In this week's lesson, two people approach Jesus. Like the disciples from last week, they are in trouble. Like them, they turn to Jesus. Unlike them, one of those approaching him is a leader of the synagogue. He comes publicly. The other is a woman who has been suffering from a hemorrhage for over a decade.
An insider and an outsider. Both have faith in him. (Look back at the verses the lectionary skipped, 5:1-20. Jesus performs exorcisms in gentile territory.)
The disciples seem pretty much oblivious. He healed a woman right in front of them, but they don't notice. They are overwhelmed by the crowd.
Not the main point, but an interesting one, nevertheless. What great healings of ungreat people are happening and we don't see it or expect it?
Comment posted in 2009:
zeke said...- i was struck by another message. jesus is in a hurry to heal jairus' daughter. it is an important person (a pharisee?) who is asking his help. in the middle of this "ambulance call" jesus stops the ambulance. someone else has taken his attention away from the girl. that someone else is supposed to be an outcast someone separated from the community by her bloody discharge. yet this outcast is the most important person in the world to him at that moment. he takes time and allows her to tell him her story. he tells her to go in peace. jesus' mission was to seek the outcast and make them whole. churches too should not be content with "churching" the people who comfortably sit in the pews, but should reach out to the misfits and those who struggle. the question is how do we do that? do we content ourselves with the fact that all are welcome at our church or do we meet them on their own turf.
Una Malachica said...- now you've got me pondering. what do we mean by the phrase "our church"? If we are followers of Jesus, why are we making a distinction between the turf that is theirs and the turf that is ours? That is, whose church is it, anyway?
zeke said...
