Simon the Leper

While Jesus was in Bethany in the home of Simon the Leper, a woman came to him with an alabaster jar of very expensive perfume, which she poured on his head as he was reclining at the table.

Matthew 26:6-7

The scene that follows the above verse is all about the woman. There is a whole discussion about whether she “wasted” all that expensive perfume on Jesus. But Jesus makes clear that what she did was a beautiful thing. He receives her gift as a form of preparation for His impending burial, and He notes that her extravagant act of love and worship will be forever be told wherever the gospel is told.

But did you miss the opening line?

Jesus was invited to dine at the home of man named Simon the Leper. That became the name he was known for in the region. The only way a person gets a name like that is if he actually had leprosy. But if he still had leprosy he couldn’t be in a home and he definitely couldn’t have a dinner party with a bunch of important guests.

So while we don’t know much about Simon the Leper, we can deduce a couple things. He lives in Bethany. He somehow knows Jesus. He once had leprosy. He no longer has leprosy. In fact, his healing had to be so complete that the people in that area were no longer afraid to be near him or his house.

I think it is safe to assume that Simon the Leper was one of the many people Jesus healed of leprosy. Or, even more intriguing is the possibility that Simon the Leper was one of the many who were healed when Jesus sent out the twelve (Matthew 10) or the seventy-two (Luke 10) to do the work of ministry. Many were healed as a result of the ministry of the disciples being sent out. Maybe Simon the Leper was one of them.

Either way, whether Jesus healed the man directly in person or indirectly through the disciples, this dinner party seems to be Simon the Leper’s way of saying thank you to Jesus.

The idea that people would be gathering in the home of a leper is astonishing. A leper was not only unclean but everything they touched was unclean. After Simon the Leper was healed, he went from someone who had to stay outside the village to someone who could have a dinner party full of guests in his own home. It’s a radical transformation, not only of his physical well-being but of his social standing in the community.

This is why people getting physically healed is so important. Physical healing rarely just stops at the physical. We are whole beings. So when one part of us gets radically healed, it often impacts the rest of our life. The abundant life we experience in our body flows over to our heart and mind and relationships and intimacy with the Lord.

The point of physical healing is to be a starting place for the holistic healing of a person.