OPEN: Today I wanted to focus one more time on the topic of drawing near to God. In James we were told: "Come near to God and he will come near to you." This morning we are going to be looking at a woman who has a desperate faith. She was determined to get to Jesus not matter what it took. Nothing was going to stop her. A desperate faith will get us things that an ordinary faith won't ever experience. A desperate faith will receive things that it never has experienced before.
Jesus responds with a heart of love and compassion to people who do whatever it takes to draw near to him.
The kind of faith that always gets Jesus' attention is a desperate faith -- Jesus offers hope to the hopeless. -- I want you to hear that again -- some of you are going to be drifting off on your Sunday morning nap in a few moments so I want you to get this before you fall asleep -- Jesus offers hope to the hopeless. There is no one beyond God's compassion. It's amazing how many moments are given to us in the Bible that are just like this -- people who abandon every protocol imaginable and do whatever it takes to get closer to Jesus.
- The paralytic man and his friends who climb up on the roof a building where Jesus is speaking and cut a hole through the rood and then lower their friend down on a pallet with each one of the them hold onto a rope fastened to the pallet. Imagine what that would be like to actually have that happen here -- to have as we were meeting here today somebody so desperate to come in that they would jump onto our roof and cut a hole though it to gain access. Mk 2:1-12
- the leper -- a man with leprosy comes begging on his knees begging Jesus "If you are willing, you can make me clean." Jesus says, I am willing and immediately the man was cured. Mark 1:40
- Blind Bartimaeus -- when Jesus came his way, he started crying out to Him, "Son of David have mercy on me" And his friends all told him to shut up -- but he completely ignores them and shouted all the more. Lk.18:35-42
- The prodigal son - Before the prodigal son would come to his father and receive the mercy offered to him, he had to first see his desperate situation, his hunger, his poverty, his rebellion, and his inevitable death. He had to first exhaust himself of his own resources so that he might cast himself upon the abundant and merciful resources of his father alone. Then only could he find true peace, comfort, and joy. Lk. 15:11-31
We all want faith like that, right? I mean am I stretching things to far to say that? Don't you want that kind of faith?
- the problem is we don't want the desperate situation that goes along with it, right?
Who wants desperation? We want stability not desperate situations. We don't like desperate situations because it screams at us that life is out of control. And who wants that? We want things to be calm and ordered and peaceful and in order -- we want stability in our finances, our friendships, our work life, our home life, our church. But the thing about the Gospel is that is always upsets the stability of this world. Have you noticed that?
God wants our stability and security to be rooted in Him and Him alone.
When we find security and stability in family, Jesus comes along and says you must love me and hate your mother and father and sister and brother and pick up your cross and follow me. If we find security in possessions he says, "Go sell all you have and give it to the poor and then come follow me." If we find stability and security in our own plans and aspirations, Jesus comes along and says you have to be willing to deny yourself and become a servant to everyone else and come and follow me. God wants us to live in a spot where our total dependence is upon him and him alone -- so that we can't cling to our families -- we can't cling to our possessions, we can't cling to our own agendas and comfort zones -- He simply wants us to cling to him. That's where he wants us to be. Finding our security and stability in him.
Context -- If you look over the passages that precede this passage you see Jesus displaying his power in a number of several circumstances. Mark 4: 35 - Jesus has the power to calm storms. He commanded a thunderstorm to settle down and there was instant tranquility. The beginning of chapter 5 - Jesus spoke to a demon-controlled man and calmed the storm raging in his mind. He has power over disturbances and demons. Today, we are going to see how Jesus has power over disease and death, as well. If Jesus can handle disturbances, demons, disease, and death, He can handle any need you have in your life!
When Jesus had again crossed over by boat to the other side of the lake, a large crowd gathered around him while he was by the lake.
Notice in verse 21 we are told that a large crowd gathered around Jesus while he was by the lake. That's the way it was for most of Jesus' public ministry. People everywhere had a fascination with him. It wasn't a fascination with some kind of star personality. It was a fascination with His power. They are stunned by His teaching, nobody ever taught like He taught. They gathered around him -- not because they wanted to be his followers, but because they had heard about his healings. They weren't particularly interested, for the most part, in responding to His message but they did want the healings that He was able to do. They were not committed- they were consumers. They weren't there to give Jesus anything -- they were there to get something from him.
But in the midst of that selfish, self-righteous, fickle crowd there were two people who stand out. They're an interesting duo. They have no relationship to each other. There's no reason they would even know each other. But they're brought together in the text of Matthew, Mark and Luke. They're two, a man and a woman, one rich, one poor; one respected, one rejected; one honored, one ashamed; one leading the synagogue, the other excommunicated from the synagogue; one with a twelve-year-old daughter dying, and one with a twelve-year-old disease suffering. The ruler and the outcast. One is a synagogue official named Jairus - the other is a woman whose name we don't know.
Then one of the synagogue rulers, named Jairus, came there. Seeing Jesus, he fell at his feet and pleaded earnestly with him, "My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live." So Jesus went with him.
We're told Jairus was a synagogue ruler. He is not a Pharisee or a Sadducee or a scribe -- the synagogue ruler was a man or a group of men who acted as the caretakers, or the overseers, or the administrators of synagogue life. They weren't necessarily the teachers, they, however, were the ones who cared for the scrolls, and cared for the facility and administrated the facility and organized the synagogue school. Now the religious establishment hated Jesus and wanted to do away with him. They said that the power he healed with came from Beelzebub -- from the devil himself. He was either out of his mind or demon possessed or both. What irked them more than anything was Jesus made a point to go find sinners and hang around with them. "Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?" They saw Jesus as a threat to their power and prestige -- a violation to the natural way they practiced their religion. But Jairus isn't concerned about any of that. In fact he's not concerned about religion at all. He's the president of the local synagogue and He had reached that point and he didn't care anymore what the religious establishment felt about him. He would take that. He had something bigger that had gripped his heart. He had a daughter who was nearly dead and she was twelve-years-old. She's ill -- more than that -- she's on the very verge of death.
- If you haven't experienced it yet, you soon will: there comes a moment in each of our lives when we realize that our real hope lies in not in religion or our upbringing, but in Jesus Himself. I don't know if this man is a real believer or not at this point. But he's desperate -- he knows enough about Jesus to know that he has the power to heal. and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live -- "I don't know that I understand all the theology that's involved in raising a sick child from a death bed -- I don't know how all this plays out with my upbringing in the synagogue -- but I know I need help -- and Jesus I'm turning to you to find it." - The amazing thing is Jesus responds immediately when this man says this. He just stopped everything in the midst of this mass of people and became available to this one man.
So Jairus, the synagogue leader, Jesus and his disciples and a whole crowd of people take off to go to his house. His heart must have been beating with joy as he anticipated that his daughter would be well as soon as they reached the house. And on the way, there is an interruption. - There is actually a story within a story. Jesus was not originally going to heal this woman -- he was actually on his way to heal Jairus' daughter. - his primary target was the daughter of Jarius not this woman.
A large crowd followed and pressed around him. And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse.
- We don't know what kind of a disease this woman had. Some scholars suggest that perhaps she had ovarian cancer. We don't know that -- what we do know is that she had a terrible disease that had plagued her for the previous 12 years. She has had this bleeding problem for as long as Jairus' daughter has been alive. -How long is twelve years? It is 4,383 days. It is 144 months. It is 624 weeks. It is 105,192 hours. It is long enough to graduate from high school. It is long enough to become a doctor. It is long enough to exhaust all of your resources on physicians and health care. It is long enough to physically exhausted and socially ostracized. It is long enough to have all hope wrestled away.
The duration alone would have pushed her into depression and desperation. -This woman had what we would call a uterine hemorrhage, a constant bleeding that could not be stopped. She also faced a financial issue. No insurance. Depleted financial resources. Condition no better. No answers on solving the problem. -She also had psychological issues. She had to sneak around (v.27) It was an embarrassing kind of illness. -She also had a spiritual and social issue. She was unclean. According to the Twelfth chapter of Leviticus, a woman was unclean for seven days after such an experience. What did that mean? An unclean, defiled woman couldn't go to the synagogue, couldn't go to the temple. She was an outcast for twelve years. If she touched her husband, he was unclean. If she touched her children, they were unclean . If she touched her friends, they were unclean. If she touched a stranger, he was unclean. What was life like for her? There was no way to become ceremonial clean. -This woman's total life was one big issue. She was defiled, destitute, discouraged, and desperate. We all know what it's like to have a bad day, but we have nothing on this woman. Twelve years of constantly having to endure would be more than most of us could take.
She had done everything a person could do in response to her condition. She had gone to every doctor she could find but after she had exhausted her finances, it says her problem was worse. The practice of medicine then was a bit different than it is today. -The Talmud stated: Take of the gum of Alexandria the weight of a small silver coin; of alum the same; of crocus the same. Let them be bruised together, and given in wine to the woman that has the issue of blood. If this does not benefit take of Persian onions three pints; boil them in wine, and give her to drink, and say, "Arise from thy sickness." If this does not cure her, set her in a place where two ways meet, and let her hold a cup of wine in her right hand, and let some one come behind and frighten her, and say, "Arise from thy sickness." -In another place the Talmud stated: Carry the ashes of an ostrich-egg in a linen rag in summer and a cotton rag in winter. Another cure was to carry a kernel of corn from the dung of a white female donkey.- With all of these proceedings, her faith began to waver. She went to doctor after doctor. Hopeful that each could help her to recover. But all to no avail. she was broken, bleeding and bankrupt. -- It's a picture of what life without Jesus does to our life. It leaves you broken, bleeding and bankrupt.
When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, because she thought, "If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed." Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.
Now she has one thing going for her.
She had heard about Jesus' healing power.
She believed it.
She violated the acceptable boundaries of her tradition and the Old Testament and she went to the crowd. And she would have had to have rubbed herself against people, who knows how many, defiling them all ceremonially, although her disease was not contagious, but ceremonially as she worked her way through the crowd. She kind of sneaks her way in, and maybe she had her face covered. And she touched His cloak. Luke says she touched the fringe of His cloak. The word touch is actually to cling to, to grasp, to hold on to. She says to herself in verse 28, "If I just touch His garments, if I just grasp His garments, I will get well."
Immediately the flow of her blood, Luke says the hemorrhage was dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed of her infliction. Time froze, the world stood still for her in that moment. The bleeding stopped. The physical problem was solved.
At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who touched my clothes?" "You see the people crowding against you," his disciples answered, "and yet you can ask, 'Who touched me?'"
When Luke tells us this story in his Gospel he points out that it was Peter who asked rather indignantly -- "You want to know who touched you? -- With all these people around you pushing and shoving each other -- you think want to know who touched you?" The flow of his power into your life is a personal thing. The work of the living Lord on behalf of sinners is personal. He felt the power flow out of Him when He healed that woman. He felt the power flow out of Him when He saved you. He feels the flow of power into your life as He sanctifies you. And He'll feel the power that takes you into glory. This is intimate personal involvement with every one of us. He says, "Who touched My garments?" He didn't ask the question for information, but to draw her out of the crowd. He's not finished with her yet.
She Makes an Amazing Discovery:
Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering." 5:33 -- When Jesus looked at HER, her heart began to tremble. She may have thought that Jesus would scold her for defiling Him, and making Him "unclean", according to Jewish Law. Perhaps she thought that Jesus would take back His miracle, because she was so unworthy to come to Him without permission, sneaking up on Him from behind. Perhaps because she "stole" this healing, Jesus wouldn't be pleased with her. Now she is going to have to face the embarrassment of being chastised publicly by Jesus. Everybody knew what that meant. You didn't do that unless you were bowing to someone greater than yourself. Up to this point, she had never spoken a word. Now, she could no longer hide in the crowd. If the story had stopped at 5:29, she would have walked away HEALED, but not WHOLE.
Now the phrase that I want you notice in particular is that last phrase -- She told him the whole truth. She told him everything - She told Him about her infirmity, about her attempts for a cure, about how she had tried everything and everybody else first. She told him about her secret plan to come up behind him and how she hoped to slip away unnoticed. She "told Him the whole truth." Part of the reason that Jesus was so responsive to this woman is that she held nothing back from Jesus. She doesn't start to stammer, "Look, I didn't mean to touch you." She doesn't try to tell him part of the truth, "Well, I did touch you but it was because I was pushed into you." Jesus isn't interested in hearing denial or partial truth from any of us today. What "truth" do you need to tell Jesus this morning? Jesus already knows, but He wants to hear it from your lips.
He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering." the result was personal intimacy with Jesus. -He actually called her "daughter." Don't miss that. When we started this story, she had no name. Now she has gone from being nobody to being the daughter of Jesus.
-Jesus told this new daughter to "go in peace." This was shalom peace. She hadn't experienced that for over 12 years. Now it was her possession for all eternity. -It's the kind of peace that puts life in proper perspective. It means having all of life's needs abundantly met. -It's the kind of intimacy described in Jeremiah 9:23-24.
-If you can't brag about your intimacy with the Lord, then you really don't have much to talk about.
You Are Never An Interruption To God's Plan.
Jesus has this marvelous quality called interruptibility. You're never a postscript -- an addendum or an afterthought. You are His primary concern. You're never an interruption to God's plan -- you are his plan. Jesus stopped on His way to Calvary to heal people. He always makes time for a person for a person who desires to reach out to Him. -- I can't get that anywhere else. Ill - one of the adjustments I had to make in ministry to New Englanders -- Down south is was very common for me to just show up at people's houses -- no appointment, no notice -- just show up at the door and pay a visit. That's not a value that most New Englanders embrace. People want appointments sometimes weeks ahead of schedule in order for you to visit them. Unannounced visits are viewed kind of suspiciously here- most people are very guarded with their private time here. It's sometimes very hard to get someone to make time for you. Not so with Jesus -- you are never an interruption to him. Now the issue isn't that New Englander's don't like spending time with people -- that's not true. In fact, I've found it to be just the opposite. It's just that New Englander's like structure. There is work time -- and there is home time. "You work when it's time to work. You have home time when you're at home. And it's not that I don't want to visit with someone -- I just have to structure it into my schedule. We don't like the structure being interrupted." Catch this: Decisions that protect structure seldom result in people drawing closer to God. You see that in the Pharisees and the religious leaders of Jesus day- they were always upset at him violating the structure of their Sabbath. They got mad at him when he healed someone on the Sabbath - Jesus would look at them at say -- you'd help your donkey if it fell into a hole on the Sabbath wouldn't you? But they were so focused on their structure that they couldn't see the value of stepping outside of it so that a person could be touched by God. They didn't want interruptions.
And to be honest, I don't like interruptions in my life either. I don't like when the telemarketer calls while we are sitting down to dinner. That's an intrusion into my plans. It's difficult to readjust my schedule when someone just shows up when I've got my day all planned out. But interruptibility was a quality that was high on Jesus' values list. (I wonder how many of us Type A personalities would have complained if we were in the crowd that day when the woman interrupted Jesus. "Jesus we can't stop for her -- we already have a plan in place -- we're due to be at Jairus' home at 2:30 to raise his daughter from the dead. We've got a schedule to keep." When someone wanted a little of his time or his attention -- they didn't have to send three emails and make 4 four calls to get an appointment with him. He allowed his schedule to be altered immediately when there was someone who needed his attention. The truth is most of Jesus' miracles were the result of interruptions. His first miracle happened when He was interrupted at a wedding. His second as He was interrupted on the way to Galilee. In fact, when you think about it, all the people He healed: the blind man, the lame man, the sick people, the paralyzed man, the dead child-all of them were interruptions. A lot of people like to follow the steps of Jesus...when they should follow the stops of Jesus.
Now why is that? Because you are so important that the moment you open the door to your heart Jesus will drop everything else he's doing to give you his full attention. He loves you that much. Not only is his door always opened for you, his heart is always focused on you. Even before you were born, his eyes were fixed upon you: "My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be." (Psalm 139: 15-16) God longs for the time when you will be as focused in Him as He is on you.
The angels in heaven rejoice when one sinner comes to repentance -- Really? I don't really know what the schedule of heaven is like -- but apparently it must be filled with one interruption after another. Whatever schedule that is in place -- whatever structure does it exist- it's thrown out the window when someone makes the decision to trust in Jesus. Because when a person turns their heart towards the Lord, it's the most important thing that's happening in all of creation. (I wonder if you view him the same way? -- Is He ever an interruption to your schedule? Being a servant means giving up the right to control your schedule and allowing God to interrupt it any time He needs to.)
Don't Settle For "Rubbing Shoulders" With Jesus.
In the crowd that day, there were two groups of people. The large crowd pressing in on Jesus were rubbing shoulders with Jesus, but they weren't changed at all by him. They were basically in the Lord's way but Jairus and this woman were on the way to Jesus. Most in the crowd were spectators but at least two were seekers. This morning, we have the same two groups. Which are you--A spectator or a seeker? Some people will crowd around Christ today but some will reach out to touch him. Which part of the crowd describes your life today? Are you part of the mob rubbing shoulders with Jesus, or are you reaching out in desperation for the power of Jesus? Just because you are in the crowd doesn't mean you're making the connection. Some of you may be thinking, "Well, I don't really need anything from Jesus today." My friend, if that's your attitude you don't know just how needy you are. How many times have you come to church and been in the presence of Jesus, but missed His power? Are you in the way of Jesus, or on the way?
In his book, Intimate Moments with God, Pastor Ken Gire prays an honest prayer that expresses my desire and maybe yours too: "I confess, O Lord, how often I have followed in the crowd pressed around you. I have touched you, but only in the rush hour of religious activity. Sunday after Sunday I take my part in the crowd as I sit through the service. I sing the hymns and hear the sermon. I read my Bible, say my prayers, give my money. How could I be so close your presence yet so far from your power? Could it be that my arms are folded? Could it be that my hands are full? Could it be that my mind so full of my own ideas there is not room for yours. I pray that if my arms are complacent, you would unfold them in outstretched longing for you. And if my hands are full, I pray that you would empty them so that I might cling only to you. I pray that if my mind is so content with my own thinking that you would renew me by revealing to me the living truth of your Word. Will you be the one who really reaches out and touches Jesus and receives what He has for you? Jesus is here--how desperate are you?
Jesus gives His full attention to anyone who presses forward with faith.
Our problem is we aren't desperate enough. Like the demon controlled man and like Jairus, she was at the P.O.T.D. She was "potd," if that's a word. She was at the Point of Total Desperation. You aren't really touching Jesus because you aren't potd yet! Listen to what God says, "You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart." (Jeremiah 29:13) If you show up and seek the Lord in some half-hearted attempt, is it any wonder you miss Him? In The Secret of Christian Joy, Vance Havner wrote: "Mind you, this woman was shy and timid. She was not in habit of elbowing her way through the crowds, but when we are desperate enough, we'll do anything to get through to God. Our Lord said, "if any man thirst, let him come to me and drink." Thirst is not casually wanting a drink of water. When we really thirst, water must be had and we will drive through any obstacle to get it. Christians do not drink of the Living Water because there is no burning, feverish, consuming thirst after God. The situation is desperate but the saints are not.
Close: What obstacle needs to be removed in your life that stands in the way of you drawing nearer today? Homework -- Define one attitude, activity or behavior that is an obstacle in your life to a closer walk with Jesus. Get aggressive at doing something about it. Do whatever it takes to get closer to Jesus
