Father, some of us here are maybe pretty pumped about some answered prayer.
Some of us, Father, are really sort of, maybe some of us have given up praying
because we don't even think it works.
And some of us are crushed with not getting the answer that we had hoped and prayed for from you.
And Father, you know the conditions of all of our hearts.
And we ask that your Holy Spirit would move in a gentle but deep and powerful way in each one of us,
that your word might be brought home to us,
that the gospel might be made even more dear and clear to us,
and that we might be so gripped by the gospel that we live each day for your glory.
And this we ask in the name of Jesus, your Son and our Savior. Amen.
Please be seated.
So the Bible text today has nothing to do with real life.
It's just completely and utterly religious and has nothing to do with any of the questions or experiences.
It only deals with why God answers some prayers and doesn't answer other people's prayers.
It only deals with sickness and death.
It only deals with social isolation and shame.
Nothing that any of us ever have to struggle with or experience.
So it would be a great help to me.
Actually, you'll see that it's the second week of our summer series.
It's Real Jesus, Real Miracles.
And this is our second week.
And we'll be looking at a story in the book of Luke.
In fact, interestingly enough, it's actually the story which is painted there.
You can sort of see it, Jesus and the young girl.
So it would be a great help if you turned in a moment to this famous story.
But before we do that, I want to just put up, if you could put up the first point, that would be very helpful.
Probably every week that I do one of these miracle stories, I just want to make this very simple point.
Is Luke is claiming, this is what Luke is claiming.
If you go back and you read the beginning of the gospel, if you go back and you read his other work,
if you notice all of the way he phrases time-shifting things, which often is not once upon a time, but it happened next.
The claim that Luke is making is that this is a true story about Jesus and it's also a miracle.
That it is something that could not happen unless God acted into our world and brought about something that only God could cause.
That's what a miracle is here.
And so this is Luke's claim.
True story about Jesus and a real miracle.
And when we start looking, it's going to be at Luke chapter 8, verse 40.
Just to sort of catch you up on it.
When we read Luke, we're reading an ancient biography of Jesus.
It was written by a pagan doctor who was an adult convert.
And Luke himself never knew Jesus physically.
He wasn't an eyewitness of any of the events in this story.
But what we see here is that Luke decided that he would go and do research after he'd become a Christian.
Maybe he's also recounting the journey that led him to become a Christian.
He interviews eyewitnesses.
He looks at official records.
And out of that, he frames this ancient biography of Jesus written at a time when many eyewitnesses to the events were still alive and could have commented on it, disagreed with it, rebutted it, whatever.
And there's no record of that.
And so that's sort of the context.
And we're going to start reading in verse 40.
And here's how it goes.
Now, when Jesus returned, the crowd welcomed him, for they were all waiting for him.
And there came a man named Jairus, who was a ruler of the synagogue.
And falling at Jesus' feet, he implored him to come to his house, for he had an only daughter, about 12 years of age, and she was dying.
And just sort of in the flow of the book, what Luke has just previously recounted is that Jesus has crossed the Sea of Galilee to the other side of the sea into a pagan land.
And he spent some time in this pagan land.
And now he's returned to the Jewish side of the Sea of Galilee.
In fact, he's returned to Galilee, which is sort of a bit of a mixed area.
But he's returned there.
And the crowd was waiting for him to return.
And when it says, and a synagogue is, and since it's now, we only have synagogues.
Synagogues weren't, in a sense, part of God's, there's no Old Testament passages that describe how synagogues are to be functioning.
Because in the Old Testament, it was expected that you would go to the temple to do the sacrifices.
But during a long period of exile, when they were away from the temple and there was no temple,
this habit of having a place, a community center that was also a place of the reading of God's word and of prayer and of instruction and support developed.
A little bit like what we would now call a church.
And so in Galilee, there is a leader of this particular place.
He has a 12-year-old daughter.
And in the original language, it's very clear that she's at the point of death.
She's at the point of death.
And so Jairus is probably unbelievably excited that Jesus has returned.
He would have known about how Jesus has already raised.
He might have heard about the fact that Jesus earlier has raised a person from the dead.
He's heard of Jesus' many miracles.
He might have heard of the official who had a son.
And Jesus was able to heal him from a distance.
And now Jesus is back.
He goes to Jesus.
This all sense of dignity is put aside, just as it would be for one of us if it was our 12-year-old daughter who was dying.
He throws himself at Jesus' feet and says,
Jesus, come and heal my daughter.
She's at the point of death.
And now one of the things, it doesn't talk about in the text, but it's sort of interesting,
is that he might have expected Jesus just to do what he had done with the official son.
Pick up Jairus and say, okay, Jairus, come stand up here.
She's healed.
Just you walk back and she's healed.
That might be very much what he's expecting.
But Jesus doesn't do that.
He doesn't do that.
And that's an important little detail in the story to notice, as well as all of the ways in the story.
You'll notice that Jesus doesn't react to each person.
He always acts with love and power and authority.
But he never acts the same way.
It's not like dealing with a banking machine that always has just pre-programmed responses to what you do.
He treats us as an individual.
And, you know, in heaven, we'll maybe find out why it is that for the official son, he did that type of miracle.
And I think it's in Luke 5.
And why here in Luke 8, he treats Jairus in a different way.
And just as in heaven, I'll find out why it is that he treated me one way and he treated Don a different way.
And he treated Terry a different way.
And the meaning of our life and why it was so important to us that God acted in one way rather than another.
The Bible doesn't make all that clear as to what his reasons are.
It just shows that he treats people in a different way.
And in this particular case, he says to Jairus, in a sense, I will go to see your daughter.
Well, what happens?
Look at the last part of verse 42.
The next paragraph, if you're looking up there.
Oh, maybe it doesn't have that.
Yeah, it does have that.
As Jesus went, the people pressed around him.
In other words, they were right up touching him.
They were like he was like moving through a crowd.
And there was a woman who had a discharge of blood for 12 years.
And though she had spent all her living on physicians, she could not be healed by anyone.
She came up behind him and touched the fringe of his garment.
And immediately her discharge of blood ceased.
Now just sort of pause.
Remember, Jesus is going to Jairus' house.
His daughter is dying.
He's having to walk through a crowd.
And in the midst of a crowd, there's this woman that comes up and touches the fringe of his garment.
Now, some of you might or might not know this.
Probably what most scholars now think that she had a, I don't know if I'm going to pronounce this correctly,
a uterine hemorrhage.
That's probably what she had.
And she had it for 12 years.
It meant that there was bleeding from her uterus.
And whether it was continual or just intermittent, it would have been leaving her anemic.
And the regular, unusual amount of flow of blood, and not just regular in terms of like a once a month if she was younger,
but just intermittent but sort of constant flow of blood would have meant that from a Jewish perspective at that time,
she was unclean.
And we're not going to go into a little bit that much,
but every single one of us knows a little bit about what it means to feel unclean.
And she was unclean.
And in their system of thought, every person she touched, she made ritually unclean,
which would have meant that there were sacrifices and all that sort of stuff.
So what she had done is she's pushing herself through the crowd,
is she's making every single person she touches, she's making them ritually unclean.
She herself would have lived a very isolated life because she would have had to be constantly separated from other human beings
because of her ritual uncleanness.
And in the original language, when it says that she touches the fringe of his garment,
it's actually a very technical word.
In the Old Testament law, one of the outward signs that you wanted to observe all of the law
was that you had certain tassels, a fringe, put on your garment.
And what she touches, even though she's ritually unclean,
is she touches that which symbolizes that Jesus is a religiously observant Jewish man.
So later on, if she hadn't been healed, the crowd would have realized that she'd,
that in fact, actually what she did was quite wrong for most of their thinking.
She touched, she touched the part that showed that he desired to be ritually clean.
And she touched that to make him unclean.
She would have done a faux pas.
But lo and behold, she, not thinking about that,
she just has this belief that Jesus will heal her.
And she touches him and she's healed.
And we all know that sometimes people can think they're healed when they're not.
But in this case, what probably has happened is not only does she feel that the blood stops,
but there would have been persistent pain and the pain goes away.
The pain in her uterus, all of a sudden the pain stops.
She has a sense that the bleeding stopped.
And because when Jesus heals, and we see this in all of the ancient biographies,
when Jesus heals, he doesn't just sort of barely heal a person, she's healed.
Her anemia and her weakness would have been gone.
All of a sudden, she would have just felt well.
All of us here who aren't anemic, we don't even experience feeling well, in a sense,
because it's natural to us.
And all of a sudden, for the first time in 12 years, she feels well.
She doesn't feel anemic.
And the pain is gone.
And she has a sense that the bleeding has stopped.
It happens in an instant.
Now, there's a very surprising thing, though, that happens.
In verse 45, we see it.
And Jesus said, who was it that touched me?
He doesn't know who touched her.
He doesn't know who touched him.
Like, he literally, this isn't like an object lesson.
This isn't like when he says to the disciples in the feeding of the 5,000,
and how are we going to feed them.
And that's sort of like he's giving them a test question.
In this case, he literally doesn't know the answer.
He has no idea who it is that touched him.
He asked that question.
Verse 45 again, and Jesus said, who was it that touched me?
And when all denied it, Peter said,
Master, I don't know if he puts the word duh,
but the crowd surround you and are pressing on you.
Like, there's all sorts of people touching you, basically.
But verse 46, but Jesus said,
Someone touch me, for I perceive that power has gone out from me.
And when the woman saw that she was not hidden,
she came trembling and falling down before him,
declared in the presence of all the people why she had touched Jesus
and how she had been immediately healed.
And Jesus doesn't rebuke her.
He speaks to her with great affection.
He says, daughter.
He claims her as part of his family.
Daughter, your faith has made you well.
And in the original language, your faith has made you well
can also equally be translated as your faith has saved you.
Go in peace.
Now, some of us are a bit troubled by this.
And I could well imagine that those who are non-Christians,
you know a little bit about what Christianity is,
be very puzzled as to how it is that Jesus,
like, don't Christians claim that Jesus is God?
How is it that he asks a question?
How is it that he doesn't know the answer?
How can he be God and ask a question?
If you could put up the point, Andrew, that would be very helpful.
Well, Jesus is fully human.
He asked questions.
See, one of the things which is so powerful about stories
is that stories help us to enter into truths
that we can maybe express as a doctrine,
like when we said the creed, fully man and fully God.
And okay, well, we can say that.
But a story helps us to enter into what that means
and experience it and know it in a deeper way.
It shapes us.
And the fact of the matter is, is if Jesus never asked a question,
how on earth could you possibly believe that he's human?
Like, how could he be human if he never asked a question?
It's one of the essential features of being a human being,
is to be able to ask questions.
It's one of the things, interestingly enough,
in totalitarian states and dictators,
what they want is they want to stop people asking questions
because they want to make you less human.
The state wants to crush you.
And if they want to crush you, they say,
no more questions.
You're not allowed to ask questions.
Just trust the glorious state, how wise it is.
In the Soviet Union, dissidents were sent to be brainwashed
or dealt with by psychiatrists
because they couldn't understand the glory of the revolution.
They'd ask questions.
Well, why is it if the revolution is so glorious,
why is it that people are starving?
Why is it that people are punished?
And, well, if you, no questions are not allowed.
So we can't look at Jesus and say,
well, Jesus was human but never asked a question.
You know, he's not here today.
Liam.
Liam went through a period.
He was really, really, you know, he's still cute,
but he was very cute.
And after service, he'd come and follow me around
and ask me questions.
Why do you do that?
And I'd give him an answer.
Why?
I'd give him an answer.
Why?
Give him an answer.
Why?
And should I just say, because.
I don't know.
Like, at some point in time,
you just can't answer endless whys.
All of you have had young kids,
many of them at some point in time,
they go through a phase,
they ask why, why, why.
Well, to think that Jesus, as a four-year-old,
never asked the question why.
Like, how could he be a kid?
Like, Jesus didn't emerge out of the womb
and immediately speak three or four languages.
He would have, like, babbled.
He had to learn.
And this helps us to feel it and experience it.
You see, if you read all of the Gospels together
and you read the rest of the New Testament,
what you understand is this,
that Jesus was fully human.
He asked questions.
He got tired.
He got hungry.
He had to sleep.
And what it is,
is that if Jesus needed to know something
that a human being wouldn't normally know,
God reveals it to him.
Because it's, in a sense,
every time you see Jesus knowing something
that he couldn't know,
it's a way for you in the story
to enter into the intimacy that he had
with his heavenly father
and the trust he had of his heavenly father,
that his heavenly father would provide for him,
including knowing when he needed to know.
So Jesus asks a question.
He doesn't know the answer.
The woman comes,
and he speaks to her with great peace.
But, remember,
Jesus is now spending time,
and who knows how long it took,
maybe 10 or 15 minutes with the woman,
not just as brief as it was here.
Maybe he was asking questions for 10 or 15 minutes
before the woman finally was brought to the front.
And you can well imagine that Jairus
is hopping up and down on both feet
because he's so anxious.
If he was sitting,
his leg was probably going like that
because he has a daughter
who's on the point of death,
and Jesus is spending time with this woman,
this woman, not his daughter.
I'm sure he'd say,
yeah, yeah, I like that woman.
But my daughter,
my 12-year-old daughter,
she's on the point of death.
And what happens?
Well, terrible news.
Look at verse 49.
While Jesus was still speaking,
while Jesus was still speaking,
someone from the ruler's house came and said,
your daughter is dead.
Do not trouble the teacher anymore.
Now, we just need to pause here for a second,
camp on it for a second.
This describes this room.
I'm guessing
that if we were to have
an open mic for people
to share prayer requests,
I'm guessing there's a couple of people
who could say,
I'd really like to share with you
how God has dramatically answered a prayer
for me this week.
I'd be surprised
if there's not a couple of you
who could get up and share
within the last week,
within the last month,
some dramatic answer to prayer.
And at the same time
that they're sharing,
and maybe after they share,
we all clap
and they go back to their seat,
a few high fives.
But at the same time,
in this very same room,
there are people
who are praying their heart out
and God is not answering their prayers
the way they want.
They prayed for the job.
They didn't get the job.
They prayed for a relationship.
They didn't get the relationship.
They prayed for a child.
They didn't get the child.
They prayed for a good answer from the doctor.
They didn't get the good answer from the doctor.
They prayed for their wayward child.
Their wayward child has gotten more wayward.
We could go on.
Verse 49,
the woman's going back to high fives.
And in the same crowd,
Jairus is crushed.
That's every church service
that you ever attended
in every Christian community.
Right here in the text.
So what happens?
How does the story
continue to resolve itself?
Well, let's look at verse 50.
How does Jesus respond to this?
And by the way,
just before that,
you can well imagine,
can't you?
And this is,
this again is so much
for many of us.
Can't you just imagine
that Jairus is saying,
Jesus,
if you had just
not stopped
for that woman,
my daughter would be well.
My daughter would be well.
So the story continues.
Verse 50.
But Jesus,
on hearing this,
that the girl is dead,
says to the man,
do not fear,
only believe,
she will be well.
That word once again,
well,
can also be translated
as saved.
And in verse 51,
and when he came to the house,
he allowed no one
to enter with him
except Peter and John
and James
and the father
and mother of the child.
Peter,
John,
and James
are three of the apostles,
three of the disciples.
And all were weeping,
verse 52,
and mourning for her.
But he said to the crowd,
do not weep,
for she is not dead,
but is sleeping.
And just so you know,
it's a very ancient metaphor,
but Jesus is using
a metaphor for death.
He knows she's dead,
as the rest of the story
will show.
He knows she's dead,
but he's using,
it's a whole other sermon
about why there could be
for Christians
a metaphor of death
as sleeping.
But that's what he's doing.
But the crowd reacts
in a different way.
Look at verse 53.
And they laughed at him,
knowing that she was dead.
Just sort of pause here
for a second.
Once again,
doesn't this describe life?
Like if you think about it,
if people who are walking by
on the street
knew that there were people
in here who believe
that Jesus is still alive
and that they can talk to him
and he will answer their prayers,
they will laugh at us.
They'd laugh.
They wouldn't laugh.
They're Canadians.
They maybe wouldn't laugh
if we were right with them.
But what they're going on
off to their friends
to have some brunch
or some dim sum
or whatever,
they'll say,
all those stupid people
in there praying,
what a waste of time.
Like that's the real world.
Once again,
so Jesus is in a room
with the five of them.
Nobody has any faith.
There's a dead girl.
Verse 54,
but taking her by the hand,
he called saying,
child, arise.
And her spirit returned.
She got up at once
and he directed
that something should be
given her to eat.
In other words,
she's so healthy
that she not only
becomes alive again
and she's so healed
that she can get up
out of the bed
and she's so healed
that she's hungry.
And he directed
that something
should be given her to eat
and her parents were amazed
but he charged them
to tell no one
what had happened.
Now,
Jesus recalls her spirit
and she's alive.
Now,
some of you might say,
this is just a couple
of coincidences.
You know,
they're not very sophisticated
back then.
They don't know about science
and, you know,
maybe just Jesus startled her
and, whoa,
she's not actually dead
and she wakes up
and, you know,
maybe it's just one
of those things
where, you know,
she was about to get well
all by herself
and it's just a bit
of a coincidence.
And, well,
I mean,
we can't entirely answer that
except to say this.
The other day,
I was in a coffee shop
and I overheard a young guy
explain to an older guy
what he did for a living.
He was an engineer
and he was an engineer
who designs
computer systems
and to protect
against cyber attacks.
And he gave,
I know there's some
computer engineers here.
I'm just going to give
a couple of things
that I overheard him say
because the rest of it
I'd get so wrong
that the engineers
and the computer people
around us
would be going like this.
But just a couple of things.
He gave the analogy.
He said,
so we have algorithms
that can track
when something anomalous
happens.
And so,
like something might be
that all of a sudden
a person accesses
their banking record
at three o'clock
in the morning
and there's an algorithm.
They know that's
an anomalous thing
that that person,
George Sinclair,
never accesses his bank
at three o'clock
in the morning
but nothing necessarily
happens
just because of
one anomalous event.
But what we're working on
is when there's
a cyber attack,
we're working on
recognizing
when there's
a certain type
of pattern
of anomalous events
within a certain
time period
that indicates
that there's an attack
and then having
a way of responding to it.
And that's the algorithm
that we're working on.
And that's a little bit
of the question here.
You could say,
well, okay,
so Jesus,
there's this true
biography
which is written
about Jesus
and it's an ancient
biography
and it records this
and yes,
it might be
a little bit of anomaly
that just at the moment
that she touches
his Jesus
that whoa,
all of a sudden
she's better.
It's just
odd coincidence
but another odd coincidence
about this
and if you go back
and you read the rest
of the book of Luke
and it's an odd coincidence
that this just happened
and this just happened
but at some point in time
you have to wonder
if it's an attack,
if it's a cyber attack,
if it's an invasion.
That the only way
to understand
what's going on
is that there's
something systematic.
So if you could put up
the next point,
Andrew,
that would be
very, very helpful.
So here's what's happening
in the course
of this story.
What Jesus does,
only life himself
can do what Jesus does.
Only life himself
can do what Jesus does.
Only health himself
can do what Jesus does
in this story.
Remember,
one of the things
which is so powerful
about stories
is that the stories
help us to understand.
We can take it
very abstractly
that God creates
all things
or that Jesus is God
and comes and enters in.
And those are just
some doctrines
and for some of us
we love statements
like that of logic
and of great verbal precision
and abstract
and we love it.
But you know what?
For many of us,
how we come to understand
these is we come
to understand them
by reading stories.
And it's not just enough
to understand
that God is God
but that what the Bible
says is this.
In all Eastern religions,
in all Eastern religions,
the fact that you
and I exist
is a result
of a primeval tragedy.
All things were one.
It was just like
there was an ocean
and all of a sudden
difference started to happen.
And it's a tragedy.
And now there's difference.
And now there's you
and now there's me.
And all of life
is at the end of the day
ultimately a tragedy
which ends
by the reincarnation
coming to an end
and then comes oblivion.
The drop of water
merges with the ocean.
And in what is basically
the atheistic worldview
which is on one level
the basic worldview
of most of the modern West.
It's on one level
taught in schools
that everything
that came to be
is just a result.
There's always just been matter
and there's always
just been energy
and matter and energy
start to interact
in scientific ways
in such a way
that eventually
life was produced.
But life came out
of nothing
other than processes.
Life has no inherent meaning
and at the end of it
you will just die.
And the Christian story
is very different.
The Christian story is
that from all eternity
the Father loved the Son
and the Son loved the Father
and the Holy Spirit
is on one level
both another person
but He's also
the actual love
which eternally flows
from the Father
to the Son
and from all eternity
there was a life.
God the Father
and the Son
and the Holy Spirit
three persons
one God
He is alive
and out of life
and out of love
God creates.
And the tragedy
of sickness and death
and our fallen creation
comes out of our
prideful rebellion
against God.
But life
is what
life comes out of.
And so what the Bible
here is picturing
is that life
well
could you put up
the next point Andrew?
What we see in this miracle
is that life
is invading
now we would say
it in the past tense
life
has invaded
His dying creation
to put things right
and deliver
His fallen image bearers.
Life has invaded
His dying creation
to begin to put things right
and deliver
His fallen image bearers.
There used to be a man
who came to the church
for a few years
he was a great old guy
his name was Jacques
and he was from France
and he
I believe he's passed away now
and he grew up
in a small little area
in France
very close to the coast
and one night
during the
Second World War
him and his family
heard gunfire
very close to the house
just in the lower field
not the field
right by his house
but just the lower field
they heard gunfire
and screaming
and they stayed
inside the house
they were under
Nazi occupation
and they just stayed
in the house
but the next morning
when it was light
he went out
and he found
the body
of an American
GI
in his lower field.
He found the dead body
of an American soldier
in Nazi
occupied Europe
and he didn't realize that
but later on in the day
in the next day
he discovered
that that was
a paratrooper
who had come in
the night before
D-Day
and that at the same time
that he was discovering
the dead body
the Allied forces
had landed
very close to where he lived.
There was an anomaly
of a dead American GI
in his lower field
but it wasn't just an anomaly
it was an indication
that the invasion
had begun
and that's what
every miracle is
in the gospel
it is evidence
that the invasion
had begun.
In this case
last week
I talked about
how the creator himself
had entered
invaded his dying
or fallen creation
here in a sense
to understand
that God
is life
life has invaded
his dying creation
to begin to put
things right
and deliver
his fallen
image bearers.
this is not just
an anomaly
it is an anomaly
that indicates
the invasion
has begun
and we know
that it will come
to an end.
But some of you
might say
well George
I don't have
faith to believe
something like this
I'm too skeptical
I'm too broken
you know
it's just
too hard
it's just
too hard
to believe
something
I just can't
possibly have
faith or belief
in it.
Well the story
actually has
some things
to say
about that
whole response
of not having
you know
faith
or enough
belief.
See part of the
problem is
that we say
we don't have
enough belief
we don't have
enough faith.
you know
in our culture
or just
we do know
that actually
belief and faith
is very very
important
just in general
it's very important.
You can't have
human relationships
and you can't
have love
relationships
if you don't
have some
degree of trust.
I've met
people
who've been
so beat up
by life
just so
betrayed
and beat up
by life
their parents
in many cases
literally beat
them up
and abused
them
and in some
tragic cases
they were just
beat up
by the judicial
system
by the
foster system
by their
siblings
and they
are just
so beat
up
by life
that they
can no
longer
trust
anybody
at all
virtually
trust
nobody
at all
and they
live very
very very
very isolated
lives
and miserable
lives
because the
fact of the
matter is
you can't
have a
friend
you can't
have a
wife
or a
husband
you can't
actually even
go to the
police
or go to
a contractor
you can't
go to a
bank
if you
don't have
some degree
of trust
so on one
level in our
culture we
understand the
real importance
of love
but the problem
in our culture
is that we
want to create
make it look
as if somehow
or another
that
well you know
how many movies
talk about how
you just have to
have trust
you just have to
believe
you just have to
you just
it's as if
almost trust
or belief
is a type of
a power
that you
have
and if
you have
this type
of power
if you
just believe
in people
if you
just believe
that Santa
is going
to come
if you
just believe
that things
are going
to be
right
then things
are all
going to
be right
but if
you can't
go sort of
all the way
to the other
extreme
because on
one hand
we can
understand
that there's
things that
happen that
take away
any ability
to love
or any ability
to trust
but we're also
aware of the
fact that in
our culture
there's lots
of things
and people
and movements
that just
aren't
trustworthy
like the
abused
woman
that just
keeps trusting
her husband
and she
goes back
and he just
continues to
abuse her
and she
goes to the
hospital
she goes
to the
shelter
and then
she goes
back
and he
beats her
up
and she
just keeps
trusting him
what the
Bible says
is the
Bible talks
about
importance
of faith
obviously
but it
always puts
it at a
second level
if you could
put up the
next point
Andrew
that would
be very
helpful
who or
what you
place your
faith in
matters far
more than
the power
or purity
of your
faith
who or
what you
place your
faith in
matters far
more than
the power
or purity
of your
faith
and
and that's
what the
Bible is
showing us
right here
the Bible
is trying to
portray to
us
how
spectacularly
trustworthy
Jesus is
in a way
that will
start to
elicit
our faith
the Bible
doesn't come
to us and
say just
believe
just have
faith
do these
exercises
take
meditation
take drugs
take therapy
so that you
will build
your faith
what the Bible
says is
that who
or what
you put
your faith
and trust
in
matters
vastly
more
than the
amount of
faith that
you have
I might
have next
to no
faith
whatsoever
that if I
get on a
plane
that I will
arrive safely
at the other
end of my
destination
but it doesn't
matter how
strong my
faith is
what matters
is that the
plane is
trustworthy
it's always
the object
which matters
more
and that's
why what the
Bible does
here in this
particular story
is that it's
trying to
portray
who Jesus
is and
why he is
so completely
and utterly
trustworthy
but some of
you might say
George okay
you're
that's very
interesting but
what about this
part that you
described of the
unanswered prayer
are you just
saying that
really
I mean
Jairus
he didn't have
any faith
he didn't have
any faith
and Jairus
has his
daughter raised
from the dead
but that's
not my
experience
of prayer
like I
just seem
George to
be going
through such
a long
period of
time where
my prayers
aren't being
answered in
the way that
I hope
and this
story doesn't
solve that
it solves it
in one very
important level
another level
it doesn't
what it does
is it doesn't
tell me why
it is that
sometimes when
I pray
what I pray
for happens
and sometimes
when I pray
God just
says no
and sometimes
when I pray
he takes a
long time to
answer so long
that sometimes
I don't even
remember that I
originally prayed
for it
and sometimes
when I pray
he answers a
prayer but in
a very very
different way
than I'd
expected and
it's only later
on that I
realize that he
answered in
different ways
and this
text doesn't
explain to
me why it
is that those
particular things
happen in my
life but what
it does is it
helps me to
press into the
fact that Jesus
is very
trustworthy
you see if
the story just
ended here
and the Bible
just ended
here I'd be a
little bit
confused about
the object of
faith and the
power of my
faith and why
God does
things and why
he doesn't
do things
but this
story is
part of a
longer story
and in this
longer story
it's moving up
to a culminating
point and the
culminating point
is Jesus dying
upon the cross
and the way we
are to understand
the story is
that when we
come to that
point in the
story and in
the very next
chapter Jesus is
going to in fact
begin to explain
to his disciples
that the entire
reason that he
came was to
die the entire
reason he came
was to die to
die for others
and so it comes
that when he
finally dies with
it's valid for us
to ask ourselves
how is it that a
man who could
raise dead people
to life would
ever allow himself
to die upon the
cross how is it
that a man who
was just touched
by a woman and
she's instantly
healed how is it
that such a person
could ever die on
the cross and what
on earth could it
possibly mean like
how could that even
physically happen if
he can make a dead
person come alive how
is it that even
physically he could
die if he can just
touch somebody in
their life how is it
that he could how is
he could die what
does it mean to have
health die on the
cross what does it
mean to have life
die on the cross
and the answer to
the gospel is that
the only thing that
it can explain that
life would enter to
die for the dead
is love
no amount of human
power can kill life
no amount of human
power could kill
Jesus if he just
wanted to continue to
heal no amount of
human power he
chose to die for
you for me if you
could put up the
point Andrew what we
see in the story is
that Jesus dies a
slave's death he's
bleeding it means he's
unclean he dies on a
cross which means he's
cursed he's dying on a
cross which means he
has the status of a
slave and he dies
condemned and Jesus
died a slave's death
unclean cursed and
condemned so that you
might become his
child clean blessed
righteous and eternally
alive
and this we receive by
faith Jesus died a
slave's death unclean
cursed and condemned so
that you might become his
child clean blessed
righteous and eternally
alive I don't make
myself alive in Christ
he makes me alive I
don't make myself clean
he makes me clean I
don't make myself blessed
he blesses me I don't
remove the curse he
removes the curse I
don't by having a
powerful faith have a
life that will survive
death he calls me when I
am dead like he called
Jairus his daughter he
takes my hand when I am
dead he calls my name
when I am dead and his
call and his touch seen
completely and utterly
pictured upon the cross is
what makes me clean makes me
blessed makes me alive makes
me righteous makes me as
child and so I do not
know why it is that God
answers my prayers and
does not answer my
prayers the way that he
does but what I know is
that he's for me he's for
me at the deepest possible
level that will go into
eternity he is for me at
the deepest possible cost to
himself and so I can live
God of gratitude please
stand
let's bow our heads in
prayer
Jesus if some of us are
willing to be honest with
each other right now we
stop praying because we
think it's not worthwhile
cynicism has poisoned our
soul and if we're honest
father some of us don't
believe we're being cynical
we're just being more aware
we're more realistic but
father we don't want to
confess that a cynicism and
a lack of faith has started
to permeate who we are and
robbed us of prayer and father
some of us are struggling with
prayers that aren't going the
way we want and we don't
know why some of us father
have had fantastic prayers and
father we thank you that we
thank you that Jesus is for us
at the deepest level
that because he is our savior
and our lord you want us to
pour out our heart to you in
prayer to pray for big things
and for small things that you
delight in our prayers that you
hear them and we know father
we know lord Jesus that you
answer them that you approach
them out of the deepest
possible love for us a love
that was deeply costly for us a
love that saves us so father we
ask that you would both increase
our honesty in prayer and our
boldness in prayer and increase
within us father more and most
importantly of all to be gripped
by the gospel in such a powerful
way that we will understand what it
is that Jesus has done for us who
he is that we pray for and his
great love for us and all these
things we ask in the name of Jesus
your son and our savior amen
your heart in prayer for us a
builds for us and our weer
and our minds of Jesus
God radiant and above me
and our honor Joker thank you
and that's his firm person
for us to pray and share
for us with our God
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