Sunday
1 July 2018
The
Sixth Sunday after Pentecost
LESSON 2
Samuel 1:1, 17-27 or
Wisdom 1:13-15; 2:23-24
CANTICLE Psalm
130 or
Lamentations 3:21-33 or Psalm 30
EPISTLE 2
Corinthians 8:7-15
GOSPEL Mark
5:21-43
Preaching Text
Mark 5:21-43
When Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a
great crowd gathered around him; and he was by the sea. Then one of the leaders of the synagogue named
Jairus came and, when he saw him, fell at his feet and begged him repeatedly,
“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.” So he went
with him. And a large crowd followed him
and pressed in on him. Now there was a
woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years. She had endured much under many physicians, and
had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse. She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind
him in the crowd and touched his cloak, for she said, “If I but touch his
clothes, I will be made well.” Immediately
her hemorrhage stopped; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.
Immediately aware that power had gone
forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, “Who touched my
clothes?” And his disciples said to him,
“You see the crowd pressing in on you; how can you say, ‘Who touched me?’” He looked all around to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to
her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told him the whole
truth. He said to her, “Daughter, your
faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.” While he was still speaking, some people came
from the leader’s house to say, “Your daughter is dead. Why trouble the teacher any further?” But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to
the leader of the synagogue, “Do not fear, only believe.” He allowed no one to follow him except Peter,
James, and John, the brother of James. When
they came to the house of the leader of the synagogue, he saw a commotion,
people weeping and wailing loudly. When
he had entered, he said to them, “Why do you make a commotion and weep? The child is not dead but sleeping.” And they laughed at him. Then he put them all outside, and took the
child’s father and mother and those who were with him, and went in where the
child was. He took her by the hand and
said to her, “Talitha cum,” which means, “Little girl, get up!” And immediately the girl got up and began to
walk about (she was twelve years of age). At this they were overcome with amazement. He strictly ordered them that no one should
know this, and told them to give her something to eat.
In the name of
the Father,
and of the
Son,
and of the
Holy Spirit. Amen.
My friend and colleague, Father Ron, has a funny habit of regularly
telling his parishioners what “my friend Frank” had to say recently that came
to his mind while preaching. I guess you
might say I’m going to pull a “Father Ron” today. After all, this Gospel reminds me of
something said by Frank. In an
interview, he said:
“I see clearly that
the thing the Church needs most today is the ability to heal wounds and to warm
the hearts of the faithful; it needs nearness, proximity. I see the Church as a field hospital after
battle.”
Frank is none other than Francis, the current Bishop of Rome. His words, and the words of the Gospel before
us this Sunday, remind us that the Church is a hospital, a place to find
healing.
There are two example of healing that occur in this Gospel. This passage begins and ends with a focus on
a young girl whom we are told was around the age of twelve. Amid her story, a woman interrupts Jesus’
journey to that young girl in desperation over her chronic bleeding over a
period of twelve years that has only become worse as no one was been able to
bring resolution to her suffering.
We know how this Gospel ends; that both the young girl and the
woman find healing in the touch of Jesus.
But for a moment, allow yourself to sit with the desperation of these
moments when healing is needed and desired.
There is a profound need for healing of the body for both. And for the father of this child, there is
more than desperation. When Jairus is updated
while Jesus the Teacher is delayed that his child is now dead, this father
enters a state of hopelessness. I cannot
help but wonder also if he was not merely hopeless and helpless at this point
but even angry. If this woman had not
delayed Jesus, perhaps Jesus the Healer would have arrived at his daughter’s
bedside in time to heal her before death took her away.
And why would this leader of the synagogue be angry at this
woman? Remember that in terms of the Law,
this hemorrhaging woman was ritually unclean.
She was not permitted to be in pubic places, amid crowds, for the Law
was clear that anyone who touched or was touched by one who was ritually
unclean would themselves become unclean.
But here she is, among such a great crowd packed in so tight that Jesus’
disciples laugh at him when he asks, “Who touched me?” She who was considered spiritually and
socially dead, an outcast in society and religion, had contaminated Jesus, and
likely countless others, by her presence and touch. And now the leader of the synagogue had a
dilemma. His child was dead, as unclean
as the woman who touched Jesus and contaminated him. According to the Law, the leader of the
synagogue from that moment should have nothing to do with Jesus, with this
woman, or even with the deceased body of his daughter. But when Jesus tells him that she is
sleeping, the desperation not of a religious leader but rather of a father
drives him to continue the journey to bring Jesus as Teacher and Healer into
his home.
The desperation of the woman and of the father are the
conditions in which Jesus brings healing as a gift of new life in places and
persons where death had taken hold and was believed to be the final word. And why has this healing happened in impossible
circumstances? It has everything to do
with the fact that when the woman and the father sought out Jesus the Teacher
and Healer, they were encountered by someone greater than they could imagine or
desire. If Jesus is merely the Healer of
the Body, it is logical to presume that he could heal the living. But Jesus is greater than a Healer of the
Body alone. Remember with me that moment
when Jesus first asked the disciples who others said he was and then asked them
who they said that he was. Blessed Peter
gave the answer: “You are the Christ.”
Little did Peter realize that his confession identified Jesus as the Healer
of Body and Soul, the Giver of Life who is Resurrection. This Gospel confirms that confession and
anticipates a confession yet to come when Blessed Thomas would address Jesus as
“My Lord and My God.”
The Church, dear friends, is a hospital for healing simply
because in this place, we are encountered again and again by Jesus, God from
God, Light from Light, True God from True God, who is among us to touch us and
heal us in ways that go far beyond what we can desire or imagine. And our role as Christians, as the followers
of Jesus, is to bring the suffering, the marginalized, even the dead in spirit
or body, to Jesus our Lord and God and cry out in prayer that Jesus the Healer
and Lover of souls would reach out and touch what is broken and make it whole,
to remind us that the final word in the Kingdom of God is always God’s Word of
Life.
There are moments when we see this healing with our eyes. Those moments are truly wonderful. There are also moments when we do not see by
sight the power of that healing. How
well I know that as just over a week ago I preached a funeral homily for a dear
boy about the age of the young girl in today’s Gospel who, like the woman in
this Gospel, suffered for twelve long years.
By faith, in those moments when our eyes tell us that all appearances point
to death having the final word, Jesus reminds us that there is a healing that
awaits us all that cannot be seen presently by any other means than faith. And in those moments, Jesus invites us to
walk on further with him, as he invited the father in this Gospel, assuring us
that those whom we love but see no longer are not dead but sleeping. And as we walk with Jesus, our Lord and God,
this very day, let us bring to him all who need his touch, even when human
wisdom would tell us that there is no hope.
In the name of
the Father,
and of the
Son,
and of the
Holy Spirit. Amen.
The Rev’d Timothy Alleman
Priest-in-Charge
St. Stephen’s Pro-Cathedral
Rector
The Church of the Holy Cross
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