On Mission With The Messiah by Michael Cloud

Note from the author: Somewhere along the way, I was told that a good Methodist preacher should always have a sermon and a prayer ready. Wanting to be faithful in that calling, I keep a few in reserve for those times I am asked to preach in different places. This one has become a favorite. I have preached it in churches across the United States and in a church in Cambodia that is deeply meaningful to our family.

I had the opportunity to travel to Cuba as a Flame Fellow with World Methodist Evangelism, and I knew this was the sermon I would bring. Preaching it there, just before the country entered its current state of emergency, was a humbling yet powerful reminder that what follows are not merely words on a page. It is not simply a message of comfort and encouragement. It is a truth from our God who loves us and cares for us, even when everything around us begins spiraling out of control. 

Lessons from the Healing of the Bleeding Woman and Jairus’ Daughter

I want to walk with you through a way of reading Scripture that has become very meaningful to me. I like to take a passage, especially one I already know well, and look at it as if I am reading it for the first time. I like to read it as if I do not already know how the story ends. It reminds me that these stories were not written as fiction or legend. They all happened in real time for the people walking with Jesus.

Take a moment and read through Luke 8:40-56.

In this story, I find myself identifying with Jairus and looking at the interaction with Jesus through his eyes. The text tells us that Jairus is a leader in the synagogue. But you might be interested to learn, as I was, that Jairus is laity, not clergy. That’s a beautiful reflection of the Kingdom of God. When it comes to being on a mission with the Messiah, there is no difference between clergy and laity. We are all on the same journey. We all need faith. We all need Jesus.

Jairus has a twelve-year-old little girl who is dying. It is not just his baby girl. It is his only child. The mission is clear. Find the Messiah. Save the girl.

As Jesus is on the way to Jairus’s house, the crowd presses in from every side. Suddenly, Jesus stops. A woman reaches out and touches the edge of his garment in a way that draws power out of him. In Mark, the woman says to herself, “If I just touch his clothes, I will be healed” (Mark 5:28). In the Greek, that word “healed” can also mean “saved.” If I could just touch the Messiah, I would be saved. That phrasing makes me wonder why she thought this way. Why is she thinking about salvation while she is talking about touching his clothes? The answer is not as random as we might think. 

Understanding the Biblical Meaning of Faith and Salvation

In Numbers 15, God instructed the people to make tassels on the fringes of their robes as a reminder for them to observe the law and to remain holy. At least five different times in the law, God specifically commands the people to “Be holy for I am holy.” These tassels also became a marker of their identity as the people of God. 

But as Peter points out in the text, many people are touching Jesus at this moment (v. 47), yet the woman is the only one healed. So, what is the difference? Many people reach out because they believe Jesus can help. This is not wrong. But the woman reaches out because she believes only Jesus can save her. It was not just that Jesus can help. He was her only hope. She is not just asking for relief. She is reaching for salvation. As the woman reaches out in desperation to grab hold of Jesus, she is reaching past the law that identifies her as unclean, and she is healed by the identity of the one wearing the robe. Behold! He has come to put away the old and create something new. 

This woman who stops Jesus in his tracks had been bleeding for twelve years. That’s twelve years as an outcast. Twelve years as unworthy to approach God in the temple for worship. It is twelve years of humiliation and shame among her people. But when she touches the hem of Christ’s garment, that hem which represents the law of God and the holiness of heaven, the power of our Holy and Almighty God does not reject her, it heals her! In Jesus the holiness of God comes close enough to reach out and touch in a way that we can grab hold of and plead for healing — for salvation. Jesus did not come to cancel the law. He came to fulfill it. And now, in Christ, we are no longer condemned; we are set free! 

In this moment, we are reminded that the Scriptures bear witness to the fact that the same power that saved her, the same power that saved us, now sends us out to proclaim this life-saving power to others. As mission evangelists, it is our job to proclaim the Gospel we have been given. It does not matter where you have been, how far you have walked away, or how far you have fallen. There is no depth of hell that Christ cannot reach. In Jesus the unclean find salvation. In Jesus the forgotten are restored. By the grace of God and the power of Christ on the cross Jesus came to take a lifetime of sins and shortcomings and offer salvation in their place.

“Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering” (v. 48). It is a faith awakened within her by God which trusts that Jesus is the Divine Healer and that there is no other name under heaven or on earth by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12). 

How beautiful. It would be impossible to not celebrate this story. But while all of this is happening, the little girl dies. Did you forget about her? Do you think Jairus felt like Jesus forgot about his daughter? Remember, the mission is not about the bleeding woman. It is about Jesus going to heal Jairus’ daughter. The woman is healed. That’s great. But while Jesus is distracted by this unclean woman, someone from Jairus’ house comes to stop Jesus from traveling any further. “Your daughter is dead… do not bother the teacher anymore” (v. 49). So, if I’m Jairus, I’m not going to be so happy that Jesus took his time. If I’m Jairus, I may not say it, but I’m going to be a bit bitter that Jesus helped someone else while he let my little girl die in pain.

They had set out on the mission to save Jairus’ daughter. This woman is in the way. She is an obstacle. She is the reason the little girl dies without Jesus. The mission has failed, all because this unclean woman had to touch Jesus. She could have waited. She could have followed Jesus and been healed on the way back. Jesus should have kept moving. There was something a little more urgent to deal with, wasn’t there? Interestingly enough, Jesus didn’t see it that way. Even while a little girl lay dying, Jesus does not turn the woman away, nor does he call her unclean.

Finding God’s Purpose in Life’s Interruptions

Here is the truth at the heart of ministry. Jesus did not sacrifice the mission by healing the bleeding woman. She was not in the way of the mission; she was the mission. The mission of the Messiah was to bring salvation to the ends of the earth. Being on mission with Jesus is about embodying His mercy, His presence, and stopping to hear the cries of the needy. In Jesus, we do not just find healing. In Jesus we find salvation. In Jesus we find new life. When Jesus arrives at Jairus’ house, he does something no one is ready for — he raises the little girl from the dead. Take heart, brothers and sisters. Jesus is never late. Jesus is always right on time.

Sometimes our walk with Jesus is interrupted. We were moving forward trying to accomplish the work He has given us to do. We are praying. We are enduring. And suddenly, something appears in our path. A person. A need. A situation we did not plan for. And we think, “Lord, I was already carrying enough.” And while we may not admit it, our weariness in life tries to make us forget how holy and powerful God truly is. But if we really are walking with Jesus, if the Son of God and Savior of the world really is by our side, then maybe that person that interrupts our plans is not so random after all. Maybe they are reaching out to be healed by the very Savior who calls you friend. Christ died so that none shall perish but that all may have eternal life (John 3:16). That includes you… and me… and those we meet along the way. It includes those we have labeled unclean, unworthy, or beyond our reach. 

This is where we must be attentive. Jesus has a mission that is way beyond the one that is right in front of our face. We cannot get so focused on the work before us that we lose sight of what the Master is doing along the way. If Jesus never stops for the woman, she continues in a life of horrible torture and pain, perpetually unclean and cast out. And so even though helping her seems to take away from the mission objective, Jesus stops so that she may be healed and have a new life. What if the people we stop for along the way are not delaying God’s work but are the very place where God is already at work? As mission evangelists, our mission to make Christ known to the end of the earth must be modeled after the one who took his time.

Following Jesus is a journey that is not defined by the destination alone. After all, we know how the story ends. Jesus continues on until he gets to Jairus’s house and brings the little girl back to life. Resurrection and new life are indeed at the heart of His work. But look with me at what happens right before this. This moment matters. If we miss it, we risk missing the miracle. It is just after the messenger comes from Jairus’s house and tells them that they do not need to keep traveling any further. Look at what happens in Jairus’s life right before the miracle takes place. In verse 50, Jesus turns to Jairus, a father who is mourning the loss of his daughter, and says, “Don’t be afraid; just believe, and she will be healed.”

How to Keep Faith When Life Feels Out of Control

I come back here to pause for this moment because the statement almost demands it. This whole journey began with Jairus believing. Why else would he come to Jesus if he did not believe? But just like the woman who had been bleeding, Jesus is not asking for a new faith. He is calling Jairus to hold on to the faith he already has. 

Jesus is not saying, “Start believing.” He is saying, “Don’t let go.”

It’s as if Jesus looks at Jairus and says, “I know you believe. I know your heart is breaking. I know you just heard news that has turned your world upside down. But take heart. Do not lose faith. Because I am about to do something far greater than you could ever ask or imagine.”

So, let me ask you: Do you have the kind of faith that Jesus speaks of in this passage? It does not talk about a perfect faith or a loud faith, but a faith that holds on. Do you have faith that when the walls are closing in around you, and it feels like you have lost everyone and everything — when your life starts to hemorrhage at the seams, and you find yourself in perpetual suffering and in pain — that Jesus will stop to save you? Faith does not mean the absence of doubt. Faith trusts that Jesus knows what he is doing, even when it looks like the mission has failed.

The saving faith that God, by his grace, awakens within us is a faith that breaks through the crowd of concerns that keep us from Jesus. It reaches out in desperation for the One who takes on death and gives life in its place.

Do not be afraid. Only believe. Do not lose faith. Salvation is found in the One who is making all things new.