Matthew 8:1-8; 13-16                                          4th Sunday of Lent

 The human touch is a powerful source of healing. Witness that when a child cries, our first impulse is to hug. We put our arms around grieving friends. After long absences, we embrace. Often, holding hands can convey much more than mere words.

 Science has put its stamp of approval on touch. Premature infants who are gently stroked will gain weight faster than babies who are left alone in their incubators. Studies show that customers are more apt to leave a bigger tip if their waitress or waiter touched them.

 In comparison to Italy or Puerto Rico, the United States largely remains a "touchless” society. We are not comfortable with it. Touch is too quickly associated with sexuality. Teenagers are so touch-starved, they jump into bed with the first person who strokes them.

 In the 1970s, “Therapeutic Touch” was developed by medical nurses Kunz and Krieger, as a form of patient care, based on the idea that the human body has an energy field. Therapeutic Touch, whether applied directly or from holding one’s hands just above a person’s skin, seemed to ease a patient’s anxiety, altered pain perception and encouraged recovery.

 Another form of hands-on healing is the practice of Reiki. Japanese in origin Reiki holds that a “life force energy” flows through all of us, and can be transferred through the power of touch. Reiki has no religious affiliation, but it is a spiritual discipline because it is based on the belief that the energy that creates and sustains life comes from a divine power. (thoughts above from Suzette Martinez Standring)

 We read today we read that Jesus, after preaching the Sermon on the Mount, comes down and begins to touch people with his hands and his words, healing their diseases, calming their fear, filling them with his loving presence.
 

 ^NRS Matthew 8:1  When Jesus had come down from the mountain, great crowds followed him; ² and there was a leper who came to him and knelt before him, saying, "Lord, if you choose, you can make me clean."  ³ He stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, "I do choose. Be made clean!" Immediately his leprosy was cleansed.  ⁴ Then Jesus said to him, "See that you say nothing to anyone; but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, as a testimony to them."  ⁵ When he entered Capernaum, a centurion came to him, appealing to him
⁶ and saying, "Lord, my servant is lying at home paralyzed, in terrible distress." ⁷ And he said to him, "I will come and cure him." ⁸ The centurion answered, "Lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof; but only speak the word, and my servant will be healed.... ¹³ And to the centurion Jesus said, "Go; let it be done for you according to your faith." And the servant was healed in that hour. ¹⁴ When Jesus entered Peter's house, he saw his mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever; ¹⁵ he touched her hand, and the fever left her, and she got up and began to serve him. ¹⁶ That evening they brought to him many who were possessed with demons; and he cast out the spirits with a word, and cured all who were sick.  ¹⁷ This was to fulfill what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah, "He took our infirmities and bore our diseases."
 

 I am convinced that Jesus had in him a more profound measure of what we have in us, except in Jesus it was perfected in power and love – the ability to touch people and make them well. The healing stories are for many of us a challenge to understand. We cannot imagine how this connects with our lives. We cannot go around touching people to heal them. Or can we?

 Is your pat on the back or gentle touch on the arm, a more powerful thing than you imagined. Surely it is a powerful act to touch someone. That’s why we have had to learn to be very careful whom we touch and when. I’m going to be very careful about hugging one of you, if we are completely alone and have had an intense conversation, but in the safety of all these friends, you can count on a bear hug or at least a shoulder clutch from me, any time.

 How many of you remember the way your mother caressed your face? How many remember climbing into a dad’s lap and being enveloped by a warm hug?

 Those of us who watched the movie “Wit” together were moved by the scene in which the nurse rubs lotions on the hands of a woman dying of cancer, all alone. The power of touch.

 But what else was Jesus doing besides touching? He was listening. He was looking. He was paying attention to people’s need. Touch without attention is not always satisfactory. I can remember when my children were toddlers, that they’d sit in my lap and if I was talking to them and stroking them but not looking them in the eye, they would take their little hands, and turn my face toward their own. “Look at me, Mommy.”

 In addition to touching, looking, and listening, Jesus also felt compassion. He really cared about their suffering. Jesus was not daunted by the large crowds following him. He did not shy away from contagious leprosy, but risked a touch. “If you choose,” the leper said. “Yes, I do choose,” Jesus said. Jesus was not looking for attention. He asked the leper not to tell anyone, except the priest, whom he was required to show his healing for permission to be in public again. He offered to travel to the centurion’s servant, even though he was busy teaching and healing others, but the centurion said that would not be necessary. Jesus does not get lost in the tasks of ministry but notices the people for whom ministry should be directed. When he entered Peter’s house, he could have been distracted by many things or even his own exhaustion and he might have failed to attend to Peter’s feverish mother. But no, Jesus was aware of the people around him. In fact, that’s the definition of being in ministry is to be aware of the people around us – that includes our family, our friends, our neighbors, our colleagues, and the strangers we meet in the course of a day.

 So I know you do not see yourself as a faith healer, in the typical understanding of that. That tv or revival preacher who touches people on the head and they collapse in what it known as the slaying in the Spirit. But perhaps you could develop a deeper understanding of yourself as a healer in this way: you are called to listen to people, to care for them compassionately, to offer them an encouraging word, an gentle reassuring touch, to pray for them, and to be willing to walk the extra mile for them when they are in need.

 Mother Teresa says it well. “Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody, I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person who has nothing to eat.” “Even the rich are hungry for love, for being cared for, for being wanted, for having someone to call their own.” “Let us touch the dying, the poor, the lonely and the unwanted according to the graces we have received and let us not be ashamed or slow to do the humble work.” These words of Mother Teresa ring true. She truly was a healing presence of Jesus Christ. All of her ministry was an act of helpful healing, being the compassionate presence of Christ.

 Following World War II some German students volunteered to help rebuild a cathedral in England, one that had been badly damaged by the Luftwaffe bombings. As the work progressed, they weren't sure how to best restore a large statue of Jesus with has arms outstretched and bearing the familiar inscription, "Come unto Me." They were able to repair all the damage to the statue except for Christ's hands which had been completely destroyed. Should they even attempt to rebuild these? Finally, the workers reached a decision that still stands today. They decided to leave the hands off and changed the inscription to read: "Christ has no hands but ours."

 Christ is doing his healing work through you by the way you treat people. Do your words heal them or hurt them? Does your attitude and demeanor contribute their health or their dis-ease? Do you ignore them or attend to their needs? A life of health is so much more than physical. Our bodies and our minds are connected to our spirits. Christ has no hands but ours. Are you using your hands to instruments of God’s peace? Be like Christ. Be a healing presence.

 The phrase "Christ has no hands but ours" is also found in a prayer by St. Teresa of Avila, a nun in 16th Century Spain. Let it be our prayer:

                    Lord Christ,

                    You have no body on earth but ours,

                    No hands but ours,

                    No feet but ours.

                    Ours are the eyes through which your compassion

                    Must look out on the world.

                    Ours are the feet by which you may still

                    Go about doing good.

                    Ours are the hands with which

                     You bless people now.

                     Bless our minds and bodies,

                     That we may be a blessing to others.