Devotions_TheTouch

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Words to Grow On

June 5, 2006

THE TOUCH

Carole Bate

I kept thinking of one particular woman in Scripture. Her story is in Matt. 9:18-26 and Mark 5:22-43. Matthew has some good words, but Mark gives more details.

Read the scriptures I gave you, then read this....

The girl is dead.

The woman is sick.

Things get worse instead of better.

The crowd closes in around Him and He doesn't see her.

She wants to touch Him.

She wants to be healed but,

She is ashamed.

She is a disgrace.

She is in pain.

No one seems to notice.

People are all around and inside herself she is screaming.

"Who am I to seek His healing?"

No one can hear her.

"He is going,

Do you see Him?

He is on His way to help someone less fortunate than myself.

I am no one.

Too many people.

I am too ashamed.

Maybe, I can just touch him and then sneak away.

No one knows how I have suffered, no one has seen or felt my pain...

Emotionally,

Physically,

Or spiritually.

I am left an outcast, alone and trampled.

He's too busy!

What he must do now is more important than me..

He is going to help a child.

Her father has come on her behalf.

No one would or could ask for me,

Especially not my father.

Why has this gone on so long?

If I could just touch His hem.

Such little faith...

Such great power flowing through me!

What has happened to me?

He knows I am here.

What if he sees me?

He knows I am here.

What if he is angry with me?

He knows I have taken from him.

Then he speaks.

Do you hear his words?

He speaks to me,

To my soul,

To the deepest part and says..

"Take heart Daughter!"

Daughter!

Daughter.

The word sounds new,

Fresh,

Pure when He speaks it.

To be called Daughter

By the son of God!

To be HIS Child.

To be a child.

To have childlike faith, hope and trust.

But wait!

The little girl is dead!

I can still hear the mourners’ voices.

The noise, the depression..

Death.

Death is in the air.

I follow Him to her house and hear him say..

"She is not dead!"

Laughter fills the air from all who are there.

Sometimes it is just easier to laugh.

Can't He see death?

Can't He smell it?

He says she is asleep.

In a coma?

Does she even know He is there?

Then He speaks and says to her..

"Little girl, I say to you get up!"

And immediately the girl stood up!

She came alive!

Before my eyes,

In the deepest part of my being,

In my soul.

The girl awoke, she stood, she walked,

She breathed, she smiled.

The child was alive!

The child within me awoke."

The little girl is alive!

The woman is healed.

Mark 5:22-43

Then one of the synagogue rulers, named Jairus, came there. Seeing Jesus, he fell at his feet [23] and pleaded earnestly with him, "My little daughter is dying. Please come and put your hands on her so that she will be healed and live." [24] So Jesus went with him.
A large crowd followed and pressed around him. [25] And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. [26] 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. [27] When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, [28] because she thought, "If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed." [29] Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.
[30] At once Jesus realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who touched my clothes?"
[31] "You see the people crowding against you," his disciples answered, "and yet you can ask, 'Who touched me?' "
[32] But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done it. [33] Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. [34] He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering."
[35] While Jesus was still speaking, some men came from the house of Jairus, the synagogue ruler. "Your daughter is dead," they said. "Why bother the teacher any more?"
[36] Ignoring what they said, Jesus told the synagogue ruler, "Don't be afraid; just believe."
[37] He did not let anyone follow him except Peter, James and John the brother of James. [38] When they came to the home of the synagogue ruler, Jesus saw a commotion, with people crying and wailing loudly. [39] He went in and said to them, "Why all this commotion and wailing? The child is not dead but asleep." [40] But they laughed at him.
After he put them all out, he took the child's father and mother and the disciples who were with him, and went in where the child was. [41] He took her by the hand and said to her, "Talitha koum!" (which means, "Little girl, I say to you, get up!"). [42] Immediately the girl stood up and walked around (she was twelve years old). At this they were completely astonished. [43] He gave strict orders not to let anyone know about this, and told them to give her something to eat.