July 9, 2023

The following transcript has been electronically transcribed. Any errors in spelling, syntax, or grammar should be attributed to the electronic method of transcription and its inherent limitations.

 Jesus's life was a life in which he just left transformation in his wake. He just traveled about the gospel accounts present us this picture of Jesus just traveling about and leaving in his wake. All sorts of transformation tr transformation in lives and transformation in circumstances. It all begins at the very beginning, chapter one, as he transforms fishers into those who leave their nets behind and are becoming fishers of men.

And he transforms the, the critics into those who are confounded. It is teaching. He transforms the sick into the well, the blind, into the seeing. The, the withered hand is transformed into a, a whole hand. The leper is transformed into one who is clean. The, the demon possessed man in the synagogue is transformed to one who is set free, and this transformation continues throughout all of the gospel.

We just recently saw how the storm was transformed into calm. Then the demonized man was transformed into a calm, collected lover of Jesus Christ. But the transformation continues through these next two stories as we'll. Obviously see the transformation of another sick woman into a well whole woman. And then the transformation of one who is dead into one who is living.

This transformation just continues throughout the entire of the story. So let's read these next two stories of transformation. Beginning from verse 21. We'll read through the end of the chapter. So beginning from verse 21, and when Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered about him and he was beside the sea.

Then came one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name. And seeing him, he fell at his feet and implored him earnestly, saying, my little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her so that she may be made well and live. And he went with him and a great crowd followed him and thronged about him.

And there was a woman who had a discharge of blood for 12 years. And who had suffered much under many physicians and had spent all that she had and was no better, but rather grew worse. She had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment for, she said, if I touch even his garments, I will be made well.

And immediately the flow of blood dried up and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. And Jesus perceiving in himself that power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said, who touched my garments? And his disciples said to him, you see the crowd pressing around you, and yet you say, who touched me?

And he looked around at who had done it or he looked around to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling and fell down before him and told him the whole truth. And 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.

There came from the ruler's house, some who said, your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further? But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue, do not fear only believe. And he allowed no one to follow him except Peter and James and John, the brother of James. And they came to the house of the ruler of the synagogue and Jesus saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly.

And when he had entered, he said to them, why are you making a commotion and weeping? The child is not dead, but sleeping. And they laughed at him, but 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 taking her by the hand. He said to Talitha cumi, which means little girl, I say to you, arise.

And immediately the girl got up and began walking for, she was 12 years of age, and they were immediately overcome with amazement. And he strictly charged them that no one should know of this and told them to give her something to eat. So the first thing that we notice in this passage is an immediate change in context.

The context changes in such a way that Jesus leaves the shore. What she was asked to leave after ridding this community of such a problem as this demonized man who would harass people, attack people who were passing by. He lived naked in the tombs and shrieking and screaming, just such a problem for the area and a problem for the community.

Jesus rids the community of this problem not to say anything of ridding the man of his problem, of the demons that possessed him, and then instead making him a child of God. He leaves the context of being asked to leave from the shores of this area on the other side of Galilee. Now he crosses back again two times within the span of two days over the Sea of Galilee, back to the near side, back to Capernaum.

And as he arrives here at the shores of Capernaum, once again, the context changes from one in which he's asked to leave to one in which he was welcomed, in fact, welcomed and welcomed enthusiastically. If we were to read in Mark's gospel, mark Chap, I'm sorry, Luke's gospel, Luke chapter eight and verse four 40, we read this, that when Jesus returned, the crowd welcomed him for they were all waiting for him.

So that speaks quite a lot about what has happened since Jesus left. Jesus apparently left. On the evening, a day and a half prior, and he goes over to the other side and apparently not all the crowd dispersed, but some of the crowd remained there on the beach watching and waiting for Jesus to come back.

And now he's come back, the crowd immediately forms again. And it's this in enthusiastic, welcoming type of crowd. So it's quite a difference from what he experienced on the other side of the sea. But one of the things that we've made note of consistently throughout Mark's gospel, and it's not something that's intuitive, it's something that we need to pay attention to sea, but it's this, that though Jesus is flocked by many, many people, and this is now, , just the reality of his life, his daily life faces the reality of being thronged and flocked by mobs of people, even though this is the reality.

Nonetheless, the vast majority of all of these people are not believers in Jesus in any way. Other than to believe in him as some sort of miracle worker or interesting teacher or item of curiosity, we've seen again and again that the crowds flock around him and the vast amount of these crowds are soil that's thorny soil or hard soil or shallow soil.

They may have a lot of interest in Jesus. They may desire his healings and even be attentive to his teachings, but they are not believers in him in any way. And one of the ways that we know this for certain, It is when we turn to example Matthew chapter 11 and we read Jesus' words speaking of this very area because so bear in mind Jesus has returned to the main area of Capernaum and we said Jesus is going to spend most of his time here in and around Capernaum.

So speaking of Capernaum, Jesus says in Matthew 11, and you Capernaum will be exalted to heaven. No, you will be brought down to Hades for if the mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would remained to this day. So the mighty works done in Capernaum. Jesus has done and continues to do many mighty works in Capernaum, but in Jesus's own words, these mighty works that he's doing in Capernaum are not producing in the context of Matthew 11.

They are not producing repentance. And as we've said before, repentance and faith are like two sides of the same coin. You don't have one without the other. And so as Jesus condemns them for failing to repent, he's likewise also condemning them for failing to believe. So these throngs and throngs of, of people that are flocking around him, we are, we have been careful not to mistake this as a large showing of people who believe in Jesus and are followers of Jesus.

Rather, we have seen again and again that the great majority of people will reject him. In fact, let's just think back just briefly over the last, oh, I don't know, half of a chapter back in chapter five, as Jesus is on the other side of the sea, what does Jesus do? He provides restoration for one whom no one else could restore.

And in return for restoring this man, he's asked to leave, he provides restoration, restores the community back to peace, restores this man back to humanity, gives him eternal life. And in exchange, he's asked to leave in the following story as Jesus goes to Jairus's house. He is going to provide not only restoration, he's going to provide resurrection.

He's going to raise back to life, not just any girl but the daughter of the ruler of the synagogue. We'll talk about that as we go through. But the daughter of the ruler of the sin synagogue, he's going to raise back to life. And what does Jesus receive? Laughter. They mock him. In the next chapter, chapter six, in verse three, Jesus returns to his hometown of Nazareth.

And in verse three of chapter six, were told that many there took of offense at him. In other words, they were offended by Jesus. They found Jesus and his words offensive. And that pretty much sums up the great majority of the reaction to Jesus. He's asked to leave, he's laughed at and mocked, and he is the cause of offense.

Let me just ask the question. Is Mark writing about first Century Israel or is Mark writing about 21st Century America? It's stunning, isn't it? How much things can change and yet things just stay the same. The vast majority of Jesus's reaction or the reaction to Jesus, I should say, the vast majority of that reaction to Jesus can be summarized with the three reactions of asking him to leave, mocking him and being offended by him.

And this is the reaction that Jesus receives by the great, great majority. Again, just to return our thoughts briefly to the parable of the soils and how three of the four soils provide no crop whatsoever. Jesus is experiencing this firsthand as he travels through such thronging crowds. So we take a turn.

Now, this from this point in Mark's gospel, really, we could go back to the previous story and see a change take place. You have heard me say since the beginning of Mark's Gospel that Mark presents the crowds not as something positive, but it's something very much negative. Mark is not enthusiastic about the crowds and he does not present the crowds as something that's helping Jesus.

Rather, he presents the crowds as a hindrance to Jesus. Now, that's not been so plain up until now, and in fact, some may have wondered, is that really the way that we should understand the crowds and Mark's gospel? Sure, there's a lot of people that don't believe, but they sure are enthusiastic. However, beginning from this point to the end of the gospel, the crowds will be displayed by Mark clearly and plainly as something very much negative, as a hindrance to Jesus as something that prevents him, or at least seeks to prevent him from doing what he seeks to do.

We really could have seen that with the crowd on the other side of this in the region of the Kerosenes, but that was a gentile crowd in earnest. It begins now as Jesus steps back ashore and the crowds once again are bigger than ever. They're described later on in verse, I think 23 or 24, as Thronging Jesus.

Luke uses the word that means to literally choke Jesus. The crowds are bigger and more aggressive than ever. And Jesus steps out of the boat into such a context from verse 21. And when Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered about him. As we, as we saw earlier, Luke says that at least some of that crowd had been waiting for him on the shore, watching out across the water, looking for that little flotilla of boats that held the called-out ones of Jesus and Jesus himself.

They've been watching the water, waiting for these boats to return. Now they finally see them come back over the horizon, and as they come up to the shore, they flock about him once again and word spreads quickly. The remainder of the crowd is here once again in just what seems like a few moments. And a great crowd gathered about him and he was beside the sea.

Now, verse 22, then came one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name. And seeing him, he fell at his feet. So here we introduce to this man, Jairus. We typically say Jairus. But it's a closer pronunciation would be Jairus. In fact, if we wanted to be authentic in our pronunciation, remember how we've said from time to time that the J sound does is not present in the Hebrew or the aromatic language.

So really it's more like “Ya Iris”, but Ya iris just doesn't come off the tongue very easily. So we'll stick with it, at least Jairus and we'll sort of split the difference. So here's this man, Jairus. We're told that his name is Jairus, in fact Jairus by name. And one of the things that we perhaps has escaped our notice, you have to be paying close attention to see this.

But Mark is not one to give names. In fact, mark so rarely gives the names. If we were to remove all the personal names from Mark's Gospel, if we were to move, remove all of the names of disciples and all the names that refer to Old Testament characters that are referenced in Mark's gospel, if we were to take all those proper names out, we would be left with only about half a dozen proper names In Mark's gospel, mark is not one to give personal names.

Almost all the characters in Mark's gospel, aside from the disciples themselves, and again, old Testament characters, almost all the characters in the gospel are nameless. But not Jairus. Ja. Iris by name is his name. His status is, he is a, the ruler of the synagogue. We're told one of the rulers of the synagogue.

Now, that doesn't mean that the synagogue and Capernaum had multiple rulers. Instead, it means that Jairus was one of a class of people that were rulers of the synagogue. Meaning that every city in the, in the region that had enough practicing Jews in that area to have a synagogue, had a synagogue. And each synagogue had a ruler.

And there was this class of people known as the rulers of the synagogue of whom Jairus was one. So he was one of the rulers of the synagogue, which means that he was a person of great status. He was a person of position, he was a person of respect. He was a person of means. He was a person of influence.

He was likely even a person of wealth. What was the ruler of the synagogue and what did they do and why did that make him so important? Well, the synagogue, it's hard for us in 21st century western culture to really relate to the synagogue in ancient Judaism. But in the ancient Jewish culture, the synagogue represented something.

If you could imagine with me, something akin to the rec center, put together with the chamber of commerce, put together with the one local church. Imagine that there's one church, one Christian Church in, in, , the county. Put that together with the rec center, put that together with the Chamber of Commerce.

And that's pretty much what the synagogue was. The synagogue was so very central to the daily life of the Jew. It's hard to overestimate just how central the synagogue was. It was where much more than just teaching took place. It was where community life took place. It was where the community stayed connected.

Well, with all those things going on, you have to have what? Somebody to organize it, right? Those things, they just don't organize themself. So the ruler of the synagogue wasn't a teacher of the law, but the ruler of a synagogue was the organizer. The supervisor, the director of all the activities that took place at the synagogue.

So the synagogue, remember it was not the temple. There's one temple and that temple's in Jerusalem. But in each city there was, there was large enough that had enough Jews living in that city. There was this synagogue, there was this central aspect of life, and the ruler of the synagogue would organize and would be in control of things like, for example, who taught at the synagogue, which rabbis were teaching at the synagogue, even what they were teaching.

The ruler of the synagogue was in charge of the community activities, the civic activities. The ruler of the synagogue had much to say about the local life of the believing Jews in, in whatever area in which that ruler of the synagogue was practicing the rulership of that, of that synagogue. So this made him a very influential person.

Very powerful person. A very respected person. Imagine probably maybe an equivalent today might be the mayor. The mayor, if the mayor also was the. Organizer of the local church and the local religious life. That would be something like the ruler of the synagogue. So this man was in charge of quite a bit of the day-to-day life of the people, and he is this ruler of the synagogue that we're told comes and we're not, not only told what he does, but we're told his name because he has a name.

I mean, everybody has a name, right? But he has a name, a metaphorical name, a reputation. He has a standing, he has a place in society. Jairus by name comes and seeing him, meaning seeing Jesus, he fell at his feet. So notice what Mark wants us to see. Mark wants us to see the ruler of the synagogue falling at the feet of the son of a Jewish carpenter.

In fact, many would say the illegitimate son. Of a Jewish carpenter. Mark wants you to see that he wants you to see the ruler of the synagogue in Capernaum falling at the feet of Jesus. In fact, three times in the story, we see this falling at the feet of Jesus and notice who falls at Jesus' feet. All the whole spectrum of humanity falls at Jesus' feet.

Throughout this story, we see the demonized gentile man falling at Jesus's feet, as well as, of course, the demons falling at Jesus's feet. Then just a few sentences, sentences later, we see the most powerful and influential man in Capernaum falling at Jesus' feet. And then just a few moments, few more sentences, we're going to see a woman whom is not going to be lost on us, that she is nameless falling at Jesus' feet.

That covers the, the full gamut of society. All of them falling at Jesus' feet reminding us that this is the only acceptable way. That anyone may come to Jesus and expect to receive saving faith, expect to receive saving grace. The only way that we may come to him is in the manner that your iris is coming, which is to say, falling at his feet, which is a demonstration of at least this.

We might ask yourself, well, well what? What does Jairus bowing at Jesus' feet? What does that mean? Does it mean that he's acknowledging Jesus as the son of God? No, it doesn't mean that, but at the very least it means that Jairus is saying by his posture, you are the superior. I am the inferior. You are the giver.

I'm the beggar. You are the master. I'm the student at, at the very minimum, that's what it's saying. Is this acknowledgement that you are the greater I'm the lesser. I need from your hand something, and that's why I grovel at your feet. At the very minimum, it's saying this, and this is what Mark wants us to see, that this is the only way to come to Jesus.

All three. In fact, all four stories, but really all three of these falling at Jesus' feet, all of them are an act of pure desperation in which the desperate one recognizes themself as the beggar. And Jesus as the master, Jesus as the giver, Jesus as the Bestower. Think of the demonized man falling at Jesus' feet.

Okay, so there's this interplay. There's this mixture between the demons and what they're doing and the man, but for the man's part, the man is desperate for Jesus to act and to free him. Likewise, as we'll see throughout the story, Jairus is also very, very desperate. And additionally, the woman is also very, very desperate.

Three acts of desperation. And notice how in each instance the circumstances of their life have brought them to a place of desperation. And in that place of desperation, they fall at the master's feet. And that is showing us the only way that we may come to God out of a sense of desperation and despairing of self.

Mixed together with, we'll talk about this as we go with a type of trust and a type of faith and a type of belief. Those two things coming together, acknowledging you are the greater I'm the lesser. That is the only acceptable way in which we may come to Jesus. So Jairus comes in such a way, Jairus by name were told.

And seeing him, he fell at his feet. Verse 23, and implored him earnestly. Same word. That's the fifth time―fifth time, fourth or fifth time-we've seen that word, which is sometimes translated begging or imploring him. Earnestly, vigorously beseeching him. He implores him earnestly saying, my little daughter is at the point of death.

Now, the previous story of such human misery as the demonized man. It's impossible for that story not to touch deeply into our hearts as we read that story. It's also impossible for this story not to touch our hearts as well. Because we can all relate with this, especially those who are apparent status in life.

We can all relate to this. This man lived in a very different culture than ours. He, , spoke a language different from ours. His skin was a different color than most of ours. His hair was a different texture than ours. His, his way of life was very different from ours, but there's at least one thing that all of us can connect with.

This man is coming and saying, my precious little girl is at the end. That's literally, he uses this idiom. That literally means at the end, or, or she's nearly there. She's just about to step to the other side. My precious little girl is right there at that point. And all of us, no matter what culture, no matter what age we live in, no matter what part of the world we live in or what language we speak, we all can relate to just the desperation of that man saying, my little girl, my precious little girl.

Now it's one word here that's, that means daughter, but the word here is, is added onto the end of it. What's the, what's called the diminutive? Now, we don't have the diminutive in English, but most languages have the diminutive. So if you've ever studied another language, you're familiar with the diminutive, and that just means that you, you add a little suffix onto the ending that takes the word and changes it to little something like if you add it onto the, to the end of chair, it becomes little chair.

But if you add that onto the end of a person of, of a word that refers to a person, it means not little person, but it means precious person, dear. My precious little girl. Now Luke tells us that this was his only daughter. We don't know if that means that was his only child or if it was his only girl child.

But regardless, there's just the tenderness. It has, it's got to touch your heart that he comes in such desperation. We'll talk in just a few moments about what it must have taken for this man to come to this point, to come and throw himself at the feet of this Jewish carpenter. But all of us can plainly see what brought him there.

You know, we can all have our pride and our Sta status in life and, and we can all say, well, that's beneath me, or This has been beneath me. But sickness and death when it touches a close family member changes everything, doesn't it? Situations in life can change everything. And this is the, one of the common themes in all three stories is the situation in these people's life has driven them to such a place of death, desperation that they come and they fall.

Jesus' feet. My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her so that she may be made well and live and notice Jesus's response. And he went, no discussion, no saying to Iris, look, can, can you not see there's 400 people here, can you, I I just got back, I, I, two days in a row, I sailed across the sea.

I just got back from this really quick, hard trip. Prior to that, I had that full day of teaching. I'm just really, can, can I come maybe a little bit later? Maybe I can take a little rest, a little nap. Can I come in the morning? No. None of that. Jesus immediately went. Now in my mind's eye, and let me encourage you to also make this your picture, your, your viewing, your understanding of what.

Has happened here. I see it playing out like this. I see Jesus flocked by this crowd, thronged by this crowd. And let's try to picture the crowd correctly. Take a away from your vision and your mind. Take away from your mind's eye any that's sort of like this. A lot of, I don't know, Bible story, book idea of Jesus in the crowds and which you see Jesus and he's walking along the path and there's all these followers around him, and they're sort of gazing up at him lovingly.

And Jesus is leading him on to the next rendezvous, the next miracle, the next healing, healing, the next teaching, whatever it may be. And everybody just sort of follow along with Jesus, looking up with him with an adoration and then glancing to where Jesus is taking them. Take that and remove it from your mind.

That's a fairytale view. Of the crowds around Jesus. Jesus is not leading this crowd anywhere. Jesus is mobbed by the crowd. Jesus is in the center and the crowd is flocking around him from all sides, and they're not there to have Jesus lead them anywhere. So Jesus is travel. Jesus's movement, and this is one of the central points of the crowds, is that Jesus's movement is terribly inhibited by the presence of that crowd.

In fact, so much so that that's really going to provide the context for the story because Jesus's movement isn't quick enough, and that's going to give rise to the events of the story that we're familiar with. And so this mob flocked around Jesus. Loud, chaotic. Here comes Jairus. Somehow gets up to Jesus. Maybe he has some friends.

He is an influential guy. Maybe some other workers at the synagogue help him get to Jesus. But he somehow gets to Jesus, falls down before Jesus' feet and with the loud voice so that Jesus can hear him. Because there's people talking everywhere. There's chaos, there's loud voices everywhere. So with the loud voice, he pleads, can you please come?

My little one, my precious little daughter is at the point of death, Jesus, who has been scattering seeds since the beginning. Jesus, who himself told the parable of the soils, knowing there's four kinds of soils. Jesus looks at this man and sees good soil. And from that point in my mind, I see a seriousness come over Jesus.

And I see Jesus with just this serious demeanor. Suddenly come over him and basically say, let's go. And then from that point, Jairus comes up and, and they together begin trying to fight their way through the crowd. People tr touching Jesus, reaching for him, blocking his way, and from that point on, they're trying to make their way through the crowd, but Jesus immediately stops what he's doing and goes to this man's rescue.

The availability of Jesus, the accessibility of Jesus is something that really just impresses us in each and every story. Jesus was always available, which should strike us very starkly and very sharply because virtually all of us, when there is opportunity to serve another, serve another in Jesus' name or minister to someone, virtually all of us will take that opportunity and weigh it through the scales of, how does this impact me?

Do I have time for this? Is this how I should spend my time? Can I, can I do this and then get back in time? Is this going to cost me too much? I have, through my life known maybe just a small handful of Christians that I could genuinely say when a need came to them. They didn't look through that filter. They didn't through look through the, because that's what we all do.

We look through the lens of me and what will this mean to me to meet this need. Jesus never did. Jesus was accessible. He was ready to go. He was full of compassion. He was compelled to go to the need. Never once seemingly thinking of himself or the exhaustion that he certainly has ex en encountered up to this point.

He immediately says, let's go. This is the master and so he says, verse 24, and he went with him and a great crowd followed him and thronged about him. And that's the point where Luke uses the word that literally means choked him. So the crowd, remember back in chapter three where, where Jesus says, have this little boat handy just in case the crowd gets too aggressive just in case they are going to trample me or crush me.

So the crowd throngs about him now, verse 25. And there was a woman who had a discharge of blood for 12 years. So the story just changed, just turned on a dime. And so the contrasts are easy for all of us to see, aren't they? There was a man, there was a woman. The man had a name. The woman doesn't have a name.

The man has a status. The woman has no status. The man has a need, the woman has a need. The man is desperate. The woman is desperate, but neither one has an advantage. And neither one has a disadvantage. In fact, we could expand it back to the demonized man and say, here we see a man, a Gentile man whose heart is good soil, whom the Lord is calling unto himself, but he is held in the grip of slavery to these demons, and he is a literal, wild man.

Naked living in the tombs. Then comes the most important man in Capernaum, A man of means, a man of wealth, a man who could probably finance the rest of Jesus' ministry if he wanted to. And then comes a woman, a nameless woman with a discharge of blood. None of them come to Jesus with any advantage. None of them come to Jesus with any disadvantage.

The woman is not disadvantaged by her place. The man is not advantaged by his place. So two polar opposites coming to Jesus. The woman we're told has this discharge of blood. Mark doesn't go into detail, neither do Matthew ne, neither do Luke, because that's not important to the story, is apparently some type of uterine hemorrhaging that she, that she has.

We don't know her age. We don't know if this is something that maybe she's an elderly person and this has come on late in life. We don't know. Maybe she's a teenager or in her twenties. And this began as her, , monthly cycle began, and it's something that's, that's been since the start. We don't know, but we know that she has this discharge of blood and it is great.

We'll look at the suffering that she endures in the next verse, but this hemorrhaging of blood. We should begin by noticing that this makes her, of course, ritually unclean for, we're told 12 years now, 12 years running. She's ritually unclean. The scriptures teach us that for that normal cycle in a woman's month.

That the woman is rendered ritually, unclean, ceremonially, unclean, and so is anyone or everyone who touches her unclean until the end of that day. Now, you might say, what a strange thing. What a what a discriminating kind of thing. What a odd thing for God to say that that makes a woman unclean and all.

Without going into too much detail, all of that relates back to God teaching us of the nature of sin, because that period in a woman's life is related to childbirth, conception, and childbirth, and we're told scriptures tell us that we are all what conceived in sin. We're all born in sin, and so God's teaching us even that is something that must be cleansed by me.

Even that is something that is not in and of itself, something that can stand before me. I must sanctify that. I must cleanse that. Okay, so the regular period of a woman is something that renders her unclean. But also we're told in Leviticus that if it continues past the normal period, that the woman is unclean for as long as it continues, which means now for 12 years, the woman has been ritually ceremonially, ceremonially unclean, meaning that she could not enter the temple, nor could she enter the synagogue.

Now, one of Jairus's duties was to supervise who entered the synagogue. Maybe I just wonder, maybe, do you think this is possible? Do you think Jairus ever turned her away? Do you think Jairus knew this woman and knew her to be someone that he would not allow in his synagogue maybe. And now this woman is interrupting this most important of missions.

I don't know, perhaps. But in whatever case, this woman is rendered essentially a leper because she is, she is restricted from the assembly of God's people. And to be restricted from the assembly of God's people for 12 years absolutely means that there can be no spiritual health there. Period. I don't care who you are.

I don't care how much you, you tell me you love Jesus. I don't care how much you tell me. You read your Bible. If you have not gathered with the people of God for 12 years, there is no spiritual health there. Spiritual health is found in God's people. So she has been denied that for a dozen years now. Her spiritual condition, her social condition, her mental condition, her emotional condition, not to mention the physical condition, the weakness that must have resulted from just a constant hemorrhaging making her most likely someone that would be very, very difficult to keep a proper weight on losing that much blood on a regular basis.

Or someone whose immune system was healthy enough to fight off all the regular little diseases and viruses and bugs that go around. Someone who loses a, a significant amount of blood on a regular basis would have a very, very weak immune system. So this is some something that she has suffered and dealt with for, were told 12 years.

So we're told that there was this woman who had a discharge of blood for 12 years, verse 26, and who had suffered much under many physicians and had spent all that she had and was no better, but rather grew worse. So we see the three. The three parallel views of her suffering. Mark just hammers us. 1, 2, 3.

With her suffering just, just expressed to us just the depth of this woman suffering. Over the last 12 years, we're told, first of all, she has suffered much under many physicians. So the, the picture that we're given there, the implication is that she has gone to many physicians to help to, to implore them, to help her in this condition.

And not only have they not helped her, but she has suffered under their treatments. So we can only imagine what. The primitive medicine of the day, what sort of approaches they might take to such a thing. I mean, this is an internal medicine type of thing. So what sort of approaches would've been taken in these days?

Some of them, no doubt, would've been bizarre. Some of them, no doubt, would've been absolutely not. Not only unhelpful, but harmful. And she suffered much, meaning that not only the condition itself is her suffering, but her attempts to alleviate the suffering have made the suffering worse. Further, furthermore, we're told that that she has spent all that she had.

Now, we don't know if that means that she was a lower-class woman and she spent what little she had, or she was a middle-class woman and she spent her middle class resources, or she was a wealthy woman and spent all of her wealth. We don't know. But either way, the result is the same. She's got nothing left.

She spent everything that she has. Seeking some sort of help, some sort of remedy, some sort of alleviation of her condition. She spent everything. So now not only does she have this condition that makes her unclean ritually, and it also makes her weak and sickly, but it also has now made her destitute.

She spent everything that she had and we're told that not only was she not any better, but she was even worse. So apparently the treatments that she has sought out not only did not help her but worsened her condition, she's made not better, but she's made worse. So she spends all spend all of her money, and in spending the money, it actually makes her condition worse.

Her suffering is tremendous here. It's significant, it's, it is not to be ignored just how deeply this woman has suffered, not for a short time, but for 12 years now. It's interesting to me. I always am interested in just the different personal perspective of the dis different gospel writers. And so as we're talking about the physicians here, it's interesting to me that both Matthew and Mark take the same position, which is to imply that the physicians did her no good.

That the physicians sort of took her money and made everything worse and put her through these really embarrassing and difficult treatments. Luke, who is a. Physician takes a little bit of a different story. He's, he presents it like this, that she spent all she had on the physicians and they couldn't help her because she had an incurable disease.

Isn't that interesting? I mean, doesn't that just show you the reality of scripture? Doesn't that just show you the, the expected, the natural, different perspectives? Can you not imagine that if someone that you know, has this long-standing disease, this longstanding medical issue, and they go to different doctors and none of the doctors are able to cure them, can you imagine that their perspective is how these doctors, they took my money and they did this and they did that, and none of them helped me.

But can you also imagine that the same perspective from the doctor's side would be We tried, but it it, it was beyond, it was beyond medical curing. Right? And that just shows you, Luke has that perspective. But Mark takes the perspective that the physicians. Not only didn't help her, but they've added to her suffering.

No better, but she grew well, so she's gone. Everywhere she could go, she sought out everything she could seek out, and nothing has helped her. She is the pitcher of the person who has tried everything, who's tried this sport, this hobby, this career path, this education path, this place in life, this outlook, this religion, this faith practice.

They've tried everything and nothing satisfied them. Nothing fulfilled them. In fact, everything just seems to have made them more empty. She's the pitcher of that person that we see walking around the street, all around us every single day. They've tried everything except Jesus. They've tried everything except faith in God and everything has come up empty.

She is the pitcher of that very type of person. So she was no better, but no, grew, grew worse. Verse 27, she had heard the reports about Jesus. And hearing the poor, she came. So she's heard about Jesus. And how does faith come? Faith comes by Romans 10 17. By hearing she has heard of Jesus and she's heard some things about him, some reports perhaps about what he teaches, some pro or reports perhaps about how he heals, casts out demons, cleanses, lepers.

She's heard. And in her heart is the beginnings of a, what we'll see is a genuine faith. She's heard about this and hearing about this, the Lord has drawn her unto himself. So she now came having heard she came to Jesus and she didn't just come in any way. She came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment.

So as she touches his garment, we're, we see how the story's going to play out, but just to sort of skip ahead, she touches him. The healing comes her uncleanliness and no way causes Jesus. To shy away, and that's something we've seen since the very beginning. Jesus is not afraid of unclean. In fact, Jesus just returned from the most unclean place in all the scriptures.

The gentile land with a man filled with unclean spirits living in the most unclean cemetery, living among the tombs, living among 2000 pigs, living among people who are pig herders, the most unclean it could possibly be. Jesus isn't afraid of that. Jesus isn't offended by that. He goes to it. Jesus has never shied away from uncles.

Instead, Jesus hasn't been defiled by people's uncles. He has purged their unclean. So in the same thing is going to happen here. So she hears the reports about Jesus. She came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garments. We can just picture her. Somehow she navigates herself to the rear of Jesus.

He's facing away from her, and somehow she navigates up into the crowd, touching people as she goes. Making them what? Ritually, unclean, touching people as she goes. And she gets close enough to Jesus and we're told that she's saying to herself. She's saying to herself, repeat, if I can just touch his garment.

If I can just reach out. If I can just touch his garment, if I can. She says, I, if I touch his garments, I will be made well. So this draws her. This draws her to the touching of the, of his garments, saying to herself, if I can touch these garments, I will be made. Well. Now the woman we know is an example of faith.

She's an example of genuine faith. Her heart too is a good soil heart. The Lord has drawn her to himself. And she responds and comes to Jesus because she's heard and she's believed. But nonetheless, let's just make note of the nature of her faith. Let's just make note of just, how shall we say misguided her faith is.

Notice what she says. If I can just touch his garment, I'll be made. Well, what is Jesus wearing Magic clothes. You see how misguided her faith is? Do you see how mixed up her faith is with Paganism? For it was the pagans who believed that things could heal. It was the pagans that believed that healing power was this impersonal force wrapped up in a idol or wrapped up in a statue, or wrapped up in some magic talisman.

Yet somehow she's gotten that mixed up together. With seeking Jesus. Ja Jairus is the same for Ja. Iris feels that Jesus must go to his house and touch his daughter for his daughter to be made well, that's the whole context of the story is Jairus has to get Jesus there and he can't do it. So you notice how both of their faith is just mixed up, confused, mixed together with false beliefs mixed together with pagan beliefs.

Yet both people have genuine saving faith. This is why, by the way, you remember when Jesus commends the centurion's faith, the centurion who comes to Jesus and says, my servant is sick. Jesus says, all right, take me to him. And he says, no, no, no. I'm a man. I understand authority and so I understand. All you gotta do is say the word and then Jesus says, I haven't found such faith where and all of Israel.

Jesus commends the man's faith. We often think that Jesus is commending the strength of his faith. , faith, , Jesus is not commending the strength of his faith. Jesus is commending the purity of his faith because his faith, though he's a gentile, is not mixed together with these false beliefs that somehow Jesus has to come there and say some words or touch him or do something.

He says, no, no, no. Your power is not like that. You just say the word. So this woman's faith is all mixed up. This woman's faith is infantile. This woman's faith is not just childish, it's wrong. But notice what Jesus doesn't do. Jesus doesn't throw her out, and Jesus doesn't say, come back when you get all this worked out.

Come back when your faith has been straightened out by some theology professors down there at the synagogue. Instead, Jesus takes her mixed up faith and receives it because it's a genuine faith. This is the definition of how we come to Jesus and receive healing from him. And by healing I mean spiritual.

By healing I mean life. We don't come to the Lord from a position of having all this worked out. That would be an act of works to come to the Lord and say, Lord Jesus, I recognize you as king of the universe. I recognize you as Messiah, and based upon my true and accurate understanding of you, will you accept me into your kingdom?

That's works. Instead, we don't come to Jesus by works. We come to him by. Faith. Jesus recognizes the nature of her faith, the character of her faith, or to put it another way, the soil of her heart is good soil. Even though her ideas are mixed together with false ideas and wrong ideas, Jesus takes her on faith and from that point on, her experience with Jesus will become faith seeking understanding because that is the experience of all of God's called out people.

All of God's called out. People go through our Christian life from the position of faith, seeking understanding, not understanding, seeking faith. The difference is very important. So, Faith seeking understanding the girl, the the woman comes, reaches out to touch him in all of her mixed up beliefs. If I can just touch those clothes, if I can, I don't even need to touch his body, just touch his clothes and I'll be healed.

Nevertheless, the healing comes and then we're told, and immediately the flow of blood dried up and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. So somehow in her body, this confirmation, she knows in her body that healing has come to her. We're not told, it's not explained to us exactly what that means, but somehow she knows that and it's immediate.

Again, all of Jesus' healings are immediate and all of Jesus' healings are full and complete. Immediately the flow of blood dried up. She felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. Now that word disease, throughout Mark's gospel, mark uses the word for disease. That's the same word as flogged, the same word that's used were we're told that Jesus was taken out and flogged.

So literally she's healed of her, of her flogging, of her misery, of her anguish, of her punishment, so to speak. So immediately she's healed of her disease. Verse 30. And Jesus perceiving in himself, the power had gone out from the crowd. Isn't that interesting? That immediately there's two perceptions that happened, the woman perceives and Jesus perceives somehow, both of them, immediately in within them, within their spirit, within their, their person.

They both recognize something has just happened. The woman just recognized something's happened to me. Jesus just recognized something just happened through me. So Jesus perceiving in himself that power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said, who touched my garments? Notice he didn't say who touched me.

So the implication here is that she didn't even touch Jesus' body, that she just reached out and just got the clothes. Now Jesus is surrounded by hundreds of people. And those people aren't just keeping a nice, safe social distance. Those people are thronging in upon him. Everyone is touching Jesus, which is the dismay of the disciples.

They answer and they say. He says, well, who touched my garments? His disciples said to him, you see the crowd pressing about you, and yet you say, who touched me? Does that sound a little bit cheeky to you? It, I don't know about you. It does to me. That sounds just a little bit disrespectful to me. Oh, the hardness of our hearts.

Because the ones who just said that are the same ones who were in the boat. Wouldn't you have thought that those who were in the boat the night before last seeing what they saw would never have spoken to him like that? Somehow perceiving in their, in their souls something about who this man is?

Wouldn't you have thought. That they would not have come back with such a snarky answer as that. Throughout Mark's gospel and throughout all the gospels, but particularly Mark's gospel, we are shown over and over again, the 12 apostles were not chosen for their spiritual astuteness. In fact, just the opposite is the case.

It's as though Jesus chose the most spiritually dull ones he could find, because that's the way of God. He always chooses the one that requires the most power. So throughout Mark's gospel, the disciples are shown not just as being average, spiritually dull, but below par, like really spiritually dull Here, these, they have just been shown the most powerful and magnificent expression of the deity of Christ.

And yet a day and a half later they say, you, you seriously. You who touched you really? Don't. You see everybody's touching you, Jesus, which of course they are, but Jesus here, this is proof for us that Jesus here means that he was been, he has been touched in a different way. He has been touched in some sort of a way that's different from how all the hundreds of others are touching him.

You see the crowd pressing around you and yet you say, who touched me? And he looked around to see who had done it, the imperfect verb tenses used there so we could translate. He looked around and kept looking around. He searched around and searched around Hess looking. He scanning the crowd to see who had touched him.

Now, here's the question. Did Jesus know who touched him or not? What do you think? Did Jesus know who touched him or not? There's some heads nodding yes. Okay. Did Jesus know who touched him? Absolutely he did. Did Jesus know who touched him? No, he did not. Now that's confusing. That's sort a riddle, isn't it?

Jesus knew who touched him and Jesus did not know who touched him. When we approach this question, did Jesus really know who touched him? Almost everyone will approach the question as though the answer has to be one or the other. Either he did or he didn't, right? There's no in between. You don't kind of know.

Either you knew or you didn't know. The mistake we often make is forgetting, because this is easy for, easy to forget. Forgetting that Jesus is not like us. Jesus is the only being with two natures. Jesus is fully human and Jesus is fully God. Two natures in one man. And so when we asked the question, did Jesus know who touched him?

Did Jesus. The son of God, the anointed Christ of God. Did he know who touched him? Absolutely. He knew who touched him. He brought her there as we'll. See in a moment. He arranged the crowd. He arranged the circumstances of the crowd so that it would be such that the woman had to do what she did so that she, he would be slowed up and so that jar's daughter would die.

He arranged all of that and even going further back, remember the demonized man and the townspeople who asked him to stay, think back to that for just a moment. Had they not, or I'm sorry, they didn't ask him to stay. They asked him to leave. Had they not asked him to leave, had they asked him to stay, jar's daughter would be dead.

The woman wouldn't have met him. You see how even when things appear to be wrong, God is still in control and he's still working all these things out in just the perfect way. So the Son of God, Jesus Christ, the Lord absolutely knew who touched him, but Jesus, the perfect man, I believe, did not know. The reason I believe that is that's the plain reading of the passage.

I would have to take the text and I would have to distort the text and I would have to to pervert the text in order to make the text say what it does not appear to be saying, which is Jesus asked who touched me, and he's looking around to see who's going to own up to it. So for some reason, that's not told to us Jesus, the perfect human is not told by the Spirit filling him who it was that touched him.

He's told that somebody did, and he's told that power has gone from him. And he's told that someone has been healed, but for reasons not given to us, he's not told in his humanity who that was. Now, seeing all of that in this episode should help you greatly in other parts of scripture in which Jesus appears to not know what we would think God would know, such as the timetable of the return of the Son of man.

Well, Jesus is a man of two natures. One nature is fully human, one is fully God. Jesus is the perfect man, perfectly filled by the spirit of God. He's also God in the flesh. And in this instance, God, the Spirit did not reveal to Jesus the identity of who it was that touched him, touched him. So he honestly and rightly, he's not trying to deceive here.

He's not playing games or playing tricks. He's honestly asking, who was it that touched me? Now, the disciple said to him, you see the crowd pressing around you and you say, yet, who touched me? But he looked around intently, looked around, kept on looking around to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling.

That's the third time now, that's the third time that there has been chaos. Jesus has stilled the chaos. He's, he healed the storm, and the result was more fear than before. The storm on the water, the demonized man and the townspeople, and now the woman, all three result in the same thing. Greater fear after Jesus acts than before.

So she came in fear and trembling and fell down before him once again. There's another falling down before him. Same word fell. Fell down before him and told him the whole truth spills everything. Spills all the beans. This is the whole truth. Jesus, this is who I am. I've had this condition now for 12 years, and I said to myself, if I could just touch your garment, I could just reach through here and I could be healed.

And yes, it was me. And yes, I have been healed. So she tells him the whole thing, but I'm sorry, verse 34, when he said to her daughter, your faith has made you well. So now why all this interchange here? Why, why? Why do you think that perhaps Jesus, the man didn't know who touched him? Why is Jesus so persistent in asking this?

Why instead would it not have played out differently? Let's say for example, Why would the spirit not have told Jesus who it was that touched him, and then understanding something of the sensitivity of the miracle, of the privacy of the miracle. Jesus would just sort of look over to her and wink and then go his way.

Why would that not be how? Why does Jesus single her out? Why does Jesus make her come forward? Can you feel the awkwardness of the situation? All these people, there's Jairus there, there and all this, and then yet Jesus just won't move forward. He says, no, we're not going anywhere until you come forward.

Why all of this? Because for the woman's faith to be genuine, it must profess him. There is no such thing as a secret disciple that remains secret, doesn't exist for faith to be genuine. The scriptures tell us plainly, we must profess him. We can't just sneak a hand through there and, and maybe just grab on to a little bit of eternal life without anybody seeing us.

Some have compared the woman, and I think this is sort of a, a humorous and helpful comparison, but some have compared her to a miracle shoplifter. You know, like she's in the store and she sees something she wants, but she doesn't want to pay for it, and so she's just going to sneak it. There's no such thing as an eternal life shoplifter.

There's no such thing as a secret disciple who remains secret for her faith to be genuine. She must own it. She must profess it. She must speak it, but also for her faith to be genuine, it must produce relationship. You see, Jesus didn't come to just dole out miracles if that's why he came. He could have stayed in heaven if all Jesus came to do was just to heal people and do so discreetly, when discretion was advised, he could have just done that from heaven.

He didn't come just to dole out miracles. He came for relationship. He wants this woman to come face to face and to see him and him see her and to know one another. That is the whole point of the faith. That's the whole purpose, is that she come forth and acknowledge him, and then relationship ensues.

Discipleship begins. Jesus doesn't for one minute, just want her to go home. Having been healed physically and oh, I'm so glad that I'm over that 12 year or ordeal. He wants this as a stepping block into relationship. Notice what he says to her. She came in fear and trembling, fell down before him and told him the whole truth.

And he said to her daughter, you know how many people in scripture Jesus calls daughter one? This one the tenderness of the moment, daughter. So make note of this, at the end of the, at the end of the story, at the end of the story of the part of Jairus, we're told that the woman who had the 12 year flow of blood we're also told that the child of Jairus was 12 years old.

Notice the parallels or the, the parallels here. RIS wants Jesus to come and heal a 12 year old daughter on the way Jesus makes a daughter who has been sick for 12 years. Jesus wants a daughter. The daughter he wants has been captive for 12 years, and so he does this on the way to heal a 12 year old daughter of Jairus.

The par. The parallels are remarkable, but he says to her daughter, your faith has made you well. Why Jesus say that your faith has made you well? You know, Jesus healed lots of people and never mentioned faith. He healed more people without mentioning faith than the people he healed and mentioned faith.

So why does he say to her, your faith has made you well, because. Relationship with Jesus necessarily means the beginning of faith, seeking understanding. Remember what Jesus said back in chapter four, you to you has been given the secret of the kingdom of heaven. To those on the outside, it's just parables.

But to you has been given the secret meaning that they come to Jesus and they say, Jesus help us with this parable. The understanding that Jesus gives them is in relationship to him. The understanding that Jesus gives them is by their coming to him and being with him. She has now come to Jesus. She has now been redeemed.

And so this process of faith seeking understanding begins, and it begins with Jesus saying, magic clothes didn't heal you. You weren't healed by some touching of of my garments. You weren't healed by some spell. You were healed by faith. Faith is the conduit. It's the vessel, it's the channel through which the healing came to you.

And by the way, that word for healing, so it's the same word for saving. So throughout the New Testament, almost every time that you see save or heal, it's the same word and it can be used interchangeably based on the context. I think in this context, we are intended to think of both. Not only physical healing, your faith has healed you physically, but also your faith has saved you because faith is the vessel through which those things come to us.

Ephesians chapter two, verse eight. For by grace, you have been saved how? Through faith, the same thing is here. Her faith itself was not the healing power as though faith as though Jesus is some sort of faith healer. Going around saying, well, if you got faith that I'll heal you, if you got faith, I'll heal you.

Well, this, if you don't have faith, then I can't heal you. That's not what happens in Nazareth In the next story. When, when we're, when we're told that Jesus could do no mighty works there because of their unbelief, Jesus isn't a faith healer in which he requires faith on the part of the people that he wants to heal in order for them to be healed.

Instead, faith is not the agent that heals faith is just the means through which the healing comes. And so in the same way Paul says that faith is the means through which the regeneration comes before by grace, you have been saved through faith. So scripture tells us it's the means that the healing comes to her, not this touching of his garment, not some sort of magic spell, not sort of, not anything other than.

The faith that has been implanted into her heart because she's heard of Jesus. She's heard the accounts and faith has begun in her heart, even though it's all mixed up and all distorted and mixed up with pagan beliefs. Nonetheless, it's still good soil and that good soil brings her to Christ, brings her to Jesus in true and genuine and honest faith, even though it's infantile, even though it's distorted and mixed up.

Listen to the words of Charles Spurgeon as he comments about this. He says, this here is the great marvel of the whole thing. Little as it was, I'm sorry, little as was her knowledge, as great as her unbelief, and astounding as was her misconceptions of her Lord. Yet her faith, because it was real, saved her.

She comes to Jesus with this genuine faith, all mixed up, all distorted, and we should be careful not to disparage her. We should be careful not to look at the story of this woman and say, oh, this pagan woman, she was a Jew. She should have known better than this. She should have known that clothes don't heal people.

Jo Iris should have known that, that God can heal without Jesus having to be present. So we should not disparage her. We should instead remind ourself that apart from the teaching work of the Holy Spirit and the complete Bible that we have, that she didn't have, aside from those things, our perception, our understanding of the things of God would be just as infantile and just as mixed up.

So by the grace of God, he sees the good soil, he sees the good heart, and from this point on, her experience with Christ will be the experience of faith seeking understanding. And it all begins with Jesus saying, here's how you were healed. You are healed through faith. And he said to her daughter, your faith has made you well.

Go in peace. That word peace there is shalom, which means a whole lot more than just absence of conflict. It means wholeness, it means wellbeing. So he says to her, go in this new wholeness, in this new wellbeing and be healed of your disease that could be rightly translated, be healed and continue being healed of your disease.

In other words, Jesus says to her, this is not going to come back the next month when all this comes back around. It won't be the same thing. Jesus is saying, I've healed you, and the healed is permanent. However, she's not permanently healed of this affliction. She is. But there'll be other diseases. There'll be other sicknesses.

Just like Jairus's daughter, Jesus will resurrect her to life and she'll die because this is a picture that's pointing us to another healing. And another resurrection. The true and the genuine resurrection, the true and the genuine healing, that which will come and put an end to all sicknesses. Jesus's healing of her was a temporary stop gap.

Just like Jesus's resurrection of Jairus's daughter will be a temporary stop gap because they will ara await the resurrection to come. So in healing her, the final thing that we'll say is this. In healing her Jesus entered into her uncles by being touched by her, and not only being touched, but by bringing attention to the fact that an unclean woman has touched him.

Jesus has entered into her uncles in order to make her unclean. Just like he entered into the uncleanliness of the man possessed of the evil spirits, he entered into his uncles to make him clean. Likewise, he will also enter into the same uncles. To rescue Jairus's daughter because as he will go to her and as he will touch her, he'll be touching a corpse three times in the span of a day and a half, Jesus goes to the unclean and touches the unclean, entering into their death, entering into their uncles, in order to rescue them out of their uncles and bring them into life.