The Woman With Grasping Faith

THE OUTCOME OF GRASPING FAITH

Mark 5:24-34

INTRODUCTION

A. HUMOR – Loyalty Tested

1. The instructor from a dog training workshop in Salt Lake City noted that a dog’s loyalty can be tested by the owner.

2. If the owner will fall down and pretend to be hurt, a dog with a bad temper will tend to bite him. A good dog will show concern, and may lick the fallen owner’s face.

3. Susan Matice attended the class and then decided to test her two dogs. While eating pizza in her living room, she stood up, clutched her heart, screamed and fell to the floor.

4. Her two dogs looked at her, and then they looked at each other, and then they raced to the coffee table for her pizza. — Associated Press, 1-17-91.

B. THE TEXT

Mark 5:24 A large crowd followed and pressed around him. 25 And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. 26 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. 27 When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, 28 because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” 29 Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering. 30 At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who touched my clothes?” 31 “You see the people crowding against you,” his disciples answered, “and yet you can ask, ‘Who touched me?’" 32 But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. 33 Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. 34 He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”

C. THESIS

1. While trying to heal Jairus' daughter, Jesus encountered a woman who believed that the faintest contact with Jesus would result in her healing. Jesus' blue fringe brought her the fringe benefits of salvation!

2. Title: "The Woman with Grasping Faith."

I. THE DIFFICULTIES FACING HER FAITH

A. THE DISEASE WAS INCURABLE

If a disease is detected early on, there is a good chance of remission. But hers had progressed to an extremely critical stage /advanced.

B. SHE HAD FREQUENT DISAPPOINTMENTS

1. She could remember all the times her hope was dashed:

a. First Physician -- his cure was an Egyptian elixir of great expense, imported. He assured her, "You’ll be speedily well" -- but she wasn't.

b. Famous Professor -- "My pills will do it." She took 300 of them but was no better.

c. Grave Old Physician -- "Balm of Lebanon." It made her acquire a new disease and with it additional pain.

d. Greek Physician -- condemned his predecessors as fools. He initiated a complex regimen of eating and physical training, but he failed too.

e. Roman Physician -- he believed an operation was necessary. She declined at first, but eventually endured one operation after another until she moved around painfully, with scars covering her body from the many medical wounds.

2. Many would have said, "I can’t trust anyone else." But she wouldn’t give up.

C. SHE FACED HER PROBLEMS ALONE

She sought alone. None aided her. Some of you have been seeking a restoration of your health for 12 years also... don't despair!

D. HER VIVID SENSE OF UNWORTHINESS

1. Under the law, while she was bleeding, she was considered unclean, and whoever touched her would also be unclean. To touch her bed, or the chair where she was sitting would cause you to be considered unclean.

2. It was an embarrassing disease you wouldn’t want to talk about.

3. She now had no money, no gift to give doctor or prophet. She was in poverty; reduced to begging.

E. HER EXTREME SICKNESS AT THAT TIME

1. She reached a frightful stage of the disease.

2. Such sickness depresses and unnerves the mind. For most people, their only thought would be, "Let me lay down and die."

II. SHE HEARD OF JESUS

A. JESUS “CHARGED” WITH MARVELOUS POWER

1. She heard about Jesus, the Prophet from Nazareth. He was “charged” with marvelous power. Certain days power seemed to emanate from Him -- like a battery full of electricity, and heal them all.

2. She heard about this Jesus and said, "Then I will touch him and be healed." She believed in Him.

B. SHE BELIEVED THE FAINTEST CONTACT WITH CHRIST WOULD HEAL HER

1. The point was not her touch, but what she was touching. "If I may touch but (only) His clothes."