The Hunchback and Not a Dame - Brandon Byler

Lesson Transcript

If every person in the world were physically crooked, would you know that you were out of shape? Would I know that I was bent? Our text this morning is Luke 13:10-17. Luke 13:10-17. It's the story of Jesus' encounter with a woman who had a very serious spiritual and spinal issue. The title of my message is The Hunchback and Not a Dame. The Hunchback and Not a Dame, with apologies to Victor Hugo. Dame is a female equivalent of the male knight.

And so dame, in the usual sense, signifies a woman of means, of authority, of significance, or perhaps all three. But the lady of the text today had none of these things, and yet Jesus cared for her. Luke 13:10, reading out of the New King James Version: "Now he, Jesus, was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. And behold, there was a woman who had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and was bent over and could in no way raise herself up.

But when Jesus saw her, he called her to him and said to her, 'Woman, you are loosed from your infirmity.' And he laid his hands on her, and immediately she was made straight and glorified God. But the ruler of the synagogue answered with indignation because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath. And he said to the crowd, 'There are six days on which men ought to work.

Therefore come and be healed on them and not on the Sabbath day.' The Lord then answered him and said, 'Hypocrite, does not each one of you on the Sabbath loose his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it away to water it?

So ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has bound, think of it, for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath?' And when he said these things, all his adversaries were put to shame, and all the multitude rejoiced for all the glorious things that were done by him." So if every person in the world were physically crooked, would you know that you were out of shape? Would I know that I was bent? I think of a little poem, and I forget how old I was when I first heard it.

I was just a boy. Perhaps my mom had recited it to me. You've probably heard it. There was a crooked man, and he walked a crooked mile. He found a crooked sixpence, which is an amount of money, upon a crooked style. And a style is a set of steps that goes over a fence. It allows humans to cross without the four-legged creatures, the cattle, the ox, the cows from getting through. So he found this crooked sixpence upon a crooked style.

He bought a crooked cat, which caught a crooked mouse, and they all lived together in a little crooked house. Allegedly, the origin of this poem goes back to the early 1600s when Scotland received its independence religiously and secularly from England. And yet they're all forced to live together in close proximity because of their common border.

Now, in order for us to know that the man, the mile, the sixpence, the style, the cat, the mouse, the house were all crooked, what would we need to have in order to know that those things were bent? We need something straight. Yeah. We need something to judge it by. So if I was the, on the flip side, if I was the only person in the world that was crooked, what would I do about that? Where would I go for some help with that? Where would you go for help?

And of course, considering our text here and what we have read, is there any way for us to identify with the handicapped lady here in this account? We see that this lady is someone who's stuck in a crooked position. She couldn't straighten up. But why share this narrative? Why is Luke bringing this to our attention?

Why do all of the Gospel writers, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, they all take time to share a number of accounts about people who were helped with a multitude of issues: physical, spiritual, perhaps even emotional? Why did they do that? I'm open to input. Why would the writers engage in this? Why take the time? If anyone calls this the sermon on the moon, after the sermon on the mountain, sermon on the plain, it's a sermon in action. Okay. Yes. So he's demonstrating what the kingdom is about in action.

I like that. I think one of the possible reasons, maybe there are several, I'm sure there are several, is to demonstrate that Jesus' power in an area of life carries over to all areas of life. Every part of life is under Jesus' ability to bring help, to bring straightness, if you will, physically, emotionally, spiritually, and so forth. And so I want you to see this morning Jesus' work in one woman's life so that you rely on his help for every area of your life. That's my desire.

That we would see Jesus' help in one woman's specific need of her life so that we rely on him for every area of our lives. In looking at our text, first of all, I draw your attention to the long-term restriction in verses 10 to 11. It says there in verse 10 that Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. It was just a normal Saturday in any town in Israel, a nondescript synagogue. And yet there's a wonderful teaching going on here because we know that's Jesus. Jesus is teaching.

That's one of the great things that he did, among other things that he was so gifted at. As the Jewish people gather together, Jesus is teaching the word to them. But in the midst of that very normal, ordinary service, something very unordinary and unusual happened in that place. In verse 11, "And behold, there was a woman who had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years and was bent over and could in no way raise herself up." This lady was, I don't know how she looked. I get this picture that she was like this.

She was bent over. And am I causing an issue to the cameraman? Okay. This lady didn't stay in one place. She walked around. Even though she couldn't stand up, she was bent over. And I get this picture of somebody who's already probably a little smaller. Most women tend to be a little smaller than men, so they're already small, and then they're bent over in addition for eighteen years, walking around with this sort of infirmity.

And I think about what I experienced as a boy growing up in Big Valley, where there are lots of Amish people. And Byler, my last name is from Amish background, so that goes back to our Sunday school lesson. And there was this older couple in our church, Dave and Edna Hostetler, definitely an Amish name. And Dave Hostetler was like this. As a boy, I thought he was about 90 degrees, but he was probably more like 110, 120 degrees. He was always in this position.

And I couldn't figure out, I was probably 11 or so, and I got to know Dave a little better, but I couldn't figure out why Dave couldn't straighten up. What's wrong with Dave? And he was an older man. Dave and Edna were an older couple, and they had moved into a retirement home there at Valley View Retirement Center. They had been farmers, hardworking people. But Dave was always stuck like this when he walked around. I could not figure it out. I thought, "Well, why can't Dave just stand up?" But he could.

And he could get down into the seat. He could sit in the pew all right at church, but he had to have his wife's help to haul him up. And Edna had this thing where she would take Dave's belt and give him the old heave-ho, and he would get up, you know, and there's Dave. But he's still stuck like this. And I remember one day I was standing at the bottom of the steps. We had a foyer with steps leading down to the entry and exit doors.

And Dave's coming down the steps over here, there's a handrail, and Edna's on the left side. And he had this way of coming down the steps. And I'm a little boy just standing down there. I don't know. I think I was just idly watching. I wasn't, you know, I was just trying to figure Dave out. Dave Hostetler just wouldn't straighten up.

And he's coming down the steps, and he looked at me and he said, "Someday you'll get old too." I was like, "Oh, okay." So I don't know if he was frustrated by his condition or if he was just, you know, letting me know that someday something's going to happen. But I just found it so fascinating that Dave couldn't seem to straighten up. That's the situation that this lady was in. She could not stand straight. She was badly bent.

And it's not that she was bent toward badness, but she simply could not stand up straight because of this spirit of infirmity. She couldn't solve her own problems. And maybe she didn't, I don't get the sense that she had a spiritual problem, but I sense from what we read in the story she had a spirit problem, if that makes any sense. There is a distinction, there is a difference there. And she had this spirit of infirmity, and so she needed some outside help to get free of it.

And you know, she represents pretty well the entire human race, not in the physical sense, of course, but we all walk around, most of us walk around fairly straight and shoulders thrown back and all that. But I think most every one of us could say that there's some area in my life where I feel a little bent. I feel a little wilted. I feel a little, you know, I've just got this thing, again, emotional, physical, spiritual, spirit, demonic, something relational that has been weighing me down.

And obviously, when we think about the broader needs of the world, there is a major sin issue that everybody is facing and everybody is stuck with. What I find so encouraging about this lady is that even though she had struggled with this problem for almost two decades, that's just amazing. I mean, what was happening eighteen years ago? It's like 2003. That's way back there. Some of you didn't even exist. Some of you were just little tykes running around.

We all were younger, those of us that were living at that time. Eighteen years with this long-term condition, this problem, but she was in a place where God could help her. I want to encourage you with that. You know, we can face long-term, unknown, chronic situations. We can have bumps and bruises and bang-ups. But the important thing is for us to stay in the place where God wants us to be, which is in a place where we can receive his help and his assistance.

And I don't know if this lady was a regular synagogue attender. I would tend to think that she was, but she was there on the day that it counted anyway. She was there when Jesus was there to teach. Some people might say, "Yeah, but I've had this issue for as long as I can remember." It just goes way back. And that's true. Some issues just are long, deep-seated. They can go back to childhood. But that's no match for our Lord. That is no match for Jesus.

Jesus is well able to help us resolve, to heal, to get us free from what it is that we are facing. I've observed in my own life and in the lives of others that there are times when we are hindered and bent, not necessarily so much by carnality as by emotional issues. These are things that can trace way back. And probably the two main issues that we tend to face as people are related to our childhood. I'm not here to bash parents or grandparents. I'm just here to say that we all have our failings.

I'm not the perfect parent. I wish I was. I didn't have the perfect parents, but I had really good ones. But when we look back at our childhood, there are two main things that happen to people very commonly, and that is either things happen to us that shouldn't have emotionally, or things don't happen to us that should have emotionally. We didn't get the love that we should have, or the respect, or the acceptance, or the belonging, or the connection, or whatever.

Those things have a way of shaping who we become and can cause problems. And you can cry your eyes out at an altar, but it's not going to help the emotional issue. There are reasons to cry your eyes out at an altar, and those things have to do with sin and repentance and things like that. But there are other things that have to be dealt with that cause a bend in us, and it can be immaturity. It can be emotionally unhealthy spirituality.

One man has, actually, there's a number of books out there about this, but one of the men who's written about this gives a list of what he calls the top 10 symptoms indicating if someone is suffering from a bad case of emotionally unhealthy spirituality. Now, I'm not preaching this as gospel. I'm offering this as something perhaps that is helpful, chill in the meat, spit out the bones. I'll just run down through this list of 10. Number one, he says, using God to run from God.

That's a sign of emotionally unhealthy spirituality. Number two, ignoring the emotions of anger, sadness, and fear. God gave those emotions for a reason, and just to act like they don't exist will not make us a healthy person. Three, dying to the wrong things. Four, denying the past's impact on the present. That was 30 years ago. It doesn't bother me now. Five, dividing our lives into secular and sacred compartments. Six, doing for God instead of being with God. Seven, spiritualizing away conflict.

Eight, covering over brokenness, weakness, and failure. Nine, living without limits. I need to take a second look at that one. Ten, judging other people's spiritual journey. And so sometimes a person's emotional immaturity keeps them from growing spiritually. There's that bend there that keeps them from straightening up spiritually. One man confessed this. He said, "I was a Christian for 22 years, but instead of being a 22-year-old Christian, I was a one-year-old Christian 22 times." That's pretty rough.

He said, "I just kept doing the same things over and over and over again." So maybe like this lady, we start out bent, but not physically, more emotionally immature. And maybe that's what Paul had in mind when he wrote to the Corinthians there in 2 Corinthians 6:11. He says, "O Corinthians, we have spoken openly to you. Our heart is wide open. You are not restricted by us, but you are restricted by your own affections. Now in return for the same, I speak as to children, you also be open. Be open.

Don't allow yourself to be restricted by spiritual or physical or emotional things that could be taken care of or be resolved." Secondly, observe the loving release in verses 12 to 13. This is a beautiful picture of Jesus. Listen again to his response to this hunchback in verse 12. "When Jesus saw her, he called her to him and said to her, 'Woman, you are loosed from your infirmity.' And he laid his hands on her.

Immediately she was made straight and glorified God." There are several things about what Jesus did that are worth noting here. The first of those is that he saw her. He saw her. Jesus saw this lady. In the midst of, I don't know how big the crowd was, maybe it was just a small group in the synagogue that day, but in the midst of the people who were there, Jesus saw her. It's a beautiful thing. There's joy in being noticed. I don't know how it is for you, but I struggle with this sometimes.

I go to Walmart, like maybe most of us do. And if you don't like Walmart, you go to some other place that's similar, Target or wherever. And my good friend from Bible College calls going to Walmart a study in weirdosity. And it happens, doesn't it? And you see people and you just wonder what in the world they are about. They look so unusual, so strange, so bent, socially bent. And frankly, the typical thing that I do is I invisibilize them. I see something over there and I don't see them over here.

And they're over here, so I see something over here. I really just don't pay attention. I don't look at them. I don't look them in the eyes. And hopefully you don't have that problem, but that's what I tend to do. And I sense that maybe that's what this lady had experienced in her 18 years. When you see somebody that's walking around in a very unusual position, it's an obvious handicap, do you really take time to observe them and talk with them and treat them as a human being? Probably.

But in first-century Palestine, I have a sense that there were people who didn't do that. And so that's the great thing about Jesus. Jesus picked out the one handicapped person that was there. There might have been more, but you know, this lady with the obvious need, and he saw her. He took the time to see her. What a blessing that is. So I'm not trying to put you on a guilt trip or anything. I'm just encouraging you to see the people around us. People want to be seen.

And I'd say especially people that have noticeable difficulties and defects, they appreciate when they are seen respectfully and seen well. Jesus did that. He saw her. He used his eyes to pay attention. And our eyes are so powerful in telling people whether we accept them or reject them. We can use our eyes. We can use our eyes to tell our children to shape up. Our eyes have a lot of power. Jesus saw her, but he did more than look. He also spoke to her. He spoke. He used his voice.

It says that he called her to him. We don't have any record that he used her name, and we don't know if he knew her name, but he spoke to her. And he said, "Come here. Come to me." And he addressed her. I'm sure he addressed her very respectfully and tenderly. It's interesting to realize that Jesus didn't go to her. He didn't walk to the back of the room or wherever she was, but he called her to come to, I'm assuming, the focal point of the room of the synagogue. Why would he do that?

Why would he make her so obvious? We don't know. We could speculate. I think there's several reasons probably why he did that. One is that he was recognizing her as a person, somebody who had been depersonalized, invisibilized. He was bringing her up to where everyone can see her, not to make fun of her, but to say, "This is a human being made in the image of God." He was dignifying her with attention. Secondly, I think he was encouraging a response on her part. "If you want help, come. Come. Come to me.

I'm not going to come to you, but you can come to me. You can respond." And thirdly, I think that as a woman who likely lived on the fringes of society and the synagogue, there's a sense in which he was calling her to re-enter the social and religious world. He's saying, "I'm bringing this lady back into full fellowship with all of society. No longer will she be marginalized.

She is now going to be a part of everyone who is in the fold, so to speak, everyone in the room." But that isn't all that he did in speaking to her. He didn't just call her forward. He said, "Woman, you are loosed from your infirmity. I want you to see the work of Jesus in one woman's life so that you choose to rely on him for the needs in every area of your life." He saw her. He spoke to her. And yet Jesus didn't just use the power of speech. He also used the gift of touch. He touched her.

It says he laid his hands on her to be seen, to be spoken to, to be touched. Isn't that something that all of us desire? What an amazing power is communicated in the tender touch. The touch that says, "I accept you. You are special. God loves you, and I love you too." Obviously, what Jesus did was good and holy and healing. And it reminds us, his example reminds us that that touch, personal contact, has a powerful possibility for good.

Those of us who were at Kingdom Fellowship Weekend witnessed that, I believe, when some of the men were sharing at the Open Testimony time on Sunday morning, and Patrick went up and put an arm around them after they got done speaking. And Patrick mentioned, I think it was in the panel discussion Saturday night, how meaningful a hug or just a man-to-man positive contact can be for a man who has been isolated from society, incarcerated for a period of time.

I think it's good for us to remember that physical touch comes in two basic forms. There are touches that take, and there are touches that give. And we live in a society where we have to be very careful about this, and rightfully so, because there's a lot of touching going on out there, and we need to discern between the touches that are given and received. There's touching that gives, and there's touching that takes, which God wants us to not engage in. And this can happen in a parent-child relationship.

If a parent is emotionally unhealthy, they might say, "Johnny, come give mommy her hug. Come give mommy your hug, or come give daddy your hug." Now, that may sound, it's probably innocent. They have no idea exactly what they're saying, but that is different from saying, "Johnny, let daddy give you a hug. Let mommy give you a hug." A parent who is relying on their child for emotional help or support tends to drain their child. Some people experience that draining.

We're supposed to be training our children, not draining them. That can happen through touch. A parent that is relying physically on their child to help them through life. Obviously, as parents, we are to be giving the touch that helps, not the touch that takes. And so this is what Jesus is doing here. It mentions that this lady was not healed until he had touched her. Obviously, he could have spoken the word, and she could have stood upright. He could have done that without even seeing her.

He could have done that while she was still at the back of the room, but he chose to call her, speak to her, touch her, and through that, accomplish an amazing work. Immediately, she was made straight. I can't imagine what it's like to walk around like this for almost two decades, looking up at everybody, most everybody. And can you imagine how she must have relived that experience in the years to come? As she thought back on that day at the synagogue where she remembered seeing Jesus, Jesus calls her to the front.

He speaks to her and says, "You're loosed," and he touches her. Wow. Praise God. Praise God. I can't believe it. I haven't been this straight in years. The change that that makes in a person's life, how amazing that is. It says immediately she was made straight, and she glorified God. I would imagine that she had a shouting spell right there in the synagogue.

Now, I don't know if at Chambersburg here you've ever had a shouting spell happen, but I grew up in a segment of the religious world where occasionally there was a shouting spell. And people get blessed and wave their hands, "Praise God." And they get blessed and run around the sanctuary. And you're looking at me like I just grew a third eye in my forehead here. I think a lot of that was genuine. A lot of that blessed me.

And I'm not saying that we need to go down that track, but I'm pretty sure that the lady didn't just wave a little hanky and say, "Thank you, Lord. Praise the Lord. He did a work in me. It's undeniable." Obviously, if those who are forgiven much, loved much, I think those who are healed much probably glorify God much. Praise God. How many of us toil beneath this weight of self-centeredness, of immaturity, of relational issues, of evil spirit oppression, perhaps?

And yet there is a remedy from the one who came, as the song says, "Upon a midnight clear." You're familiar with that message. It says, "And ye beneath life's crushing load, whose forms are bending low, who toil along the climbing way with painful steps and slow, look now, for glad and golden hours come swiftly on the wing, O rest beside the weary road, and hear the angels sing." What are you facing or experiencing this morning? Is there an internal striving?

Is there a bend, so to speak, that you are struggling with? Is there a weight that is pressing you down? How is it for you, sister? How is it for you, brother? Are you living upright and free in all the freedom that God has for us? Or do you find yourself struggling with certain restrictions? It doesn't matter how long or short-term those things are. They are no match for the release of our Lord. Finally, we see the lively response, verses 14 to 17.

There's no question about it that everywhere he went, people responded to Jesus. People responded to him. And here he is performing this amazing miracle, and everyone's saying, "Praise the Lord." Well, most everyone, right? Seems like there were a few that didn't join in on the celebration exactly. They had a lively response, but it was a lively negative response. That response was resentment. We see it in verse 14. The ruler of the synagogue answered with indignation because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath.

And he said to the crowd, "There are six days on which men ought to work. Therefore, come and be healed on them and not on the Sabbath day." Now, it's possible for us to overlook all that is going on here. I don't know that I've plumbed the depths, but it's important for us to see what is happening. And that is the synagogue ruler is upset with whom? Jesus, yeah, and the lady. But he doesn't talk to them. He addresses whom? The crowd. The crowd. He addresses the crowd. Why did he do that? That seems very odd.

Now, if your interest is not sociology and cultural anthropology, please forgive me. I have a great interest in those things. I really think that why this ruler acted the way he did has to do with his cultural context. And some of you are perhaps even more versed in these things than I am. When you look at the cultures of the world, they fit into basically three models, if I understand it correctly. The American or the Western model would be innocence, guilt. Okay? So there's a law for this.

You broke the law, you're guilty. Whether you feel like you're guilty or not, you're guilty. In a lot of Middle Eastern countries and perhaps other places in the world, there is the honor-shame model. And the honor-shame model is very much group-oriented, and it's very careful about not shaming the group or the family unit.

And that's why it's very hard for people in those contexts to break away from their dominant religion and embrace something like Christianity, because what they're doing is shaming the entire group that they're thinking about leaving. That's very difficult. So the important thing is to maintain the honor of the group. It's important to maintain face, to save face.

And that's why certain groups will say, "Hey, it's okay to lie as long as you're saving the face of the group," because that's the value the group holds very dear. We're going to save face. And then the third model would be the power-fear model, and it's represented by a lot of countries in Africa, which is a very different model from even the other two. So I think Jesus' culture, if I understand correctly, was much more of an honor-shame culture, very much group-oriented.

You're not going to be doing individualistic thinking so much. Definitely not like we see here in the Western world. So think about that in relation to this ruler of the synagogue. The ruler of the synagogue had certain responsibilities, as defined by a writer here. The honored office of synagogue leader, acquired by election, appointment, or inheritance, served a wide range of practical and spiritual leadership.

Duties included regulating worship, choosing Torah readers and prayer leaders, inviting other people to preach, and contributing to the building and restoration of the synagogue building. The leader also represented the congregation and the community and to outside authorities, functioning as the synagogue's ambassador to the world beyond the synagogue walls. So you could think about Brother Justin, Brother Kevin, Brother David.

They're synagogue leaders here at Chambersburg, and they take responsibility for calling people to preach, for who's going to read the Bible, things like that. They carry a certain amount of responsibility. This ruler carried a lot of the same responsibility. The writer says, "Furthermore, Jesus' law-breaking action also dishonors the synagogue leader personally as one charged with enforcing Sabbath law. For the leader, the only appropriate response to Jesus is anger.

The leader's rhetoric of response reinforces his indignation by using the strict language of Sabbath law to rebuke both Jesus and the woman." So think about if I'm up here spouting off heresy and things that are directly opposed to what Brother Kevin and Justin and David have been teaching, there's a proper response on their part to deal with the falsehood, the things that are going to lead the flock astray. So I think we should have a little bit of understanding for this synagogue ruler. He felt responsible.

He's representing to the community what this synagogue is all about. Now, if I understand correctly, in honor-shame cultures, they tend to be more indirect when they're addressing problems. And so is it possible that that's why the ruler did not directly address Jesus? He went to the crowd. I don't know. I wish I knew more about it.

I tend to think, and Brother Kevin will have to help me out here, I tend to think of River Brethren as being more of an honor-shame group in the sense that they are quite indirect about how they correct things. I've had different experiences on the job. I work construction for a River Brethren fella and all the crews of River Brethren, and we get along fabulously. I love working with them, and I love learning about their culture.

And one of the things that they've tended to do is, let's say one of us makes a mistake and miscuts the metal. We're putting a metal roof on a house or on a pole shed, and one of us miscuts the metal, and somebody's going to have to run to AB Martin to get another piece of metal. That's a very sad situation, but all too common experience for us. And I raise my hand to say that I'm all too often guilty in miscuts. As hard as I try, I am not naturally a construction person, but I'm learning.

And I tell people I only feel like a dummy every other day now, and so I'm growing. And I enjoy construction. But what will happen is the foreman will call the boss, and invariably what he'll say is, "A mistake was made, and we'll have to get some more metal." Very indirect. Doesn't say anything about who did it, how it was done, who's at fault, who's guilty. It just says, "And you know what? That saves face for the whole crew. We have no idea. There's five of us.

It could be any one of the five that miscut this metal, and somebody has to run for it." And my boss is the same way. He's very indirect. If he feels like something needs to be corrected, he doesn't necessarily come out and say it. He'll just offer a suggestion that, "Well, maybe we should do this. Maybe we could do it that way," rather than saying, "I want you to do it this way." So I don't know, Brother Kevin. I think of the RBs as being more of an honor-shame culture.

And interestingly enough, America is moving more and more toward an honor-shame system. In the cultural changes that are happening, that is what's taking place. So it's good for us to be learning more about these things. So the ruler is addressing this heresy. I think it puts Jesus in a bit of a could put Jesus into a bit of a quandary because he was the invited he's the guest speaker. And what should he do? Should he apologize and step down to help save face for everyone?

He wants to get into other synagogues, I'm sure, to teach and preach. What if this gets around that he's causing synagogue problems? The doors will all be closed to him. He won't have access to any other synagogues. Preaching circuits shut down. What should he do? Well, I think Jesus did have a strong sense of maintaining the community's honor. And yet we know that he also had a strong sense of what was right and true. And so we see that Jesus didn't back off.

He was willing to press ahead and directly address this rebuke that was indirectly given to the crowd. "You guys need to stop coming to get healed on Sabbath because there are six other days. Sunday through Friday is perfectly fine, but don't come on Saturday, okay? That is a day set aside." Well, Jesus decided to address it somewhat head-on, though it is kind of indirect. I think Jesus was operating within his culture.

"Then the Lord answered him and said," verse 15, "Hypocrite, does not each one of you on the Sabbath loose his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it away to water it?" Now, the reason I'm saying Jesus was indirectly addressing him is because the narrator, Luke, tells us that Jesus answered him. He's telling us that Jesus answered the ruler. But when you look at the rest of what Jesus has to say, it's plural.

Now, this is where I'd like my Greek-speaking scholarly friends to help me out here because I don't know the original languages. I like Strong's and Power Bible CD. They've really helped me. But when you look at this word, hypocrite, it's plural. And then he says, "Does not each one of you" he's addressing more than one. And later on, it talks about his adversaries, which is plural. All of these things are Jesus talking to a group of people, not just singling out the ruler of the synagogue.

So that's why I'm saying I think he was using his staying within his culture to indirectly clearly you can be indirect, but very clear about who's getting the blame here and what should and shouldn't be happening. That's how the ruler did it. This is how Jesus is doing it. Jesus is being somewhat indirect, but he's being very clear in the midst of that. He says, "Hypocrites," that's what a lot of the translations say. It's a plural.

"Hypocrites, does not each one of you on the Sabbath loose his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it away to water it? So ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham whom Satan has bound?" Think of it, for 18 years. Shouldn't she be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath? Jesus was clear. Of all the days that you can choose, isn't the Sabbath a great day? It's a great day to be freed, freed from bondage. And you religious guys, you do exactly that with your oxen, your donkeys.

You take the time to work to take them out to water and bring them back again. And what's great is Jesus calls this lady a daughter of Abraham. That's beautiful. A daughter of Abraham. The fringy outcasts of society, she's a daughter of Abraham. She's a believer. She's a child of God, a child of the covenant. And yet somehow Satan had gained some sort of advantage over her through this spirit of infirmity. And you know what? I think these sorts of things can happen.

I want to be careful not to preach heresy because I don't want one of these brothers to have to rebuke me like the synagogue leader did. But there's a man named Pete Scazero who's written a book called Emotionally Healthy Spirituality. And his subtitle says, "It's Impossible to Be Spiritually Mature While Remaining Emotionally Immature." And a summary of his observations as a church leader are these: some of the struggles in life we think are spiritual issues may actually be emotional issues.

It's easy to misdiagnose our problems and the problems of others and to think that they are spiritual when, in fact, they might be demonic or spirit or emotional. Just as the lady in our text appeared to have a physical issue, which was actually demonic, so we also could misdiagnose our own or another's problems. And this doesn't mean that we excuse sin. We don't excuse problems in others or in ourself. But it means that we recognize that different issues must be dealt with differently.

If it's a sin issue, the way we deal with it is to repent. If it's an enemy issue, demonic, spirit, whatever, the way to deal with that is to renounce. And if it's an emotional issue, the way to deal with that is to resolve. Jesus, of course, is the answer to every problem. But his answer comes in different ways for spiritual, emotional, and enemy issues. And I'm glad that Jesus provides resolution for all of these. Obviously, in the case of this woman, she needed to be released. She didn't need more doctors.

She didn't need more drugs. She didn't need more devotions. She needed deliverance. And that's exactly what Jesus brought to her. So the synagogue leader showed resentment. Jesus offers a rebuke. The response, thirdly, that we see is that of the adversary's remorse. Verse 17, "And when he said these things," very indirect, but very clear, "all his adversaries were put to shame." Again, we're thinking about an honor-shame culture.

The entire group that was against him, apparently it was just more than this one guy that was the leader. There were several. All of them were put to shame. The leader had tried to shame Jesus, but in the end, it was he and his cohorts who were shamed. Not that their shame or remorse led them to repentance necessarily. It was more of the remorse of King Saul than it was that of King David. But it did shut them down for a while. A fourth response that we see is rejoicing.

Verse 17, at the end of the verse, "All the multitude rejoiced for all the glorious things that were done by him." The presence and response of the multitude is probably more important than we even realize in our Western context. Torgerson, a writer, notes that the crowd, being even lower than Jesus in the honor-shame society, rejoices at Jesus' response to the synagogue leader and all those opposing Jesus. Though at first glance, the crowd's presence may seem insignificant, its role in this scene is crucial.

Matters of honor and shame must be witnessed publicly in order to be recognized as valid. As such, the crowd's response to the interactions between Jesus and the synagogue leader is instrumental to the outcome of the honor-shame challenge that is taking place. Jesus has exposed the leader's hypocrisy, and the crowd rejoices. In so doing, the crowd publicly affirms Jesus' place of honor, while the leader's once mighty positions become humiliated positions of shame. Jesus is not the only one honored, however.

He has not only defended himself, but has also publicly advocated for the woman. He calls her a daughter of Abraham in the presence of the religious leaders and before a crowd that once would have seen and treated her as one of lowly position. Jesus' witness to the woman's share in Abraham's offspring raises her up to a place of honor at the same time that Jesus' opponents are brought down to shame. It's a beautiful reversal, and that's one of the main motifs of Luke.

If you recall the song that Mary sang there at the beginning of Luke, she talks about how the lowly will be exalted and the mighty ones will be brought down. And Luke delights to share that throughout his gospel. That's happening here, right here in this account. The leaders, the well-respected, the highly sought after, are brought down, and Jesus, who was looked down upon, and the woman who was considered less than, are elevated to places of honor. It's a beautiful picture of what God does for his people.

So through this miracle, God was glorified, Jesus was justified, the adversaries were mortified, the woman was rectified, and the crowd was electrified. What a beautiful picture that is. Earlier in Luke, Jesus tells us why he came. He says to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the oppressed, to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor. That's Luke 4:18 and 19.

As you think about your own life this morning, I'd like you to just ponder briefly what it is that potentially, possibly is bowing you down. Is it a physical thing? Is it a marital thing? Is it a child-raising thing? Is it a spiritual thing? Is it a spirit thing, demonic, oppression? Is it sin? Contemplate in your own heart, do I have a bent? Do I have something that is weighing me down? Maybe it's a short-term thing. Maybe it's a long-term thing.

I'd like you to take that to Jesus and ask him what he wants you to do with that. "Jesus, what do you want me to do with this? Do you have help for me with this? What is your answer for this?" And I'm sure it'll be different for each of us. But I'm quite confident that the God who brought healing, release for this lady, desires also today to bring release to us. What sort of healing or restoration would Jesus like to work in you today?

In closing, Jesus worked a wonderful miracle for the crooked woman that day, and he's well able to do the same for us. The Hebrew writer states very clearly of Jesus that he is able to save to the uttermost any bend, any crook, any struggle. He's able to save to the uttermost those who come to God through him since he always lives to make intercession for them. I hope that you've seen the work of Jesus in one woman's life in such a way that you'll rely on his help for every area of your life.

Through Jesus, we get to be upright people who serve our wonderful God.