The sermon for this Sunday is based upon the text of Luke 13:10-17, which is the story of the Crippled Woman. In ancient times, it was thought that physical handicaps were the result of demonic possession. Jesus did not feel this way. He treated those with physical infirmities as He treated everyone else. He loved them as He loved everyone else, approaching them not as disabled persons but rather people with a disability.

As the story goes, Jesus was preaching in the Synagogue when He saw a very hunched over crippled woman who had been crippled for 18 years. He called her forward and said to her your infirmities are cured and she immediately straightened up; however, the officials of the Synagogue were upset with Jesus for what He had done and admonished Him saying “there are 6 days in the week to do this but not on the Sabbath Day.” Then Jesus pointed out how each one of them worked on their daily chores on the Sabbath Day and said, why can’t a daughter of Abraham not be cured on the Sabbath, to which they were extremely humiliated, and the people rejoiced at what Jesus had done.

This Gospel Lesson teaches us that we should become humble enough to admit with joy and gratitude the good that can be done through other channels than those which, rightly or wrongly, we consider “proper”.

When faced with healing on the Sabbath, let us as did the people then, rather than the Synagogue officials, rejoice for all the good things that were done by Him!