Persisting in Faith

The Gospel for June 28 (Mark 5) builds on the theme of the miracles of Jesus that we began last week with Jesus calming the storm. In today’s healing of Jairus’ daughter and the woman with the hemorrhage, Jesus heals not only physical disease, but also social ostracism.

Last week, we watched Jesus calm the storm while he was crossing the Sea of Galilee. He was crossing from the Jewish side of the sea – the area where his community of faith lived – to the Gentile side, where non-Jews lived. On the Gentile side of the Sea of Galilee, Jesus healed the demon-possessed man who lived among the tombs – and greatly upset some pig farmers whose livestock ran wild off a cliff. He then re-crossed the Sea of Galilee back into Jewish territory. By including all this crossing and recrossing in the story, Mark is making a point – not subtly either, but practically highlighting and underlining it and drawing arrows around it – that Jesus’ ministry was to both Jews and Gentiles. The culture of the time dictated strict boundaries between Jew and Gentile, but Jesus crossed those boundaries repeatedly – literally crossed them by sailing back and forth from the Jewish to the Gentile communities that were divided by the Sea of Galilee. We’ll see him crossing other boundaries in today’s Gospel.

Anyway….so Jesus is back on the Jewish side of the Sea of Galilee, back in familiar territory. He’s accosted by Jairus, leader of the local synagogue. Jesus was already drawing negative attention from many of the religious leaders, so Jairus was risking his standing in the community by approaching him –but his 12-year old daughter is dying, and he’s desperate, so he’s willing to put his reputation aside to save his little girl. Desperation has forced Jairus out of his comfort zone. And so Jesus begins the walk to Jairus’s house, with a crowd gathering as he proceeded.

On the way, Jesus is quietly approached by another desperate woman, one who has been afflicted with continual hemorrhages for 12 years. We’re told that she spent everything she had on physicians, but was worse rather than better for the effort. Imagine how exhausted and drained this woman would have felt after having been ill for so long. Remember that according to the purity guidelines of the day, she would have been considered ritually unclean – by the guidelines, should have been isolated from the rest of society - and would have ritually contaminated everyone she inadvertently bumped into as the crowd jostled its way along. Given her status, obviously she did not want to draw attention to herself. “If I can just touch his clothes, I’ll be healed,” she thinks. So she touched his cloak, and was healed immediately. Jesus felt healing power going forth from him, and asked, “who touched me.” The disciples responded “what do you mean, ‘who touched you’; the whole crowd is jostling against you.” But the woman approached him in fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told Jesus what she’d done. Jesus took the time to face her and say, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.” And she was healed, not only of her physical illness, but of the ritual uncleanness and isolation that had come with it. It was a holy interruption to Jesus’ journey, a holy interruption that forever changed the course of this woman’s life.

Good for the woman. At first glance, not so good for Jairus. While all this is going on, he tries to maintain his composure while becoming more and more frantic for Jesus to get to his home and heal his daughter. And then messengers come from Jairus’ house with the dread words, “Too late! She’s dead.” In his frantic effort to seek healing from Jesus, he had apparently missed the last, precious moments of his daughter’s life, had been away from her bedside during her last conscious moments.

In the midst of Jairus’ grief, Jesus responds with what one writer called his shortest sermon – “Do not fear. Only believe.” They arrived at the house, where the hired mourners are holding forth. Jesus asks why all the commotion: the little girl is not dead, but sleeping. The mourning turns to bitter laughter, and so the paid mourners are put outside. In the presence of Peter, James and John, Jesus calls to the little girl, “Little girl, get up.” The girl begins to blink her eyes and look around, and Jesus asks the family to get her something to eat.

Two women, nearly cut off from community by illness. Two desperate seekers for healing. In both cases Jairus and the anonymous woman crossed boundaries of ritual purity to reach Jesus, Jesus crossed boundaries of the ritual purity laws in order to heal each woman, and in both cases the healed women were restored to their communities. In these stories, healing is not just the removal of illness, but the wholistic restoration of wellness and right relationship in all aspects of life.

There are a number of ways of looking at this Gospel. One of the more traditional is to lift up the persistence of each of these seekers. Both had to go out way of their comfort zones to seek after Jesus; both had to overcome significant obstacles and great discouragement in their respective quests for healing. In effect, both through faith sought a “way out of no way,” sought the proverbial window of faith that opens when all doors have been slammed shut. Both refused to let those around them discourage them – remember the crowds that blocked the woman from easy access to Jesus, and the hired mourners who laughed at Jesus - and both were rewarded for their faith.

The difficulty comes when we think our prayers can control God – if we just pray enough, or fast enough, or believe enough, or tithe enough, God will give us the desire of our hearts. This mindset very nearly reduces faith to a commercial transaction – God, I’ll send up x number of prayers, and you’ll send down our heart’s desire. At the bottom of this type of thinking is fear, fear that God really doesn’t desire our good, fear that God needs to be bribed somehow by our prayers to act. Yet Jesus said, “Fear not; only believe.”

Along with the lesson of persistent faith, this Gospel teaches that God is always in control. Faced with Jairus’ request, Jesus moved with steadfast purpose. The anonymous woman’s interruption provided another opportunity to glorify God, but it did not deflect Jesus from his original purpose. Faced with the desperate anxiety of Jairus, the curiosity of the crowds, the perplexity of the disciples, the mockery of the professional mourners, and the apparently hopeless state of Jairus’ daughter, Jesus moved forward with purposeful, unhurried steps. And so it is with God’s response to our prayers. I believe God answers all prayer – sometimes yes, sometimes “not yet”, often, “no, but here’s something better.” God can see past our limited vision, the advertising and culture-induced wants that masquerade as needs, our sin that prompts us to ask for that which would hurt us, in order to give us what we truly need.

Jesus told Jairus – and tells us – do not fear; only believe. Fear not, though the wind and waves may come. Fear not, though life’s circumstances may leave us feeling depleted and alone. Fear not, though it seems all our efforts have come to naught, and our journey of faith has brought us to a dead end. Fear not. God has not left the building – indeed, God is waiting to do amazing things still, if we’ll get out of the way with our need for control. Despite all appearances, it is the God who loves us and loves our neighbors who is in control. Fear not. Only believe.