Week 3: Be Amazed

Friday Dec 22

by GC Youth

One day while he was teaching, Pharisees and teachers of the law who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and from Jerusalem were sitting nearby, and the power of the Lord was with him to heal. Just then some men came carrying a paralyzed man on a stretcher. They were trying to bring him in and lay him before Jesus, but, finding no way to bring him in because of the crowd, they went up on the roof and let him down on the stretcher through the tiles into the middle of the crowd in front of Jesus. When he saw their faith, he said, “Friend, your sins are forgiven you.” Then the scribes and the Pharisees began to question, “Who is this who is speaking blasphemies? Who can forgive sins but God alone?” When Jesus perceived their questionings, he answered them, “Why do you raise such questions in your hearts? Which is easier: to say, ‘Your sins are forgiven you,’ or to say, ‘Stand up and walk’? But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he said to the one who was paralyzed—“I say to you, stand up and take your stretcher and go to your home.” Immediately he stood up before them, took what he had been lying on, and went to his home, glorifying God. Amazement seized all of them, and they glorified God and were filled with fear, saying, “We have seen incredible things today.”

Luke 5:17-26

We would like to invite you to re-read this popular Gospel story or, if available, listen to the story. On this encounter, choose a character to experience the story in their shoes. This might be a person in the crowd, one of the friends, the paralytic man, Jesus, a Pharisee, a scribe. As you are re-encountering this Scripture through this character, think about what you see, what you smell, what you can touch, what you taste, or what you might hear?

Did you notice anything different this time?

Here’s what we noticed: the room would have smelled very bad; you might even taste the smell in the room. The air was musty and stifling, our mouths dry and grainy, like sandpaper. The crowd was hushed, focused on Jesus’s teaching. Then, we begin to feel bits of the roof falling on our heads. The crowd is starting to chatter, questioning why the roof was falling down around us, light starting to seep in. The chatter is growing even louder as we see a group of men huddled around a cloth mat, attempting to lower another man into the already musty and dusty room. As a Pharisee, we feel, at first, very smart asking clever questions. We are feeling even smarter than Jesus, perhaps. Our eyes begin to grow wide in disbelief; we are flabbergasted and surprised that Jesus would heal and forgive this particular man. When the healed man stood, rolled up his mat, and walked out, we were left thinking, “Wow, that was God.”

The folks in this story had never experienced this sort of thing: friends tearing a hole in a roof to get their paralyzed friend in front of Jesus, friends that sought out healing for their outcast friend, a man being forgiven and healed from sin. They were seeing things they never thought they would see or even know were possible to hope for. We imagined that the paralyzed man and his friends would have felt nervous, even while feeling amazed. The paralyzed man thinking, “Will Jesus love me?”

What we learn about amazement in this story is not unlike the amazement felt during Advent. We learn that God likes God’s people, that God notices us. God wants to be around God’s people, and that even God is amazed at God’s people. It is hard to not imagine that Jesus was astounded at the friends in this story. After all, what heals is the faith the friends have that our God will continue to notice us, even (and maybe especially) in the middle of our weariness.

God continually acts in amazing ways, even in a weary world. Our minds are blown that the same vulnerable baby, born alongside farm animals, is who heals the man in this story. It makes us wonder: if we open our eyes, would we too find something amazing that God is healing?

Memory Passage

The wolf shall live with the lamb;
the leopard shall lie down with the kid;
the calf and the lion will feed together,
and a little child shall lead them.

— Isaiah 11:6

Weekly Practice

  • Go on a walk in a familiar place. As often as you can, stop and look up. Pay attention to details you usually miss.

  • Spend time looking at the night sky and stars. Offer a prayer of gratitude to God.

  • Look back at the list of joys from Week Two. Do something on that list!