Tassel
(Matt. 9:18-26, Mark 5:21-43, Luke 8:40-56, Matt. 9:27-34)
1.A couple had been married for 35 years. Wife gave husband grapefruit every day of married life. One day, she ran out and apologized passionately to her husband. Husband replied, "That’s okay dear. I never liked grapefruit anyway."
2. Some people are just as complacent about seeking God---years go by, but they never buckle down...
Question: What sort of people seek out Jesus?
TS------->Our text offers us some clues.
I. A Busy Days Worth of Miracles
A. Jairus’ Daughter is Deathly Ill
1. Jairus is not just anybody: a synagogue official: read Mosely--
2. Not a swineherder, not like Nicodemus, sneakily seeing Him at night...
3. Jairus’ daughter is a mere 12 years old,
4. Jesus agrees to come to Jairus’ house---a crowd makes it difficult for him to travel through the streets of Capernaum
B. The Interruption: A Bleeding Woman
1. This woman had a bleeding problem for the entire life time of Jairus’ daughter ---12 years
2. Note her lot: Mark 5:24-26
3. This woman had an idea in her mind: If I could touch the tassel of his garment, she thought she would be healed
4. Jesus had tassels on the edge of His garment because He was a Jewish Man who obeyed the Law of Moses...
Numbers 15:37-40
"Then the Lord said to Moses, Speak to the Israelites and say to them: Throughout the generations to come you are to make tassels on the corners of your garments, with a blue cord on each tassel. You will have these tassels to look at and so you will remember all the commands of the LORD, that you may obey them and not prostitute yourselves by going after the lusts of your own hearts and eyes. They you will remember to obey all my commands and will be consecrated to your God."
5. But where did she get the idea that touching these tassels would heal her? In the Jewish idiom of the day, these tassels were called, "wings," just like a pulpit has wing....
6. The Jews (rightly) understood Malachi 4:2 to refer to the Messiah....let’s turn there...last OT book
Hark the Herald, "risen with healing in His wings..."
7. She touches the wings of his garment is immediately healed...
8. Jesus asks His disciples, "Who touched me?"
(1) why Christ did not know....
(2) the disciples thought this a dumb question....they scold Him
9. Everyone around denies they touched Jesus---finally a woman admits it and tells what happened...
10. Jesus responds gently, "Your faith has made you well. God in peace and be freed...."
11. How did Jairus feel about this delay? Seconds count when a life is on the line, but He trusted Jesus--no record of Him pushing Jesus along...
C. Jesus Approaches Jairus’ house, men come out and tell Jairus not to bother the teacher---"Your daughter is dead..."
1. Jesus to Jairus: "Don’t be afraid, just believe and she will be healed...
2. Jesus separated Peter, James & John (inner 3) to go with him into the house....
3. Gathered outside the house were mourners and wailers, some well meaning, others hired
Talmud: even the poorest man required to hire 2 flautists & 1 mourner, minimum
4. Jesus rebukes them: Why the commotion? She is not dead, merely asleep
5. They start laughing at what they think are the ravings of a mad man...
6. So the parents, Jesus, and the inner three enter....
7. He takes her by the hand, and says, "Little Girl, Arise!" And she arises...hungry...
D. Then Jesus encounters 2 blind men who had been following Him, "Have mercy on us, Son of David..."
1. What the term "son of David" meant...
2. Do you believe I am able to do this...Yes Lord...According to your faith it will be done....
Question: What sort of people seek out Jesus?
Prop and Main Point:
II. There Are Two Qualities Among Those Who Sincerely Seek Out Jesus: Sense of a Need, but, More Importantly, Faith that Jesus Truly Is the Messiah
1. Jairus had a need, but he thought that Jesus COULD heal his daughter....
2. The woman with the flow of blood was convinced that Jesus was the Messiah with healing in his wings....
3. The two blind men referred to Jesus as "Son of David," and Christ healed them according to their faith....
4. God doesn’t always grant healing.....and the closest I’ve seen to someone rising from the dead are some of you after a dry sermon....but He always takes pleasure when we trust in Him...which leads us to the application...
III. God Wants to Walk with Us in a Faith Relationship
1. The beauty of the Gospel never gets old...
2. Everyone HAS a relationship with God...
----a relationship of enmity
---a relationship of friendship
2. By nature, we experience the wrath, the holiness of God----we see His displeasure, wrath, anger, indignation...
-----incidentally, hell is not so much a place as it is relating to God’s wrath....
3. The Lord Himself became a man to absorb the wrath due us (on the cross)....so now we, who were by nature enemies of God, can be forgiven and become friends of God...this transaction occurs by faith....
4. Salvation begins that relationship....but, like all good relationships, it is nurtured by quality time and a quantity of time...Bible study, prayer, service, fellowship, church community....
5. Behind the scenes in all this is the Holy Spirit, the One who can give us an appetite for the things of God...
6. Let me tell you how I came to be a sauer kraut lover....
7. Back then, sauer kraut was unappealing...disgusting....that’s how the things of God seem to some of you, perhaps; unless the Holy Spirit develops a taste for the things of God within you, you might find them repulsive...but once you have aquired the taste, you can’t get enough!
8. What does it mean to be filled with the HS?
(1) recognize need---a sense of reality---we fall FAR short...empty...not fulfilling our purpose—bothered
(2) empty self/surrender
(3) stop trusting in own ability, trust in His (God conscious....)
Question: What sort of people seek out Jesus?
Those who sense a need and those who are genuinely convinced that Jesus is the Messiah.
