Luke 13:10-17 · A Crippled Woman Healed on the Sabbath

10 On a Sabbath Jesus was teaching in one of the synagogues, 11 and a woman was there who had been crippled by a spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not straighten up at all. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her forward and said to her, "Woman, you are set free from your infirmity." 13 Then he put his hands on her, and immediately she straightened up and praised God.

14 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, not on the Sabbath."

15 The Lord answered him, "You hypocrites! Doesn't each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or donkey from the stall and lead it out to give it water? 16 Then 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?"

17 When he said this, all his opponents were humiliated, but the people were delighted with all the wonderful things he was doing.

Cure for an Aching Back
Luke 13:10-17
Sermon
by King Duncan
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One Sabbath day, Jesus was teaching in a synagogue. A woman was there who was severely disabled. Her body was all bent over so bent over that her head was nearly even with her waist. Dr. Luke tells us she could not straighten up at all. That strikes me as an unbelievably sad situation. Forgetting the pain and the inconvenience of not being able to straighten one’s body, imagine what that would do to your self image. Imagine not just the physical pain, but the emotional pain of this kind of obvious deformity of the entire body.

Dr. Ralph F. Wilson suggests that this woman’s problem was probably what physician’s today would call Ankylosing Spondylitis, or Marie-Strümpell Disease, a disease that causes bones in the spine to fuse together. It is a disease that usually affects young men, thoug…

ChristianGlobe Networks, Inc., Dynamic Preaching Third Quarter 2013, by King Duncan