Hitchhiker’s bLOG – 2022.02.08

Part 2 – Shocking!

And a great crowd followed him and thronged about him. And there was a woman who had had a discharge of blood for twelve 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 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.” Mark 5:24b-34

The crowd swarming around Jesus sets the scene for the meat to be added to the Mark Sandwich. (see bLOG 2022.02.07). In this crowd is a woman who should not be in that crowd as her flow of blood makes her ritually unclean per Levitical law. Her presence is shocking. The woman’s suffering has exhausted all resources (likely indicating she was a wealthy woman), and the many doctors have not helped; the condition only worsens. She has suffered, and she, like Jairus, is desperate. Note: Isn’t it interesting that the length of her suffering coincides with the age of Jairus’ daughter? I don’t think this is a coincidence.

The woman is confident that touching the hem of his garment will heal her. She makes her way through the crowd and achieves her goal. Like a lightning bolt, she feels the healing! At the same time, Jesus feels power (δύναμιν, pronounced dy-na-min) leave his body, and “immediately” begins turning around in the throng to see who touched him. His dullard disciples are shocked that he would even try to find that person in the crowd, but Jesus is intent on finding his target. The woman knows she is outed, comes forward, and, like Jairus, falls at Jesus’ feet.

Jesus’ response is shocking as well; “Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.” No doctors nor sacrifices by the priests could make this woman clean, but faith in this man has brought her shalom!

Don’t forget that all this happens while Jesus walks with Jairus to his home to lay hands on a sick girl. I can only imagine what is going through Jairus’ head!