August 30, 2026 — Sunday Worship
The Holiness of Jesus
Text: Luke 5:12–16
“While he was in one of the towns, there came a man who was full of leprosy. When he saw Jesus, he fell with his face to the ground and begged him, ‘Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.’ Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. ‘I am willing,’ he said. ‘Be clean!’ And immediately the leprosy left him.
Then Jesus ordered him, ‘Don’t tell anyone, but go, show yourself to the priest and offer the sacrifices that Moses commanded for your cleansing, as a testimony to them.’
Yet the news about him spread all the more, so that crowds of people came to hear him and to be healed of their sicknesses. But Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and prayed.”
Introduction
In Luke 5:1–11, Jesus called Peter to become His disciple.
Peter obeyed Jesus’ command and let down the nets. As a result, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break.
When Peter saw what had happened, he fell down at Jesus’ knees and said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!”
Peter saw who Jesus was. And at the same time, he saw who he himself was.
He saw the holiness of Jesus, and in the light of Jesus’ holiness, he became aware of his own sinfulness.
But in today’s passage, another person also falls down before Jesus.
This time, it is a man with leprosy.
He says to Jesus, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”
The central message of today’s passage is this:
Jesus is not a holy Savior who simply stays away from the unclean. He is the holy Savior who makes the unclean clean.
Today, I want us to consider how the holiness of Jesus cleanses us from our sin and uncleanness.
1. The Leper’s Greatest Problem Was More Than His Disease
Luke 5:12 says,
“While he was in one of the towns, there came a man who was full of leprosy. When he saw Jesus, he fell with his face to the ground and begged him, ‘Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.’”
The word “leprosy” in the Bible does not necessarily refer to what we today call Hansen’s disease.
The biblical term could refer to various kinds of serious skin diseases and abnormal skin conditions.
But this man’s greatest problem was not simply that he had a skin disease.
His greatest problem was that he was considered unclean.
Leviticus 13:45–46 says,
“The person with such an infectious disease must wear torn clothes, let his hair be unkempt, cover the lower part of his face and cry out, ‘Unclean! Unclean!’ … He must live alone; he must live outside the camp.”
This was more than simply a medical quarantine.
This man was separated from the community.
He could not live a normal social life.
He was separated from the worshiping community of Israel.
For an Israelite, belonging to the community of God’s people and participating in worship was at the center of life.
So this man experienced not only physical suffering, but also social isolation and religious exclusion.
That is why his words to Jesus are so important.
He did not simply say, “Lord, heal my disease.”
He said, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”
What he needed was more than physical healing.
His cry was essentially,
“Lord, make me clean again.
Let me return to my community.
Let me return to the worshiping people of God.
Let me come near to God again.”
This is what he was asking Jesus to do.
2. Being “Unclean” in the Bible Does Not Necessarily Mean That Someone Had Committed a Sin
Here we need to make an important distinction.
In the Bible, being ceremonially unclean does not necessarily mean that a person had committed a moral sin.
For example, a woman’s menstrual period could make her ceremonially unclean, but menstruation itself was not a sin.
Likewise, touching a dead body could make someone ceremonially unclean, but burying a loved one was certainly not a sin.
Therefore, when the Bible calls a leper “unclean,” it does not necessarily mean that he was a worse sinner than everyone else.
Ceremonial uncleanness and moral sin are not exactly the same thing.
However, uncleanness was closely connected to Israel’s worship and approach to God.
Things associated with death, decay, blood, and serious skin diseases were regarded as conditions that stood in contrast to the wholeness and life of God’s creation.
Therefore, a person who was ceremonially unclean could be temporarily restricted from full participation in the worshiping community.
And here we begin to see an important picture of sin.
Sin separates us from God.
We cannot stand before a holy God on the basis of our own righteousness.
Just as the leper had to live outside the camp, sinners cannot stand before the holy God by their own strength or righteousness.
But here is the good news:
Jesus came to the very person who was outside.
Jesus did not wait for the man to become clean before coming near him.
Jesus came near the unclean man.
And this is the grace of the gospel.
3. The Holiness of Jesus Makes the Unclean Clean
Now we come to the most amazing moment in this passage.
Luke 5:13 says,
“Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. ‘I am willing,’ he said. ‘Be clean!’ And immediately the leprosy left him.”
Notice what Jesus did.
Jesus touched him.
Jesus could have healed him simply by speaking a word.
But Jesus reached out His hand and touched him.
Why is this so significant?
Because according to the Jewish understanding of ceremonial uncleanness, contact with an unclean person could make another person unclean.
So we might ask:
When Jesus touched the leper, did Jesus become unclean?
No.
Something completely different happened.
Jesus was not made unclean.
The leper was made clean.
Luke says, “Immediately the leprosy left him.”
This is the holiness of Jesus.
Our human holiness can be defiled when we come into contact with uncleanness.
But Jesus possesses a holiness that is not defiled by uncleanness.
Instead, His holiness cleanses the unclean.
The uncleanness did not spread from the leper to Jesus.
Rather, the holiness of Jesus brought cleansing to the leper.
This tells us something profound about who Jesus is.
Jesus is not simply another prophet who performs miracles.
Jesus is the Holy One who brings the holiness of God into the world.
His holiness is greater than our uncleanness.
His purity is stronger than our impurity.
His grace is greater than our sin.
4. The Law Reveals Uncleanness, But Jesus Cleanses the Unclean
Leviticus 13 explains how a person with a suspected skin disease was examined and declared clean or unclean.
Leviticus 14 explains what happened after a person had been cleansed and how that person could be restored to the community.
But there is something very important here.
The law did not heal the person.
The law could identify and declare whether someone was clean or unclean.
But the law itself could not remove the disease.
God was the One who brought healing and restoration.
The same principle applies to sin.
The law reveals our sin.
The law shows us that we are sinners.
The law reveals God’s holy standard and exposes our failure to meet that standard.
But the law itself cannot cleanse us from our sin.
That is why we need Jesus.
Jesus did not merely come to show us our sin.
He came to remove our sin and make us clean.
Jesus said to the leper,
“I am willing. Be clean.”
And immediately the disease left him.
This is the good news of the gospel.
The law can show us that we are unclean.
But Jesus can make us clean.
The law can expose our sin.
But Jesus can forgive our sin.
The law can show us our need for righteousness.
But Jesus gives us His righteousness.
Therefore, our hope is not in our ability to make ourselves clean.
Our hope is in Jesus Christ, the Holy One who reaches out His hand to the unclean and says, “I am willing. Be clean.”
Let Us Pause and Think About This for a Moment
Today, Hansen’s disease, commonly known as leprosy, can be treated. And it is not a disease that is easily transmitted through brief everyday contact, such as a handshake.
When I was part of a missionary organization, our leaders were sent to Sorokdo during spring break of their senior year in college to serve the people living there. By the time I became a senior, that ministry had been discontinued, so I did not have the opportunity to go myself. But I heard the testimonies of those who had gone before me.
After spending three days and two nights serving there, many of them came back and shared how deeply they had been challenged in their faith.
One of the things they talked about was this:
They knew intellectually that the risk of contracting the disease was very low. But when they actually sat down to eat with the residents, they found themselves feeling afraid.
They were careful about where they slept. They sometimes hesitated before touching a door handle.
But while they were there, they also experienced something very surprising.
They discovered that many of the residents of Sorokdo deeply loved the Bible. Some read the Bible constantly and memorized large portions of Scripture. Some had memorized the entire New Testament. I even heard testimonies of people who had memorized the entire Bible, both the Old and New Testaments.
They also saw how much these people missed their families. And through that, they were reminded again of how precious family is.
But perhaps the greatest change happened in the way they saw the people.
At first, because of their physical appearance, they felt afraid and kept their distance.
But as they worshiped and sang praises together, something began to change.
They began to see these people differently.
They no longer saw them primarily through the appearance of their bodies.
They began to see them as precious human beings—souls whom God loves.
Their bodies had been affected by leprosy, and their physical appearance was not what society considered normal.
But they had encountered Jesus.
And in Christ, they could stand before the holy God as people who had been cleansed and declared righteous.
That is the power of the gospel.
5. Our Cleansing Was Completed at the Cross
The physical healing of the leper was an amazing miracle.
But that miracle points beyond physical healing to something even greater.
What we truly need is not merely to be cleansed from physical disease.
We need to be cleansed from sin.
Second Corinthians 5:21 says,
“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”
This is the gospel.
Our sin was placed upon Christ, and Christ’s righteousness is given to us.
The basis on which we stand before God is not our own righteousness.
It is the righteousness of Christ.
We do not come to Jesus after we have made ourselves clean.
We come to Jesus in our uncleanness.
And Jesus cleanses us.
That is grace.
6. What, Then, Is Christian Grace?
Dear brothers and sisters, when the leper came to Jesus, what merit did he have?
Had he done many good things?
Could he make himself clean?
No.
He came to Jesus with nothing.
All he could say was,
“Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”
And Jesus reached out His hand first.
That is grace.
The same is true for us.
God did not save us because we had first become righteous.
God did not save us because we had first searched for Him.
God came looking for us first.
He loved us while we were still sinners, and He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, for us.
Therefore, our salvation is not based on our merit.
It is based on the grace of God.
That is why we cannot boast in our own righteousness.
We can boast only in the cross of Jesus Christ.
Our testimony is not, “Look at how good I have become.”
Our testimony is, “Look at how gracious Jesus has been to me.”
7. Those Who Have Been Cleansed Should Live with the Heart of Jesus
Now let us consider one final and important question.
How should those who have been cleansed by Jesus live?
There are people around us who make us uncomfortable.
Some have complicated pasts.
Some carry deep wounds.
Some people may cause us to think,
“It would probably be better if I kept my distance from that person.”
But look at Jesus in today’s passage.
Jesus did not push the leper away.
Jesus reached out His hand.
And Jesus made him clean.
This does not mean that we should stop calling sin “sin.”
It does not mean that we should approve of sin.
But it does mean that we must never close the door of the gospel to sinners.
The church is not a gathering of people who have no sin.
The church is a community of sinners who have been cleansed by the grace of Jesus Christ.
Therefore, the church should be a place where people can come to Jesus.
We must not allow our prejudice, fear, or judgment to become a barrier that keeps people from coming to Christ.
We should not stop when we see someone’s uncleanness.
Instead, we should introduce that person to the One who can make him or her clean.
Conclusion
Dear brothers and sisters, I want you to remember today’s message in one sentence:
“Human holiness can be defiled by uncleanness, but the holiness of Jesus encounters the unclean and makes them clean.”
The leper came to Jesus.
And Jesus reached out His hand and touched him.
Jesus said, “I am willing. Be clean.”
And immediately the leprosy left him.
He could return to his community.
He could return to the place of worship.
He could once again live among God’s people.
And this is the same gospel for us.
We cannot make ourselves clean before God.
But our uncleanness does not defile Jesus.
The holiness of Jesus removes our uncleanness.
When we come to the cross, Jesus takes our sin upon Himself and gives us His righteousness.
Therefore, dear brothers and sisters,
Do not hide your sin from Jesus.
Bring your failures to Jesus.
Bring your wounds to Jesus.
Bring your uncleanness to Jesus.
And believe the words of the leper:
“Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”
And Jesus says, “I am willing. Be clean.”
And now, having been cleansed by the grace of Jesus, we are called to go out into the world.
Let us not look at people merely through our own eyes.
Let us learn to see people with the heart of Jesus.
Even the person we consider unclean—Jesus can make clean.
Even the person we are tempted to give up on—Jesus can save.
Therefore, the calling of the church is not to push people away.
It is to bring people to Jesus.
Let us bring sinners to Jesus.
Let us bring wounded people to Jesus.
Let us bring the lonely and the rejected to Jesus.
And let us ourselves come to the cross of Jesus every day.
Why?
Because Jesus is the Holy Lord who makes the unclean clean.
May all of us live this week with this gospel in our hearts and in our lives.
In the name of Jesus Christ, our Lord, I bless you all.
Let us pray.