Sometimes the things that aren’t present are what get my attention.

For example, in Matthew 15:29-31 Jesus sits down on the side of a hill and a crowd of 6,000 to 15,000 people gather. Thousands of sick are brought and laid out before him. Jesus heals them all. Thousands of them, he heals every single one of them.

Do you know what leaps out at me in that? He sat down.

Why?

Was he tired? Did his feet hurt (I can empathize with that!)? Why did he sit down? I don’t think it is insignificant.

Again, how do you heal thousands of people?

Do you go to every single one of them and touch them or say something over them? If there were only a thousand and he only walked among them to touch them and spend just one minute with each of them it would have taken more than 16 hours to heal them all!

It seems the text is saying he did it while seated. And there seems to be an insinuation that he didn’t say much to make the miraculous happen. Perhaps like when he called the dead Lazarus out of the tomb with a simple “Lazarus, come out!”

He makes it look easy.

Now here’s the kicker: “I tell you the truth, anyone who believes in me [Jesus] will do the same works I have done, and even greater works…” (John 14:12).

In an attempt to reconcile the two we want to take the easy way out and say, “Why, Jesus was God, so of course he could do that!”

Really? What if he had to do it in the same way we would have to do it…