no immediate need for his assistance: and this was the condition of the Pharisees while our Lord was on earth. He came “to seek the lost;”(Luke 19:10) and in the pursuit of this benevolent object, he did not disdained to freely converse with tax collectors and sinners: not that he meant to endorse their sins; no; he mingled with them only to reclaim them, just as physicians go among the diseased for the purpose of curing them.

But this greatly offended the proud Pharisees—men “who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt.”(Luke 18:9) They complained of his conduct to his disciples, asking, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” but “wisdom is justified by all her children.”(Luke 7:35) Our Lord, in the text, vindicates his own conduct, while he accounts for that of the Pharisees: “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.”—These men were unaware of the state of their own souls, while others were rejoicing that they had found a remedy.

These words may teach us the four following things:

First—That sin is the disease of the soul.

Secondly—Jesus is the great physician.

Thirdly—Those who are insensible of their sins, neglect him.

Fourthly—Those who know their true condition, are very eager to be helped by him.

I. In the first place, we are taught that sin is the disease of the soul. We brought it into the world with us, deriving it from our first parents; for “sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin.”(Romans 5:12) It is a strictly accurate description of sin, for it has just the same effects upon the soul that disease has upon the body. Sickness destroys all our powers of action, and deprives us of the ability to carry out our affairs, however important and urgent they may be: whatever dangers we might avoid, whatever advantages we might obtain, there is a total inability for action; and thus it is with the soul.

We have before us a vast eternity, and this is the only time we can prepare for it; it is the seed-time of eternity; we are now called upon to “work out our own salvation with fear and trembling;”(Philippians 2:12) but while this sickness persists, we have no heart to engage in this great work; we cannot bear the thought of putting in the necessary effort. Even the ordinary means of grace are frequently neglected; the Bible, and prayer, and sermons, are shunned; for the sinner has no heart for them.

Sickness deprives a man of rest; he cannot be composed: he feels a constant uneasiness, an insatiable thirst: and so, as the Scripture says, “There is no peace to the wicked;”(Isaiah 48:22) he turns from creature to creature, seeking rest and finding none; the world disappoints him; he meets with repeated and perpetual difficulties; this perhaps irritates him, and makes him a burden to himself and others; to get rid of his cares, he runs to amusements and distractions; but the disease, instead of being relieved, is aggravated, and he grows worse and worse.

Disease often makes the sufferer delirious. A very sick man may not knows where he is, or what he says; when he is at death’s door, he imagines himself perfectly well, and if not prevented, would be in danger of destroying himself. And so a man in a state of sin is furiously bent on his own ruin; he will not be persuaded there is any danger in his case; and he is very angry with the servants of Christ who would convince him of his error. Solomon says, “the hearts of the children of man are full of evil, and madness is in their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead.”(Ecclesiastes 9:3) How do such people fondly imagine that their hearts are good, even while their ways are contrary to God’s will! Sin deforms the body. “When God disciplines a man with rebukes for sin, he consumes like a moth what is dear to him;”(Psalm 39:11)—“He changes his countenance, and sends him away.”(Job 14:20) The finest face may soon be disfigured, and the most lovely person become homely; but, in the sight of God, nothing is so beautiful as holiness, nothing so ugly as sin.

Finally, disease is the forerunner of death.—Many diseases are mortal in their tendency, and if not caught early, will bring the patient to the grave. Some diseases baffle the skill of the most skilled physician.—Sin, which is the disease of the soul, is certainly mortal, if Christ the great physician does not intervene: Death was the original threatening, to keep man from sin. God said to Adam, “in the day that you eat of” the forbidden fruit, “you shall surely die;”(Genesis 2:17) and die he did; his body became mortal; and though he had a long reprieve, he returned at length to the dust from which he came.

But he immediately suffered a moral death; he became “dead in trespasses and sins,”(Ephesians 2:1) and liable to the bitter pains of eternal death. And so,“one trespass led to condemnation for all men.”(Romans 5:18) This is our state: we are, universally, dead in sin; we have bodies doomed to the grave, and souls exposed to the just anger of an offended God. This is indeed a miserable state; but it would be far worse, if there were no remedy. Thanks be to God, we can, with confidence, say, There is a physician, and he no less a person than the Son of God; and this is what we propose,

II. In the second place, to notice—That Jesus Christ is the great Physician.

There is no one on earth able to cure the souls of men, but the Son of God; he pitied us in our low state; he saw us perishing in our sins and in our blood; and he left his throne of glory—visited this sinful planet—took our nature into union with his own; indeed, he “has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows; yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed.”(Isaiah 53:4-5)—When on earth, he gave many gracious examples of his power to heal the souls of men, by healing their bodies; and such was his power, that “every disease and every affliction,”(Matthew 4:23) among the people was healed; and such was the compassion of our blessed Lord, that of all the great crowds of sick and afflicted people who applied to him, not one of them was sent away without relief.

In the cure of our souls two things are necessary: we are guilty, and must be justified; we are polluted, and must be sanctified: he performs both these parts of our cure; which is implied by the expression, that out of his side came water and blood. As the apostle John writes in his first epistle, “This is he who came by water and blood—Jesus Christ; not by the water only but by the water and the blood.”(1 John 5:6) So that this may encourage us to apply to him, and say,

“Be of sin the double cure—

“Cleanse us from its guilt and power.”

Seeing, then, there is such a great and able Physician, may we not ask as in Jeremiah, “Why then has the health of the daughter of my people not been restored?”(Jeremiah 8:22) This leads us,

III. In the third place, to observe that men generally are too unaware of their sins, to come to Christ; “those who are well have no need of a physician;” it is the worst symptom of the disease of sin, that men are totally insensible of it, or think themselves so slightly diseased, that they are in no danger; and, in any case, that there will be time enough in the future to pay attention to these things. Sin destroys all our faculties; it blinds the eyes of our understanding, and deadens the feelings of our hearts; the mind is so darkened, that it does not behold sin as it is, and dreadful mistakes abound, respecting its true and dangerous nature. Let us endeavor to detect some of these.

i) Some of these fatal mistakes among men arise from ignorance of the holy law. If sin is “lawlessness,” (1 John 3:4)we ought to consider, what are the demands of that law; and we will find it requires perfect obedience to the will of God, and that, flowing from perfect love to him; it requires also that we should love our neighbor, in all instances, as ourselves. Now; while men are ignorant of this holy law, they discover no disease; but when, as in the case of the apostle Paul, the commandment comes, with a powerful conviction of its spiritual nature, unsatisfied demands, and fearful curse, then, like him, they are ready to die.(Romans 7:9)

ii) Another mistake respects the depravity of our natures. Of this most people are ignorant. “God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes.”(Ecclesiastes 7:29) Man is now an apostate creature, and it may be said of him, in all his faculties, as was said of Israel, in all the branches of her civil and ecclesiastical, estate, “The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint.”(Isaiah 1:5)

iii) Another dangerous mistake respects their opinion of their own goodness. How many people imagine that they have good hearts, good desires, good intentions; they mean, they say, no harm, they do none to any man, even while they are living in open rebellion against God, and in the total neglect both of his law and of his gospel. And so it is that men deceive themselves; they are “whole” in their own esteem, and are angry with those who would convince them of their danger, though with the friendly desire of their obtaining a cure.

Others will admit that all is not quite right; they cannot say they are in perfect health, but they see no reason to be alarmed; they are no worse than others: besides, they say, God is very merciful, and he will not deal with his creatures severely; and if they should come short at last, the merits of Christ will make up the deficiency; besides, they intend to reform and repent, at some future time.

Now all this exposes a dreadful degree of ignorance; they are strangers to themselves, and to the nature of that gospel, which, take it in which view you please, always supposes that man is in a fallen, dangerous situation. And this why it has justly been called “the religion of a sinner;” also we find, that men have “pursued a law that would lead to righteousness,” but “did not succeed in reaching that law:” the reason was, “they did not pursue it by faith, but as if it were based on works.”(Romans 9:31-32)

Consider the Gospel itself for a few moments, and you will see that it supposes the condition of man to be not that of one who is whole, but who is exceedingly diseased. Why is the love of God in giving his Son spoken of as amazing love, as surpassing all understanding?—“God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son;” and for what end? That men “should not perish,” as they must have done but for this marvelous provision of love, but “have eternal life.”(John 3:16) Again, the love of Jesus Christ is spoken of as the most extraordinary thing in the world, and as absolutely necessary for the salvation of man—that one must die for the people— “the righteous for the unrighteous.”(1 Peter 3:18)

Our case would have been hopeless without him, and his death is represented as being the sole foundation of our hope; so that to depend upon anything else is, in effect, to nullify grace, and to say that “Christ died for no purpose.”(Galatians 2:21)—Again, consider the offices of our dear Redeemer, and what do they imply? Is he a prophet? Then we were ignorant creatures, and needed his instructions.—Is he a priest? Then we were guilty, and needed his sacrifice.—Is he a king? Then we were feeble and weak, and unable to defend or rule ourselves. Look at all the operations of the Holy Spirit, and they speak the same language, and while they hold out to us the divine and only remedy, they strongly imply our wretched state. Now all those that are ignorant of this, neglect to apply to the Lord Jesus Christ; but some acquaintance with it is found in all those who resort to him for relief—such as, in our text, are described as “sick.” This leads us,

iv) In the fourth place, to observe, that those who know their true condition will gladly come to Jesus Christ as their physician.

For the eyes of their understandings are enlightened; they see the law of God in its spiritual nature and extensive requirements; they perceive the fearful consequences of breaking it, for “cursed be anyone who does not confirm the words of this law by doing them.”(Deuteronomy 27:26)

Furthermore, their heart is softened, the heart of stone is taken away, and God has given them a feeling heart of flesh; the conscience is made alive; convinced, it may be, at first, of some one particular and flagrant transgression; but they are led back in painful reflection on the whole of their past lives, recollecting long-forgotten sins, and tracing them to the sad source of all—Original Sin. And as a result earnest desires and sincere prayers are offered for relief. “What must I do to be saved?”(Acts 16:30) is the anxious inquiry. “Behold, he is praying!”(Acts 9:11) is the observation that everyone makes on the returning sinner; then, indeed, the soul eagerly turns to the Gospel of the grace of Jesus, and the Gospel displays his ability to heal; it shows us that Jesus possesses almighty power; it shows that he possesses the same power that created and supports the world.

The Gospel also displays the loving heart of the compassionate Redeemer; it records also the wonderful cures he has already performed, and which are recorded for this reason, that in all future ages great sinners may be encouraged to repent; then the soul looks up to him as the Israelite looked to the bronze serpent in the wilderness, when stung by the fiery serpents, and ready to die of their wounds; and whoever so looks to him will be immediately healed; persuaded, fully persuaded both of his power and his grace, the soul finds health restored, and his guilty conscience finds peace.

The case of each one of us in this room has now been described.

In one of these two classes each one of us must be found. Is it in the first? Are you among the well, who think they do not need a physician! If so, you are making a great mistake, and a very dangerously mistake; which if not corrected, will prove fatal. Your present views of yourselves are in direct conflict with the whole of the Bible. If you look to the law, that condemns you, because you have broken it; if you look to the gospel, that condemns you too, because you disregard its remedy. Where then will you look, if neither the law nor the gospel can give you relief?

You will perhaps say, Can I be sick without knowing it? Yes, you certainly may. Many are, even as to their bodies: some very dangerous disease may be making fatal progress before it is discovered; some sink into a lethargy, and feel nothing; others are delirious; and it is no uncommon thing for persons to be seriously diseased while they imagine that all is well, and that there is no danger.

Do consider carefully how sin miserably perverts the judgment, and hides from men their true condition. Sinners are frequently like many patients, who imagine, to the very last, that they are getting better and better, when there is only a step between them and death. Believe the divine testimony! The word of God is true, and shows you your true condition; and while it points out your danger, it kindly directs you to the true remedy.

The inconsistency of so many on this point is truly saddening. If their bodies are disordered in the slightest degree, they are keenly aware of it, and greatly alarmed; but their minds are so blinded, their consciences are so dulled, and they are so deluded by the tempter, that they will not believe, nor bear to be told of, their spiritual sickness and danger. May God so enlighten our minds, soften our hearts, and fix upon our consciences such a deep and lasting conviction of our sickness, that we may be of those who earnestly cry, “God be merciful to me a sinner!”(Luke 18:13)

But, hopefully , there are some here who are convinced of their disease, and such are apt to be dejected, and tempted to despair. The deceiver says, There is no help for you in God; your case is special; there never was one so bad, and it is in vain for you to look for healing. But remember, Jesus is mighty—almighty to save. Mark the words; “Able to save to the uttermost”(Hebrews 7:25)—to the uttermost: and surely your case is not beyond the uttermost. You may object that sin greatly ‘abounds:’ True; but grace shall ‘much more abound;’(Hebrews 7:25) and remember, that the Savior is as willing as he is able to save.

Remember the cures he performed while on earth. Many were the applications made to him, and, sometimes, rather ill-timed; but he never rejected them; he healed all who applied to him. May it not be said, then, “Take heart, he is calling you?”(Mark 10:49) You may say, He does not call me by name. But yes, he does: for is not your name Sinner? That is the name by which you are called; he calls you as Sinners.

Christ declared that he came “not to call the righteous but sinners to repentance”(Luke 5:32)— that he “came to seek and to save the lost.”(Luke 19:10) Now this is your condition. He knows it is, and he has made you feel it; you are therefore the very person he came on purpose to heal. But, you are deeply dejected and brokenhearted. This is your character; well, “He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.”(Psalms 147:3) Indeed, when he first opened his commission, and declared the purpose of his coming into the world, this was declared to be one of his offices: he came—“to proclaim good news to the poor.”(Luke 4:18) Why then should you despair? Can you doubt the effectiveness of the remedy? or the love of the physician? or the sincerity of his offers? Be faithless no longer, but believing. Take the remedy; believe its efficacy, and give him glory.

Some of you have received a cure. Gratefully acknowledge it to the glory of his name. You are not like some, mentioned in this chapter, who were prohibited from telling anyone of it. No, you are commanded to publish it abroad, and let the fame of Jesus be known everywhere. Call, then, upon your soul, and all that is within you, to “bless his holy name, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases, who redeems your life from the pit, who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy.”(Psalm 103:1,4) Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, who have been thus graciously restored from the dreadful disease of sin. O that men would “thank the Lord for his steadfast love, for his wondrous works to the children of man.”(Psalm 107:31)

It is generally necessary for a person recovering from disease to be very cautions, for fear of a relapse. You live in a contagious world: you live in an hospital, where all are diseased. Shun the dangers which surround you, and avoid even the appearance of evil. Study to preserve your spiritual health. Let him who has been cured remember this—“Watch and pray that you may not enter into temptation.”(Mark 14:38)

Finally, let us look forward with joyful hope to that happy world where sin is not known, or known only by recollection; where no inhabitant will say, “I am sick,” but where every one may and will say, I was “sick, to death,” but the Lord had mercy on me, and healed me;

now to our glorious Healer, even to “him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honor and glory and might forever and ever.” (Revelation 5:13)