Philip Yancey in his great book, “Where Is God When It Hurts,” tells the story of NBA basketball player Bob Gross. He insisted on playing in a key game despite a badly injured ankle. Knowing that Gross was an important part of the game, the team doctor injected Marcaine, a strong painkiller into three different places of his foot. Gross started the game, but after a few minutes, as he was battling for a rebound, a loud snap! could be heard throughout the arena. Gross, oblivious to the break, ran up and down the court twice more, then crumpled to the floor. He felt no pain, and yet a bone had broken in his ankle. By overriding pain’s warning system with the anesthetic, the doctor had caused permanent damage and ended the basketball career of Bob Gross.
Leprosy has the same end result. It ends the life of the person it infects because it destroys the body’s ability to feel pain. Where it attacks it causes a loss of the sense of touch. That doesn’t sound too bad but consider the implications. When you reach for the stove to pick up a frying pan that is hot you immediately drop it and put ice on the burn. You watch as your skin turns red and blister. Now, if you had leprosy you would grab the pan and feel nothing. You’ve lost your sense of touch. You carry the pan unaware of the damage it is doing to your hand. As you set the pan down and remove your hand several layers of your skin are left around the handle. But you feel nothing.
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Brett Blair, www.eSermons.com, Sept 2001. Yancy quote from “Where Is God When It Hurts,” p. 34.