He touched her hand, and the fever left her, and she rose and began to serve Him. Matthew 8:15 ESV1
Read Matthew 8:14-17, Mark 1:29-34 & Luke 4:38-41
Have ever heard the call of Jesus but realized you just didn’t have what it took to do what He asked? Have you ever felt overwhelmed by a need but didn’t see how you could possibly help? Have you ever wanted to obey Jesus but felt like you had to say, “I just can’t!”? If so, you may be able to identify with the account recorded in these Scriptures.
Jesus had just finished teaching at the synagogue in Capernaum. He had just cast out an unclean demon from a member of that synagogue. The people had been amazed at the supremacy with which He taught and astounded at the authority He had over demons. It had been an awe-inspiring day of Jesus displaying the power and glory of God. But now Jesus needed something from His fellow man; He needed a place to stay the night.
It just so happened that Capernaum was Peter’s hometown. I don’t know if it was Peter confidently speaking before completely thinking, or if Jesus was stating, as He did later to a man named Zacchaeus, “‘I must stay at your house today’” (Luke 19:5), but somehow Jesus was going to spend the night with at Peter’s house with his family. Peter appears to have had a somewhat larger-than-normal house because it wasn’t a single-family home. According to Scripture, this was not only the home of Peter and his wife and children (if he had any), but it was also the home of Andrew and Peter’s mother-in-law (see Mark 1:29-30).
“In Jesus’ time, the smallest homes of the very poor might be little more than a square, stone structure covered with a whitewashed sort of stucco. There would typically be one larger multipurpose room and a smaller back room for the animals. Some houses in hilly regions were partial cave dwellings, built up against the limestone rock face, perhaps with the front section built onto it … Such structures were easy to build and there was a certain natural coolness to them.
Another sort of house, also common among the working poor and typical village-dwellers, was one built around a central open court with small rooms opening onto it … The open concept retained the coolness by allowing air to move freely through. Cooking could also be done in the open central court when the weather permitted. If the family had some animals, they were often kept in a part of the house at night. Families, sometimes including several generations, tended to live under one roof and had little or no privacy.”2
Peter’s home was probably the second kind of above-mentioned house. This means it would have been the perfect place for Jesus and a few of His disciples to spend the night. But there was a problem–Peter’s mother-in-law was sick with a very high fever.
I can just imagine Peter’s wife meeting him at the door and saying something such as, “Hi, Honey, I am so glad you are home, and I am very interested in meeting your new friends, especially since I have already heard what happened at the synagogue, but this is not a good time to have over so many people. Mother is incredibly sick. I am unbelievably tired. I have been up to my eyeballs with caring for Mother and taking care of her responsibilities as well as mine. It is the Sabbath day. I really should be resting before I have to hit it full swing again tomorrow. I don’t want to get sick too. Besides, hospitality really isn’t my thing. Mother is the one who is so good at it. Please see if you can’t find somewhere else for your friends to stay.”
Then, Peter, probably reluctantly and a little embarrassed, likely went out to Jesus and his friends and said something like, “Sorry, Boys, I thought we would be able to house you for the night, but my mother-in-law is really sick, and the house is a mess. It isn’t a good time. Perhaps, you could all stay…” I think Jesus may have then interrupted Peter with, “Take me to her.”
“When Jesus entered Peter’s house, He saw his mother-in-law lying sick with a fever” (Matthew 8:14). “And He stood over her and rebuked the fever, and it left her, and immediately she rose and began to serve them” (Luke 4:39). What had looked like a big deal wasn’t a big deal at all after Jesus entered the scene. He didn’t just heal Peter’s mother-in-law; He infused her with the strength to do what she needed to do. I don’t know if you have ever been “ill with a high fever” (Luke 4:38), but one does not recover instantaneously from such a sickness. Usually, it takes a few days after a fever has passed, for one to feel up to his/her normal responsibilities. It would take even longer for one to be able to offer hospitality.
Peter may have been the head of this house, but, I believe, his mother-in-law was the one who made it a home. This was her dwelling place as much as it was his.
I can imagine Peter’s mother-in-law had her doubts when she was volunteered (or, more accurately, was “voluntold”) to entertain Peter’s friends, but when she took up Jesus on His gift of healing and the energy to serve, she got to be part of so much more than she could have ever imagined. When Peter’s mother-in-law opened up her home to Jesus, she opened up her home to Jesus’ work.
That night, the home of Peter’s mother-in-law became the site for a city-wide healing service. “That evening at sundown they brought to Him all who were sick or oppressed by demons. And the whole city was gathered together at the door. And He healed many who were sick with various diseases, and cast out many demons” (Mark 1:32-34a). Earlier that day, when Peter’s mother-in-law lay in bed, tossing and turning with fever and possibly going in and out of delirium, she couldn’t have imagined what she would have experienced before the day was through. But that was only the beginning of this home being used for God’s glory.
The home of Peter’s mother-in-law became Jesus’ home away from home. Jesus’ hometown was Nazareth (see Matthew 2:23), but this was the place where He stayed while He was in Capernaum. Scripture tells us, “When he returned to Capernaum after some days, it was reported that He was at home” (Mark 2:1). As we will see, as we continue our study of the healings of Jesus, other miracles happened right here. It seems that Jesus and His followers were always welcome at Peter’s mother-in-law’s house.
According to archeologists, the home of Peter’s mother-in-law may have become one of the first Christian churches.
“Italian excavators working in Capernaum may have actually uncovered the remnants of the humble house of Peter that Jesus called home while in Capernaum … Buried beneath the remains of an octagonal Byzantine martyrium church, excavators found the ruins of a rather mundane dwelling dating to the first century B.C.
Although slightly larger than most, the house was simple, with coarse walls and a roof of earth and straw. Like most early Roman-period houses, it consisted of a few small rooms clustered around two open courtyards. Despite later proving to be one of the most exciting Biblical archaeology discoveries, the house appeared quite ordinary. According to the excavators, however, it is what happened to the house after the middle of the first century A.D. that marked it as exceptional and most likely the house of Peter, the home of Jesus in Capernaum.
In the years immediately following Jesus’ death, the function of the house changed dramatically. The house’s main room was completely plastered over from floor to ceiling—a rarity for houses of the day. At about the same time, the house’s pottery, which had previously been household cooking pots and bowls, now consisted entirely of large storage jars and oil lamps. Such radical alterations indicate that the house no longer functioned as a residence but instead had become a place for communal gatherings, possibly even the first Christian gatherings, a key factor in how Christianity began. As with many Biblical archeology discoveries, often the small details most convincingly tie ancient material remains to Biblical events and characters.
For instance, the excavators found that during the ensuing centuries, the plastered room from the original house had been renovated and converted into the central hall of a rudimentary church. The room’s old stone walls were buttressed by a newly built two-story arch that, in turn, supported a new stone roof. The room was even replastered and painted over with floral and geometric designs of various colors …
This simple church building, helpful in determining how Christianity began, survived for more than 300 years before it was finally replaced in the fifth century by a well-built octagonal martyrium church. Octagonal martyria were built to commemorate an important site, such as the original house of Peter that once stood here. The inner sanctum of the octagonal building was built directly above the remains of the very room of the first-century house that had formed the central hall of the earlier church.
Biblical archaeology discoveries are not cut-and-dry cases. Though there is no definitive proof in this instance that the house ruin uncovered by the excavators actually is the ancient house of Peter, there is layer upon layer of circumstantial evidence to support its importance in early Christianity and its association with Jesus in Capernaum and his foremost disciple, Peter. Were it not for its association with Jesus and Peter, why else would a run-of-the-mill first-century house in Capernaum have become a focal point of Christian worship and identity for centuries to come?”3
Pretty cool, huh? What a series of blessings came when Peter’s mother-in-law by faith said, “Yes” instead of “No.” What a series of workings came about when she gave up her privacy and her property saying to Jesus, “Thine” instead of “Mine.”
I don’t know what you sense Jesus leading you to do in Him today. I don’t know if that thing is causing you apprehension. But I do know that often there is something which holds back you and me. But, just like Peter’s mother-in-law, we don’t see the whole picture. Take a step of faith alongside me. Follow Christ’s leading. “Be strong and courageous … for the LORD your God is with [us] wherever [we] go” (Joshua 1:9). He is with us in whatever He asks. He will take whatever we give Him and do so much more with it than we can even imagine.
1 Scripture quotations marked with ESV are from The Holy Bible, English Standard Version (ESV), copyright 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. All Scriptures are taken from the ESV unless otherwise noted.
2 http://blog.adw.org/2014/07/what-were-typical-homes-like-in-jesus-time/