(Snapshots Session 5)

Mark 5:21-43

The Sick Woman

12 years. One little girl 12 years old. One woman sick 12 years. Their two stories collide on a road in Galilee.

The young girl sick, near death. Jairus rushes to Jesus asking for help. “My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her, so that she may be made well and live.”

And so Jesus comes.

While he makes his way along that dusty, dirty road, the crowd crushes in around him. And that woman. . . .the one bleeding for 12 years gathers up every ounce of courage, every moment of desperation and reaches out her hand.

Perhaps believing the superstition that the robe of a great man had power. “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.”

She touches the cloak. And in an instant she is made well. Her body is freed from the suffering.

———

The suffering.

Physical: a woman bleeding 12 years leaves one anemic, weak, broken.

Social/religious: a Jewish woman bleeding leads her to be an outcast.

Emotional: hopeless. She has spent all she has on doctor after doctor. They don’t know how to fix her so they try potions and odd things boiled in wine and sitting over trenches and hopeless means that lead to just more suffering.

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Jesus stops. He turns. “Who touched my cloak?’

For the disciples this is impossible. So many people. How would you know?

For the woman, this horror filled moment- she tried so hard to be anonymous, to sneak up behind, to not allow him to peer at her face, to just stick out a hand and touch.

For Jesus, he knows. He felt the power go out of him. He wants to see her.

She comes forward. Kneeling. Trembling. Explaining.

“Daughter, you faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”

Her imperfect faith. Freed. Not just her body but all her suffering. No longer an outcast. No longer hopeless.

She reached out a hand in imperfect faith and she was given hope.

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Meanwhile, Jairus’ daughter dies. Just like that. But Jesus goes anyway. He reaches out and takes her hand. “Little girl, I say to you, get up!” And she does.

Two stories. One trip.

Jairus coming to Jesus religiously clean. Boldly. In the open. And Jesus moves and gives hope.

The woman coming to Jesus unclean. Quietly. In secret. And Jesus moves and gives hope.

For that is what he came to do:

“to proclaim that captives will be released” and that “the oppressed will be set free”  (Luke 4:18-19)

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Freed when in desperation a hand is held out. Released when an imperfect faith acts.

Imperfect faith.

Coming to him just as we are. Without it all figured out.

Come to him with an imperfect faith.

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Take a moment or two to experience  Addie Zierman’s  “Come Weary”