A Deeper Healing

Mark 5:21-43

Rev. Monte Marshall

I want all of you to know today, that God has really been messing around with me over these past several weeks.  First of all, in preparation for last Sunday’s sermon, I was working with Mark’s story about Jesus calming the storm as he and his disciples were crossing over the Sea of Galilee in a boat from Jewish territory to Gentile territory.  Then Charleston happened and the Spirit went to work to help me discern a connection between Mark’s text and the news I was following in the media about the people of Emanuel AME Church and the murderous rampage they endured at the hands of a racist young man.  And the result was last Sunday’s sermon.

This morning I can honestly say that I’ve been through another one of those weeks.  The Spirit has been messing with me again to connect this morning’s text to last week’s news about the Supreme Court and the Confederate flag.  And it’s an amazing thing because I’ve discovered that when the connection is made, Jesus shows up again.  He shows up again as a healer, but a healer seeking much more than to deliver relief from a physical ailment.  He’s after a deeper healing—the kind of healing that Mark addresses in this morning’s text. 

Mark sets the stage for his story with a geographical reference.  Jesus has once again been in a boat, crossing the Sea of Galilee, this time leaving Gentile territory to return to Jewish lands.  A large crowd gathers on the Jewish side of the lake.  Jesus stays with them on the shore.

Mark then introduces a man named Jairus.  The fact that Jairus is actually named in this story is a rare occurrence in Mark’s gospel that serves to underscore the elevated social status of this man.   In fact, Jairus is a man of privilege.  He’s a synagogue official, and as such, he’s the head of his social group. 

Jairus is a man who knows how to follow the rules.  He interacts with Jesus as a male of equal social standing within a patriarchal society.  When he sees Jesus, he falls down at Jesus’ feet, which is, as commentator Chad Meyers notes, “a proper granting of honor prior to asking a favor.”[1]   

Jairus is also the head of his family and he comes to Jesus as an advocate for his daughter to plead for her healing:  “’My little daughter is desperately sick,” he says.  “Come and lay your hands on her to make her better and save her life.’  Jesus goes with him and a large crowd follows, pressing from all sides.”

At this point, Mark interrupts the narrative of this man of privilege, and inserts a disruptive story from the margins.  A nameless woman suffering for 12 years with unstoppable bleeding approaches Jesus from the cover of the crowd.  She wants to be healed.  In fact, she’s desperate for healing, but she’s a woman and not a man.  The rules won’t allow her to approach Jesus and plead openly for her own healing.  And she has no advocate to speak for her.  She’s alone. 

And she’s destitute.  She’s used up all her resources trying to get well, but she’s been exploited by one physician after another.  Consequently, she hasn’t gotten better, she’s gotten worse.  To put it another way, the health care system has failed her.  

So this nameless woman is alone; she’s destitute; and she’s an outcast.  Her bleeding makes her ritually unclean.  According to the rules, she can’t worship with others, she can’t be touched by others; she can’t touch others.  According to the rules, she shouldn’t even be in the crowd because she risks contaminating others with her with her “impurity.”  According to the rules, she’s to be segregated from the rest of the community.  And this has been her plight for 12 years!

Under these circumstances, this nameless woman is desperate for healing.  But the rules are against her—the same rules that a man of privilege like Jairus accepts and obeys. 

So what does the woman do?  Well, she breaks the rules surreptitiously.  She tries to remain invisible because she’s in the crowd where she’s not supposed to be, and she touches Jesus’ cloak which she’s not supposed to touch. 

So what comes of her rule breaking?  She’s healed and she feels it. 

And Jesus feels something as well.  He feels healing power leave him.  So Jesus turns and asks the crowd:  “’Who touched me?’”

The disciples are dismissive.  They figure it’s just the crowd pressing in on him.

But Jesus wants to know.  So the woman comes forward, frightened and trembling because she knows what’s happened to her.”  And like Jairus, she falls at Jesus’ feet and tells him the whole truth.”

Jesus then says, ‘”My daughter…your faith has saved you; go in peace and be free of your affliction.”   And here is a dramatic reversal.  Chad Meyers writes:  “From the bottom of the honor scale [this nameless woman] intrudes upon an important mission on behalf of the daughter of someone on the top of the honor scale—but by the story’s conclusion, she herself has become the ‘daughter’ at the center of the story.”[2]

It’s at this point that Mark resumes the story of Jairus and his daughter.  News arrives of the daughter’s plight.  She’s died and the question is asked:  “Why put the Teacher to any further trouble?”

Jesus overhears and responds:  “’Don’t be afraid.  Just believe.’”  He then proceeds to Jairus’ house with his inner circle of disciples.  The mourners are there.  Jesus says:  “’Why all of this commotion and crying?  The child is not dead, but asleep.’”  When the mourners start to ridicule him for that comment, he throws them out.  He goes to see the child.  And he does something that the rules don’t allow.  He touches a girl presumed dead.  He takes her hand and according to the rules, he becomes unclean.  He says to her in Aramaic, “’Talitha, koum!’” which means, “’Little girl, get up!’”  The girl immediately gets up and walks around.  It’s at this point that Mark informs us that the girl is 12 years old.

The people are astonished.  Jesus tells the family to keep quiet about this, and he tells them to feed the little girl.  This is where the story ends.    

So given what I said earlier, you’re probably wondering:  What in the world does this story have to do with last week’s news?  Well, let me share with you what I’m thinking.

First of all, it seems to me that Mark’s story is about much more than the healing of a woman’s bleeding and the raising of a little girl from death.  A clue to this deeper meaning is found in the number 12.  The nameless woman had been bleeding for 12 years.  The little girl was 12 years old.  The number 12 in this context suggests that the story’s deeper meaning is about Israel.  And how many tribes make up Israel?  12.  Chad Meyers puts it this way:  “Mark shapes his story to intentionally juxtapose the two extremes of the Jewish social scale.  The little girl had enjoyed twelve years of privilege as the daughter of a synagogue ruler, yet was now ‘near death’….Indeed, as far as Mark’s Jesus is concerned, the social order represented by the synagogue ruler’s Judaism is on the verge of collapse.  The statusless woman had suffered twelve years of destitution at the hands of the purity system and its ‘doctors’; yet she still took initiative in her struggle for liberation.  The object lesson can only be that if Judaism wishes to ‘be saved and live’, it must embrace the ‘faith’ of the kingdom:  a new social order with equal status for all.  This alone will liberate the lowly outcast and snatch the ‘noble’ from death.’”[3]   This, too me, is the deeper healing pointed to in the text.   

And for this deeper healing to take place in this day and time, old narratives of privilege will once again have to be disrupted by other narratives from the margins.  In the process, we’re invited to trust Christ who continues to be at the center, touching and being touched, so as to heal and restore life to both the privileged and the not-so-privileged.  Indeed, I’m struck by how two narratives of privilege were disrupted this past week by counter-narratives from the margins that point us toward a deeper healing.

First of all, an old narrative of Southern white privilege was disrupted by the stories of pain and suffering that continue to be told by people of color in the wake of Charleston.  Their stories aren’t of physical illnesses causing blood to flow, but of a long, torturous history of racism, violence, hatred, and abuse in America that has caused far too much blood to flow—and most especially, African-American blood.  Charleston is but the most recent reminder of this national affliction. 

But wait!  Look what’s happening!  Jesus, the healer, is still be at the center of things, touching and being touched, because symbols like the Confederate Battle Flag are beginning to come down in parts of the Old South, and they’re being removed from store shelves and merchandise lists of businesses across the country.  Isn’t this a sign that we’re continuing to move toward a deeper healing? 

To those of our neighbors who are resisting this gospel disruption, we love you and we invite you to a deeper healing that brings social equality and justice.  It’s the same invitation extended by Mark’s gospel story.  So why not follow Jesus?  If we’re already following Jesus, but still resist, then why not follow Jesus a little more closely so that we don’t end up like those first disciples in Mark’s story who just don’t get it?  Why not touch the hem of his garment or be touched by him?  Why not trust God and not be afraid?  Why not go ahead and die to that which is killing us anyway?   Why not go ahead and die to every ounce of bigotry within us so that we are finally free enough to look into the eye of a person of color and say:  “You and I are of the same family!  We’re kinfolk!  And we’re equals?”  Why not go ahead and die to the bigoted parts of ourselves so that finally, we can live?

Now there was a second narrative of cultural privilege disrupted last week.  It happened when the Supreme Court issued its decision on marriage equality.  What a day it was!  A majority of the Supreme Court—the highest court in our land—finally responded to the compelling stories of those pushed to the margins because of their sexual orientation or gender identity, by acting for justice.  This ruling moves our nation toward a deeper healing as our LGBTQ neighbors increasingly take their rightful places in our society—not as second class citizens, but as equals.  In my estimation, it is way past time to stop demeaning them, excluding them, keeping them in the closet, and treating their love as second rate.  In my estimation, it is way past time for all forms of discrimination against them to end. 

And so I’ll say it again:  To those of our neighbors who are resisting this particular gospel disruption, we love you and we invite you to a deeper healing that brings social equality and justice.  So why not follow Jesus?  If we’re already following Jesus, but are still resistant, then why not follow Jesus a little more closely?  Why not touch the hem of his garment or be touched by him?  Why not trust God and not be afraid?  Why not go ahead and die to that which is killing us anyway?   Why not go ahead and die to every ounce of bigotry within us so that we’re free enough to stand face to face with our LGBTQ neighbors and say:  “You and I are of the same family!  We’re kinfolk!  And we’re equals?”  Why not go ahead and die to the bigoted parts of ourselves so that finally, we can live?

Dearly beloved, it’s time for a deeper healing.  So trust God and don’t be afraid.  Christ is at the center, touching and being touched.  It’s time for a deeper healing!  Thanks be to God!