A Markan Sandwich - Transcript of Sermon St Margaret's Draycott-In-The-Moors 28th June 2015

St Margaret’s Draycott 28^th June 2015

2 Corinthians 8.7-15 & Mark 5.21-43

I’m a runner, nothing too serious, about 20 miles a week, the occasional 10k and the odd half marathon.

If Mark’s Gospel was a race it would be a 10k.  A 10k is enough of a challenge in terms of distance. (In old money that is 6.2 miles) Yet it moves along at a cracking pace.

Mark’s Gospel also moves along at a fair pace with an economy of words. It is considered to be the earliest of the Gospels and written for a Gentile readership. Although initially people would have heard it read rather than reading it themselves.

Last week we are all at sea and it is worth noting that when we think about people hearing this Gospel, when they heard boats mentioned they would know something important was going to happen.

In our reading today we have our feet firmly on dry land but near to the lake shore.

We have skipped the reading of the demoniac being healed (pigs and evil spirits being cast back into the sea) and moved back across the water where a large crowd soon gather.

We then have a Markan sandwich – two stories interwoven and each informing the other.

Remember that for Mark he wants to show Jesus’ authority and his compassion.

‘When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.’  Matt 9.36

This is such a rich story and I only wish we had the time to explore all of it's various nuances and the lesson we can learn. However time restricts, but please do explore this passage further at home and perhaps in home groups this week.

So, I would like to draw your attention to just a few things and for your consideration as you seek to live out your vocation here as the People of God in this place.

Let’s begin by getting hold of the most amazing fact that this story is about a woman and a female child.  In ancient culture and in Jewish culture of this time they were non-people. Their value came through their parents or through a husband.

True there are some notable exceptions throughout history and indeed in the Scriptures, Deborah during the period of the Judges perhaps being the most notable on the Old Testament.

So Jesus is engaging with woman. Let’s stick first of all with this woman who had been hemorrhaging for the same length of time the little girl who was dying had been alive – twelve years.

A crowd, a woman cut off from her community, cut off from worshiping God – her hemorrhaging would have made her ritually unclean – she hears about Jesus. Desperate times calls for desperate measures. I only need to get close enough to touch the hem of his cloak – that will be enough. She has faith, maybe only as little as a mustard seed faith, but it is enough for her to reach out to Jesus for healing and salvation, which are but one word in the Greek. She manages to touch Jesus’ cloak and knows in an instant that healing has come, she is now restored. 

She can now slip away and show herself to the Priest and be restored back into the community, back into being able to worship God.

However on this occasion Jesus feels a power going from him, he knows someone has reached out towards him in faith and hope.

There is the pressing matter of a very anxious Synagogue Ruler who had come in equally desperation and knelt at Jesus feet and begged for help.  All of that was again unprecedented – Synagogue Rulers did not make a habit of falling at the feet of an itinerant Rabbi. But desperate times calls for desperate measures.

Leaving Jairus twisting his cloak in his hands and hopping from one foot to another Jesus seeks out the woman who had touched him. From a heart of belief she had reached out for healing and salvation and now, as Paul will go on to write in Romans, she was called to confess with her mouth.

‘If you declare with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.’  Romans 10.9

Let me ask you this, what room do you leave for people with mustard seed faith to touch the hem of Jesus?

In one church I ministered in we made a point of leaving some of the back pews empty not only for latecomers but also for visitors. This enabled them to slip in the back quietly and without being fused over. Of course we took care if it was right to talk to them later, but we allowed them the space to watch and observe God’s people at worship.

Let me also ask this question – do you expect people to come and join you on a Sunday morning who do not ordinarily do so? If we have no level of expectancy that there may visitors among us then we can very soon slip into a way of doing that suits us, pleasing ourselves rather than placing ourselves before God and welcoming the stranger among us.  We don’t need to announce anything or explain things, people know what we do. I can’t tell you the number of times I have heard that said or known it to be implicit in the way Worship is conducted.

Then while I am asking questions here is another one as we think about this woman and Jesus asking her to confess with her mouth. Just what opportunity do you give for those who believe in their hearts to also confess with their lips?

Recently at the First Eucharist of Becky Richards at my home Church, St John’s Littleworth, we didn’t have a sermon, but three testimonies of how God had been a source of strength and help. 

On Tuesday I sat with members of the Church Army Community and we heard stories of how God had done some amazing things in people lives. We need to hear these stories, we need to encourage other, we need to know that if you touch but the hem of Jesus’ robe in faith you will receive health and healing and salvation.

Let’s get back to Jairus whom we have left anxiously watching this interruption take place.

Jesus’ is on a roll now and so having identified the woman, having called her daughter, having shown such compassion and love and having recognized her faith he now ask her to confess, to speak out.

Woman didn’t speak out in front of men in public in this culture and context – it was yet another taboo Jesus’ is about to drive a chariot and horses through.

Jairus would have heard her story and would have felt such a body blow. Because she was unclean and she had touched Jesus he was now also unclean. And God did not work through people who were unclean. Jesus could do nothing now to save his daughter.

Just as Jairus is processing this and anxiety beginning to turn to despair he receives news that his daughter has died.

Jesus overhears this and turns to Jairus and says, ‘do not fear, only believe,’ perhaps as he did so he pointed to the healed woman slipping back into the crowd.

They arrive at the house and Jesus takes with him his inner circle, Peter, James and John.  Note here that there is nothing wrong in having close confidants, only when they begin to think they are more important does the trouble arise. 

They are chosen by Jesus.

John 15.16 ... "You did not choose Me but I chose you, and appointed you that you would go and bear fruit, and that your fruit would last...

The official mourners are there with offering lamentations. Although being a Synagogue Ruler he would have many friends and people who would have come to commiserate.

Then we have one of only three places when we have the language of Aramaic. Probably spoken by Jesus because it was a language the girl would know and would bring comfort. It was something that impressed itself upon the minds of those gathered there, especially Peter, accepting that Mark’s Gospel is largely Peter’s account.

Talitha Cum – Little Girl, get up. This isn’t resurrection into new life that will come later. This is restoration and rising from the dead into a physical life.

As we have run alongside Mark in his Gospel we have witnessed Jesus calm a storm, heal a demoniac and now we see him raise the dead.

Jesus is demonstrating his authority over nature, over demons and over death.

Jesus is Lord of life and the author of creation.

However the story continues – so come back next week for further installments!

Jesus authority will be challenged, he will hear the sad news of the execution of John the Baptist and then we read of the Feeding of the 5,000. 

As Jairus’ daughter is restored back to life he says to her parents, ‘give her something to eat.’

As Jesus gathers with his disciple before a crowd of thousands whom the disciples want dismissed so that they can go and get some food, Jesus says to his disciples, ‘You give them something to eat.’

And he says to you and he says to me when we see people, who are deemed unclean, when we meet people dead in their sins, when we see people lost and leaderless, ‘you give them something to eat.

Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. John 6.35

Let me close by drawing your attention to Jesus words accompanying his instruction to feed the girl.

‘He gave strict orders not to let anyone know about this.’

This is known as the Messiah Secrecy Motif, found mainly in Mark. The broad understanding is that Jesus didn’t want to preempt his unfolding ministry and maybe even start riots. There was to come a time when this would change. It begins with Peter’s confession in chapter 8, although Jesus swears them to secrecy on the Mount of Transfiguration, until the resurrection.

Guess what folks – the resurrection has happened and we are no longer sworn to secrecy but are actively encouraged to tell everyone all about the marvelous things God has done in our lives and what we have witnessed Him doing in the lives of others.  

But maybe, just maybe, you are here this morning with a mustard seed faith. Or maybe you have yet to hear the voice of Jesus calling you to get up.

Well today you have an opportunity not only touch the hem of Jesus’ robe but to stand in front of Him and know yourself to be clothed in a new, fresh robe of righteousness that has your name and the name of Jesus the Saviour engraved upon it.

Jesus wants you take off your filthy rags of sin and corruption and be clothed with the garments of heaven.

And for those who are already clothed in a robe of righteousness you have an opportunity to receive new power so that you will find boldness in openly declaring Jesus as Lord of all

I now invite you all to bow your heads and close your eyes as I offer the prayer of Sir Francis Drake…

Disturb us, Lord, when We are too well pleased with ourselves,
When our dreams have come true
Because we have dreamed too little,
When we arrived safely
Because we sailed too close to the shore.

Disturb us, Lord, when
With the abundance of things we possess
We have lost our thirst
For the waters of life;
Having fallen in love with life,
We have ceased to dream of eternity
And in our efforts to build a new earth,
We have allowed our vision
Of the new Heaven to dim.

Disturb us, Lord, to dare more boldly,
To venture on wider seas
Where storms will show your mastery;
Where losing sight of land,
We shall find the stars.
We ask You to push back
The horizons of our hopes;
And to push into the future
In strength, courage, hope, and love.

AMEN