Twelve Years Series

Solomon Northrup was born around 1808 in New York to a former slave. His father, who eventually married a woman of mixed ethnicities, had been emancipated in the will of his deceased owner. They had two sons who were born free. Solomon took after his father in learning how to work the land, but he also had a gift for music and excelled at the violin. His work tended to be seasonal, so he held a variety of different jobs - whatever the market would allow.

In 1841, while walking through their NY town looking for work, he met two entertainers who said they were part of a circus. They invited Solomon to join them on a brief trip, offering a small per diem and extra money for nights that he performed. So, assuming this would be a trip of just a few days, he did not get word to his wife and three children, who were some 20 miles away visiting family. This was of course, before the time of telephones and automobiles.

Solomon and these men went to New York City, performing a couple of gigs along the way. These men invited Solomon to join them in Washington DC to participate with the circus that they said they were a part of. While there, they drugged Solomon and sold him to a slave trader. When Solomon awoke from his drugged stupor, he found himself in chains. The more that Solomon protested for his freedom, the more his enslavers beat him. So, for the next twelve years he served as a slave in Louisiana.

Eventually, Solomon was aided by a Canadian man who got word back to his family in New York. They enlisted the help of the government who then secured Solomon’s rightful freedom.

I can imagine those twelve years would have been frustrating and demoralizing for him - not to mention his wife and children - hearing little if anything from Solomon for that time. Not knowing if he was dead or alive.

A lot can happen in 12 years. As children, our bodies go through their most drastic changes in those years. When Solomon was imprisioned, his children were about 10, 8, and 5. The would have been around 22, 20, and 17 the next time he would see them. Upon his reunion with his family, he learned that one of his daughters was married with a child of her own.

As adults, we look back on a history of 12 years and think that it was a blink of an eye, but in the midst of suffering, that 12 years can feel like an eternity.

If you have your bibles, open them to Luke 8. We’ll begin in verse 40 as we learn of two different people whose worlds collide with Jesus after they have experienced two completely different terms of 12 years.

Last week, we got a chance to witness Jesus demonstrating his authority over natural and spiritual forces. This week, we’ll get to see Jesus’ authority over death and disease. In both of these, we are urged to recognize that…

Theme: Jesus fulfills our greatest hopes and heals our deepest needs.

The question is, do we really believe that?

So Jesus had been on the Gentile side of the Sea of Galilee where he healed a demon-possessed man. When he was rejected by the the people of the region, He returned to the Jewish area of Galilee to an adoring crowd.

Luke 8:40 ESV

Now when Jesus returned, the crowd welcomed him, for they were all waiting for him.

Just like all of us, when we come to Jesus or Scripture or even a popular figure - be it political or social or educational or inspirational or even entertaining, we come for a variety of reasons. It’s unclear why the crowd waited for Jesus - maybe it was His teaching or His care or His healing. Luke doesn’t give us any insight into this. We do, however, get a bit of insight into two very different individuals - an upstanding member of the synagogue and an outcast. One comes because his hopes are being dashed, the other because her healing is endlessly deferred, but in both, we find that Jesus delivers true hope and healing.

We first get introduced to Jairus.

Luke 8:41–42 ESV

And there came a man named Jairus, who was a ruler of the synagogue. And falling at Jesus’ feet, he implored him to come to his house, for he had an only daughter, about twelve years of age, and she was dying.

As Jesus went, the people pressed around him.

Here, we get introduced to this man of the synagogue - a ruler. It’s unclear exactly what his role may have been, but he seemed to be instrumental in the regular activities of the synagogue. Some speculate that he was like a board member. That being said, he would have maintained a lifestyle in which he could be involved in religious life. Overall, we could surmise that he was generally a good, righteous, religious man. As good as he was, we can see that tragedy hit his family. He was blessed with only one child, a daughter who was now about twelve years old. Darrell Bock notes that at 12 she would have been close marriageable age in their day (p. 792). For the last twelve years, we can assume that he had acted like many of us - invested in his daughter, taught her the things of God, brought her to the regular gatherings of God’s people. We can even assume that he sought to fulfill the charge that Moses made to parents in the book of Deuteronomy, in the Shema: