Matt.15:30,31 – And great multitudes came unto him, having with them those that were lame, blind, dumb, maimed, and many others, and cast them down at Jesus’ feet; and he healed them: Insomuch that the multitude wondered, when they saw the dumb to speak, the maimed to be whole, the lame to walk, and the blind to see: and they glorified the God of Israel.
The book of Acts talks about extraordinary miracles that took place at the hands of Paul. In today’s verses we see different types of healings taking place in the ministry of Jesus. There was the mute, deaf, blind and lame like we saw many times in the ministry of Jesus but this one category of miracle mentioned by Matthew in this passage really causes us to stop and take notice. This would fall into the category of extraordinary miracles that happened in Paul’s ministry and also here in Jesus’ ministry. What am I referring to ? I am stuck on the word maimed. Maimed means deformed or mutilated. This would be something like a stump becoming a foot. This extraordinary miracle affected the crowd, it had to. Who could grow a new foot but God Himself, this was a whole new category of miracle. Here is how Adam Clarke describes this.
“Those that were-maimed. Wetstein has fully proved that those who had lost a hand, foot, &c., were termed kulloi by the Greeks. Kypke has shown, from Hippocrates, that the word was also used to signify those who had distorted or dislocated legs, knees, hands, &c. Mr. Wakefield is fully of opinion that it means here those who had lost a limb, and brings an incontestable proof from chap. “If thy hand cause thee to offend, CUT IT OFF; it is better for thee to enter into life WITHOUT A LIMB, than, having thy TWO hands, to go away into hell.” What an astonishing manifestation of omnific and creative energy must the reproduction of a hand, foot, &c., be at the word or touch of Jesus! As this was a mere act of creative power, like that of multiplying the bread, those who allow that the above is the meaning of the word will hardly attempt to doubt the proper Divinity of Christ.”
Clarke used an unusual word, omnific, in his description of this healing of the maimed. The word literally means capable of creating anything. That is the conclusion we have to come to and the people in the crowd had to come to that day. What did they do? – “they glorified the God of Israel”. What made this even more astounding was this was in Gadara, a predominately Gentile crowd worshipping the Jewish God. Now this is extraordinary.
