And Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, I will; be clean. And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. The touch is the scandalous act: Jesus touches the leper, which by the law would make Jesus ritually impure. Instead, the cleanness flows from Jesus to the leper — the direction of the contagion is reversed. The leper becomes clean rather than Jesus becoming unclean. This is the pattern of Jesus' entire ministry: he enters the space of the defiled and the excluded and his holiness overwhelms the defilement rather than being contaminated by it. The immediately communicates the completeness and speed of the healing. I will — Jesus affirms what the leper asked: not only can he, but he will. His will aligns with the leper's desire for restoration.

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