NAMED, BUT UNKNOWN: SIMON THE LEPER

Simon the leper (Matthew 26:6-13; Mark 14:3-9; John 12:1-8) was filled with genuine gratitude.

He was the father of three great kids: Lazarus, Mary, and Martha. It’s likely that there were grandkids that filled his home with happy noise.

His home was large enough to host a banquet. Maybe he was a shopkeeper in Bethany, the small village strategically positioned on the highway between Jericho and Jerusalem.

His world had been turned upside down when he’d contracted leprosy. It’s likely that he’d spent time living and slowly dying in a leper colony, until the day that Jesus touched, healed him, and saved him. Of this miraculous event, the Scriptures are silent. How else would Simon have been given such a nickname? And how else would Simon have been cured from an incurable disease? Simon was eternally grateful for Jesus’ touch.

When his son Lazarus died, Jesus called him from the tomb (John 11:1-44). Standing at the grave, Simon heard Jesus speak, “Lazarus, come out!” (John 11:43). What once was dead, Jesus made alive! Almost unbelievable… but certainly unforgettable.

Simon and his family were overcome with gratitude to Jesus! “So they gave a dinner for him there; Martha was serving them, and Lazarus was one of those reclining at the table with him” (John 12:2). While friends and family gathered around the table, “Mary took a pound of perfume, pure and expensive nard, anointed Jesus’s feet, and wiped his feet with her hair. So the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume” (John 12:3).

I suspect that Simon, Lazarus, and Martha, understood the significance of Mary’s extravagant act… the bottle of perfume was worth “three hundred denarii” (John 12:5). That’s equivalent to the annual wages of a common laborer!

Jesus explained it… “By pouring this perfume on my body, she has prepared me for burial” (Matthew 26:12). They understood that Jesus came to die!

Simon must have smiled as he watched his daughter worship the “lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world”(John 1:29). Jesus’ touch healed… Jesus’ words gave new life… and Jesus sacrificial death redeemed for eternity!

“… think on these things” (Philippians 4:8, KJV).