One touch

Luke 8:43-48

 

She slips into the crowd with a desperate push. She shuts her mind to the thought of what might happen if she is found out. No one will notice she is here. No one ever notices.

Unclean.

This is her name now. Her life. Twelve years of the bleeding that won’t stop, twelve years of the hemorrhaging away of her self and everything she once knew. Now she is only this steady flow of suffering. This disease no one can heal has taken all she has. This thing she never sought, never asked for, has made her an outcast. Unclean means unseen. Unfit. Unlovely. Unwanted.

Even touching others will make them unclean too. When was the last time she felt a human touch? She grits her teeth and pushes on as the crowd presses in around her. They will never know. She gasps at the unfamiliar presence of so many people. She trembles as she stumbles forward. Just keep your eyes on him.

She’s heard the stories and seen the evidence of his power. He has touched the unclean, has gone in among them as if he were born to do so, wading right into the suffering and ignoring the shocked faces of the religious leaders. His touch heals.

But how can she stop him with so many people watching? To beg him to touch her? How could she ask such a thing? What will they say when they realize how close they have been to her, she who does not have the right to be there, who has made them all unclean by her presence? And how can her shame bear up under the gaze of such power?

She pushes closer, inching toward the man who holds her only hope. The people crush her in their jostling to see him. They shout his name, scream for his attention, elbowing her in her slow fear. She cannot see him now. She will never be heard.

Through the press she sees only the edge of his robe. She fears him, but she fears more the desperation of this life of shame.

Touch his robe. Only touch him and you will be healed. She believes. She reaches out through the throng, fingertips brushing the fringe of his robe, the barest whisper of connection.

She stops. She falls to the ground. Power courses through her like living light. She feels the healing. Is this what it is to be whole? She weeps with the wonder.

Suddenly she is aware of the stillness, the thick silence. The crowd has stopped. A space has opened around him. They stare at Jesus as his question rings through the air again.

“Who touched me?”

She glances up. He asks the question, but his gaze is fixed on her.

She cannot hide now, but this newness within her gives her courage. Trembling, she kneels at his feet. He stands there, waiting.

“I just want to be clean,” she whispers.

“Daughter.” The word is so tender that she looks up. He is smiling. His eyes are filled with tears.

He takes her hands. The first touch she has felt in all these long years. He gently pulls her to her feet. His gaze, his touch, they fill her with such love and wonder that she forgets everything. This is the healing. Standing here in this moment, looking into that face and knowing she is loved completely.

“Go in peace,” he says, pressing her hands. “Your faith has made you well.”

The moment is broken by urgent voices demanding his attention, and the crowd moves on, some barely pausing to look at her curiously, most hurrying along to see the next big miracle. But his look stays with her, his touch still tingles on her skin.

She didn’t know she needed his love until he gave it to her.

And soon this one whose flow of blood has stopped will hear of his own blood flowing down unstopping, drop by drop, heart breaking for his daughter, heart

stopping for love of her. And he will be unclean. Unseen in cold stone.

But there is One who sees. And his love is a power that raises even the dead. And then she will be truly healed.

You are well. Clean. Whole. Loved.

And one day she will kneel once more at his feet that are scarred with his love, and she will not even dare to touch his robe. But he will touch her again. And this touch will sear her very soul, marking her for all eternity.

“Daughter. Your faith has made you well.”

What to do when all your pigs die. Part I

Mark 5:1-20

He lives among the dead. Naked, crazed, violent, desperate, driven. His people

did not know what to do with him, so it was a relief when he fled to the tombs and stayed there, tormented and alone. Forgotten.

Who knows how he had come under the power of these demons? Perhaps he had actually invited them in himself. Perhaps they had simply seen his weakness and seized it. We only know that he was there, dying with the dead.

He stands upon the shore of the sea, still marveling at what he has seen. A furious storm howling around him like his own torments, hurling waves over the rocks. He had been driven out into that storm, had stood there letting it lash him, wishing it would swallow him up and end it all.

But then.

A sudden swoosh, like a flash of something forgotten, and the storm vanished. Disappeared. Calm settled over the sea in quiet stillness. Stars blazed overhead. He felt the power, and fear and hope surged up as the war within his soul grew frenzied.

Now he stands, watching the speck in the distance become a tiny boat that moves ever closer. He waits. The powers in him pulse with fear. His own heart, so long a prisoner, beats hard.

He does not know the Man, but the spirits in him recognize the Son of God. They throw him down in terror at those holy feet. They beg.

And then.

The Man speaks, his body jerks, and suddenly his soul is as calm as the untroubled sea. He is still. He is free.

He doesn’t even notice the disciples staring slack-jawed at the thousands of pigs squealing and hurling themselves into the water. He looks into the eyes of his Savior, who looks right back with a smile on his face. This Man sees straight into his broken soul and doesn’t flinch away.

The people come running. They see the man they feared, sitting still and calm, and they see a whole herd of pigs floating away in the sea.

They are terrified.

They don’t know who this Man is, only that he has just destroyed their livelihoods and won over one they had learned to fear and hate. And just as the demons begged to be released from this powerful presence, they beg him to leave. No questions asked. Just go.

Sometimes our healing takes different forms. Sometimes it happens all at once; in one glorious moment, the storm within us evaporates. Sometimes it looks like everything we hung our hopes on rushing down the hill, away from us, and plunging into the sea.

I wonder what would have happened if those people had asked Jesus to stay. If they had just heard his voice, listened to what he had to say. If they had stepped through the fear of the sudden unknown and asked.

What are you doing here, Jesus?

And yes, why the heck did you just destroy our pigs? And what do we do now? And why is this crazy man suddenly sane, and what is that light in his eyes?

I wonder what he would have said. Where he would have led them. What wonders he might have done, and how their lives might have changed.

But they were too afraid. And instead of laying hold of the gift that was right there—right there!—they fled from it. They sent it away.

The King of the Universe had just sailed to their shore, and they asked him to leave. They preferred the safety of their grazing pigs to the miracle of the healed wretch.

The life he calls us to is always better than the one he calls us to leave behind. If he drowns your herd of pigs, you'd better believe that’s what you needed. Maybe it’s the only way to get rid of the demons in your life. Maybe it’s the only way to be free. How will you know unless you listen?