After Being Touched

He touched her hand and the fever left her and she got up and began to wait on him. -Matthew 8:15 (NIV)

Jesus goes to Peter’s house and finds Peter’s mother-in-law lying in bed with a fever. Jesus touches her, the fever leaves, and she begins serving.

This has never really been one of my favorite miracle stories. It reminds me of the sexism of Jesus' day (which unfortunately still exists today) suggesting that the role of women is to wait on men. But today it strikes me that perhaps this woman waits (serves) on Jesus because that’s what all of us are supposed to do with our lives; we are all called to serve Christ out of the new life that he offers. Peter’s mother-in-law then is expressing her gratitude for life and for being touched by Jesus.

So many of us have been touched by Jesus, healed or restored in some way only to go right back to doing what we were doing before Jesus touched us. But I want to be touched by Jesus and then devote my entire life to serving him.

May God grant you the grace to be touched and then to serve today.





You can sign up to receive these daily devotionals by email each morning by scrolling to the bottom of this page and entering your email into the yellowish box.

If you're interested in reading through the Bible in a year, tomorrow's suggested readings are Matthew 11-13.