But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (then saith He to the sick of the palsy,) Arise, take up thy bed, and go unto thine house.
—Matthew 9:6
Man is a mixture of opposing natures; he is spirit and matter, soul and body. On one side he is the son of God, on the other he is doomed to destruction because of the fall. Sin in his soul and sickness in his body bear witness to the hold that death has over him. It is this twofold nature that has been redeemed by grace. It was the psalmist who cried, “Bless the Lord, O my soul….Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases” (Psalm 103:2–3). When Isaiah foresaw the deliverance of his people, he added, “And the inhabitant shall not say, I am sick: the people that dwell therein shall be forgiven their iniquity.” (Isaiah 33:24).
This prediction was accomplished when Jesus the Redeemer came down to this earth. He showed us that the preaching of the gospel and the healing of the sick went together in the salvation that He came to bring. Both are given as evidence of His mission as Messiah: “The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk…and the poor have the gospel preached to them” (Matthew 11:5).
This truth is nowhere more evident than in the healing of the paralytic. The Lord Jesus began by saying to him, “Thy sins be forgiven thee” (Matthew 9:5), after which He added, “Arise, take up thy bed, and go” (verse 6). The pardon of sin and the healing of sickness complete one another, for in the eyes of God sin and sickness are as closely united as the body and the soul.
We see, in the accounts given in the Gospels, that it was more difficult for Jews at that time to believe in the pardon of their sins than in healing. Now, it is the opposite. The Christian church has heard so much about the forgiveness of sins that the soul easily receives the message of grace. But divine healing is rarely mentioned. In order to receive healing, it is usually necessary to begin by confessing sin and desiring to live a holy life. This is, without doubt, the reason people find it more difficult to believe in healing than in forgiveness. Unbelief may attempt to separate these two gifts, but they are always united in Christ. He is always the same Savior both of the soul and of the body, equally ready to grant pardon and healing. The redeemed may always cry, “Bless the Lord, O my soul….Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases.”