Touch Jesus

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF MARK

TOUCH JESUS

Mark 5:24-34

A large crowd followed and pressed around him. 25 And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. 26 She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse. 27 When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, 28 because she thought, "If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed." 29 Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering. 30 At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who touched my clothes?"  31 "You see the people crowding against you," his disciples answered, "and yet you can ask, 'Who touched me?'" 32 But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. 33 Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. 34 He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering." 

NIV

If we desire to be healed we only need to touch Jesus. This woman had gone to as many doctors as see could find, spending all her money and still had not gotten any better. She must have been at her wits end, depressed, hopeless and resigned to being the way she was. But something happened, she heard about Jesus, she heard of the healing power he had, and perhaps it was in desperation she came to him, or maybe her hope had been restored, there was a way to get rid of the sickness. Either way she made her way, not in a pushy way, yelling at Jesus. She didn’t even fall at his feet pleading for a healing; she just knew that if she could but only touch his clothes she would be healed. Talk about faith, this woman was filled to the brim with it. She had no doubts at all that Jesus was the answer to her problem. So why then do so many believers walk around with so many sicknesses? Do we still have enough money that we can spend on doctors? Oh right, we now say that Doctors are sent by God to heal us, that he has given men the knowledge of healing through medical science. Some of that might be true, but why wasn’t that woman healed by medical science? Of course man’s knowledge has increased in that area, yet why didn’t God give those doctors the same knowledge he has given the doctors of today? Maybe doctors of any age are not agents of God, but rather agents of mankind. If we just touch the clothes of Jesus we could be healed. Some men have become rather famous and perhaps even wealthy claiming to be an agent of God laying their hands on people with the healing power of Jesus. A crowd gathers to see the show, but is all that or real or just a show? Why do we need to follow after some supposed healer, when all we need is to touch Jesus? Maybe we are missing the faith this woman had. Maybe we doubt because we don’t really believe. Maybe we would rather spend all we have seeing doctors then coming to Jesus. Maybe we have more faith in man then in Jesus. Maybe we are afraid Jesus won’t heal us and then we would look foolish. Maybe we are afraid he would not heal us, and we would lose our trust in him. But in all reality if we really desire to be healed, let us reach out and touch the helm of his garment.