12 Years

Over the past couple of years of blogging, I have written quite a lot about the woman who had bled for 12 years. But it wasn’t until the past couple of weeks that I took the bigger story into account. I mean, her healing took place as Jesus was on His way to go see the daughter of Jairus, a religious ruler, who was dying. Talitha. That was her name, meaning little girl.

Talitha was 12 years old.

That means that when this little girl’s life began, this bleeding women’s life would have begun to slip away. And when this women’s life would begin again, this little girl’s life would slip away.

Where the story begins…

Jairus was a religious ruler, he would have known the law, and he would have enforced the law. He would also know what was said about Jesus. Word spreads fast. He would have known what was said in the local synagogues, and he would have known what His followers have said about Him. And that drove a hope in him that lead him to do what he did next.

 He pleaded earnestly with him, “My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live.”
Mark 5:23

His daughter was dying and this Man could heal people, at least that is what the word on the street would have been. A crowd had formed around Jesus, but when Jairus saw Him, he fell at His feet and begged Him to come and lay His hands on his little girl so she could live. She was only 12 years old.

I am not sure what caused Jairus to believe enough in a Man who continually loved through the law, and did what was lawfully unthinkable. What would his friends think of what he was doing? But it had to have been hope. The hope that maybe regardless of what people would think of him if he believes in who this Jesus guy is, just maybe this Man is actually who people claim Him to be. Maybe Jesus really could heal his dying little girl. That is desperate. About as desperate as what happens next in the same crowd of people.

Jesus went with him, and the crowd followed. And this is where the woman who had been bleeding for 12 years comes up in the crowd to touch His robe.

Daughter, your faith has healed you.

He would have known that she was unclean, and that anyone that she touched would become unclean as well. Lawfully, anyone. And I could only imagine that what was going through his head as Jesus stopped on His way to healing Talitha was that He was stopping for someone that had touched Him who was unclean.

My daughter, now what? My only hope is slipping away at the hands of someone who is unclean…we are running out of time… I am so glad that this women’s faith has healed her but what about MY faith for my daughter?!?

As Jesus is declaring to her her healing because of her faith, messengers arrive to tell Jairus that His daughter has died.

Your daughter is dead. There is not use troubling the Teacher now.

Was he thinking? No, No, No. Not my Talitha, my little girl. How could this happen? He was going to heal her, I know He was.

Yet Jesus says, Don’t be afraid, just have faith.

Just have faith. Has anyone ever said that to you? Just have faith. I actually don’t like it when people say this to me, because it is so hard to “just have faith”. I mean maybe that would have been easy for Jairus if he hadn’t just gotten news that his daughter had died.

Don’t be afraid. Just have faith

But this is written in the red letters friends, because it is spoken by Jesus.

But faith must have been all he had as he followed Jesus to his home, and Jesus calls her to get up. And she does.

And sometimes faith is all we can have when our situations are as desperate as a women who has bled for 12 years, and a 12 year old who is dying.

I want to share with you some of what has stuck out to me when reading this account as a bigger picture.

• His love for the least of these, the unclean, and the outcast, does not change His love for you.
• Other people’s miracles will not take away from His work in your life.
• His love is available to everyone. It does not matter if you are a government official, or the one who the law considers untouchable.
• Sometimes you just have to have faith.

I am not sure where you are with you walk with Christ. Maybe you have never heard of Him, or have heard of Him and have just enough faith to believe that He can restore what is broken in your life. Maybe you are seeing other people get healed, and feel like His healing is for everyone else but you. Or maybe you are seeing other people’s faith move mountains, as your faith has been crushed.

Wherever you are, He loves you and would tell you that even when you are faithless; He is faithful. He would tell you that His love is for you, and that even when things feel dead, He is not done working.