Summary
Friendship is an important theme shown throughout the bible. We are not only referred to as children of God, but also as friends of God. The healing of the paralysed man shows the true loving nature of Jesus and the power of friendship. Four friends step out in faith believing for the impossible because they believed that God was with them and that he was a God of miracles. Don’t let anything hold you back from the faithfilled, blessed life God has for you. They carried him to Jesus to be healed; he walked home not only healed physically, but spiritually. He walked home a new man, beginning a new life with God, forgiven, free, and whole. Come to Jesus and you’ll get more than you bargained for!

Key Scriptures
Mark 2 v 1- 12 - A few days later, when Jesus again entered Capernaum, the people heard that he had come home. They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left, not even outside the door, and he preached the word to them. Some men came, bringing to him a paralysed man, carried by four of them. Since they could not get him to Jesus because of the crowd, they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and then lowered the mat the man was lying on. When Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralysed man, ‘Son, your sins are forgiven.’
Now some teachers of the law were sitting there, thinking to themselves, ‘Why does this fellow talk like that? He’s blaspheming! Who can forgive sins but God alone?’
Immediately Jesus knew in his spirit that this was what they were thinking in their hearts, and he said to them, ‘Why are you thinking these things? Which is easier: to say to this paralysed man, “Your sins are forgiven,” or to say, “Get up, take your mat and walk”? But I want you to know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins.’ So he said to the man, ‘I tell you, get up, take your mat and go home.’ He got up, took his mat and walked out in full view of them all. This amazed everyone and they praised God, saying, ‘We have never seen anything like this!’

James 2:19 - You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that – and shudder.

John 15: 13-15 - Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.

Follow up questions
1. What is it that could be stopping you from getting to Jesus?