Why did Jesus make that woman free from her infirmity?—In order that she might walk at liberty. Certainly it was not in order that she might continue of her own free will to do that which before she was obliged to do. And why does He make us free from sin?—In order that we may live free from sin. On account of the weakness of our flesh, we are unable to do the righteousness of the law; therefore Christ, who is come in the flesh, and who has power over all flesh, strengthens us with might by His Spirit in the inner man, that the righteousness of the law may be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. We can not tell how He does it; He alone knows how it is done, because He alone has the power; but we may know the reality of it.
Pay special attention to the words of Jesus to the woman, uttered while she was yet bound down, and unable to lift herself up: “Thou art loosed from thine infirmity.” “Thou art loosed,” present tense. That is just what He says to us. To every captive He has proclaimed deliverance. The woman “could in nowise lift up herself;” yet at the word of Christ she at once stood erect. She could not do it, yet she did. The things that are impossible for men are possible for God. “The Lord upholdeth all that fall, and raiseth up all those that be bowed down.” Ps. 145:14. Faith does not make facts; it only lays hold of them. There is not a single soul that is bowed down with the weight of sin which Satan hath bound on him, whom Christ does not lift up. Freedom is his; he has only to make use of it. Let the message be sounded far and wide. Let every soul hear it, that Christ has given deliverance to every captive. Thousands will rejoice at the news.
Christ came to restore that which was lost; He redeems us from the curse; He hath redeemed us; therefore the liberty wherewith He makes us free is the liberty that existed before the curse came. Man was made a king. It was not merely the one individual first created who was made king, but all mankind. “In the day that God created man, in the likeness of God made He him; male and female created He them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam,” that is, man. Gen. 5:1, 2. “And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in His own image, in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them. And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it; and have dominion,” etc. The dominion, we see, was given to every human being, male and female.
