The Wonder-working Power - Mark 5:21-43

The Wonder-working Power - Mark 5:21-43
Pastor Lee Hemen
January 3, 2010

According to a recent AP story, a Colorado woman says a Christmas miracle brought her and her newborn son back from the brink of death after her heart stopped beating during childbirth and the baby was delivered showing no signs of life. “I got a second chance in life,” Tracy Hermanstorfer said. She was being prepped for childbirth at Memorial Hospital in Colorado Springs. Her 37-year-old husband was by her side when she began to feel sleepy and lay back in her bed. Tracy's husband Mike was clutching his pregnant wife's hand when her life slipped away on Christmas Eve, and then he cradled his newborn son's limp body seconds after a medical team delivered the baby by Cesarean section. Minutes later, he saw his son come to life in his arms under the feverish attention of doctors, and soon he learned his wife had inexplicably come back to life. The couple both credits it to the wonder-working power of God.

What loving father would do anything in order to heal their sick child? What person would travel to far places in order to be healed of a debilitating disease? We read or hear about a tragic accident or fatal diagnosis and feel empathy for those involved. When we hear about these kinds of situations, we are often moved by them and we sometimes wonder at the justice of it all. Therefore, when we read these two accounts from Mark’s Gospel of Jesus and his healing of the young girl and the woman that suffered so much we are amazed at God’s wonder working power…

READ: Mark 5:21-43

“I wonder if this new Rabbi can heal my beautiful daughter. I have heard so much about him and his teachings are changing people’s lives. They say he can heal and perhaps even raise the dead! Oh, Almighty God who has created everything, please hear my pleading cry and let your servant not be disappointed! Hear my humble prayer for my little girl and heal her before she dies!” Would God hear the prayers of a frantic father? A family that is struck by tragedy can find comfort when they least expect it, even when obstacles are place in our way. We discover here in Mark’s Gospel…

I. The wonder-working power of God in the life of a family! (Vv. 21-24, 35-43)

1. In our depths of despair, God’s power is available! Jesus and His disciples returned to the other side of the Sea of Galilee, probably near Capernaum. Another large crowd gathers around Jesus while He was still by the lake. On this occasion, Jairus, one of the synagogue rulers came to Him. Jairus was a lay official responsible for the synagogue building, the worship services, and a respected leader in the community. However, something was different in Jairus’ life today. We discover that Jairus’ little daughter (His only daughter, Luke 8:42) was dying. In fact, Matthew’s Gospel indicates that the girl may have already died! In humility, Jairus pleads earnestly with Jesus to come and put His hands on her so that she might be healed and live. The “laying on of hands” symbolized the transfer of vitality and was often associated with Jesus’ healings. Evidently, Jairus, learning about Jesus’ wonder-working power, was convinced that only Jesus could save his daughter’s life. Jesus was his final hope. We find that as Jesus left, a great crowd followed pressing around Him. A frustrating delay ensues caused by a woman’s healing and I imagine became a severe test of a father’s faith. Jairus’ fears that his little daughter would die before Jesus got there were sadly confirmed by the report from his household that she had died. The messengers erroneously concluded that it was futile to bother the Teacher any further. Jesus overhears the message and he (parakousas) “refused to listen”. Jesus’ reassuring words to Jairus could be rendered: “Stop fearing; just keep on believing.” He had already exercised faith in coming to Jesus and he had seen the relationship between faith and Jesus’ wonder-working power; now he was exhorted to believe that Jesus could restore his lifeless daughter. At Jairus’ home, they had already begun the traditional Jewish ritual of morning. Jesus seeing the hullabaloo of people crying and wailing loudly enters and bluntly asks, “Why all this commotion and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep.” The mourner’s response is natural, they laugh at Jesus, but he kicks them all out except for the parents and a few of his disciples. Jesus immediately takes the child “by the hand and said to her, ‘Talitha koum!’” (Aramaic meaning, “Little girl, I say to you, get up!”) “Immediately the girl stood up and walked around!” At this all present were “completely astonished.” They saw for themselves the wonder-working power of God in the life of a family!

EXAMPLE: Life has a way of exerting itself on us. Bad things happen to good people and good things happen to bad people, and really awful things happen to everyone all the time. That is the way of the world. We would all like only good things to happen to us but we forget that we live in a sin-fallen universe. This year Denise and I have had several friends that have experienced tragedy, both through automobile accidents. However, the interesting thing is how both families have reacted to their situations. How they have responded is in direct proportion to their faith. While both went through very tough times, one has found strength, compassion, and encouragement through their close relationship with Christ. While, the other family is barely existing day-to-day and living in fear of what the future may have in store for their family. Here in Marks’ Gospel we find a father beside himself over his little girl who is dying. While along the way in looking for an answer to his dilemma life throws what he sees as an obstacle, turns out to be the complete restoration of his child. He finds for himself the wonder-working power of God.

“Who am I that God should hear my cry? I have long sought relief from my humility and no one has been able to help me. My faith is waning and my money is gone. Even my family turns away from me and no one cares about a poor woman without family or friends. Oh, Lord, my hope is in you alone. Only your Messiah can heal me and perhaps Lord if you would hear the prayers of this one who seeks your face one last time…” Would God hear the prayer of someone like this woman? Poor, alone, and a societal outcast to everyone she meets? Here in Mark’s Gospel we see…

II. The wonder-working power of God in the life of an unknown! (Vv. 24-34)

1. No one is unknown to the Lord! This section has a “sandwich” structure. The account of the raising of Jairus’ daughter from the dead is divided by this incident of an unknown woman with a hemorrhage. What appeared to be a disastrous delay actually served as a reassurance for the restoration of Jairus’ 12 year-old daughter. A nameless woman with an incurable condition is part of the crowd. She had been bleeding for 12 years! Her humiliating condition made her ritually unclean, excluding her from society since any who encountered her would also be “unclean.” “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.” However, there was hope. She had heard about Jesus’ wonder-working power. She did the unthinkable! She came up behind Jesus in the crowd and touched His cloak. She kept telling herself: “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed.” Notice that “Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt (she knew without a doubt) in her body that she was freed from her suffering.” Jesus realizes that “at once… power had gone out from him.” He turns “around in the crowd and asked, ‘Who touched my clothes?’” I believe Jesus was honoring the woman’s faith, and he willingly extended His wonder-working power to her. The touch of the garment had no magical or mystical effect. Jesus emphasized his ability to distinguish the touch of one who in faith expected deliverance from the accidental touch of the unbelieving crowd. His disciples were incredulous: “You see the people crowding against you and yet you can ask, ‘Who touched me?’” Jesus kept looking (penetratingly) around at the crowd in order to see who had touched Him in faith. The woman, the only one who understood Jesus’ question, came in humility and fear because she knew what had happened to her. Courageously she confesses everything. Jesus compassionately responds, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.” The affectionate title, “Daughter” (its only recorded use by Jesus) signified her new relationship with Him. She was no longer just one of the unbelieving crowd, but one of his own. This assured her that her healing was complete and permanent. In her extreme personal need as a living “dead” person for 12 years had come to a permanent end because of the wonder-working power of God!

EXAMPLE: I have seen wonderfully faithful folks experience the heartbreak of being told a loved one has an incurable disease. When I first started ministering here at Grace an older couple found one another after experiencing death of their perspective spouses. I had the wonderful experience of leading both of them to the Lord and later marrying them. They had only been married a short time when the husband learned that he had aggressive cancer. Everything was done that could be done by doctors and those who loved them. He even asked the deacons to come anoint him with oil and pray for him, which they did at the time, to no avail. The grace and humility he showed during his illness caused a lot of his family to realize that they did not have the faith he had recently acquired. Some struggled with the idea of why would God allow this to happen to him? Having counseled couples who faced the loss of young children because if SIDS, I related what I have learned about faith and life in general: God loves and holds precious every life, whether it is 9 minutes old or 90 years old. For God there are no unknowns. His wonder-working power is available to any who come to him in faith. Does he heal all who come to him? No. However, he willing accepts, loves and comforts everyone who does. And that is the most wonderful part of his wonder-working power.

Conclusion:

We have learned about the wonder-working power of God in the life of a family; and we discovered the wonder-working power in the life of an unknown, now, let me ask you: “What about your life? Have you personally experienced the wonder-working power of God?”
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Pastor Lee Hemen has been the outspoken pastor of the same church for 25 years in Vancouver, WA. He writes regularly on spirituality and conservative causes and maintains several web blogs. This article is copyrighted © 2009 by Lee Hemen and is the sole property of Lee Hemen, and may not be used unless you quote the entire article and have my permission. You now have my permission...

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