Christ could see how sick she was, for she lay there with a fever unable to get up. Was any case too hard for him? Was he ever at a loss to know what to do? No, he stood over her, as Luke records, as one who knew exactly what he is going to do and was master of the situation. Christ has authority over all the power of the devil, over all disease, and over all the effects of the curse. Nothing takes him by surprise; nothing daunts him; nothing causes him to fail. We must come to him with this confidence, for certainly our problems are too hard for any human being to solve. This was true of this woman’s fever. The science of medicine may have advanced further in our day, but at that time there was no knowledge of how to cure such a fever. The situation was alarming, so they came to him with this dire need and he responded. They did not know how he healed her; they did not need to know. He works according to his own knowledge and does not need to share that with us. We see the result of what he does.
But her fever was a picture of the disease of sin. This sick mother was in a confused state in which she could scarcely understand where she was or what was going on around her; her thinking was confused, and she could not participate in the family life or serve those around her as she would have liked to have done. In the same way, sin renders us useless to God and to man. We cannot pray to him, love him, obey him, or worship him. The removal of our sin is something that no power on earth can achieve, and that is what we need. Only the infinite power of God can remove our sin and its consequences for they are eternal. Only the wisdom of God can devise a way by which sinners can be forgiven and brought into the closest possible relationship with God, as his sons and daughters. Only the righteousness of Christ can earn each one of us a place in heaven, which is ours by right because the Father cannot turn away the mediatorial work of the Son.
Christ does not deal merely with the symptoms when he takes up a case, but he goes right to the heart of the matter and he addresses the root cause. That is not how physicians on earth work. They so often do not know the root cause but have to work backwards from the symptoms and try to bring relief. The workings of pathogens are beyond their understanding and they must let the illness play itself out. They rely on a healing process which they understand imperfectly, and without which they could achieve little. Christ is the author of the healing process, but he bypasses it to bring immediately health and proper functioning to all parts. He works directly in correcting the malady and after he has worked, there is no trace of the problem. He who designed the body knows its workings, and he knows the nature of all disease and how to stop its progress. But he also knows the souls of men and women, and the terrible effect sin has had on them. The root cause of all human ills is sin, and unless this can be dealt with then no real advance has been made. He knows how to remove the fever of sin which confuses all right thinking and damages every organ of the soul – the mind, the will and the affections, and the conscience which oversees them all. He knows the workings of our hearts and puts in us a new nature that knows how to love him and obey him willingly and cheerfully. It is through the work of Jesus Christ on the cross that the problem of sin is dealt with, and it is through the application of his work by the Spirit that our hearts are made new.
This is not the way that people normally recover from a serious illness. There must usually be time for recouperation and the gathering of strength, but when Christ heals, there is no such gradual process, but an immediate infusion of life and strength. This lady had been enfeebled, confused, and useless to the household, but now she was so well that she proceeded to prepare a meal for them, and busy herself as though she had never been sick. We too are useless to God before conversion. Christ touches our wills and our understanding and our feelings, and his touch is a healing touch. He lifts up the soul to begin immediately to pray to God, to give thanks with a true realisation of what has been done, to find its complete and utter satisfaction in the Lord, and to worship him. We see that the kingdom of heaven is the only kingdom that will endure and that service in that kingdom is the only service that will have lasting effect. We long to play a part in the work of the kingdom. Of course, there is growth subsequently, but the healing of the soul is immediate. Conversion involves the receiving of a new disposition. Once I was a friend of sin, but now sin is my enemy. I am lifted up to understand the truth of God.
Luke tells us that Christ rebuked the fever. Why is this? The word means reprove or admonish. Normally we would only rebuke a person, for only a person is capable of understanding and responding to a rebuke. The same word is used of Christ when he cast out demons (Matthew 17:18; Mark 1:25). But Christ is also said to rebuke the waves in order to calm the storm (Matthew 8:26), and here he rebukes the fever, not because there is any demonic influence at work behind it, but because Christ came to remove all the effects of the fall for his people, and this healing symbolises that removal. God indeed sent the curse as a punishment for sin, but in the case of the elect, that punishment is completely removed by the work of the Redeemer.