Sermon 11/10/13
Mark 5:21-43
Immediately: A Woman Healed, a Girl
Resurrected
(Damsel, I
say unto thee, arise!)
Have you ever been trying to accomplish something, some
task, and found that you were nearly constantly interrupted? Sometimes we want to be interrupted – I can’t tell
you how many other things I can find to do while I’m supposed to be writing my
sermon! But sometimes, just when we’re getting productive, just when we feel like we might actually start checking
things off our to-do list, just when we feel like we’re “in the zone,” that’s
when a stream of people knock on the door, or call on the phone, or just need a
few minutes of your time. Interruptions!
I think of learning, as a child, that interrupting is rude. This is an
important lesson for children to learn, because children usually think of all
of their concerns as demanding immediate attention. I want this and I want it
now! My mother used to joke that my three brothers and I might not need anything
from her for hours, but if she would take a phone call, talking to someone else, suddenly all four of us needed her
time; all of us were interrupting her, seeking her attention. Think of the
responses you might hear a parent give to an interrupting child: “Not right
now.” “In a little bit.” “Just a minute.”
Or think of the person who, when you see them, your mind
races to find some way, some excuse, some ruse you can come up with to avoid
interacting with them – because you know that you have only five minutes before
you have to be somewhere and you know that conversations with this person never
last for less than an hour. You know what I’m talking about! Where an
interruption will turn into not just a pause in your day but a screeching halt?
Today’s gospel lesson from Mark finds Jesus being
interrupted while he’s on his way to resolve another interruption. Jesus has traveled across the Sea of
Galilee, and finds crowds waiting for him on his arrival. The crowds included a
man named Jairus, a synagogue leader, and perhaps one of a group that did not
usually welcome Jesus and his way of teaching in the synagogues with open arms.
But, Jairus, it seems, has no such qualms about Jesus, at least not in this
case. His daughter is sick, and he knows, believes fully, that Jesus’ touch
will heal her. Jesus doesn’t hesitate, but follows Jairus to his home.
On the
way there, the crowds continue to follow him. One among the crowds is a woman
suffering for some twelve years from hemorrhages. We read that she has seen
physicians and poured money into her care without result. She tries to get to
Jesus in the crowd, just to touch his clothes, confident she will be made well.
She reaches him, and is healed immediately.
Jesus knows he’s been touched – he can feel it. He looks to see who touched
him. The disciples discourage him, wanting to get on with it, get going. But he
stops, and takes the time to seek her out. When she comes forward, scared, and
tells him what she did, Jesus says to her, with gentleness, “daughter, your
faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.” Then,
while he’s still speaking, as if in rebuke for his taking time with the woman,
people come from the Jairus’ house to say that the girl has already died, and
not to bother with Jesus coming. Jesus simply responds, “Do not fear, only
believe.” He proceeds as planned to the house, and entering, seeing the
mourners, asks, “Why do you make a commotion and weep? The child is not dead
but sleeping.” Of course, they laugh at him. Surely, even without advanced
technology, people could tell the difference between sleeping and death. Jesus
sends them outside, and takes the child’s hand, and says, “little girl, get
up.” And immediately she gets up. And
they were all properly amazed.
We see
Jesus as a healer again and again in the scriptures, and this passage gives us
a healing and a resurrection. We are reminded of Jesus’ powerful ability to
bring healing to our lives when we let him. But this text has a unique
structure – a story within a story – a healing within a healing – and I think
we can learn from the structure of the story itself – from the fact that Jesus
heals one woman while on his way to
see another. This is a story of Jesus being interrupted, and what he does when
that happens.
There’s a wise woman in this congregation who has told me
that one of the things that frustrates her most is when people say they don’t
have time to do something. If we want to do something badly enough, she
insists, we’ll find the time. If we were being honest, we’d just say, “That’s
not a priority in my life right now,” when we receive a request and our answer
is going to be “no.” But, I suspect many of us – and I know I do this – opt to
say: “I don’t have time.” I think we like the way that sounds better. It sounds
better than saying, “this thing that you are asking me to do isn’t as important
to me right now as other things I’ve chosen to do with my time.” When is the
last time you told someone you didn’t have time? What were they asking you to
do? Would it have been more accurate to say that something wasn’t a priority
for you right then? I think about her words often, and try to remind myself of
what I really mean when I think I don’t have time.
I’m amazed, in ministry, at how often it is the gift of
time that people find most valuable. I’ve shared with some of you that I spent
time interning as a chaplain at Crouse while I was in seminary, working
primarily in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, the NICU. It took me a while to
learn that parents of struggling newborns already knew I couldn’t fix their problems for them, even though I wanted
to desperately. What I could do
though, was give them my time – sit with them, without filling the time with clichés about their suffering. We fancy it up
in the church by calling it the “ministry of presence.” Being there with someone. When one of us – pastors and lay people
alike – spends time visiting a shut-in or hospitalized member of our church
family – that time spent is so valued by the person being visited. Honestly,
sometimes I find it embarrassing how thankful someone can be that I’ve spent
thirty minutes or forty-five minutes of time with them. It makes me wonder what
we typically communicate to one another if people feel like we’ve done
something extraordinary when we give them a small piece of our time.
One of the only things Jesus ever seems to ask of anyone for
his own benefit is in the gospels when, just before he is betrayed and arrested,
Jesus is spending time in the garden praying. Repeatedly, he asks for the
disciples to stay awake, to remain with him.
They can’t do it. They’re too tired or overwhelmed, emotionally spent. What
Jesus wants is not that they solve his problems – they can’t. But that while
he’s grieving what he must go through, he would be surrounded by people who
love him. He wants their presence. Their time. Their company.
In fact, how we are present or not present with one another, how we do or don’t see each other is the measure by which
we are judged, Jesus says. Recall the parable of the sheep and goats. Notice,
when Jesus talks about what separates the sheep from the goats, the king doesn’t say: You sent me food and drink, you sent
me clothing. No, the exchange between the king and the people revolves
around when they saw the king or
failed to see the king in their
interactions spending time with other
people. It is the time spent visiting, the time spent caring for the sick, the
time spent welcoming the stranger – face to face time – that Jesus notes as
significant. In order to see Jesus in people you actually have to spend some
time with them!
Why is it that giving someone our time is so important?
Why might someone be so thankful for forty-five minutes of our time? I suspect,
it is as that wise woman has said: Our time says that something is a priority. And
making something a priority says that that thing, whatever it is, person or
event or activity – that thing is worth
our time. That thing is valuable. And
that is the key. That is what Jesus is about in his ministry – letting people know –
particularly the ones who have been told otherwise
over and over again through the actions of others – often through the actions
of those claiming to be closest to God – letting people know that they are worth time. They are valuable.
The question I want us to ask ourselves is this: What
does the way we spend our time say about who
we find valuable? Who do we consider “worthy?” Now, I’m suspecting for most
of us, that our families and dear friends are near the top of our list. They’re
certainly on the top of my list. But the scriptures remind us that we actually can’t
pat ourselves on the back for that – even those who are evil, Jesus says, can
take care of “their own.” Who else is
worth your time? Who else have you
made a priority? And perhaps, some harder questions: Are only certain people –
certain kinds of people – worth your
time? Who hasn’t made the cut? Jesus
spends huge chunks of his time with the most vulnerable. He doesn’t have money
to send them. He’s not adored by the poor, the sinners, the outcasts because
he’s giving them things. No, he gives them himself.
He gives them value and worth because he knows them and spends time with them.
Jesus’
ministry is full of interruptions. Everything we read about seems to happen
when he’s on the way somewhere. He’s
on his way somewhere else when he sees Zacchaeus in a tree and makes plans to
eat dinner with him. He’s eating dinner with people when a woman anoints his
feet with oil. He’s hanging out at a wedding when he’s called on by his mother
to change water into wine. He’s in the middle of teaching when a man is lowered
through the roof to be healed. He’s on his way to heal a sick girl, when he’s
interrupted by a woman who needs healing and disciples who don’t consider the
woman worth Jesus’ time. But Jesus always seems to have time. The woman is
healed immediately. And a girl to be
healed becomes a girl to be resurrected – but Jesus can do that too, and she
gets up immediately. Because each
person – two people, in this case, who were ritually unclean in one way or
another – each person is worth it to Jesus. Valuable.
You can rest assured that Jesus would stop in his tracks
for you. Be interrupted for you. You’re worth God’s time, right now. Immediately.
Who is worth yours? Who will make you
stop in your tracks?
Amen.
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