Luke 5:13

‘And he stretched out his hand, and touched him, saying, “I will, be you made clean.” And immediately the skin disease left him.'.

But Jesus had come in order to help those whom other people found disgusting, and to the man's total surprise, He reached out His hand and touched him. It was the first time he had been touched for a long time, and the last thing that he had expected. Men normally turned away from him with a shudder. For to touch a skin diseased man like himself was for the person in question also to be rendered ritually unclean. No Pharisee would have come within a mile of him if he could help it. But then there was nothing that he could do about his condition. He was powerless to help him. But Jesus deliberately chose to touch him. He could have healed him at a word. Why then did He touch him? It was a gesture of supreme religious authority. By this Jesus revealed His conscious superiority to all disease and uncleanness. By it He was claiming that He could not be rendered unclean by His contact with the skin-diseased man because He was the source of all cleanness. He was saying that He was the One Who was so pure that His purity countered any uncleanness. In any other the claim would immediately have been dismissed. But what was to be said of a case where the disease simply disappeared before their eyes?

Jesus then added, ‘I will. Be clean.” It was Jesus' will that he be made clean. And immediately he was healed, for immediately the skin disease was cured. It ‘left him'. Nor was Jesus rendered unclean. His purity had counteracted any uncleanness. And the man was no longer skin diseased, he would no longer render others unclean by contact with him. And who could charge with uncleanness the One Who had healed him? In this too was a picture of what Jesus had come to do for Israel. He wanted as the Messiah to make them clean. He would ‘bear their griefs and carry their sorrows', (Isaiah 52:3) being afflicted for their sakes that they might be healed. Only God could so rise over uncleanness.

There are many examples in the Old Testament of God's promise that He would make men clean, although they are not specifically related to skin disease. ‘I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols will I cleanse you, a new heart I will give you, and a new Spirit will I put within you, and I will take out of your flesh the heart of stone, and will give you a heart of flesh.' (Ezekiel 36:25, compare Leviticus 14:7 where sprinkling of blood is used with regard to skin diseases). ‘On that day there will be a fountain opened for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem to cleanse them from sin and uncleanness' (Zechariah 13:1). At least one member of the house of David had been stricken with skin disease (2 Kings 15:5).