Mark 5:21-43, from Proper 8 (13)
Grace flows through the world like water through a creek bed. Its will is to gouge, lift, carry and deposit until the way for the life it brings is wide and straight and level and deep. The noise it makes is the sound of its will being thwarted.
Mark 5:21-43 opens with a great deal of such noise. A large crowd is pressing and jostling Jesus on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee, possibly the same crowd he had escaped for a few days during his mission among the pagans on the lake’s opposite side. Impediments to the will of grace are everywhere, and Jesus is throwing himself against all of them at once. Suddenly, the throng parts, because an important man has arrived to speak with Jesus, and the rules of the world say that when important men show up, ordinary ones must make way. The man’s name precedes him in reverent whispers that ripple through the crowd: Jairus, a leader in the local synagogue. He falls, distraught, at Jesus’ feet, probably not noticing that until this moment, there had been no room to do so. That’s how privilege works.
His little daughter is dying, he tells Jesus. He begs Jesus to come heal the girl. There is no apology to whoever had been next in line for grace, no acknowledgement that he is diverting the flow of it down his exclusive, personal spillway. But let’s not judge Jairus harshly. Under similar circumstances, who among us would not use every resource at our disposal without hesitation or even a thought? And while much of the world is built to channel grace toward those with power and means, Jesus reminds use elsewhere that they uniquely struggle to receive it (Matt. 19:24).
Jesus surrenders himself to the desperate man, and the two bob along in the crowd now flowing to Jairus’ house. But an impediment awaits them. She is the opposite of Jairus in every way: isolated, impoverished, female. Blood had been seeping out of her constantly for the last 12 years, and despite having spent much money on many doctors – a clue, incidentally, that she might once have belonged to Jairus’ upper-crust society – the hemorrhaging has grown worse. Her last, penniless, friendless hope lies in Jesus. Without the means to capture his attention the way Jairus has, though, she realizes the grace she needs will be hers only if she steals it. She slips up behind Jesus in the crowd, reaches out her hand, and touches his cloak. Instantly, she is healed. But in the same instant, grace’s troubled way through the world grows suddenly smoother and quieter. And Jesus, to the woman’s horror, notices the change.
“Who touched my clothes?” Jesus turns and demands, glaring at the people who, as the disciples impatiently point out, seem to have all been touching him all at the same time. But the woman knows she is caught. Trembling, she confesses her theft. Judged unclean because of her illness, the woman would have made Jesus similarly unclean by touching him. But here as elsewhere in the Gospels, Jesus seems to care little about what others consider unclean. Softening, he validates her faith and tells her to go in peace.
But the delay she caused has been catastrophic for Jairus. Messengers arrive with word that it is too late. His daughter is dead. Let Jesus get back to his regular business, they say, meaning the mundane business of the common folk.
But Jesus won’t have it. The way is not yet wide, straight, level and deep, and the will of grace is relentless. “Stop being afraid,” Jesus tells Jairus, “and start believing.” At the house, there is yet more noisy resistance to grace: crying and wailing – then ridiculing laughter aimed at Jesus for saying that this obstacle, too, will be moved. He shoos them and their cacophony out of the house, allowing only three disciples and the dead girl’s parents to remain. He takes the corpse’s hand. That, too, would have made those of his time consider him unclean. But, again, he seems unconcerned. She had been 12 years old, one for each year of misery the recently healed woman had endured, and her body had been on the cusp of beginning the monthly cycles that, for the woman, had somehow gone debilitatingly out of control. Too little life and blood in one place, too much of both in another. Gouge, lift, carry, deposit. The way must be smoothed.
“Little girl,” Jesus says tenderly, in Aramaic, the language of the common people, “get up.” And making no noise at all, she does.
My resistance to the flow of grace made a lot of noise last week. So did the resistance of others. Some of us got what we needed – and more – by diverting it down spillways maintained for the purpose. Others, desperate for a single drop, had to steal even that. A furtive touch of the cloak and a secretive trip across the southern U.S. border are both small misdemeanors, considering the misery motivating them. But “diverting” and “stealing” can mean the same thing. One way or another, we’re all thieves of grace, unless and until it runs smoothly and quietly through the whole world, bringing abundant life to all.
