Reach out in faith: Luke 8: 41-end: Choral Evensong at St Mary’s on 8th June 2008.  Usha Hull

The journalist and writer Malcolm Muggeridge once said, ‘Everything happening, great and small, is a parable whereby God speaks to us, and the art of life is to get the message.’ Many of the stories in the Gospels about Jesus are like parables. They are about real people, people who are living, loving, needy, damaged, people in need of healing. People, in fact, like you and like me.

In the course of our lives we tend to meet people who are very different from ourselves, yet who are as much part of the rich tapestry of the human race whom God so loves. We come across many a story and many instances that make us pause and think. If God is all around us, in the people we meet, then life itself is rich in happenings that we would do well to heed and meditate upon.

I had occasion to pause for thought recently. In the course of my journey of faith I have always believed that the early morning is a holy time, a time when in a brand new day, yet untouched, we are closer to Heaven. Since the earliest times, Christian tradition has always set aside time for prayer in the early dawn. And on a recent birdwatching holiday in Pembrokeshire, Colin and I visited a Cistercian monastery where we learnt that the monks’ day began at 3.15 in the morning, for some of us a painfully early hour.

Yet getting up at 3.15am is not unusual where monastic life is concerned. What made me pause to think was not that the early dawn is the traditional time for prayer, but the thought that one of the reasons the monks rise to pray so early is because the hour before dawn is the time when human beings are terribly vulnerable. And the more I think about this, the more sense it makes to pray at that particular time.

The darkest hour is the hour before dawn, so the saying goes. This is the hour when hope seems at its lowest ebb, when dawn raids are made to catch people at their most vulnerable, when suffering seems to peak and darkness is at its densest. So it makes perfect sense that this should be a time devoted to prayer, a time when we reach out to touch God. After all, we are people in need, vulnerable, fragile, deeply dependent on the goodness and grace of God. Sometimes in our own lives, in the pain and sadness life inevitably throws at us, the darkest hour before dawn is the time of need preceding the power and healing of God in our lives. And in prayer essentially we reach out in this darkness to touch God in faith.

In today’s reading from Luke we have two stories of faith. Here are two stories that read like living parables. There are two people in need, both vastly different from each other. One, an un-named woman, is despised on account of her illness, held to be unclean, shunned and alone. The other, named as Jairus, is a respected synagogue leader, held in high esteem by the local populace as the synagogue was the centre of worship at the time of Jesus, and Jairus would have been responsible for its administration, building maintenance and worship supervision. Both people, for different reasons, would have found it difficult to approach Jesus directly and openly.

The woman would have been afraid to approach Jesus directly because she was ashamed of her illness and was made to feel ashamed by the attitudes of those around her. According to Leviticus 15, a man who touched such a woman became ceremonially defiled, whether or not the woman was in good health or, as in this case, ill. To protect themselves from this defilement, Jewish men carefully avoided touching, speaking to, or even looking at such women.

So this woman must have had low self esteem. She probably thought that what right had she, an unclean woman of little account, to seek healing from one so good, so pure, so life-giving and strong, other than her absolute need and belief that Jesus could heal her. She probably thought she could remain anonymous in the crowds surrounding Jesus, tapping into the source of healing and life without the source itself being aware of it.

Jairus, however, would have found it difficult to approach Jesus for very different reasons. He was, it seems, a pillar of the local community, respected, listened to, bound by the conventions and local politics of the society he lived in. For such a man, who lived within the constraints of his traditional Jewish culture, to fall the the feet of an itinerant preacher would have been unheard of, for this would have been against all convention and demanded huge courage.

Both these two very different people, fell at the feet of Jesus for very different needs, but both sought the same thing: the life-giving power of God to heal, to restore, to give back all that is good that the cares of life have taken away from us. Both these people defied the conventions of their time, both had faith in the Lord and both showed enormous courage.

In responding to the faith of these two people, God shows us that he is no respecter of rank or privilege, of human convention. No matter who you are, the Lord tells us, only have faith. ‘Trust in me,’ he tells us ‘and all will be well.’ And this holds true no matter how long a problem has lasted, for in the case of the woman she had been ill for twelve years; no matter how hopeless the situation seems, for was not Jairus told his daughter had died; and no matter what your situation in life is, male or female, rich or poor, privileged or despised, because God loves us.

But there is one provision. If we seek healing from the Lord we need to meet him face to face. Jairus came to Jesus openly in front of the crowds. For the love of his daughter he was willing to show the world that he didn’t care what people might say, that what was important was his little girl lying gravely ill. This is the glory of God in the world that when we truly love we are willing to lay everything on the line, willing to risk all, be truly humble.

The woman, on the other hand, preferred to remain anonymous perhaps out of modesty and shame. It is possible that Jesus knew who had touched him. But he wanted the woman to step forward and identify herself. He probably wished this for two reasons. First, he wanted to proclaim to the crowds that this so-called unclean woman who had touched him was a human being loved by God and deserving of recognition and respect. And second, he wanted the woman herself to come face to face with her need for God, for this in itself was a healing in itself.

And so the stories of these two people throw up challenges for all who would have faith in every generation. Just as there were huge crowds surrounding Jesus, so many of us think we walk with God and yet rarely touch and make contact with the deep reality of God’s love for us. It is only at the point of real contact with God that our lives are changed, and we are made better, more loving human beings, more humble, more aware of just how much we depend on the mercy and love of God.

Sometimes we only reach out to touch God in moments of dire need yet surely our prayer lives should constantly seek out loving awareness of him. Sometimes we know we are in need of healing yet try to avoid coming face to face with our healer. And sometimes to reach out to touch God in our lives requires great courage and humility.

A woman long ago touched the robe of Jesus in faith and need. She did so in the belief that it was not his robe that had healing properties but the power that emanated from Jesus himself. And we need to ask, how do we touch God in our own lives? How do we tap into, as it were, the real power, the real goodness, the real love that created us and ever waits for us? In the throng and press of our lives, should we not seek moments of real encounter? In the busy moments of our lives, should we not seek times of real silence when words are not enough? Should we not discern the beauty and love of the God who created us by taking moments to meditate on the rich fabric of our lives through which God speaks to us?

I end with a short prayer. Let us pray.

Lord of all healing, we believe that you are present in the darkness before dawn, in the waiting and uncertainty, in our doubts and need, in both sickness and health. We pray that in the press and cares of this world we may ever reach out to touch your healing presence in our lives.

Amen