Below is the sermon I preached at St Martin's Community Church on July 2nd, 2006. This was SO tough, because I just don' know what I believe about healing, so it was a challenge to preach on it, but I did it, and apparently it went well. In typical Sarah style, I felt completely numb after it, and can't even remember if I read what I wrote! :)
Good morning! I feel so honoured to be here, and standing before you as a member of the
I must confess that I did feel a little daunted by the lectionary bible readings for today, as they were some pretty heavy issues covered. Death of our enemies in 2nd Samuel chapter 1, stewardship or if you speak modern English - responsibility in 2nd Corinthians chapter 8 or healing and the raising of the dead in Mark Chapter 5. These are not topics I generally think about very often, and they are certainly not the types of issues I would cover by choice in a sermon.
Then as I was in the midst of writing today’s message, when I thought I had finally decided about what to speak about today, my Grandfather and my Auntie died within a matter of days. I don’t want to say that this was divine intervention, but I suddenly began to realize the important message contained in two of these biblical passages. At first look 2nd Sam 1 and Mark 5 don’t really have a lot to do with each other. One speaks of death and mourning and the other about healing. However as I began the process of grieving and supporting my family through our hard time, I realized that in actual fact, both passages give some really significant messages about the healing process.
Now each of these passages, could have an hour long sermon attached to them, but don’t worry, I won’t preach for three hours, I won’t even preach for one! But I will talk about three significant lessons to be learned from the readings today.
The first lesson we can learn is that in order for healing to occur, sometimes forgiveness must first take place.
In 2nd Samuel 1 we read about David encouraging the people of
My Auntie Phylis was a wonderful and godly woman. She was kind and compassionate and always made time for each member of our family. Despite living in
My Grandad on the other hand was estranged from our family, and after a few failed attempts at reconciliation, he decided it was all too hard, and we didn’t hear from him again, until the phone call came from his wife to tell my mother he had died. The instant reaction from my mums sisters was “Good riddance”, however, my mother is now not only mourning the loss of her father, but also with the loss of any opportunity for reconciliation. I imagine that perhaps when Saul and Jonathan died, David was feeling similar to my mother.
On the one hand he was mourning the loss of a wonderful and godly friend, much like my mother is mourning the loss of our Auntie Phyl. But at the same time, there’s the death of Saul, who lead Israel for many years, but who was incredibly hurtful towards David, even attempting to kill him, much like my Grandfather did, albeit emotionally not physically, to his relationship with my mother.
A beautiful song written by David is found in 2 Sam: 1. The passage tells us that David taught this song, called the Song of Bow, to the men of
I encourage you to read this song carefully in your own time. You can find it in 2 Samuel 1:17-27 but today I’m only going to focus on a few key verses:
In verse 23, David reminds
“Saul and Jonathan – in life they were loved and gracious, and in death they were not parted. They were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions. O daughters of Israel, weep for Saul, who clothed you in scarlet and finery, who adorned your garments with ornaments of gold.”
I imagine it was really difficult for David to remind his people that Saul was a good man. It’s certainly not the Saul he saw during his life. However, David reminds the people that
When reading the song David wrote for Saul and Jonathan, we can feel the love he felt for his best friend Jonathan and the grief he was feeling at the news of his death. In verse 26 David writes “I grieve for you, Jonathan my brother; you were very dear to me, Your love for me was wonderful, more wonderful than that of women.”
In his humanness, I’m sure David would have loved to have mourned just over the death of Jonathan, and celebrated the death of King Saul, however he did the opposite, and as a result of his leadership during this time, was made King of Israel, despite the fact that position should have gone to Saul’s other son.
I don’t think that was the reasoning behind David’s gracious leadership during the period of mourning. I sense that David had some deeper sense of wisdom during this time. You see, David did not get the opportunity to reconcile with Saul in life. However, how he reacted to the death of the man who considered him an enemy, was vital to how he would be seen in the future. How David was treated by Saul, was Saul’s sin. It would have become David’s sin had he not forgiven Saul. In this passage, when we look deeply, we can see that forgiveness can lead to healing, and healing leads to life. By David forgiving Saul, he did not say that Saul was right in treating him badly, what he did do was say that he was not going to allow that to stand in his way of becoming the man God called him to be. He remained faithful to God, forgave his enemy, and in turn, God was faithful to him, and healed him of his pain.
It would be easy for my mother to say “Good riddance” in reaction to her fathers death. But by going to his funeral, as an act of forgiveness, she has opened herself up to the healing God wants to give her for all the years of heartache and pain she’s felt at the hands of her father. There are probably things in each of our lives that we need to forgive others for, and I can assure you, from experience, that once you forgive, you make way for God to heal your pain. Sometimes, we will not get the chance for reconciliation in life, that takes two people to humble themselves and seek forgiveness. However, we can forgive and move on with our lives. Had David not humbled himself, forgiven Saul and lead people in their grief, I’m not convinced he would have been made King.
Mark Chapter 5 gives us two other lessons surrounding healing. In this chapter we find a story about a man named Jairus, a religious ruler, kind of an elder in today’s church terms I guess. He would have been considered an “important” man in their community. His 12 year old daughter was close to death, and out of desperation, Jairus raced to find Jesus, and asked him to come and heal her. Whilst Jesus was on his way to help Jairus, he is interrupted by a woman who’s so desperate for healing, she reaches out in faith for it.
The first message we can learn from Mark 5, is about the woman who was healed by her faith. The lesson here is that God uses our faith in healing. We read about this woman in vs 24-34:
“24Jesus went with him, and the crowd thronged behind. 25And there was a woman in the crowd who had had a hemorrhage for twelve years. 26She had suffered a great deal from many doctors through the years and had spent everything she had to pay them, but she had gotten no better. In fact, she was worse. 27She had heard about Jesus, so she came up behind him through the crowd and touched the fringe of his robe. 28For she thought to herself, "If I can just touch his clothing, I will be healed." 29Immediately the bleeding stopped, and she could feel that she had been healed!
30Jesus realized at once that healing power had gone out from him, so he turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who touched my clothes?"
31His disciples said to him, "All this crowd is pressing around you. How can you ask, `Who touched me?' "
32But he kept on looking around to see who had done it. 33Then the frightened woman, trembling at the realization of what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and told him what she had done. 34And he said to her, "Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace. You have been healed."
The first thing we need to understand when reading this passage is that Jesus was at a point in his ministry where he was becoming quite famous. People had become aware of the work that Jesus was doing, and the miracles he was performing, and wanted to be in on the action. Whispers and rumours would have started to circulate. People would have been going to their local priests and asking them who this preacher guy was.
I think sometimes we forget that Jesus was quite famous. Or we picture a few church like people following him around, a bit like a Hillsong concert. But we can assume it was so much bigger than that. He was one of the celebrities of his day.
I imagine when Jesus was around it was more like when Nicole Kidman came home to Sydney last week to get married. All of the sudden, there’s whispers going around town that she’s going to get married, they find her local priest and question him, they alert the media, everywhere she turns, there are well wishers ready to talk to her, touch her, take her photo, everyone in the world wants to know when and where she’s going to be getting married, they crash her hens night and her wedding.
Now of course in Jesus time, there wasn’t the internet, or cameras, or phones, or any other form of technology we have today. But when Jesus came to town, he was followed by people who’s lives he’d changed. And people would stop and ask them why they were following this man. When they heard about this preacher who was performing miracles, word would travel around the towns, and crowds would gather, hoping to see a miracle. People would have been clammering to get his attention “Hey Jesus, heal me”, “Hey preacher man, help us”, “Hey over here come to my place for dinner”, complete hysteria is often the picture that’s painted when Jesus came to town. And in the midst of it all, Jesus is “interrupted” by a woman so desperate for healing, she reaches out to touch his cloak.
But for this woman, there is more we need to understand. She had been hemorrhaging for a very long time. Some of you may already know, that during biblical times, when a woman was having her monthly cycle, she was not allowed out in public. We read about this in Leviticus 15:19-30. It’s a pretty long passage, but essentially what it says is that a woman who is going through her menstrual cycle is unclean, and anything that she touches is unclean, therefore she should stay within the house during this time. If the bleeding is longer than her menstrual cycle, then she is unclean for the amount of time she is bleeding, plus an extra seven days. Now my dad lived with five sisters, before marrying and having two daughters, I reckon he probably thinks this is a good custom! But imagine what this woman would have gone through. Forgotten by many of her friends. Unable to be healed by doctors. Scared because she didn’t know what was going on with her. Sick and desperate, she displays much courage and ventures out in public. Perhaps she did this out of the wisdom of God knowing Jesus was the Saviour, or perhaps she was hoping for some magic, but either way, she reached out and touched Jesus. Now remember, by touching him when she was unclean, she is essentially making him unclean also.
Lets try to compare what this woman was going through with some of today’s illnesses. There are people in our society who are shunned because of their illness. Perhaps there are people here today to whom society has forgotten, and who already know or who want to know what the healing touch of Jesus is like. When I read this story, I’m reminded of my friend, who I will call Daniel for today. Daniel was a model in his early life, an extremely attractive man with the world at his fingertips however, after years of being given free drugs and free alcohol, he was wracked with addiction. The industry forgot him. His friends no longer called. Years of drug abuse have induced schitzophrenia, and due to his addictions, he would often feel he didn’t need his medication, so would suffer from major psychotic episodes. He was considered a no-hoper. That was until he stepped foot in church. Daniel attended church for nearly a year, not wanting to bother anyone with his problems, with his pain, thinking he wasn’t worthy of this God we talked about, let alone worthy of new friends, especially the goody goody Christians. We all got to know him a bit, and loved him deeply in that time. But we had no idea the sort of torment he was going through, desperate to give up his addictions. One night, after a major episode, he reached out to Jesus. He was not immediately healed of his schitzophrenia, but he was healed of his inability to ask for help. Within a month, with a lot of help and counseling, he had stopped drinking and using drugs. And within six months, he had moved in with people from church, who ensured he was taking his medication. Nearly a year on and has not had a major episode since that time. It is as though Jesus looked into his eyes and told him “Your faith has healed you”
It’s important to notice, that unlike my friend Daniel, the woman was not only completely healed of her medical ailment, but that she was IMMEDIATELY healed. One of the dangerous things some churches preach about is that the only reason we don’t get physically healed is our faith is not strong enough. Daniel has a strong faith, but for him, his healing comes through the medication the doctors give him. Also, his healing didn’t come immediately, he had to work for it. In most of the other healing stories in the bible, people were required to DO something in order to be healed, to go and wash themselves, to GET UP and walk, go and present themselves to the church, but in this story, she didn’t have to do anything, her faith healed her. We need to remember, that sometimes we need to DO something in order to receive our healing, Daniel needed to learn to ask for help and needed to stop drinking and using drugs. David needed to forgive Saul and lead his people in a time of mourning. At other times, like with this woman, Jesus will just step in and heal us instantly.
What’s even more important, is that Jesus knew that healing power had gone out from him, and he started to ask, ”Who touched my clothes”. The disciples thought he was absolutely mad! There were heaps of people around, many people probably touched his clothing. However, he knew that there was someone who had touched him in order to be healed, and I suspect he wanted to look her in the eyes and speak to her. As she realized he was looking for her, she got a little frightened, she probably thought he was going to be angry because she’d made him unclean, so she threw herself at his feet. But he was not angry, instead, he looked her in the eyes, and very affectionately told her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you.” When you ask for healing, when you reach out and touch Jesus, asking him in return to touch you, he will not be angry. He will not look down on you for your sin. He will affectionately look at you, take you in his arms and tell you that your faith has healed you.
The final message about healing that these passages give us, is that healing does not always happen in our timing. Remember Jairus? Let’s read a bit more about him:
Mark 5:22-23 says “A leader of the local synagogue, whose name was Jairus, came and fell down before him, pleading with him to heal his little daughter. “She is about to die” he said in desperation. Please come and place your hands on her; heal her so she can live”.
We learn in verse 24 that Jesus went with him.
Now imagine how Jairus would have felt when Jesus stopped in the midst of his journey to heal his daughter, and healed another woman… more than that, touched an “unclean” woman. He was probably feeling a bit like “Come on lets get out of here, ignore her, lets get on with healing my little girl, quick she’s dying!”. Now the bible doesn’t say this is what happens, but remember Jairus was an important man in his community, and was probably feeling pretty desperate. Jesus was his last hope of healing his little girl.
We continue Jairus story after the interruption by the woman in verse 35:
“35While he was still speaking to her, messengers arrived from Jairus's home with the message, "Your daughter is dead. There's no use troubling the Teacher now."
36But Jesus ignored their comments and said to Jairus, "Don't be afraid. Just trust me." 37Then Jesus stopped the crowd and wouldn't let anyone go with him except Peter and James and John. 38When they came to the home of the synagogue leader, Jesus saw the commotion and the weeping and wailing. 39He went inside and spoke to the people. "Why all this weeping and commotion?" he asked. "The child isn't dead; she is only asleep."
40The crowd laughed at him, but he told them all to go outside. Then he took the girl's father and mother and his three disciples into the room where the girl was lying. 41Holding her hand, he said to her, "Get up, little girl!"[a] 42And the girl, who was twelve years old, immediately stood up and walked around! Her parents were absolutely overwhelmed. 43Jesus commanded them not to tell anyone what had happened, and he told them to give her something to eat”
Imagine what Jairus must have been thinking when they stopped to help the woman, and yet found out that his daughter had died in the mean time. The grief he must have felt would have been enormous. Then Jesus says to him ‘Don’t worry about it Jairus, relax, Trust me.” There’s an important message here. Sometimes, we don’t trust Jesus when he says he’s going to do something. We wait and wait for something to happen, and when it doesn’t we lose faith. But when Jesus promises something, He ALWAYS comes through. He had promised Jairus he would heal his daughter. And even death can’t stop Jesus doing something he promises. That’s the beautiful thing. And even when everyone laughed at them, for going in to wake a dead girl, they continued to trust, and as a result, received an overwhelming gift, their daughter. Notice here that Jesus didn’t want them to tell anyone what had happened. This was a private healing.
Sometimes what we go through is just for us to experience, our experience with God is special. Our healing that has occurred when Jesus has come through for us, is to strengthen our faith, not everyone elses. That’s what happened here. Jesus wanted Jairus to see that he would keep his promises, and that nothing could hold him back from keeping them, not even death. If you’ve been waiting for healing, and it hasn’t been coming, perhaps there’s something else going on here, a lesson we’re to be learning. Does Jesus want to heal us? Yes, absolutely. Does he always do it in our timing? Nope, not a chance. But the lessons we’ll learn through the journey to healing, will be priceless, and personal.
