Mark 5:25-34
Twelve years of hemorrhage, the movie twelve years a slave, my 50 years of uneasiness. I am thinking of the maladies, illnesses and issues we all have and how to cure them. All of us want to be healed and want to be whole, that is a gift we would all wish for this Christmas. How would we attain it?
The woman in this passage has tried everything and in the end, tries to cheat her way to a cure, to salvation or wholeness. Whether hemorrhage is literal or a metaphor it does not really matter. She knew her help was in Jesus. If she could not touch him on the sly, even in a busy crowd, she'd be cured. Jesus knew of her plight, knew the 'energy' left him but he was also quite generous and loving in his response.
In the case of twelve years a slave which I still would like to see, I am using it as a metaphor in which we are all slaves. We are all crying out for freedom from one ailment or another, from one situation or another. We all want to leap out of the closet. This however is harder to cheat your way out of.
I was in a closet I wasn't even aware I was in. All I knew is an uneasiness. I knew something wasn't right and with this 'illness' I searched for wholeness. I tried to get closer to God and 'touch' him. God in return loved me, supported me and showed me that I am loved as I am. Still I was in a closet. In the fullness of time I began to realize what was going on. Through the advice of a true friend (now husband), I sought out a qualified therapist who also had a grasp of my spiritual beliefs. While he was of great help to me, allowing me the freedom to discover my feelings and the truth about myself, he oddly suggested I might want to cheat as the hemorrhagic woman did. I could leave the church, leave my wife and he suggested I did not have to tell anyone the reason. I could touch the cloak to cure myself but try to be quiet about it. The truth of the matter is, that just makes your closet a bit roomier. It is still dark because there still is not the light of truth and love that you need to grow and be a whole person. Hiding who you are, hiding the truth, leaves you with a feeling that there is a reason why you are still hiding. I can understand not coming out for fear of safety or becoming homeless. But not coming out, not acknowledging does leave you with a feeling that you are cheating your way out of the closet. You feel there is still something wrong with you otherwise you would feel free to come out and tell everyone.
The gift of freedom, the gift of holiness and uniqueness, the gift of salvation and the gift of the incarnation are all gifts from God. Free and total. However limits placed on our freedom, limits we place on our cures are man made. I can't help but think of Jean Valjean who did his time but still had to carry papers. He was free but not quite free. Out of the closet to some people and not others, or 'out' at night, or in one situation or another is not really out of the closet either. We deserve total freedom and wholeness that God wishes us to have. Nay, that God gives us freely and totally as a right of being one of his beloved creations. We must fight and demand the equality, freedom and dignity that would keep us 'ill' or in chains when such bonds are man made.
Now there was a woman who had been suffering from haemorrhages for twelve years. She had endured much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse.She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, for she said, ‘If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well.’ Immediately her haemorrhage stopped; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, ‘Who touched my clothes?’ And his disciples said to him, ‘You see the crowd pressing in on you; how can you say, “Who touched me?” ’He looked all round to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told him the whole truth. He said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.’
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