Mark 3:5

In this passage, Jesus surprisingly says to the man with the withered hand, “…Stretch forth thine hand…” (Mark 3:5). The Lord called for an activity in the hand that was quite limp and useless. Here, we note the man’s obvious inability to do what he was told. He was called upon to do an impossible thing. His hand was already withered. Therefore, the command seemed unreasonable.

This was the second command Jesus gave him in the passage. The first was very reasonable and easier. Jesus told him earlier to “…Stand forth” (v.3). Now this second command! Did Jesus bring him before this watching company here in the synagogue and set him in the midst to embarrass him or just to highlight his severe disability? Of course not!

When we look at the man and at his withered, nerveless, useless, helpless hand, all we see is impossibility and misery. However, when we look at the face of Jesus and recognize who it is who spoke to him, we rapidly see impossibility giving way to possibility and miraculous transformation.

Jesus changes things. Jesus has the capacity to change the entire landscape and trajectory of our mundane and sin-cursed lives. Not only does He command us to do the impossible, but He, along with the command, gives the necessary power to perform the very thing He is calling upon us to do. The man is called upon to stretch forth not the good hand but the withered hand.

This is an unchangeable, scriptural truth! Jesus empowers us to do the extraordinary and the spectacular! Just a little further on in this same chapter, the evangelist reinforces this truth when he informs his readers that Jesus not only called and ordained the original twelve disciples to preach but also to do the miraculous. He ordained them “to have power to heal sicknesses, and to cast out demons” (Mark 3:15). Could it be that we forget this sometimes? We were also sent to be empowered to do the miraculous.

I know it may seem difficult to comprehend, but if He gives the command for it to be done, then it is no longer impossible. It becomes possible just because He commands it. May we, His pilgrim church, always keep this in mind, that Jesus does not show up among us to reveal disability but to end it.

It is worthy of repeating; Jesus walks among us to cancel disability. We therefore command and expect disability to be cancelled. In Jesus, the “cannot” is cancelled and the “can” becomes the mighty truth concerning our lives. He is waiting to communicate the power necessary for the command given. “…And he stretched it out: and his hand was restored whole as the other” (v.5). In Him, the disability is cancelled!