Giving Him Something He Can Feel

“And Jesus, perceiving in himself that power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said, ‘Who touched my garments?’” [1]

How sensitive are you? I don’t mean, are you woke. Neither am I particularly thinking of whether you are able to feel the pain of another. But, I do wonder whether you are sensitive enough to feel a warm zephyr kiss your cheek as it passes on a brisk spring morning? I would imagine that this is a very real possibility. You see, I’m asking about the sensitivity of your nervous system. Can you feel the rustle of a breeze created when a sparrow flutters while falling to the earth? That degree of sensitivity is far less likely, I should suppose. Yet, we witness the Son of God testifying, “Aren’t two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them falls to the ground without your Father’s consent” [MATTHEW 10:29 CSV]. That is real sensitivity!

Let’s try this again, shall we? When you are in a crowd and someone brushes against the tail of your jacket, do you notice? Chances are that you take no notice of such gentle, meaningless touches to your clothing. Oh, you may take note when someone actually pushes you, but a casual, meaningless brush against your clothing will likely go unnoticed. What about when a hair falls from your head to land on your shirt or on your blouse? I know that we see the hair clinging to our clothing when we take off the garment, but we didn’t feel the hair fall, and we took no particular note when it fell. But our Heavenly Father knew when each hair fell, and He knew precise number of hairs that fell. The Master informs us, “Even the hairs of your head have all been counted” [MATTHEW 10:30 CSV]. Now, that is sensitivity!

We’re geared to sift through the many casual, and mostly meaningless, interactions that each of us experiences each day. It is the only way that we would be able to actually deal with the matters that truly have an impact in our lives. And yet, we serve a God who not only sees each thing that happens in our life, but a God who is touched by what happens to each of us. We have a Father who hears each cry, even when we are unable to make an orderly or rational presentation of what has wrung a silent sob from our hearts.

A DESPERATE WOMAN SEEKS JESUS — Why would anyone seek Jesus? Why would anyone seek out the Son of God. In order to answer that question, consider what was taking place in the life of the Son of God at the time of the things recorded in our text. Jesus had set out to cross the sea with His disciples. As they were carried across the water by the gentle winds, Jesus fell asleep in the stern of the boat. While He was asleep, the zephyrs transform into a fierce storm that threatens to swamp the boat with the waves.

In fear, the disciples struggled to row toward the shore, but they were helpless. The waves were crashing into the boat and the wind pushed it around as though it was but a leaf on the water. At last, the terrified disciples turned to the last hope they had. The Word of God tells us that they awakened Jesus and pleaded with Him to do something.

You can see one of two of the disciples stagger along the deck as the make their way to the Master who is asleep on a cushion. He hasn’t even stirred despite the violet pitching and rolling of the boat. As they shake the Master awake, they are crying out, “Teacher, don’t you care that we are going to die?” At last fully awake, the Lord rebukes the wind, and commands the sea, “Calm down! Hush!” At His command, the storm stops, the waves subside, and everything is calm as though no storm ever raged. The wind stops blowing, the sea no longer heaves, the boat gently rocks on the water. There is so little wind that if the boat is to make it to shore, the men will have to row.

Then, the Master asks those men who had been so terrified while the winds raged, “Why are you such cowards? Don’t you have any faith yet?” The same disciples who had been so terrified only minutes before are now fill with great fear. The men aren’t simply intimidated, they are genuinely fearful. Fearful though they had been of the ferocity of the storm, it is the One who commands the storm that now fills them with an overwhelming sense of awe. The entire account is recorded in MARK 4:35-41.