Jesus, the Woman, & Jairus's Daughter

[0:00] The following message is given by Walt Alexander, lead pastor of Trinity Grace Church in Athens, Tennessee.! For more information about Trinity Grace, please visit us at TrinityGraceAthens.com.

[0:16] So Mark chapter 5, look with me in verse 21. I'm going to read all the way to the end of the chapter. So if you do have a copy of the scriptures, it'd be good to have it for you. So Mark 5, verse 21.

[0:29] And when Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered about him. So we've seen this again and again. And here we see it here, this crowd.

[0:41] And he was beside the sea. Again, around the sea. Then came one of the rulers of the synagogue, Jairus by name. And seeing him, he fell at his feet and implored him earnestly, saying, My little daughter is at the point of death.

[1:00] Come and lay your hands on her so that she may be made well and live. And he went with him.

[1:13] And a great crowd followed him and thronged about him. And there was a woman who had had a discharge of blood for 12 years.

[1:25] So suddenly we're introduced to another character. And who had suffered much under many physicians and had spent all that she had and was no better but rather grew worse.

[1:39] She had heard the reports about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his garment.

[1:51] For she said, in her mind, we're to presume, If I touch even his garments, I will be made well. And immediately the flow of blood dried up.

[2:06] 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?

[2:24] 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.

[2:41] But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling and fell before him and told him the whole truth. And he said to her, Daughter, your faith has made you well.

[3:01] Go in peace and be healed of your disease. Verse 35, While he was still speaking, there came from the ruler's house some who said, Your daughter is dead.

[3:16] Why trouble the teacher any further? But overhearing what they said, Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue, Do not fear, only believe.

[3:32] And he allowed no one to follow him, except Peter and James and John, the brother of James. They came to the house of the ruler of the synagogue, and Jesus saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly.

[3:45] And when he entered, he said to him, Why are you making a commotion and weeping? The child is not dead, but sleeping. And they laughed at him.

[3:57] But 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. And taking her by the hand, he said to her, Talitha kumi, which is Aramaic, which means little girl, I say to you, arise.

[4:18] And immediately the girl got up and began walking, for she was 12 years of age. And they were immediately overcome with amazement.

[4:29] And he strictly charged them that no one should know this and told them to give her something to eat. Love that little detail from Mark.

[4:40] The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of God abides forever. One of the things my mom used to say is there's only one thing, or the only two things you have to do in life is pay your taxes and die.

[4:57] Two things are inevitable in life, taxes and death. Now, I don't want to get off on taxes this morning, a little bit of a contentious fact. They are a fact of love life.

[5:07] The Bible no doubt commends us to pay them even when we pay them to a wicked ruler. I'm not saying America is run by a wicked ruler. That was a bad association. But even if they are as wicked as ancient Rome.

[5:21] But I do want us to consider death. Death has often been referred to as the great interruption, tearing loved ones out of our life and interrupting our relationships with them.

[5:31] Death is the great enemy. Who doesn't fear death? Who doesn't wonder what happens when you die? I remember being 11 years old, wondering about this.

[5:42] What happened? You cease to exist. What goes on? How could you cease to exist and never exist anymore? I mean, wouldn't that be cruel? What's going on? But death is also, as my mom said, one of the great inevitabilities.

[5:54] One thing is certain, we're all going to die. There's a 100% death rate of humankind. Yet, even though it's inevitable, we don't prepare for it well and don't live as if it's going to happen.

[6:06] One of the reasons for this is the blessings of modern medicine. Author Annie Dillard makes a long list of the ways people died several hundred years ago. She says, Women took fever and died having babies.

[6:18] Babies died from puniness or the harshness of the air. Men died from rivers and horses, bulls, steam saws, mill gears, quarried rock, and falling trees or rolling logs.

[6:29] Children lost their lives as well. Hard things smashed them like trees in the ground. When horses threw them and they fell, they drowned in water. They sickened. Earaches wormed into her brains.

[6:41] Now, that's a vivid image, isn't it? And fever from measles burned them up and pneumonia eased them out overnight. A couple hundred years ago, death was something that was up close and personal.

[6:54] Take one example. From 1684 to 1700, the British queen Anne had 18 pregnancies.

[7:06] Eight were miscarriages. Five were stillbirths. One lived a few minutes. Another a few hours. Another was born and died two years later of disease.

[7:16] Another by tragic accident. One lived past infancy but died at age 11. The statue of her outside St. Paul's Cathedral in London.

[7:29] Crying. Modern medicine and science have relieved us of many of the causes of miscarriage and early death. Modern medicine and science has brought many blessings, not least of which is significantly curtailing the threat of disease through vaccine.

[7:45] But the effect is death's been moved from view. One author says, Today the vast majority of people decline and die in hospitals and hospices away from the eyes of others. It is now normal to live to adulthood and not watch anyone die or even see a corpse except in a brief glance of an open coffin at a funeral.

[8:06] Have you seen anybody die? So mom was right. The only thing you have to do is pay taxes and die. But death is almost hidden from view.

[8:17] Now, our passage this morning takes us back into a world long before modern medicine. In a cluster of stories where we've already seen our Lord's great flower displayed over the uncontrollable sea and the uncontainable or unstoppable demoniac were brought face to face with two of the old world's most great fear, greatest fears, disease and death.

[8:52] We encounter these in a cluster. We encounter a woman whose life has been ravaged by disease. But we also encounter a father desperate to find help and healing for his daughter on the verge of death.

[9:05] And interestingly, at the end of this series of stories, Mark sandwiches the one inside the other. So the story of the woman is sandwiched inside this story about Jairus and his daughter.

[9:18] And so much like he's done all throughout Mark, he kind of gives us a little bit of the first story. Then he gives us the whole bit of the second story. Then he finishes the first story. And there's many similarities between these stories.

[9:30] Both are women. Both are called daughter. Both 12 years. So she's had this disease for 12 years. This Talitha, or not Talitha, the daughter's name is 12 years old.

[9:41] But the similarities are not why Mark sandwiches them together. Mark sandwiches them together, as we're going to see, in a wonderful way, to help us see the real Jesus Christ and the staggering call to faith in him.

[9:54] So we're going to take this scene by scene and hopefully get a good... This is one of those passages, I've got to be honest, that I think I could spend a few more weeks on it and not get to the end of it.

[10:05] So this is a swing, you know. I hope it's not a swing and a miss, but it'll be a swing. The first is Jairus. Scene one, Jairus. In the first scene, we encounter Jairus.

[10:18] Jesus, again, so he was on the other side of the sea in Gergesa with the demoniac, just healed the demoniac. He crosses to the other side of the sea with his disciple, we think on the side where Capernaum was, and he encounters a man named Jairus.

[10:31] Look in verse 22. He says, Then came one of the rulers of the synagogues, Jairus by name. Seeing him, falls on his feet, implores him earnestly, My daughter is at the point of death. Come lay your hands on her that she may be well and live.

[10:46] Jairus is a ruler of a synagogue. Now the synagogue, we encounter this in a number of places, the synagogue is just a place where Jews gather to hear the law read and preached every Sunday. So it's a lot like, our worship is a lot like synagogue worship.

[11:00] He's not a priest, he's more like a ruler of the synagogue, kind of president of the synagogue. It's more like a deacon, more like someone that would make sure all the chairs are set up, make sure coffee is made and things like that, make sure the scrolls are in good working order so they would roll out these massive scrolls.

[11:16] They wouldn't have a nice little Bible. This is incredible. You have this Bible to hold on to your hand. They would roll it out so that they could find their place in the Old Testament. And so there's a number of rulers of the synagogue in Capernaum, and one of them is Jairus.

[11:32] We're introduced to him by name. Jairus has no doubt heard about Jesus and was most likely there, in our Bibles, at the beginning of chapter 3, when Jesus healed the man with the withered hand.

[11:42] Do you remember that? There was quite a bit of drama about this. Jesus heals the man with the withered hand on the Sabbath in the synagogue, and now his daughter is dying, and he comes to Jesus in desperation.

[11:54] He falls. I mean, we see Mark vividly captures his desperation. He fell at his feet. He implored him. He begged him. I think it's the same word that's used for the demons, begging to be thrown into the pigs.

[12:12] And so he begs him earnestly, greatly. Now, if you're a parent, it's not hard to put yourself in Jairus' shoes.

[12:25] There's nothing like seeing your child in trouble. There's nothing a parent wouldn't do for a child in trouble. I'll never forget the look on my dad's face one time when I was in big trouble.

[12:38] Not trouble with him, but in big trouble. I'd had a wreck when I was 16. I was like any other 16-year-old had a wreck. I think it's just a rite of passage.

[12:50] You have to destroy a car to make it to 18. And gotten a wreck. Just a couple miles down from my granddad's farm. Everybody knew my granddad's town of 2,000 people.

[13:07] When the cops came, because the car was flipped and stuff, the cops came and said, who are you? I said, I'm Walter Revel's grandson. Can you go get him?

[13:18] He's just two miles down the road. Went and put him in the car and put my parents in the car and when they walked onto the scene, I'll never forget my dad's look. Like, I'll do anything to rescue this boy.

[13:33] That's the look in Jairus' eyes. What would you do if your child's dying?

[13:47] There's another aspect, though, to his desperation. Now, Jairus, if you remember, after Jesus healed the man with the withered hand, they resolved, all the rulers of the synagogue resolved how to destroy Jesus.

[13:58] They resolved to kill him. But Jairus is breaking away from the gang to Jesus Christ. He's leaving his buddies and falling before Jesus in desperation.

[14:22] The scene closes. I almost think this is a little bit of a joke. In verse 24a, and he went with them. It seems that already Mark is aligning this, likening this, to the previous story.

[14:41] You know, remember when the disciples took Jesus in the boat. They assumed they understand what's going on. They said, come on, Jesus, come with us. We'll guide you safe across the land. And that didn't end up so well, did it?

[14:53] And so too, Jairus assumed he knows what's going on. He assumes he knows what Jesus is going to do. So Jesus goes with him. But as we're going to see, Jesus is really taking Jairus with him to show him something amazing.

[15:08] So immediately, it's seen shifts in the middle of that verse, actually. It's seen two on the woman. He went with him. A great crowd followed him and thronged about him. And then we're introduced to a woman.

[15:20] The story of Jairus and his daughter is interrupted by the story of this woman. Now there's always a crowd around Jesus. We've seen this all throughout Mark's gospel. And the woman slips into the crowd, but beneath the sight of the crowd, she's suffering from disease.

[15:33] And Mark captures this. Much like no one could control the sea and much like no one could contain the demoniac, no one can solve this woman's disease.

[15:46] Look at verse 25. It says, there was a woman who had a discharge of blood for 12 years and who had suffered much under many physicians. She had spent all that she had and was no better, but rather grew worse.

[15:57] She was suffering from some sort of gynological condition that no one could help her with. And the disease had ravaged her. She had been bleeding for 12 years.

[16:07] She had done all that she knew what to do to get help. She'd seen many physicians. She'd spent all her money, but all the money only made her worse. Do you see?

[16:21] It's an impossible situation. That's the point. That's what we're beginning to see. And if the condition wasn't enough, she is unclean. According to Old Testament law, she had been unclean all the days of her discharge for 12 years.

[16:36] She's unable to go to the temple or the synagogue. She's unable to gather with family and friends. She's unclean. Everything she touches is unclean. She lives alone. Leviticus 13 would say, outside the camp.

[16:49] If she goes inside the camp, she's required to shout out, cry out, unclean! Unclean! It's me! Unclean!

[16:59] I got a new name! Unclean! It's hard to imagine the effect of disease.

[17:12] Physically, but also emotionally and spiritually. I was reading this book a couple months ago. Researchers gathered for a basic scenario in which a group of people would play a silly game of catch, tossing the ball to one another to pass the time and trying to keep it aloft, but scientists set up one condition for the experiment, so they're just tossing a ball, you know, like a beach ball you might do out in the yard.

[17:39] They have one condition. Unbeknownst to one woman in the group, the ball would never be tossed to her. So you're out there. Hey, hey. You know, try to put yourself in her shoes.

[17:52] You're in a group that starts a game of catch. The ball randomly popcorns around the group. Giggling ensues. You keep waiting for your chance to join the fun, but the ball never comes your way.

[18:04] You're patient at first. You smile when others smile. You inch a little further into the circle to try to draw attention. Hey, I'm over here. Will you hit the ball to me? Your smile is becoming more forced now.

[18:17] There's still a sliver of hope that your exclusion is randomly. Eventually, you conclude the ball is never coming to you. This game isn't for you.

[18:30] You pretend you don't want to play anyway. You stop trying. But this is not a game. The ostracized person testifies to an increased sense that life is meaningless and devoid of purpose.

[18:47] The game is just the way to pull back the curtain on the fundamental need for community. So imagine the effect on this woman.

[19:08] No one drops by. No one calls. No one speaks her name anymore. No one listens to her verbally process what's going on in her mind.

[19:21] But somehow, she hears the reports about Jesus and when he draws deer, slips into the crowd and makes her way to him. She heard the reports about Jesus.

[19:33] Verse 27, came up behind him and touched his garment. She thought to herself, she said to herself, if I touch even his garments, I'll be made well. And immediately the flow of blood dried up and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.

[19:48] There's so much we're not told. I feel like I say that every week in Mark's Gospels. Not told what she hears, not told what, all that she's thinking, all we're told is that she heard, she came, she touched, and then she's healed immediately, completely, and unintentionally.

[20:06] She touches his garments and rather than making Jesus unclean, Jesus immediately makes her clean. Now, there's no delay in her cleansing. She's not told to wait on the Lord.

[20:17] She's not told to go wash herself seven times in the river like the Lord did with Elijah. She touches Jesus and is healed immediately. That wonderful word that peppers Mark's Gospel, she's healed immediately, but she is healed completely.

[20:34] The flow of blood dries up. She feels in her body that she was healed of her disease. There's nothing gradual about this woman's healing.

[20:46] She's healed instantaneously and completely. Nearly every example of healing in the life of Jesus is just this way. Immediate, complete healing.

[20:59] healing. She's completely changed in a moment. Now, a little side. I believe God still works to heal today.

[21:11] But one of the problems I have with the so-called charismatic movement is they often teach that healing is a process. I have one book I have in my library.

[21:23] You may conclude what we might call, or you may conclude with what we might call post-prayer direction. Emphasize that healing is a process. If nothing happens instantaneously, the person may feel discouraged. And so, we kind of make them feel better that healing may be a process.

[21:37] But that doesn't make sense. If the miraculous gift of healing is operative today, it's going to happen the same way that happened in the life of Jesus. Which is immediate, complete healing. And that's what's wonderful about this.

[21:48] But it's not just that she was healed immediately, not just completely. She was healed unintentionally. Now, we've seen many people healed already in the Gospel of Mark, but we've never seen someone healed unintentionally.

[21:58] Jesus doesn't heal her by reaching out His hand to touch her. Jesus heals her when she reaches out her hand to touch Him. He heals her unintentionally, without being aware.

[22:13] I mean, how nice would that be? You know, just touch me. You know, you will be healed. I mean, He heals her without intending to. from a human perspective.

[22:26] It reminds me of the handkerchiefs and the aprons of the Apostle Paul that were taken throughout the first century world. And people were healed as they touched Him just because they had touched His body.

[22:37] How much more the garments of Jesus Christ. So, we would assume this scene would end just right there. This woman's healed.

[22:48] She goes away healed. Jesus would continue His journey to Jairus' house. That would be a wonderful ending. But Jesus does not keep walking.

[23:04] Jesus slows His steps and stops. Even with the time ticking by and Jairus standing in the wings, waiting in the wings, Jesus turns around.

[23:15] Look at verse 30. And Jesus perceiving in Himself that power had gone out from Him. Now, what in the world does that mean? The assumption is she touched her garment so that He wouldn't know that she had touched Him.

[23:38] Right. But when she touches His garment, power shoots out from Him in such a way that He knows she has touched Him.

[23:51] That is amazing. I don't know what it means, but it's amazing. Then, He turns to His disciples. Look back there.

[24:05] Perceiving the power had gone out from Him. He immediately turned about in the crowd. I just imagine Jesus surrounded by people turning about. Now, who touched my garments? Who touched my garments?

[24:16] Now, this moment and this question is the center in this carefully crafted sandwich. Jesus is turning around. Who touched my garments?

[24:26] Who has caused this power to shoot out from me? Now, on the one hand, this is an absurd question. How can we know who touched you? The crowd is all around Him.

[24:38] Now, rulers in the ancient world would pass through a town and they would be believed to be people of power and prominence and so they believed to be people that can heal. So like Alexander the Great, he was known to pass through a town. People would come just to touch and to feel His feet, trusting that He would be healed and that's what goes on.

[24:53] That's what you see even with the Pope nowadays. And so too, the crowd was pressing in to touch Jesus. So the disciples kind of say, what are you talking about? How are we supposed to know who touched you?

[25:05] The better question might be, who didn't touch you? Who hasn't reached out their hands to you? But there's one person to whom power has shot out.

[25:16] So this is an absurd question, but it's also a perplexing question as well. What are we to make of the all-knowing Son of God asking what just happened? Hey, I missed that.

[25:29] What happened? Oh, I missed that play. Who shot that? Jesus is not asking for information.

[25:40] Jesus is calling this woman to Him. Do you remember what God says to Adam in the garden when he and Eve had eaten the apple? And he's walking through there in the cool of the day.

[25:54] Where are you? Where are you? He's not trying to find Adam. He's trying to alert Adam that he knows what he's done and he's calling him to him.

[26:06] That's why Jesus asked this question to call this woman to Him. So he asked the disciples who touch him then he looks around to see who had done it. Now, take this in for a minute.

[26:18] this woman wants a miracle but Jesus wants a meeting. This woman wants healing but Jesus wants a face to face.

[26:32] This woman wants a power encounter but Jesus wants a personal encounter with her. Just as ravaging as the disease is this desire of the Messiah to interact with her personally.

[26:49] One philosopher talks about the difference between I-it and I-thou relationships. I-it I and something impersonal. Like I have an I-it relationship with my computer.

[27:03] I tell it what to do and it does its thing. I have an I-it relationship presumably with my car. When I press the button it turns on or with my watch or something else like that. They're just things. They do things for me.

[27:15] an I-it relationship with food. It's a very fond I-it relationship. I have an I-thou relationship with my wife Kim.

[27:31] If I treat her like my car it's not going to go well. With my children with my friends my relationships are very different to the ones filled with give and take and patience and forgiveness and love and all those type things.

[27:50] This woman wants an I-it relationship with Jesus. Now she just wants to be healed. Maybe it's because she assumes no one wants to be around her and she assumes the same of the Savior. But Jesus wants a real relationship with her.

[28:05] Now we can begin to fall into the same thing. You Christianity just something we do or some box we check. We can view it like an I-it relationship as if God's just something genie that we call up to or something like that.

[28:21] Jesus wants something more. When she hears the question verse 33 the woman knowing what had happened to her she doesn't say knowing that she touched him or it doesn't say that knowing what had happened to her knowing that this encounter had been different she 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 daughter this woman is an outcast an unclean woman who lives alone Jesus is your mind you're in my family now your faith has made you well literally your faith has saved you it's not only healed your disease it's saved your life this woman just wanted to be healed of a disease but Jesus wanted to set her whole life so he said be healed of your disease go in peace now

[29:41] I say peace you know this is not a word of dismissal this is definitely not a hippie type phrase of our Lord saying it's all good or something like that this is a Hebrew word shalom it means completeness comfort security it's the greatest blessing Jesus could offer her Jesus does not want her to know Jesus not just wanted to know that she is healed Jesus wants her to know that she is loved and kept and secure forever and ever and ever you know they said of Eugene Peterson at his funeral he was a wonderful small town pastor that he would crawl into his kids bed and say God is for you God loves you God is for you God loves he whispered to him while he was falling asleep this is what Jesus is doing to this woman he's pulling her aside and said my peace I give to you this is to root you and ground you for the rest of your life scene three Jairus' daughter after an encounter with this woman the scene shifts suddenly to Jairus

[30:44] Jairus' daughter actually before the scenes even over the scene shifts while he's still speaking to the woman Jesus interrupted people come from the ruler's house and say Jairus' daughter is dead verse 35 your daughter is dead why trouble the teacher anymore but overhearing what they said Jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue to Jairus himself do not fear only believe Jesus is saying to him trust me be patient there's no need to hurry trust me be patient there's no need to hurry every culture has a different sense of time there have been a different culture some cultures time is relative some time is precise early on time on time is late and late is unacceptable and so we can get off cue and so what he's kind of saying to Jairus is don't worry

[31:48] I got this trust me be patient I love you there's no need to hurry Tim Keller says like this it's not I will not be hurried even though I love you it's I will not be hurried because I love you I know what I'm doing and if you try to impose your understanding of schedule and timing upon me you will struggle to feel loved by me it's a you know it's a jarring declaration to Jairus I mean what's he saying don't fear only believe trust me be patient follow me even though your child is just dead I mean I have a friend who just lost his young daughter I mean what's he saying to Jairus we're about to see all eyes are suddenly on Jesus Christ Jesus allows no one to follow him but Peter James and John and of course Jairus whereas the story begins with Jesus going with Jairus the story ends with Jairus

[32:49] I mean with Jesus taking Jairus and Peter James and John into this house and when he arrives there's quite a commotion there's weeping and wailing so this just fits that culture completely you know our culture has been affected by England and we keep a stiff upper lip and we kind of awkwardly cry at funerals or something like that we're taught to be stoical or something like that but that's not this culture this culture weeping and wailing and at any funeral you would actually hire mourners to mourn with you so you would have someone play the flute you'd have someone weep and wail and so the mourners are already there weeping and wailing the die has already been cast it's already been decided this daughter has died and the mourning has already begun Jesus said to him why are you making commotion and weeping the child is not dead but sleeping and they laughed at him as people often do at the work of God and he put them all outside and took the child's father and mother and those who were with him and went into where the child was taking her by the hand he said

[34:01] Talitha Kumi which means little girl I say to you arise Talitha is an Aramaic word it's translated little girl but it's more tender than that it's more like it's like lamb that's literally it's a word that a mother would use with a child like honey Talitha Kumi Talitha arise it's more like Jesus saying honey it's time to get up now in the midst of defeating death and destroying the enemy who holds the power of death Jesus enters this girl's little world most tenderly now this is interesting now Mark wasn't writing to people that would understand

[35:02] Aramaic so he has to translate which means little girl arise but why does he include the Aramaic and I think this is the reason Mark wants us to hear the very words this girl heard in that little room where the morning had already started Mark wants us to hear these words these words that came out of our sayers mouths so that we might put them into ours and understand just like Taylor pointed out last week we're told to cry Abba Father not to take up some other language but to take up the very words of Jesus Christ these are his words and he gives them to us and so the same thing is going on here Mark wants us to hear the very words he spoke to this girl and raised her from the dead everyone obviously was overcome with amazement so what do we say now why what's going on with all this you know why sandwich the story of this disease ravaged woman in the midst of the story about

[36:18] Jairus' daughter there's profound similarities the woman the daughter the 12 years but the differences tell the story the woman was poor and possesses the weakest faith imaginable did you notice the contrast between her and Jairus it's very intentional Jairus is a man she's a woman couldn't own property couldn't be a witness in court patriarchal culture Jairus is named the woman is unnamed Jairus falls boldly at Jesus' feet after all he's the ruler of a synagogue but the woman sneaks up from behind to touch his garment what it's saying what it's saying is it's not the person of faith or the power of faith that matters it's the object of faith Donald McLeod says it's not perfect faith that's saved nor strong faith nor great faith but faith simply faith in

[37:22] Christ faith that may often be ashamed of itself that's incredible but which at the lowest ebb of its strength clings to the assurance expressed by James Frazier of Brear a little arles as well as much that's like earnest money a little bit of earnest money is the same as much same thing with faith the only faith that saves is faith in Christ and it doesn't matter who the person is or how powerful his faith is that's the truth of the gospel it's not the faith of the strong it's not the faith of the bold it's not the faith of the prominent that accesses the grace of God in Jesus Christ it's the faith that's in Jesus so I would say if you believe in Jesus Christ if you have faith in him believe that he died and was raised from the dead you'll be saved and so it gives us the character of faith another thing the woman rests her faith completely on the promise of God this woman the woman is the model of faith in this passage the woman is the one teaching

[38:37] Jairus now Jairus if you notice Jairus is a spectator of the whole scene very intentional he sees everything that happened we don't know all that she was thinking when she reaches out to touch Jesus garment but we do know that Jesus commends her faith your faith has saved you she hears what Jesus is doing and puts her trust completely in him it helps us see the true character of faith faith that rests on anything else outside of Jesus Christ is untrue faith and so Jesus stops and delays to test Jairus' faith Jesus one of the jobs I would love to have is like a testing facility for brand new cars coming off the lot because wouldn't you love to destroy a few Baymers you know and just to watch them and analyze the way they're destroyed and it's a testing factory designed to help save many lives well the same thing is going on in this passage

[39:44] Jesus is testing Jairus' faith here we get to the heart of the story it's not enough for Jesus to heal his daughter Jesus wants an encounter with Jairus too Jesus wants him to trust in Jesus too Jesus as it were Jesus raises his eyes to us he says what will you do with Jesus Christ how will you respond to the pressure to life how will you respond to those things that seem impossible to you that's what this passage is pressing into us how will you respond when you don't have hope for the future when you see something impossible your marriage has lost its joy will you trust him will you be patient will you refuse to give up will you refuse to conclude that all is meaningless will you wait for him to raise the dead I think the stories come together along with all the other stories so that we might trust in Jesus Christ no matter what the obstacles are we saw it with the sea the sea was uncontrollable but Jesus calms the storm we saw it with the demon the demons are uncontrollable they bind this man but Jesus

[40:54] Jesus unbinds him and lets him go and close him and seats him in his right mind so too Jesus overturns disease and death in a word do not despair Jesus overturns disease and death and every dead end distress for those who believe in him don't despair I think that's what he's telling Jairus I think that's what he's telling us don't despair Jesus overturns disease and death and every dead end distress for those who believe in him and conclude with this in one of the lowest points of his life Martin Luther's 14 year old daughter was stricken with the plague it was said of him broken hearted he knelt beside her bed and begged God to release her from the pain when she died and the carpenters were nailing down the lid of the coffin Luther screamed out hammer away on doomsday she will rise again that's what this passage meant to do to us hammer away at us disease death doomsday we will rise again may God help us

[42:20] Father in heaven we cry out to you we humble ourselves before you we walk you've been listening to a message given by Walt Alexander lead pastor of Trinity Grace Church in Athens Tennessee for more information about Trinity Grace please visit us at trinitygraceathens.com who