Jesus quickly walks the busy streets of Capernaum in an effort to get to Jairus’ house to heal his daughter. In the midst of the throng of people, Jesus stops and asks, “Who touched me?”  Obviously many are bumping up against him as he makes his way through the crowd. Peter points this out, but Jesus says:

“Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me.” Luke 8:46

While Jesus most likely felt a release of power whenever he healed, this is the only time I remember it being mentioned in Scripture. So who is it that drew power from him without his direct order?

Flash back twelve years. A twelve-year-old girl has just become a young woman. She’s heard other girls talk about it—maybe she had excitedly looked forward to it as a rite of passage. Now her time has come! But she soon discovers that having a period is not all it’s cracked up to be. To my male readers, I won’t embarrass you with the details of imagining what it would have been like in early days without modern conveniences.

Believe it or not, Leviticus has regulations even about this subject.

When a woman has a discharge of blood for many days at a time other than her monthly period or has a discharge that continues beyond her period, she will be unclean. Lev. 15:25

We’re not talking just messy, we’re talking ceremonially “unclean.” (See last week’s blog, “Unclean, Unclean!”) So what does this mean?

Any bed she lies on while her discharge continues will be unclean, as is her bed during her monthly period, and anything she sits on will be unclean. Anyone who touches them will be unclean. Lev. 15:26-27

We can only imagine the embarrassment of this twelve-year-old when a normal 7-day ordeal becomes a month-long ordeal. By age thirteen, she has endured for a year. Does the father insist that she not be in public for fear that she has an accident and be discovered? Is she finally put out of the house? Maybe in a little shed out back? Do neighbors wonder where she is? What gossip spreads about her?Does she feel almost like a leper? Like she should call out, “Unclean! Unclean!” Imagine how weak she becomes with such ongoing loss of blood.

Somehow this now 24 year-old woman has had some sort of income which has been nearly depleted in an attempt to find any doctors who can help her. Then she finds out that a man named Jesus has been healing people. She finds him in Capernaum.

When Jairus pleads to a healer for his daughter, our young woman realizes that this man must be Jesus. She dare not touch him, but she reasons that if she could touch even the hem of his garment, she might be healed. At last, she catches up to him, reaches out, and touches the edge of his robe.

Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was free from her suffering. Mark 5:29

For the first time in twelve years, she feels renewed. She is whole again—no longer unclean. Can you imagine her relief? No more doctors. No more hiding in the shadows afraid to touch anyone. No longer feeling shunned.

Oh the joy when we reach out and touch the healer. Some of our wounds are physical, others are emotional or relational and yes, even spiritual. His power is there for all of us.

~ Joyce ~