Mark 5:21-43
Now there was a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years. She had endured much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse. She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, for she said, “If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well.” Immediately her hemorrhage stopped; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, “Who touched my clothes?” And his disciples said to him, “You see the crowd pressing in on you; how can you say, ‘Who touched me?’” He looked all around to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told him the whole truth. He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.”
While he was still speaking, some people came from the leader’s house to say, “Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further?” But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the leader of the synagogue, “Do not fear, only believe.” He allowed no one to follow him except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James. When they came to the house of the leader of the synagogue, he saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly. When he had entered, he said to them, “Why do you make a commotion and weep? The child is not dead but sleeping.” And they laughed at him. Then he put them all outside, and took the child’s father and mother and those who were with him, and went in where the child was. He took her by the hand and said to her, “Talitha cum,” which means, “Little girl, get up!” And immediately the girl got up and began to walk about (she was twelve years of age). At this they were overcome with amazement. He strictly ordered them that no one should know this, and told them to give her something to eat.
The Leader of the Synagogue, the “Grande Fromage” of the town, as J-A would say, was waiting for Jesus. His daughter was dying, so Jesus made a beeline for this little girl. It was urgent. Time was scarce. No time for distractions or interruptions… but then, along the way, Jesus felt it… power going out of him… someone had been healed. He stopped. He took time he didn’t have. He asked who touched him. A woman came forward and confessed what had happened and then Jesus said “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in Peace. BE IN SHALOM. BE WHOLE. And almost as an afterthought… be healed of your disease.”
You see, to Jesus, the bleeding was a big deal, but not the whole story. Under the surface there was so much more. The exhaustion, the worry of a medical issue that would not… could not be resolved… the anxiety of being bankrupt from medical bills, the torment of being separated from her community… sent into exile until this unclean bleeding thing had stopped… except that it never stopped. But NOW… NOW she was made SHALOM… WHOLE in body, mind, spirit, and community once again.
Jesus chose to stop for this interruption and bring wholeness to this woman’s life… but in our world of limits and scarcity, choices like that have consequences. The interruption had taken too long. The little girl was dead, and dead was dead. Jesus said, “Don’t be afraid. Come with me. Trust me.”
This is how it goes in Mark’s Gospel and how it goes for us as well. Jesus shows us over and over again that he has power over the winds and the sea, over sickness and disease and even over death itself! But no matter how many times he shows it, no matter how many times we hear it, we never really embrace it fully, do we? Then and now we stubbornly cling to the notion that there is only a limited amount of everything… time, money, resources, healing, wholeness, life… so choices must be made…things must be either this or that and there will always be winners and losers, those who live and those who die.
This sandwich of parables sets us all up to agonize about that sort of impossible choice once again by pitting a sick little girl and the daughter of someone rich and important against a poor, exiled, no-name woman. The world demands we make a choice. Will it be the no-named woman or the little girl with powerful connections? There simply isn’t enough time or healing or life for both. One must win and the other one loose. One must be healed and the other one left to languish. One must live and the other one die. We MUST choose!
For those with deep compassion for the poor you might choose the woman. She is the lost, the last, and the least. Others would choose the child. Innocent and vulnerable, with so much life ahead of her. Still others would choose the leader of the Synagogue as an investment in the power he possessed and the potential he had to be able to do more in the community in the future. How would you answer? Which one is the right choice? Who lives? Who dies? Who writes the story? This parable demands we choose! The world demands we choose!
But Jesus… Jesus chooses both. Jesus chooses the woman AND the little girl! Where we see only scarcity, Jesus finds abundance. Where we see either/or, Jesus finds both/and. Where we see only brokenness and exile, Jesus shows us wholeness and shalom. Where we see only death, Jesus shows us life... and as people who are the Body of Christ, Jesus shows us that we are not limited by the world’s harsh rules of scarcity either! In Christ we are shown there is a NEW creation with an overflowing abundance of possibilities!
Having trouble embracing Jesus’ seemingly unbelievable truth of all that? You’re in good company. The disciples back then had trouble too. I’m no better than the disciples 2000 years later. The world’s ways are very loud and INSIST there is only so much to go around! It is easy to get beaten down and give in. To hear the quiet truth of God’s abundance is much, much, much harder.
I have found that I am only able to hear the quiet truth of God’s abundance when you all help me hear it. When we gather together, you take me by the shoulders and turn me so I can hear the truth the world has drown out. That is the incredible power of this Christian Community we call Christ Trinity Church. When we show up here for one another… it’s even MORE than the 80% of success Woody Allen claimed it is! Because we all need help to hear the truth that we can never hear on our own… that there really is a beautiful, Divine, wholeness to the world. Alone we only hear the shattering brokenness. Together we point out God’s abundance to one another. Alone we only see scarcity. Together we have the strength to walk one another toward life. Alone we so easily spiral into the darkness of death.
On this side of the pandemic may we recommit to coming together in this place to gently turn each other every week so that we might hear the truth, that in Christ there is more than enough healing and wholeness and life for all of creation. Amen.
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