We've
crossed the lake with Jesus – a stormy crossing you'll recall. On
the other side – foreign territory – a total outcast is healed, a
crazy man living among the tombs. Jesus breaks through boundaries
of all types, including when he gets back across the lake onto home
territory again...
Mark
5:21:43
This
is a text with two distinct narratives. But could you have one story
without the other? If you'd just had Jairus and his daughter then
Jesus would have got on with that healing more quickly and likely
avoided the drama of the father hearing his girl was dead. But isn't
that part of the power of the narrative? Assumptions, limitations
and interruptions.
Mark's
primary task in his whole gospel book is to answer the question: who
is Jesus? Establish his identity, namely, show us that he is the son
of God. That is, show us who God is, how God acts, and what
God is like.
About
the interruption to the mission with Jairus: God's power of healing
love works with interruptions all the time. No boundaries, no fixed
procedure, no-one needs to be side-lined for more important things.
These
are two stories that belong together: woman and woman-child healed;
an aging woman's healing interrupting the healing of a girl on the
cusp of child-bearing (she was born in fact the same year that the
woman's trauma began).
Two
people who risk: the father risks reputation – Jesus is already a
target of his synagogue colleagues; what's more, as a father it is
risky to love so much a child (and a girl at that) when 60% of
children die before their teens. The woman risks extreme censure for
touching Jesus in her untouchable state; what's more, she dares to
hope against hopelessness. Now that's the riskiest thing of all
surely.
One
person despairs so much that he crosses boundaries of emotion and
honour and gets first hand experience of what God's power of love can
do. His despair pushes him to a point of openness to faith.
The
other person dares to hope and is healed by the faith revealed to be
already part of her being. Her hope is the spring of her faith.
This
is a text between fear and faith: each of them fear, yet are
able/driven to step out of fear into the place of faith. And for us
who read it, it asks us to imagine what we might do.
This
contrast of faith and fear means Mark is guiding us to think of
faith's opposite not as being simply no faith. What's
significant here is not absence or otherwise of faith, but getting
through the fear. Getting beyond the fear to be able to do something
– for daughter or for self. It can be despair that drives it.
That's where Jairus is, desperate and in despair which triggers him
to act and try to do something for his daughter's future. But it's
even stronger place to be already when it is hope that drives it.
That's where the woman is, desperate but holding on to hope. She
already knows who Jesus is. She trusts him as agent of God's power
to heal.
Both
Jairus and this women reach out to where God is – presence, power,
strength, wholeness, healing.
But
at this point the story also stirs questions about faith and healing,
and about prayers for healing. About miracles (and we'll talk some
more about that later, if you like), about hope for healing and
praying for healing against the odds.
Why
isn't everyone we pray for healed, that is, made better? Even when
they have faith?
Last
November, my wife and I went to our 19-week ultrasound and found out
that our baby was only measuring 15 weeks. After a series of tests,
we were told we would lose her.
But
through eight weeks of repeat scans, she held on. Then through five
weeks of hospital bedrest. Finally, Nola was born, a scrappy one
pound, one ounce.
She
spent 12 weeks in the hospital. Her life is still full of challenges.
But yesterday we celebrated four months with our daughter, who now
tips the scale at five pounds.
I
won't say that God saved Nola. There are too many other beloved
children who don't make it. But I must say that God has saved me
again and again through these long months. God has sent a legion of
angels to my side…
…the
anonymous person who left a fully-decorated Christmas tree on our
porch, when we didn't have the energy to celebrate…
…the
ten-year-old girl who prayed for Nola every day of her winter
vacation…
…the
church member who struggles with anxiety but sang "It is Well
with My Soul" on my voicemail…
Vince
Amlin connects this to a couple of verses from Psalm 107:
Give
thanks, for God is good. God's love endures forever. Let the redeemed
of the Lord tell their story—those God redeemed from the hand of
the foe… Psalm
107:1-2
He
comments:
Psalm
107 charges us to share our good news. Those who wandered lost…those
who sat in darkness...those whose ships were nearly sunk…tell your
story!
And
he ends his reflection with these words and prayer:
So
many angels. So many stories to share. God is good. God's love
endures forever. Give thanks, and go tell yours.
Prayer
Yarn
Spinner, write your story of love in me. Send me as an angel to those
who are lost and sinking. And bless sweet Nola.
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