(Luke 13:10-17)

A woman is healed by Jesus. It happens in the synagogue on the Sabbath.

Translate into Christian terms and it could be in this church on this Sunday evening. Try and imagine the scene. Maybe there is a disturbance at the back. A woman gets out of her pew. She’s someone who has been coming to church since she was young. She has some disease of the spine, which means that she’s been virtually bent double since 1982. She used to be an attractive young lass. All the young men fancied her. But then disease struck and for years she’s been like this. It came on quite suddenly. Equally suddenly all the young men stopped paying her attention. Now she can never even so much as raise her eyes. The only view she ever has is of the ground in front of her. OK. You get the scene. So, now back to that first century synagogue

There must have been quite a stir. It was quite unprecedented for something like this to happen in the middle of Sabbath worship. What is Jesus going to do? By now his reputation for healing is well-known.

Jesus looks at her and speaks. “Woman you are set free from your infirmity” The Greek word used here is asthenia, and carries the sense of weakness or infirmity. The woman had no actual bodily illness, but rather a weakness, a disability.. But she had been like that for all these years. No wonder that Jesus says that she is “set free”. And we are told
  Jesus put his hands on her and immediately she straightened up and praised
  God.

Before we move on in the narrative of this part of Luke’s gospel, let’s note one other thing. Verse 10 had told us that she had been crippled by a spirit. Now, those of you who were here two weeks ago will have heard Charles Widdowson speak of people being bound by demonic spirits. Some of you may well have raised an eyebrow when he said that. But what about the incident he then spoke of. Let me just add that I believe the demonic is very real. Not that we should go looking for demons in every shadow and round every corner. But Christian people can be bound in their thoughts or emotions or acts by demons which had gained entry before they were Christian. I recall one time when as part of our Healing and Prayer Ministry Team I was involved with two others in extended prayer counselling of a young Christian man. To cut a long story short: After several sessions it became clear that this was a case of demonic bondage. After anointing the man with oil, we commanded the demon to tell us his name, and in a voice very different from the young man’s usual voice, we heard the name of the demon, which we promptly commanded, in Jesus’ Name to leave. And the young man was free!

Let us move on to the next element in this narrative, where in verse 14 we read
  Indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, the synagogue ruler
  said to the people, “There are six days for work. So, come and be healed
  on those days but not on the Sabbath
Note two things. One that the synagogue ruler did not, like the healed woman praise God for what God had done. Second he made his objection not to Jesus but turned to the people, the congregation.

Was he afraid of Jesus? Or was he just ignoring him in his anger? But signally he cannot praise God for what God had done! One is reminded of another incident when the Pharisees accused Jesus of casting out demons by Satan’s power. What blindness! What folly!

But the main point I would make is that this man almost for sure was bound too. Bound by a religious spirit. He would rescue an animal is danger on the Sabbath but not- even could have done it, carry out this work of greater compassion. There is that incident related in Mark’s gospel where the Pharisees complain to Jesus because his disciples eat food with (ritually) unclean hands. Jesus’ response on that occasion was to say “You have let go of the commands of God and are holding on to the traditions of men”(Mark 7:8)

They were more concerned with rules and regulations that with love and compassion. They cared more for the things of man than for the things of God. Such is always the case with the religious spirit. Human ritual, human tradition can so easily outweigh the Word and worship of God, and the religious spirit is alive and well today! People will never be drawn into a church where religion, where rules and regulations outweigh and even overrule the worship of the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. He may still, in his compassion bless people, but his heart will be grieved and angered. There are, of course, many other things which can hold our churches back, but a religious spirit (be it an Anglo-Catholic or an Evangelical one!) can so easily hinder the work of the Holy Spirit. Let us have the courage to see where our individual churches and even we as individuals may be thus bound.

But now I would like to move on to the climax of this incident. Verse 16:
  Should not this woman a daughter of Abraham whom Satan has kept bound
  for eighteen long years be set free on the Sabbath day from what bound her?
What more fitting day for this act of liberation to take place? And I would suggest further that in this verse we have the kernel of the Christian gospel!

1. Whom Satan has kept bound.
This is the human condition. It has been the human condition ever since Adam and Eve fell in the Garden of Eden. Ever since the serpent, ever since Satan, in his cunning caused them to act in disobedience of God’s command, the human race has been removed from Eden. The human race has lived out of fellowship with its Creator God, and of course this is not just a racial but a personal matter. We are all born bound in sin’s bondage. This is not popular truth but let us remind ourselves of Psalm 51:5
  Surely I was sinful at birth, sinful from the time my mother conceived me.
Before God cast Adam and Eve from Eden, he places a curse on Satan. We have it in Genesis 3:15
  And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed
  and hers; he will crush your head and you will strike his heel.
The Hebrew word zero’ is the one translated ‘seed’ and carries the sense of ‘posterity’. The woman’s ‘seed’ is singular and surely looks forward to the one designated in Luke 3:37 as the son of Adam, the son of God. The Lord Jesus Christ alone was sinless and free of that bondage. He alone could crush the serpent’s head
 
2. This woman a daughter of Abraham A daughter of the one with whom the Lord God Almighty made a covenant that through him and his seed all peoples would be blessed. This woman stood in line to receive God’s blessing, and God’s greatest blessing and the one mostly, surely, covered in this covenant is the blessing of salvation. Let us remember the words of the Nunc Dimittis, where Simeon speaks of having seen God’s salvation. God’s. It is not out work. We cannot choose to be recipients of salvation. It is God’s gracious gift to those to whom He wills to give it. Romans 8:30 tells us And those he predestined he also called; those he called, he also justified; those he justified he also glorified.
  Don’t ask me to explain the truth of election, but don’t ask me to deny it either. If you are Christian be doubly thankful.

3. set free of the Sabbath day
The day of rest. There’s another meaning to rest in the Bible. It is the ‘rest’ of salvation. How long some poor souls labour to satisfy God’s law. How long they labour to get into God’s good books. They may well do it through the works of religion. But let us realise there is nothing we can do to earn, merit or deserve salvation. We shall only do it when we accept the Lord Jesus Christ on his terms and give up all our self-based labour.

Can I finish with a personal note? You may have been coming to church all your life. You may have considered yourself ‘religious’ and ‘moral’ all your life. But. Have you received God’s gift of salvation? Have you knelt before the Cross and cried out for mercy and forgiveness and new life in Jesus Christ? If not, remember the Bible says:
  Now is the time of God’s favour. Now is the day of salvation
That day will not last for ever. Call upon the Lord today not to-morrow