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The Life-giving Touch of Jesus
By Linda Rex
June 27, 2021, PROPER 8—In the middle of this pandemic, many of us discovered that we acutely missed the social benefits of physical touch. For our spiritual fellowship at Grace Communion Nashville, the loss of hugs and handshakes was a serious loss, not to mention the inability for a time to even be in the same location with our friends and family.
As we face the possibility of another season of separation, it is comforting to be reminded of the reality that nothing, not even the restrictions of social distancing, can separate us from the love of God in Christ, nor from one another. We are created for relationship, and healthy interactions with others are an essential part of our personhood. So we will do our best to keep our relationships strong in spite of social distancing and health restrictions.
In the gospel passage for this Sunday, Mark 5:21–43, we find two people who are faced with catastrophic health situations and who believe that the only person who can rescue them is Jesus. One of these is a woman with ongoing menstrual bleeding, a situation which, due to the restrictions of her religious beliefs meant she was excluded from any fellowship with other people. She was considered ritually unclean, and for the past twelve years had been avoided by anyone who was afraid they might be touched by her in some way, for they would have been made ritually unclean as well.
It took a lot of courage for her to enter the crowd that day, risking physical contact with those around her for the sake of being able to touch Jesus’ garment. She said to herself that if she could just touch his clothing, she would be healed. She believed that he was someone who healed people and drove out demons. At this point, she was willing to take the risk of entering the crowd and touching his clothing for just the possibility of finally being freed from her social exclusion.
While Jesus had been on the beach earlier, speaking to the crowd, Jairus had come up to him and urgently appealed that Christ would heal his twelve-year-old daughter. The synagogue official was at the point of desperation it seemed, since he was willing to humble himself to the point of kneeling before Jesus as he made his request. In compassion, Jesus had agreed and the crowd had followed the two of them to Jairus’ home, pressing in on them, making travel a bit cumbersome.
It was in the midst of this large crowd that Jesus stopped to ask quite loudly, “Who touched my garments?” The disciples thought he was crazy—he was being touched by everybody, it seemed! But here, trembling and afraid, came the woman who had touched his prayer shawl, kneeling at his feet. She had touched him, and knew that she had been healed. Fearful of rejection and condemnation, she poured out her story, the painful truth of her suffering, all the failed attempts to get well, all the useless doctor visits and treatments, and her simple desire for healing and relationship. She had hoped to slip away unseen, but Jesus had in mind a deeper healing.
Jesus called this woman “daughter”, setting her again within the context of community and family fellowship. And he gave her a benediction of shalom, true peace—of reconciliation with both God and man. This was the real healing she needed, far beyond the relief from her physical ailment. She was accepted, forgiven, and beloved. In this moment, all the barriers erected against her were wiped away and she was welcomed and restored.
It is interesting in the stories of Jesus healing people and raising people, that he did not always abide by the religious restrictions regarding what was ceremonially clean and unclean. To be touched by this woman rendered him, according to tradition, ceremonially unclean. But the Messiah was more than willing to allow himself to be made ceremonially unclean so that she could be made once and for all, clean. This points to the reality that the Word of God took on our “unclean” human flesh to make it “clean”—becoming sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in him. Jesus was not made unclean by our sin and death—he transformed our humanity and made us like himself instead, and we participate in this new existence by faith in him and by the gift of the Spirit.
At this point in the story, while Jesus paused to minister to this woman, messengers arrived from Jairus’ home. They came to tell him that his daughter had died, that he didn’t need to bother Jesus any more. Christ pointedly ignored what they said, choosing instead to continue to Jairus’ house, in spite of the realization that religious tradition prohibited the touching of dead bodies. He was on his way to perform an acted parable, demonstrating once again that the kingdom of God, present in his person, was breaking into Satan’s stronghold of death, demons, and disease, and freeing all those held captive.
The official mourners were already wailing when Jesus and three of his disciples arrived. When Jesus told them the girl was only sleeping, they scornfully laughed, making fun of the idea that she might possibly still be alive. They had seen her dead body, and they recognized death when they saw it. But Jesus was symbolically speaking of death as merely sleep, a temporary condition over which he had all authority and power.
He, taking the lead, ushered all the mourners outside and then entered the room where the dead child lay. In the final scene of this acted parable, Jesus simply took the young woman’s hand and told her to arise, which she did. As she got up and started walking about, Jesus encouraged her stunned parents to make sure she got something to eat, demonstrating that she was completely well.
In this passage we see Jesus teaching the crowds, showing compassion to those in need, and touching the untouchables, bringing them back into fellowship. We see Jesus restoring community, willing to risk ceremonial uncleanness for the sake of those who could do nothing to change their situation. These all point to what God did for us in Christ in the Word of God setting aside the privileges of Godhood to join us in our human flesh, so that our fellowship with the Father, Son, and Spirit might be restored and we might be made new.
As we go through another chapter of the pandemic saga, it would be good to reflect upon what these stories tell us about who Jesus is and who we are in him as the Father’s beloved children. What does it mean that in Christ, God has declared us clean, when we so often choose the way which leads to evil, sin, and death? The kingdom of God has broken in on this broken world, and Jesus is actively, by the Spirit, working to make all things new.
When we feel isolated and separated from meaningful fellowship, we can be reminded that we always have a personal companion in us and with us—Jesus by the Spirit. We can practice the spiritual disciplines of solitude, silence, and stillness, and experience in a real way the indwelling presence of God, guiding us, encouraging us, comforting and strengthening us. And at any time, like this woman and like Jairus, we can run to Jesus, throwing ourselves on his mercy, knowing he will lift us up and restore us, welcoming us home to the Father in the Spirit, and restoring us to warm fellowship with him and one another.
Father, thank you for sending your Son and your Spirit, for including us in your life together as the Triune God of love. Renew in us again a sense of our inclusion, of your presence and power at work in us and in our world each and every day, through Jesus our Lord and by your Spirit. Amen.
“And He said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace and be healed of your affliction.’ While He was still speaking, they came from the house of the synagogue official, saying, ‘Your daughter has died; why trouble the Teacher anymore?’ But Jesus, overhearing what was being spoken, said to the synagogue official, ‘Do not be afraid any longer, only believe.’” Mark 5:34-36 NASB
“For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, yet for your sake He became poor, so that you through His poverty might become rich.” 2 Corinthians 8:9 NASB
Pending Judgment—Part II
By Linda Rex
Last week I asked the question: If Jesus is indeed the exact representation of the Father, does that mean that our heavenly Father is a really nice guy who never did or does anything in anger or that might be hurtful to us as human beings? I wrote about how Christ is our reconciliation and perfect relationship with our Abba, but often we seek to hide our sin and brokenness rather than humbly bringing it into the light of God’s love so we can live fully in the reconciliation which is ours in Christ Jesus.
God loves all people everywhere and has reconciled them to himself in his Son Jesus. We read in John 3:16-17 that God gave his Son for each human being, not so they would be condemned, but that they would be saved. And yet we also read in the Old Testament conversations and situations in which it seems as though God loves some people more than others.
I was sitting on a sofa in someone’s living room one day talking with a gentleman who loved God and wanted to live rightly, but more often than not was unkind and uncaring to his family and others. This person had such a low opinion of himself, it was reflected in how he treated others. He told me that God loves some people and hates others, and wondered whether or not some people were born already unloved and unblessed by God.
The example he pointed to was the story of Esau and Jacob in a passage in Malachi. In Malachi 1:1-2 we read, “‘I have loved you,’ says the Lord. But you say, ‘How have You loved us?’ ‘Was not Esau Jacob’s brother?’ declares the Lord. ‘Yet I have loved Jacob; but I have hated Esau, and I have made his mountains a desolation and appointed his inheritance for the jackals of the wilderness.’” Here, in most translations, it says that God hated Esau but loved Jacob.
Now my understanding of the language (I’m not a Hebrew scholar) is that what is being said is not that God hates or abhors Esau, but that comparatively, he loves him less. But that still doesn’t seem to jive with our understanding that Jesus came because of God’s love for every human being. How could God do that and love some more or less than others?
The thing to avoid here is “either/or” thinking. It is better to turn to “both/and” thinking, understanding that both things are true at the same time. God “so loved the world” and he “loved Jacob, but hated Esau.” Both of these are true statements and neither is contradictory of the other. Indeed, the whole outcome of God choosing Abraham, then choosing Isaac (over Ishmael), and choosing Jacob (over Esau), was so that God could fully express his love for the whole world in his son Jesus Christ, who bore the humanity which had its roots in these patriarchs.
The apostle Paul actually writes about what God did in choosing Jacob over Esau. In Romans 9:10-13 he wrote: “there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac; for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that God’s purpose according to His choice would stand, not because of works but because of Him who calls, it was said to her, ‘The older will serve the younger.’ Just as it is written, ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.’” Paul’s point here was that what God did in showing his mercy and love was not because of any particular person’s performance, but genuinely from his own heart of love and grace.
We don’t earn God’s love or forgiveness. It is fully a gift. Some have refused it. Others have not. God loves both Jews and Gentiles, and even though the Jews were his chosen people, he offered salvation to them and to the Gentiles. During Paul’s missions to the Gentiles, though, often it was the Jews, God’s very own chosen people, who refused to receive the gift of forgiveness in Jesus. The Gentiles, who had for centuries been excluded from the fellowship of God’s people, warmly received the gift of grace. They were willing to come into the Light and live in the Light, while the Jews continued to deny the truth of who Jesus was as their Savior and Lord, the Messiah of all.
Salvation is a gift from God, and the Holy Spirit, who has been poured out on all from Abba through his Son Jesus, works to bring each and every human being to saving faith in Christ. We do not know why some people come to faith now and others don’t. God has his reasons. The Holy Spirit works in ways we do not understand. But if we look at things from the view of eternity and God’s perfect love expressed to us in Jesus, we can see God has no desire to leave anyone out or reject anyone.
We are forgiven and accepted in the Beloved. But we are also free to reject and turn our backs on that gift of love and grace. We are included in God’s life and love but are free to live our lives as though we are forgotten, unloved, and unwanted. We exclude ourselves—God doesn’t exclude us.
The reason Jesus Christ is the Elect or the Chosen One is not so that only people who are Christian can be saved or go to heaven when they die, but rather so that each and every person might be included in God’s love and grace right now as well as for all eternity. Jesus Christ is our perfected humanity, and whatever may happen in this life that may make us feel as though God loves us less, as though we have been left out in some way, is a lie—a deception which Satan has suckered us into since Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden.
The question which arises now is whether or not someone who has refused God’s grace before death will be offered grace after death. This is a great question full of all types of complications. But I would, at this point, simply point out that death and Hades were defeated in Jesus, and will ultimately be tossed into the lake of fire. Death is a place Jesus has already been to and returned from, and so death is not a barrier to eternal life. God’s heart is that each and every person be saved: “God so loved the world.” And his Son Jesus Christ is his final and ultimate Word in this regard.
Thank you, Abba, for loving each and every one of us so much that you sent your Son and your Spirit for our salvation and our communion with you. Grant us the grace to believe we are included and accepted in Jesus, and to live in the truth that each and every other person is also included and beloved in Jesus. We trust you to finish what you have begun, through Jesus our Lord. Amen.
“For God so loved the world, that He gave His 1conly begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.” John 3:16-17 NASB
Our Life in the Trinity 