There's Room for You, Too - Part 1
Defining our Value #2A
by Jamie Steach
As we explore our self-worth, we will find ourselves in a constant wrestling match pitting the voice of our own thoughts and experiences against the voice of God. One approach we can use to see our value in God’s eyes is to look at a few different ways that we question our worth and compare what we feel with how Jesus interacted with people. Today I want to address the question of if there is space for us, and what that says about our value. Do you know the feeling? It’s the one where you feel left out, or uninvited, or not worth the care or energy of someone else. It’s the feeling when there is someone that you deeply care about, and you desire a close friendship with, but you feel like there isn’t room for you in this person’s life with all their other friendships and connections. The kind of experience where no matter what you do, you just keep feeling like you’ve been left out of the loop, or that someone else is always more important than you. And then, of course, you start to question what’s wrong with you that you aren’t enough for these other people. Have you ever felt any of these things? I want to look at a story today that I feel addresses some of these experiences, and that shows that no matter who you are, Jesus always has room and time for all of us.
21 When Jesus had again crossed over by boat to the other side of the lake, a large crowd gathered around him while he was by the lake. 22 Then one of the synagogue leaders, named Jairus, came, and when he saw Jesus, he fell at his feet. 23 He pleaded earnestly with him, “My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live.” 24 So Jesus went with him.
A large crowd followed and pressed around him. 25 And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. 26 She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse. 27 When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, 28 because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.”
(Mark 5:21-28 NIV - The same story can be found in Luke 8)
There are quite a few things happening here. First, before the story even picks up, Jesus has just healed a man possessed by demons on the other side of the lake, but the people were so afraid of what happened that they begged Him to leave. Our story picks up once Jesus has crossed to the other side of the lake and is met by a large crowd. A synagogue leader, who most assuredly would have been seen as an important man, approaches Jesus asking Him to heal his daughter. As Jesus starts to go with him, we suddenly learn about a woman who has been in the crowd who is desperate for healing of her own. In simple terms, there is a large crowd, a synagogue leader, and a woman all vying for Jesus’s attention. So, what will Jesus do? How will he triage the situation? What value system will determine who receives His attention?
Before we get any further into that, I want to take a deeper look at the societal value system of the Jews in this time. First, let’s look at the synagogue leader. Especially in this Jewish culture that knows their place as God’s chosen, set apart people, a synagogue leader must be seen as a man of more importance than the regular Jew. While not quite at the level of the priests, a synagogue leader would likely be a rabbi, and at the very least would be seen as a spiritual leader. Again considering the nature of the Jewish nation, this is a man who would have no small importance in their social structure. Next, we have a woman. And not just any woman, though being a woman alone would be enough to dramatically decrease her worth in the eyes of her society. This woman has been bleeding for twelve years. A quick look at the book of Leviticus will inform us that there are many things in this culture that will make a person ceremonially unclean. From childbirth (Leviticus 12) to skin diseases (Leviticus 13-14), there is a whole process that must be followed to avoid making others ceremoniously unclean, and to be cleansed yourself, if you are to ever find yourself with one of these conditions. Additionally, Leviticus 15:19-30 lays out all of the regulations of uncleanness and purification related to the “regular flow of blood”(v. 19) of a woman, and other related bleeding. Sure, we might not know with certainty what the nature of this woman’s bleeding was from the text, but I’d venture to guess that she falls into this category. So what does this tell us about her? Not only is she seen as having no value for being a woman, but she would also be seen as ceremonially unclean, and as having been ceremonially unclean for twelve years. That’s 12 years of not being allowed near the temple, 12 years of being ostracized from the Jewish community, 12 years of people avoiding contact with her at the risk of becoming ceremonially unclean themselves, and 12 years of spending everything she had, desperate for a solution. If this had happened during the time of Leviticus, she likely would not have even been allowed to live inside the main camp of Israel because of her uncleanness. And again, if anyone even so much as touches her, they will be declared ceremonially unclean themselves for the rest of the day. Everything she touches becomes unclean in the eyes of the Jews.
This is the woman that is desperately seeking Jesus. This is the experience she’s had so far in life. Outside of the doctors she has spent everything on, who knows if she’s even had human contact in 12 years? Can you imagine that? Imagine being quarantined, by yourself, or at least separate from your people, for twelve years. Her own family could have even pushed her away because of her uncleanness. Her own family could have treated her like she wasn’t worth the risk. In this society, there is no room, no space, for this woman. Would you have given up hope by now? I’m sure she has spent years questioning if she’s even worth anything at all. How amazing then is it that this woman has the courage to go into a large crowd of people, and even to have the hope that if she can just touch Jesus’s clothes, she will be healed? That’s AMAZING. In any case, Jewish culture of the day would tell us that the synagogue leader had much more value than the woman, and so, if Jesus buys into that culture, we would see His actions mirror this. He would go to help Jairus, the synagogue leader, and He would avoid touching the woman at all costs. So what does Jesus do?
27 When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, 28 because she thought, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” 29 Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.
30 At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who touched my clothes?”
31 “You see the people crowding against you,” his disciples answered, “and yet you can ask, ‘Who touched me?’ ”
32 But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. 33 Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. 34 He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”
35 While Jesus was still speaking, some people came from the house of Jairus, the synagogue leader. “Your daughter is dead,” they said. “Why bother the teacher anymore?”
(Mark 5:27-35 NIV)
Wait, what? Jesus was supposed to help the synagogue leader, and avoid touching the woman at all costs, but that isn’t what happened. Instead, the woman touches Him, and He starts looking for her. Why does Jesus react like this? Is He seeking her out in anger to express how she has defiled Him? What is He doing? In this moment, Jesus recognizes exactly what’s happening, and He knows exactly what He needs to do. I like to think He knew what was going on the whole time, that He knew she would come that day, that He knew exactly how she would try to approach Him, and that He knew exactly who she was and exactly where she was during this whole story. Wouldn’t all of these things fit perfectly with what we know about Jesus? Jesus knows us deeply, and intimately. He knows all of our needs before we do, and He is the only one who is perfectly equipped to fill them. Jesus was a man who was all about the marginalized, and she is certainly that.
So what does He do? I think there are a couple really important things we learn about Jesus from this part of the story. He starts looking around for her, because He could feel the power leave Him, and I love the reaction of His disciples because I think it’s exactly how anyone would react. You’re in the middle of a crowd, what do you mean who touched you? There’s probably five people who were touching you at once, why are you looking for someone? But again, I think Jesus knew exactly who she was, and exactly where she was, because He knew exactly what she needed. Jesus isn’t just in the business of physically healing people. To go through what she has gone through for 12 years, she would need some mental and emotional healing, as well. She has the very tangible heart sickness that we hear about in Proverbs 13:12, and Jesus knows this. He knows that she needs His full attention, and not just a miraculous by-product. She comes forward, trembling with fear because she knows what has happened and what she has done. I wonder if some of that fear comes from an expectation that Jesus will put her in her place as a woman, and if He will be angry to learn she has made Him ceremoniously unclean. That she will be reminded yet again that this world has no space for her. But this isn’t what happens. I don’t know how you picture this scene, but when I picture Jesus in this moment, I see Him reach down to her and help her to her feet (by reaching out and touching her). With His hands on her shoulders, maybe one on her face, I hear Him gently call her daughter, praise her faith, tell her they are at peace, that He is not angry, and free her from her suffering. What an amazing safety she would feel with Jesus. What a burden would be lifted from her shoulders. What life, what joy would be restored to her soul. How important and valued she must feel, to be given His full attention like this. And in the end, He made her clean instead of her making Him unclean. She found her space, all because she had the courage to reach out and touch Jesus.
I think one reason I love this story is because I relate to this woman so much. Not in her physical experiences, but in the way she pursues Jesus, or just pursues what she needs, for that matter. When I look at her actions, I see someone who is trying to slip under the radar, who sees her immediate need for something and tries to go as unnoticed as possible to get what she needs and get out. And for someone who has been ostracized for 12 years, can you blame her? I picture her trying her best to disguise herself and slip through the crowd without anyone realizing who she is, without drawing any attention, get healed, and get out. I’m sure she has a great fear of rejection, of how people will react to her. And that’s why I relate to her. I relate to that fear, anticipating the rejection and possible humiliation that would come with sharing who you really are, and so trying to just get what you need and get out. Trying to slip under the radar because you know what you need, but you feel there isn’t room for you. And she almost gets away with it, except that it’s Jesus she comes to. We can’t ever fly under the radar with Jesus. She has been so conditioned that she has no value that she seeks getting her needs filled in what she knows as the safest way possible, which is the way that no one would ever know she had been there. It feels much safer than being recognized, called out, and rejected again, of course. Except that there’s yet another option that brings true safety, and it’s the one she found: Jesus. The way He claimed her, instead of rejecting her. The way He sought her, instead of casting her off. The way He healed and restored her, instead of wounding her more deeply. He waits for all of us with that same safety and belonging.
Check back in next week for Part 2 of this article as we return to this passage to take a deeper look at Jairus and his space and experience with Jesus in this story.
* The image “Heb cover hi.jpg” is from Wikipedia.org; the file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. It features “tzitzit”, the fringes on Jewish traditional clothings that the lady mostly likely touched when she reached out to Jesus.