Mark 5:21-43
Rev. Laura J. Collins
June 29, 2003
On Friday, we arrived home from our vacation in the middle of the day. We had company arriving from out of town later in the afternoon, so we were unpacking and changing bed sheets and doing the grocery shopping quickly to be ready for the guests. I, however, was suffering from post-vacation stress syndrome and plopped into a chair to rest. Luke had been tugging at my shorts ever since we got home saying, "Mom, come play with me, come play with me."
"Luke," I said irritably, "I have a head-ache and a stomach ache and I need to just sit here for a few minutes by myself."
Luke looked at me and then gently climbed into my lap. He put both his hands on the top of my head and closed his eyes and said, "God, please make my mommy feel better." Then he paused, opened his eyes with an expectant grin and said, "Are you better now?"
Though my headache did not instantly disappear I was better just looking at the faith and hope in the eyes of my young child. We have been teaching him that God can make us well and he has no reason not to believe us. While I was stewing about feeling lousy and needing to get things done, he redirected my priorities. Don't stew, pray.
"Do not fear, only believe."
This morning's reading from Mark has two wonderful healing stories woven together. The story of the little girl whose father begged Jesus to come and help her and the story of the woman with a flow of blood who was healed on the way to the little girl's house.
Let's look first at the story that interrupts the original story: the woman with a flow of blood. We are told at the beginning of the reading that Jesus has just gotten out of a boat and that the crowds surround him immediately. This woman, whose name we do not know, was part of the crowd. We're told that she had been sick for 12 years, that she had gone to every physician she could find and that she had spent all of her money trying to be healed, but nothing had helped.
In the Jewish purity laws a woman with a flow of blood was considered unclean. Women having their period were separated from the rest of the family and could not return to society until they had been ritually cleansed. So this woman, in addition to the tiredness, pain and other difficulties related to her problem, had been unclean for 12 years -- unable to have normal family life, to participate in worship, or to socialize.
Imagine, if you can, the isolation and loneliness that surrounded her. Imagine the shame and depression she must have suffered and the desperation she must have felt. She was breaking religious law just by being part of the crowd around Jesus that day. No wonder she snuck up behind him trying to remain unnoticed. Her actions are an excruciatingly tender mix of humility and hope. "If only I can touch the hem of his garment," she thinks.
These words have cradled me through difficult days; days when I felt miles from God, but longing for spiritual comfort. "If only I can touch the hem of his garment ..." I don't need all of Jesus, just a brush, just a reassurance, like a child clinging to her mother's skirts.
So she pushes through the crowds just to get close enough to touch and she knows that her illness is healed. Jesus also knows. In a crowd jostling him on every side, he feels the power go out from him, he senses the healing energy that has poured from him to somebody else. He stops and asks who.
The disciples get irritated. What do you mean who touched you? We're like you're twelve body guards trying to push you through this crowd and you wondered which one touched you? But Jesus knows. And the woman knows. And though it must take every ounce of courage she has left she comes to him and falls on the ground at his feet and tells him her story.
Jesus stops and listens and then tells her, "Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace and be healed of your disease."
Now this is interesting because we know that before Jesus spoke, she had already been cured. But here is the difference: she approached him thinking that he could "save" her -- the word used means to make well or make whole. When she touches him and the blood stops, the text says she was "cured"-- a different word. But not until Jesus has met her and heard her story, does he say that she has been "saved" or "made whole." Then he wishes her peace and freedom from her disease.
The woman was desperate and longed to use Jesus like a talisman -- like a lucky rabbit's foot she could rub and be healed. So she touched him and that might have been enough -- her blood stopped. But Jesus was not content to be used like that. He wanted a relationship. He wanted to see her face to face. He wanted to hear her story and recognize her humanity. He wanted her to know that to him, she was a whole person, not just a disease. And so, he stopped and he listened and then he said to her, not only was she cured of her disease, but she was made whole -- no longer a disease, but a person, a member of society. Her faith had not simply cured her, it had saved her, given her a whole life, a life of integrity and peace.
Now, if you think that the disciples were irritated by this interruption, imagine how the father of the little girl felt. There he had been, waiting at the seaside for Jesus to get off the boat, falling at his feet and begging repeatedly for Jesus to come and save his child. Can't you feel the desperation?
The week before I left for vacation, I spent several hours in the pediatric intensive care unit. (Now, for those of you who have a regular prayer list, don't forget to include the people who work in places like that. Nurses who need to remain calm and confident in the midst of families desperate for their little children's health. Surrounded day and night with the critical care of the most vulnerable people.)
We saw accident victims wheeled in. We saw families gather to hear the bad news. We could feel the desperate hopes and prayers hanging in the air, prayers from people who may never have prayed before in their lives. So that is what I imagine when I read about Jairus falling on his face and begging Jesus for help. I imagine how he stood by the seaside, waiting impatiently, straining to see if one of the boats pulling to shore might be the one. I imagine how he ran, not caring who he pushed aside in the process, to be first in line when Jesus set foot on shore. I imagine how all thought of dignity was lost as he fell crying at his feet.
Jairus, we are told, was the president of the synagogue. That meant he was in charge -- he held the most powerful lay position in the local religious community. Unlike the woman, who was pushed to the edges of society, he was the center of his community. A leader most likely known and admired for miles around. A person of learning and perhaps wealth; certainly one whose faith and position were well respected.
None of that matters when your baby is dying. You just do whatever you have to do.
So imagine how Jairus must have felt when Jesus stopped on the road to listen to this woman. This unclean, outcast woman, sick for years and years. But Jesus did not let Jairus's position nor desperation get in the way of making a connection. Jesus stopped to listen to the woman; he would not be hurried by desperation or even death. The human touch was too important.
What a lesson that is for us. We, who hurry about, thinking we've got to get things done yesterday. We who complain about interruptions to our important work, as if the interruptions weren't, in fact, often the life work we are being called to do.
Finally, after what must have seemed an eternity to Jairus, Jesus got to the home where the little girl lay, but the mourning had already begun. She had just died, maybe in the very moments when Jesus had stopped on the road to listen to the woman. Before Jairus could collapse in grief, before he could even take in what he was being told, Jesus looked him in the eyes and said, "Do not fear, only believe."
Believe what? The words of the crowd who said that the time for hope had past? Or the eyes of Jesus, which said that is it never too late to hope? How do we learn to believe in the possibility of life when everyone around us tells us the reality is death? How do we learn to believe in the possibility of peace when reality around us speaks of endless war? How do we learn to believe in the possibility of genuine community, when reality promises only cheap substitutions as our best chance?
Do not fear, only believe.
Jesus restored the little girl to life. The story seems to demand a dramatic ending. Fire from heaven or a wild riot from the crowds at least. Instead, the story ends on this simple, human note. Jesus looked at the little girl and said, "Get her something to eat."
Concerned not with drama, but with humanity, not with sensationalism, but with common care. Jesus ends the story where each of us needs to begin: taking care of each other. And having faith enough to believe that such care matters.
Do not fear, only believe.
Williamson, Lamar. Interpretation Series: Mark. (Louisville: John Knox Press, 1983).
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