Our Touch Can Make The Difference
The disciples tried to say it was incidental contact...
Football has very specific rules about when and how contact between linemen can occur. Those rules are just the beginning of the rules about illegal and incidental contact, and fans on opposing sides never agree on how the rules violations are called. If it’s your team that makes illegal contact, you say it’s incidental, while the fans of the opposing team yell “Intentional! Intentional!” The referee makes the decision, and then one side boos. (Don’t you miss football?! It was the way we let all of our frustrations about life spill out as we cheered our team and cursed the referees and the opponent.)
A Crowd, a Touch
I guess when Jesus got to the other side of the lake after the demon-possessed man was healed, the news had traveled fast about the miracle. When Jesus got out of the boat, a crowd surrounded him. A synagogue leader named Jairus dropped to his knees before Jesus and begged him to come and heal his dying daughter. As they walked towards the house, the crowd was quite pushy, trying to get to Jesus, when suddenly Jesus stopped and asked, “Who touched my garments?” The disciples called incidental contact and tried to run the play that would result in getting across the door frame of Jairus’s house so the little girl could be healed.
Jesus said no. He had felt the power leave his presence, and he knew it wasn’t incidental. He knew someone was in need and had reached out to touch his garments.
The woman knew what she had done. It was premeditated. It was her last hope after 12 years of suffering. She collapsed in front of Jesus, ready to take whatever shame or lecture might come. She had heard plenty of those by the men who gave advice from the oral traditions that were used to govern everything, including medicine. Twelve years of home remedies offered by men concerning a women’s menstrual cycle?! And imagine the guilt trips and questioning about what sins this woman must have committed to stay so sick. Surely she was lying, on top of whatever else she had done that left her in an unclean and untouchable position.
Four hundred years earlier, the prophet Malachi had spoken these words about a coming Messiah: “the sun of righteousness shall rise with healing in its wings...”
It wouldn’t surprise me that this woman had heard about the coming Elijah, who would prepare the way for the Messiah and then the news from this same prophet who said healing flowed from the Messiah. There had been plenty of rumors spreading about both John the Baptist and this miracle worker who had healing in his wings. The keepers of the law were focused on the enforcement of the law. Those in need of a miracle hoped that Malachi was right. They hoped, and they prayed. And this woman took action. She was determined to find help from Jesus.
She was determined to find help from Jesus.
Only Believe
Jesus apparently didn’t give much attention to the oral traditions. Ignoring the belief that he himself would have been considered unclean by contacting this woman, he moved on to Jairus’s daughter. But the crowd stopped again, because Jairus had just heard that his daughter had died. He told Jesus not to bother coming to the house. It was hopeless, and being around a dead person would put Jesus further out of compliance with the Jewish laws.
Jesus spoke into the sadness and grief: “Do not fear, only believe.” He took Peter, James, and John and proceeded to the house. The weeping and wailing was especially loud when they arrived. Children aren’t supposed to die before their parents. It’s tragic.
Jesus interrupted and asked why they were weeping: “She isn’t dead, she is only sleeping.” They laughed at his words, probably like they had laughed behind closed doors before, when the interpreters of the oral traditions gave medical advice. I suspect the women laughed louder.
Jesus cleared the room. He took the little girl’s hand and said, “Talitha cumi,” which means, “Little girl, I say to you, arise.” Immediately, she got up and walked into the other room, greeted by the amazed eyes of her family and friends.
Hope today
It’s a scene to offer us hope in 2020, an unusually difficult year. Today there are many who are already weeping and wailing over financial ruin. Some are shouting that we’ve regressed in our efforts to achieve racial justice. Others grieve over loved ones lost to COVID-19 and fear there will be more. Some may even think that it’s useless to pray about all of this.
But I bet the two women in Mark 5 whom Jesus healed would say otherwise. I bet Jairus and his family would agree with them. Maybe it’s time to quit talking and moaning and take action. And maybe it starts with believers claiming the promise that there is, in fact, healing in his wings.
Maybe it’s time to quit talking a start believing the promised that Jesus would come to heal.
What if we dared to reach out to Jesus? What if we ignored the politicians who shout at each other and the social media that proclaims nonsense every day? What if Jesus’s words, “fear not, only believe,” are for us today?
Maybe we need to forget incidental contact and deliberately reach out in prayer and touch the hem of his garments.
God’s Word for You
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Photo by Dev Benjamin on Unsplash
