Your Faith

Reading: Numbers 19-20; Psalm 28; Mark 5 30 Jesus realized at once that healing power had gone out from him, so he turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who touched my clothes?” 33 Then the frightened woman, trembling at the realization of what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and told him what she had done. 34 And he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace. You have been healed.” (Mark 5:30-34 NLT) On his way to Jairus’ home to lay hands on his critically ill daughter and heal her, Jesus was interrupted by a sick woman’s desperate faith. For twelve years this woman had suffered from chronic bleeding that made her not only sick, but ceremonially unclean. She tried everything she could and only got worse. Then she heard about Jesus and had a desperate thought that if she could touch his clothing she would be healed. As she pressed through the crowd, she made everyone she came in contact with, including Jesus, ceremonially unclean. When she touched the fringe of his robe her bleeding stopped immediately, and she could feel that she had been healed. What she did seriously violated the Jewish ceremonial laws! When the religious people in the crowd found out she had made them unclean, they wouldn’t be able to enter the synagogue. They would each have to go through a ritual of bathing and washing their clothes and would be unclean until evening. Yet Jesus didn’t rebuke her for violating the ritual law, he commended her for an act of faith. Jesus realized that healing power had been drawn out of him by someone’s act of faith. He searched until he found who had done it and told her, “Your faith has made you well! Go in peace. You have been healed.” I believe someone who will read this is desperate for God to intervene, to heal, to help you with a long-standing issue. I think the message for you is to forget what others will think, don’t wait any longer, press through to Jesus, and by an act of faith draw from him the power that you need. May your faith make you well! Prayer: Father, I pray for all my friends who will read this today. I pray that our faith will be stirred by your word. But I pray especially for someone who will be prompted by your Spirit to take a bold, possibly uncomfortable, possibly risky, step of faith toward you. May their faith connect with your power, and may they be healed!