Category: Matthew Chapter 9

There are four lessons in this passage which deserve close attention. Let us mark them each in succession.

Let us mark, in the first place, that strong faith in Christ may sometimes be found where it might least have been expected.

Who would have thought that two blind men would have called our Lord the “Son of David”? They could not, of course, have seen the miracles that He did: they could only know Him by common report. But the eyes of their understanding were enlightened, if their bodily eyes were dark; they saw the truth which scribes and Pharisees could not see; they saw that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah. They believed that He was able to heal them.

Let us mark, in this passage, the gracious name by which the Lord Jesus speaks of Himself. He calls Himself “the Bridegroom.”

What the bridegroom is to the bride, the Lord Jesus is to the souls of all who believe in Him. He loves them with a deep and everlasting love; He takes them into union with Himself: they are “one with Christ and Christ in them.” He pays all their debts to God; He supplies all their daily need; He sympathizes with them in all their troubles; He bears with all their infirmities, and does not reject them for a few weaknesses. He regards them as part of Himself: those that persecute and injure them are persecuting Him. The glory that He has received from His Father they will one day share with Him, and where He is, there shall they be. Such are the privileges of all true Christians. They are the Lamb’s wife. (Rev. 19:7) Such is the portion to which faith admits us. By it God joins our poor sinful souls to one precious Husband; and those whom God thus joins together shall never be put asunder. Blessed indeed are they that believe!

Let us notice, in the first part of this passage, our Lord’s knowledge of men’s thoughts.

There were certain of the scribes who found fault with the words which Jesus spoke to a man sick of the palsy: they said secretly among themselves, “This man blasphemeth.” They probably supposed that no one knew what was going on in their minds: they had yet to learn that the Son of God could read hearts, and discern spirits. Their malicious thought was publicly exposed: they were put to an open shame. Jesus “knew their thoughts.”