Episode 519 Their Faith Has Made You Well (Mark 2:1-22)

This week BibleWorm reads Mark 2:1-22, beginning with the story of a man whose friends dig a hole through the roof so they can lower him down to Jesus. We discuss the relative importance of forgiveness and healing, with this text suggesting that the most urgent matter is being set right with God whatever the abilities and limitations of our particular bodies might be. We notice, too, that Jesus heals him based on their faith, and we ponder whether our faith, too, can have effects for others, whether our faith in God or our faith in people themselves. And we discuss a series of stories in which Jesus contrasts a new community of radical welcome with an older structure of righteousness, concluding that God values both the old way and the new way, desiring only that each makes space for the other to thrive.