Sermon Illustrations
Christ Suffered for Us - The Lesson of The Lepers
In her book Ten Fingers for God, Dorothy Clarke Wilson writes about Dr. Paul Brand who worked with leprosy patients in India.
Sometimes they would all gather together in fellowship. One evening, Paul joined them, and they asked him to speak.
Dr. Brand had nothing prepared, yet he willingly stood up, paused for a moment and looked at their hands, some with no fingers, and some with only a few stumps. Then he spoke: "I am a hand surgeon, so when I meet people, I can't help looking at their hands. I would like to have examined Christ's hands. With the nails driven through, they must have appeared twisted and crippled. Remember, Jesus, at the end, was crippled too."
The patients, on hearing this, suddenly lifted their poor hands towards heaven. Hearing of God's response to suffering had made their suffering easier.
Source:
Dorothy Clarke Wilson and Philip Yancey, Ten Fingers for God: The Life and Work of Dr. Paul Brand (Paul Brand Publishing, reprint 1996), n.p.