Disciple – The Outsiders

I’m super grateful to Zach and Lacey for sharing their story.  And for those of you that do foster care, or for those of you that are adoptive parents or in the process, please know that we’re praying for y’all.  If there’s anything we can do to help, as your church family, we are totally on board with that.  Like we started saying last year, we don’t have a foster care ministry; we’re a foster care church.  And if you’re right now thinking like, oh, “I gotta talk to somebody,” just swing by the info center and they’ll get you connected.

So my name is Caleb and I serve as one of the pastors here at Desert Springs, and today we’re going to continue in a series called “Disciple.”  We’re in a season where we’re going through the whole gospel of Mark, and we’re in the Gospel of Mark Chapter 5 today.

I don’t know if you’re allowed to have favorites when it comes to Bible stuff, but this is one of, if not my favorite, chapter in the Gospel of Mark for a variety of reasons.  I hope to tease some of that out for you today.  So we’ll be in the Gospel of Mark.

For those of y’all joining us online, I’m so glad to be connecting with you this way.  Thanks so much for joining us.  If you have a Bible, go ahead and grab it.  Or if you don’t have a Bible, just go to bible.com.  There are free Bibles available there for you.  For those of you joining us in person, you should have received a handout on the way in with the text that we’ll be going through.   Also, if you don’t own a Bible, please take one of those as our gift to you.  We’d love to get that to you.

So the Gospel of Mark, Chapter 5.  What we’ve been doing is that we’ve recognized that the Scriptures, by and large, are artistically designed not primarily to be read, but to be heard.  And so we’re going to read it together.  One of the things we’ve been doing is tethering ourselves to the ancient practice of hearing the Word of God spoken.  So I’m going to ask that you would not read along if that’s OK.

I know for some of you that really like reading it to yourself.  You’re probably cursing at me right now.  But you’re not allowed to do it.  There’ll be the police to escort you out if we catch you reading along.  The reason that we don’t want to just read is We want to allow the words, like to allow the spirit, to kind of like conjure up in our imagination these scenes that we’re going to read about.

I’m going to ask that you would just be attentive to whatever the Spirit of God is bringing to your mind or bring it to your heart.  It could be an image.  It could be a word.  It could be a series of words.  It could even be lunch. That’s fine, too.  Whatever it is, just be attentive to what the Spirit of God ‘s doing as you hear the Word.  So this is the gospel of Mark Chapter 5.

Now they came to the other side of the sea in the region of the Gerasenes.  As soon as He got out of the boat, a man with an unclean spirit came out of the tombs and met him.  He lived in the tombs, and no one was able to restrain him anymore, not even with a chain.   He often had been bound with shackles and chains but had torn the chains apart and smashed the shackles.  No one was strong enough to subdue him.

Night and day, among the tombs and among the mountains, he was always crying out and cutting himself with stones.  When he saw Jesus from a distance, he ran and knelt down before him. He cried out with a loud voice, ‘What do you have to do with me, Jesus, son of the Most High God?  I beg you before God, don’t torment me.’  For He told him, ‘Come out of the man, you unclean spirit.’

Jesus asked him, ‘What is your name?’

‘My name is Legion,’ he answered Him, ‘because we are many’.  And he begged Him earnestly not to send them out of the region. 

Now a large herd of pigs was there feeding on a hillside.  The demons begged Him, ‘Send us to the pigs so that we may enter them.’  So He gave them permission, and the unclean spirits came out and entered the pigs.  The herd of about 2000 rushed down the steep bank into the sea and drowned there.

Now the men who tended them ran off and reported it in the town and in the countryside.  And the people went to see what had happened.  They came to Jesus and saw the man who had been demon-possessed sitting there dressed and in his right mind, and they were afraid.  Those who had seen it described to them what had happened to the demon-possessed man and told about the pigs.  Then they began to beg Jesus to leave their region.

As He was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged him earnestly that he might remain with Him.  Jesus did not let him but told him, ‘Go to your own people and report to them how much the Lord has done for you and how He has had mercy on you.’  And so he went out and began to proclaim in the Decapolis how much Jesus had done for him, and they were all amazed.

When Jesus had crossed over again by boat to the other side, a large crowd gathered around him while he was by the sea.  One of the synagogue leaders named Jairus came, and when he saw Jesus, he fell at his feet and begged him earnestly, ‘My little daughter is dying.  Come and lay your hands on her so that she can get well and live.

And so Jesus went with him, and a large crowd was following and pressing against him.  Now a woman suffering from bleeding for 12 years had endured much under many doctors.  She had spent everything that she had had and was not helped at all.  On the contrary, she became worse.  Having heard about Jesus, she came up behind Him in a crowd and touched His clothing.  For she said, ‘If I just touch His clothes, I would be made well.’  Instantly her flow of blood ceased and she sensed in her body that she was healed of her affliction.

And at once, Jesus realized in himself that power had gone out from him.  He turned around to the crowd and said, ‘Who touched my clothes?’

His disciples said to him, ‘Don’t you see this crowd pressing around you, and yet you say, who touched me?’  But He was looking around to see who had done this.  The woman — with fear and trembling, knowing what had happened to her — came and fell down before him and told him the whole truth.

‘Daughter,’ Jesus said to her, ‘Your faith has saved you.  Go in peace and be healed from your affliction.

While he was still speaking, people came from the synagogue leader’s house and said ‘Your daughter is dead.  Why bother the teacher anymore?’

When Jesus overheard what was said, he told the synagogue leader, ‘Do not be afraid, only believe.  He did not let anyone accompany them except for Peter and James and John, the brother of James.  They came to the leader’s house, and he saw a commotion of people weeping and wailing loudly.  He went in and said to them, ‘Why are you making a commotion and weeping? The child is not dead, but asleep.’

They laughed at him.  But he put them all outside.  He took the child’s father, mother, and those who were with him and entered the place where the child was.  Then he took the child by the hand, and said to her, ‘Talitha kum!’’ which is translated ‘’Little girl, I say to you, get up.’  Immediately, the girl got up and began to walk.  She was 12 years old.

At this they were utterly astounded.  Then he gave them strict orders that no one should know about this and told them to give her something to eat.”

This is the word of the Lord.

There are many things within this text that weave together one of the principles that we want to use – one of the tools we want to use when we study the Bible together is to look for things and just to notice things.  And one of the things I want to encourage you to notice are recurring patterns or themes.  Especially in this text, the patterns really pop out.  Right, so just pay attention to like things like numbers or people’s postures when they see Jesus, what their posture is.

Also, not only are we going to watch for patterns, things that kind of keep repeating, but we’ll also watch for contrasts — two things that might be dissimilar and might not align.  And we’ll see those things in the text.  I hope to tease them out for you.

I did want to say if you are looking for an opportunity to study the Bible more deeply, we’ve got a group that meets on Tuesday night.  I’m part of it.  We meet over in the student center and we’re just studying through — kind of doing a deep-dive study in the Gospel of Mark.  If you’ve never studied the Bible with a group of people, we would love to have you join us.  This is great opportunity to kind of use some of the Bible study skills and opportunities.

Also, if you have studied the Bible for a long time, one of one of the best things you can do to reignite your discovery of Scripture is to read the Bible with a bunch of people who aren’t like you.  Because they say crazy things, right?  And you get to add crazy things, and we all get to see something like holding up a diamond to the light.  We get to see the Scripture in a fresh new way, and so I just would invite you to join us for that.

What we’re going to do now is we’re going to go through the text and I’m just going to help us notice some things.  Because I am your pastor, I might make some application points.  But what’s more important to me personally is not that you walk away with like one golden nugget of application.  Rather, I want you to have experience with Jesus because what we’re talking about in this “Disciple” series is what it means for us to follow Jesus,

OK, so one of the reasons why we’re doing it this way and just kind of throwing large amounts of Jesus at you is because my hope for you is that you would have a Jesus experience — that you would that you would come alive in following Jesus. — not that you would walk away with a golden nugget that I came up with in my brain.

Now let’s take a look at verse one.  Let’s pull it up here.  OK, so right before this happened, there was this miracle where they’re going across the Sea of Galilee and there’s a storm and the disciples freak out. And this is where Jesus shows his command over nature and says to the storm ‘Peace or Shalom.  Be still.’  And everyone like Dang bro you can calm the storm. That’s awesome.  But notice where they came from, Capernaum, and they go over the sea and they come to the other side of the sea to the region of the Garasenes.

One of the things that we know about this region is that it was, generally speaking, not a Jewish region.  So the way that a Jewish man — just remember Jesus was Jewish, He lived in Jewish areas predominantly — but he’s going into a place that is not Jewish.  There’s this word –it’s kind of weird — it’s called gentile.

Gentile is a weird word.  We don’t generally use it.  It just means the “ethnic other” group.  So Jews recognize themselves as an ethnic entity, and then there’s the non-Jews, the ethnic others, which is over there were the Gentiles.  So this is the land of the ethnic others.

OK, so let’s keep going. A man with an unclean spirit came out of what?  Out of the tombs.  Now if you were in a boat and you dock, and a person comes running out from the tombs, what is your general response?  Get back in the boat.  And go back home, right?

Just notice that Jesus does not retreat.  Can we notice that?  This man lived in the tombs, and no one was able to restrain him, not even with a chain, right?  Because he had often been bound.  I just want you to notice how Mark is artistically giving you an impression of just how bad – how afflicted –this guy is.  We’re going to discover in a moment that he is afflicted by the forces of the kingdoms of evil, right?

He’s got demons or unclean spirits and that afflict him.  But notice too:   physically what’s going on with him that he had often been bound with what?  Shackles and chains.  Those are things that keep people in captivity, right?  And yet this man is breaking loose.  But he is not actually free, is he?  Notice that he lives in the tombs.  Who did the binding?  The people around.

If you’ve got a guy who lives out in the tombs and he’s like raging and howling at the moon and crying out and saying things that make you very uncomfortable — What would you do?   “911, hello.”  And generally speaking, they would take the person away in what?  Right.  Who put him in the shackles and chains?  Probably his neighbors.  So he’s not only afflicted by this demonic, evil force, but also he’s bound and shackled, probably by his neighbors.  But he tears them apart, smashes the shackles.  No one was strong enough to subdue him, and so they probably were just letting him be out there in the tombs, right?  “As long as you kind of stay out there, we’re going to be fine.”

Night and day among the tombs.  How many times have tombs been mentioned so far?  Mark keeps using this word.  That’s interesting, right?  Tombs, tombs, tombs.  OK, so night and day among the tombs and the hills, he would cry out and cut himself with stones.

Is this man afflicted?  This man is dynamically afflicted.  When he saw Jesus from a distance, note this —  he ran.  And notice the posture.  What does he do?  Did you notice it?  Now is that striking to you, knowing just the little bit we know about this man?  That’s striking.  No one could contain him.  No one could subdue him, and yet he sees Jesus and subdues himself.  Kneeling is not only a posture of worship, but also a posture of submission.  You kneel before a king.  Notice he is subdued.  But on his own, that’s interesting.  OK, so notice it.

So he kneels before Jesus and he cries out, “What do you have to do with me, Jesus?”  Notice what do you have to do with what?  Me.  OK, this is gonna get important here in a minute.  “Jesus, son of the Most High God …”  ***TV timeout

I know you guys know this because you are excellent at Bible trivia games.  I know that everyone on their birthday plays Bible trivia.  I love that we’re at church full of people who have Bible trivia.  Actually, I don’t think any of you have ever played Bible trivia at any sort of party, because if you play Bible trivia, it ceases to be a party.  It just becomes seminary.  But next time you’re playing Bible trivia, you might win if you can answer this question.

In your Scriptures, in what we might call the Old Testament, the term “Most High God” is generally used.  You know this already.  It’s generally used when the ethnic outsider nations are in view  — that God is the Most High God above the gods of the other nations.  That’s generally how it’s used.  It’s in Genesis.  It’s in the Psalms.  I think Isaiah uses this language.

The tomb-dwelling man kneels down before Jesus and he cries out, “Jesus, son of the Most High God.”  This is different than what the demon in chapter one called Him the Holy One of God, right?

So here He is.  He’s the son of the Most High God, which is what most of the ethnic outsider nations would have said about the God of Israel if they were submitting to the God of Israel.  You’ll notice that here he refers to Him as the Most High God.  So we’re just going to notice that. ***

Let’s keep going.  “I beg you before God …” Notice I beg you before God don’t torment what?  Me. Just notice.  For He had said, “Come out of the man, you unclean spirit.”  Singular or plural?   Singular.  One man, one spirit.

“What is your name?” Jesus asked him.  *** TV timeout.  One of the things that we know about the ancient mind is they thought that if you could get somebody’s name from them, you had power over them. ***

“ What’s your name?  My name is Legion.”  Is Legion a religious word?  No. Is it a household word?  No.  What is it?  It’s military, right?  These people were under the occupation of Rome, and one of the primary units of soldiers in the Roman Empire was a legion, right?  From what we can tell, a few thousand soldiers was referred to as a legion — so kind of like how you have squadron and battalion, the Romans had a legion.  This is a military term and I want you to remember — rewind the tape all the way back to the chapter one of the Gospel of Mark.  I love this.

Jesus comes on the scene proclaiming the good news of what?  Was he proclaiming the good news that if you say a magic prayer you go to heaven when you die?  No, he comes on the scene proclaiming the good news of what?  “The Kingdom of God.” Kingdom is a political word.  It’s a political entity, but it’s not the kingdoms of men, the kingdoms of this world.  It’s the Kingdom of God, and then Jesus marches forward as the Kingdom of God comes here now, he’s constantly driving out disease and driving out demons.

And here now you have in vivid detail, vivid relief, a military word used for the forces of darkness, the kingdoms of this world.  So Jesus comes in, do you see that Jesus is postured as being with war?  Not with the man, but with the evil forces that have afflicted this man.  Do you see that?  It’s where’s the legions exist.  Is it the tomb-man himself, or is it the kingdoms of this world that have afflicted?  Is it that the demonic forces that are inside of him? Jesus doesn’t kill the man. I just want to notice that.

“Because we are many, our name is legion.”   Because we are many – notice we switched from me to we.  And he begged Him earnestly to send them out of the region

One of the things that we know about the ancient mind is that they understood demonic forces or the kingdoms of this world to be kind of regional, to be regionally located.  Now in in the Jewish cultural identity, they separated themselves from other ethnic outsiders.  One of the ways they did that was how they dressed, how they celebrated holy days.  Another way that they separated themselves from the ethnic outsiders was how they ate.  There’s this thing called kosher law.  And one of the things that you definitely didn’t need was a ham.  You didn’t eat pigs, and it was a cultural identity marker to say “There’s the outsiders who eat pigs.”  In fact, there’ are curses used in the Scriptures like “You do nothing but run among the tombs and eat pigs.”  I think that’s Isaiah who says that.

And here now you’ve got these unclean spirits, begging to be put into an unclean animal.  Any Jewish person reading this would have thought of pigs in the same way we think of rodents, right?  Like rats or something like that, it’s kind of a derogatory feeling.

The demons beg Him, “Send us over to the pigs so that we may enter them.”  This was striking to me.  So he gave them permission.  Is this boss level or what?  What did Jesus do?  He gave them what?  Which means he has power and authority over them.  This is this is really interesting.  And the unclean spirits came out and entered the pigs.

Now most of us are just thinking “Cool.  The pigs are just gonna hang out, I guess, in these tombs.”  But notice what happens next.  The herd rushed down the steep bank of the sea and drowned, swallowed up by the sea.  I think he’s riffing on Pharoah’s army.  Notice the herd of about 2000, right?  Remember a legion is thousands of soldiers.

What did Legion or the Legion of Demons beg Jesus not to do?  Do you guys remember?  Send him out of the region.  What was the other one?  “Jesus, please don’t do what to us.”   Do you see it in your text?  Is the word torment there?  What were they doing to this man?  Do you see that they’re crying out to Jesus?

The only way that this demonic force — representatives of the kingdoms of evil kingdoms and darkness — the only way that they could think about someone with power, is that the power is used to torment them.  It’s their corrupt view of power.  And yet Jesus, showing the power of the Kingdom of God, gives permission.  And notice that the demons destroy themselves.   They get swallowed up by death.  Notice how Jesus uses power.

OK, so check this out.  Then the men who attended the pigs ran off and reported it to the town and in the countryside.  Do you think it was a positive or negative report?  How much money do you think 2000 pigs was worth to whoever owned them?  A little or a lot?  They lost the money, right?

They reported it to the countryside, and people went to see what had happened.  They came to Jesus and saw the man who had been demon-possessed sitting there dressed in his right mind. Jesus just boss leveled the most bossed person in their community — the most powerful person in their community.  Those who had seen it described to them what had happened, and the demon- possessed man told about the pigs.  Then they began to beg Him to do what?

I just want to notice something.  There are many different responses to Jesus.  There are many different responses to Jesus doing a work like this.  There are many responses that people have to Jesus freeing people from their afflictions.  Some fall down on their feet and worship God.  “Thank you so much for  freeing this man.”

Did you just notice that there’s no townspeople coming out and saying, “Lord, Lord, thank you for healing this man.  We’ve been praying for him for the last decade.  Thank you.”

Do you notice that there’s none of that?  Do you notice what there is?  “Jesus, if you keep bringing the Kingdom of God in here, it’s gonna hurt our bottom line.  Get out of here.  Jesus, you bring in that Kingdom of light into our kingdom of darkness here and it’s really going to impact my wallet.  We just prefer for you, Jesus, just to go back from where you came from.”

This is an inference, but I think the text is inferring it.  They seem to be more concerned about the loss of pigs than the gaining back a neighbor.

Do you think that has any implications for us capitalistic individualistic, consumer-based society?  Is it possible we might that we might stymie or even reject the work of God and the Kingdom of God  ’cause it doesn’t make dollars and cents?  Now, I said I wasn’t gonna do applications, so it’s just a random question you should think about and pray over.

As Jesus was getting into the boat, the man who had been demon-possessed begged him earnestly that he might remain with Him.  Jesus did not let him but told him go home to his own people and report to them how much the Lord had done and how Gpd has had mercy on him.

This man, this demon-possessed man, is now an evangelist.  So he went out and began to proclaim in the Decapolis — which is a confederation of about ten towns — how much Jesus had done for him.  And they were all amazed.  This is one of the things I think that a follower of Jesus is called to do.    “What has Jesus done for me?  Let me tell you about it.”

When Jesus had crossed over … Do you remember what happened just before this scene?  Do you remember that the disciples and Jesus were in a boat coming from a Capernaum and landed amongst the tombs?  In this the ethnic “other” territory — the land of the Garasenes — according to Mark, He heals.

Then this dude gets back on the boat and goes back.  What’s that about?  It’s almost like Jesus is showing us,” Yeah, l want my followers to go to the places nobody else wants to go to and to live the Kingdom of God in those spaces, like among the Garasenes  or among the tombs”

It’s striking because I’m a planner.  When I plan a trip, I plan a trip.  You guys know I’m talking about spreadsheets and the like.  Well, this doesn’t add up on the spreadsheet.  “Dude, you went all the way across that stormy water and did the whole ‘we’re all gonna die,’ Jesus.  And then you tell this one man to go to the to go into his people group and share what God has done.  And then you get it back on the boat and leave, Jesus.  Don’t you want to tell some more people and to just notice that the Kingdom of God grows like a mustard plant?”

OK, let’s keep going.  A large crowd gathered around him while he was by the sea … OK, we’re just going to notice some patterns.  One of the synagogue leaders… Was he poor?  No.  Was he of low status?  What was he?  He’s a leader.  He’s a religious leader named Jairus.

He came and when he saw Jesus …Have you noticed the posture?  OK, so you’ve got already in this text a repeated theme from the demon-possessed man.  Legion and this religious leader — are those two people different?  Right.  One’s are religious insider, an ethnic insider, a leader.  The other is an outsider cast out from their city, cast off from their community and ethnic outsider, a spiritual outsider.  These two men, in my opinion, couldn’t be more different.  And yet notice the posture is the same.  You guys catching it?

The religious leader fell at Jesus’ feet and begged Him earnestly — notice again the begging, “My little daughter is dying.  Come and lay your hands on her so that she can get well and live.”

Is this a good request?  Got any dads in the room?  Is this something you could see yourself doing if your kid was sick?  Yes.  This man is earnestly looking to Jesus.  It’s probable that he had no other alternatives.  It’s probable that he had tried other things.  So he’s at his end and falls on his knees and begs Jesus.  So Jesus went with him.  Isn’t that good of Jesus to do?

Yeah, I’m going to lean into this intentionally.  This is, by design, frustrating.  What does the man Jairus want more than anything?  He wants his daughter to be healed, right?  He loves this girl, right?  So much so that he’s willing to go as a religious leader and fall on his knees in front of Jesus.

And Jesus seems to return and say, “Yeah, let’s go, bro.”  Right?  If you’re Jairus this moment, how are you feeling?  A little hopeful, right?  A little bit like, “OK, Jesus.  We’re going to do this man, but my daughter …”

And a large crowd again, the large crowd was following him and pressing against him.  Do you see the scene?  Have you you guys have ever been to a Metallica concert?  OK, so obviously not a lot of good musical taste in the room today.  This is a massive crowd.  Now a woman suffering from bleeding … for how long?  Twelve years.  Is this a chronic disease?  Is her condition something that could be addressed in a little bit?  She’s been suffering it for twelve years.  She had spent everything she had at this moment in her life on doctors, and they didn’t help at all.  She became worse under the care of these doctors.  I’m not quite sure why.

Notice to the woman has no name.  In this text, did the religious leader have a name?  Yeah, Jairus, right?  Did the dude in the tombs have a name?  What was interesting is some entities had a name.  So there might be something going on with names and posture in a community.  Jairus is obviously an upstanding citizen.  We’ve got his name.  This woman was likely a social outcast.  Having heard about Jesus, she came up behind Him in the crowd and touched His clothing.

The reason that this woman would have been an outcast is, according to their ethnic cultural boundaries, their ethnic markers and their religious traditions, she would have been rendered unclean because of the blood.  It’s highly likely that she’s unmarried and cast out from her community.  One of the reasons I think that is because she’s sneaking around – likely because everyone else knows of her condition ’cause she’s in this small community.  She’s kind of sneakily coming up — notice not in front of Jesus, but where?  Just kind of sneaking behind Jesus.  “Don’t see me, don’t look at me.”

It’s highly likely that she had the same experience as the man possessed with Legion as a social outcast.  Although her affliction was not in its demonic form, it was in the breakdown of her body.  We’ve also noticed throughout the Gospel of Mark that what we think of as two completely separate things, the spiritual and the physical.  The Biblical authors recognize that they are so interwoven that the kingdom of darkness can become manifest in a demon possession or in a brokenness of the body.  Because it’s all death bringing.  It’s all darkness.  It’s all evil.

Having heard about Jesus, she comes up behind him in the crowd.  And what does she do?  She touches his clothing, for she had said, “If I just touch his clothes, I’ll be made well.” Instantly, her flow of blood ceased and she sensed in her body that she was healed of her affliction. I’ll just ask you this question:  Have you ever heard of Jesus referred to as a deliverer?  He delivers us from our affliction.  Here you get it in repetition.

At once, Jesus realized in Himself that power had gone out from Him.  He turned around in the crowd and said, “Who touched my clothes?”

Now I want to press pause for a minute.  Where was Jesus headed?  To heal the girl.  And he stops.  Jesus does not have a very good travel planner.  He stops and has a conversation.  “Who touched my clothes?”  If you’re Jairus, how are you feeling?   That’s right.

His disciples said to him, “Do you see the crowd pressing against you?  And yet you say, who touched me?”  I think we’re meant to see it that way, right?  Like “Jesus, you’re crazy.  Look at all these people.”   But he was looking around to see who had done this.  Notice where Jesus’s s gaze is going.  I just want to notice that he’s looking for the one who no one else wants to see.  He’s gazing into this crowd.  “No, no, no.  Something happened.  Someone touched me.  There’s someone here.”

The woman, with fear and trembling … There’s that theme again.  Do you remember that the townspeople also experienced fear and trembling?  But their response to was to send Jesus away.  Her response to knowing what had happened to her is that she fell down at his feet.  Fell down before him and told him the whole truth.  Notice the posture.

Oh, it’s gonna make me cry.  This woman is an outcast.  Notice Jairus wanted Jesus to heal whom?  His daughter, who he loves.  Notice that Jesus gives the unnamed woman a name.  But it is not like Janet.  He names her in a positional way, as it relates to himself.  Do you notice what He calls her?  Daughter.

You see, Jairus is really concerned about his daughter, which I think we could all agree is noble and loving.  But notice too that Jesus is concerned about His daughter, too.  “Daughter,” he said to her, “Your faith has saved you.  Go in peace, Shalom,” which is complete wholeness and being healed of her affliction.

Now you’re Jairus.  While Jesus was still speaking, people came from the synagogue leader’s house and said,” Your daughter is dead. Why bother the teacher anymore?  We waited too long.  Jesus, you were spending too much time with that woman who could have waited.”

I just want to ask again … I’m not trying to make application here, I just want to ask a question:  Have you ever prayed or asked God for something, and it just feels like He’s taken too long?  Or the very thing you wanted was inverted in your life and you think, “God, are you even listening?  Are you even showing up today?  Where are you God?”

I just want you to know your experience is not unique.  We see it in the Biblical text.  It may be that God might be doing something more than you could even know to ask for, maybe.  Notice that when Jesus overheard what was said, He told the synagogue leader “Do not be afraid, only believe.”

What does it mean to believe?  So I asked a friend of mine.  He’s one of our strategic partners who does Bible translation with an organization called Wycliff.  I’m a Bible nerd.  He’s a Bible nerd, so I called up a fellow Bible nerd just to ask the question “What does it mean to believe?  And this is what he said.

“Well, let me start with a dictionary definition.  The Greek word for believe in the New Testament is pistillo.  If you look this word up in a Greek lexicon, what you’d find is two different senses of the word.  The first one is to consider something to be true and therefore worthy of one’s trust.  So this is you’re considering something to be true.   This is a kind of a mental verb.  You’re just considering it in your mind to be true.  So for example, if I see a chair over there in the corner, I can look at that chair and I can say that chair is real and I believe that the chair is sturdy.   I don’t think that’s what Jesus really means in most places when he’s talking about believing or having faith.

The second sense of the word in a Greek dictionary, is this: to entrust oneself to an entity in complete confidence — with the implication of total commitment to the one trusted.  Now that’s kind of a mouthful, but let’s let me pick it apart a little bit.

The first part to entrust oneself — that’s not just considering something.  This is this is stepping out and entrusting oneself to that thing that is worthy of trust.  Here we have complete confidence.  We have total commitment or loyalty to that one thing.  We’re not just looking at that chair in the corner.  We’re going and sitting on it, right?  Because we really believe that it’s worthy of our trust.  It’s going to carry our weight when we when we sit down in it.

Another interesting thing is that if you look at the adjective form of this word pistos, this is often translated as faithful, right?  So this is talking about the trustworthiness of the thing that we’re putting our trust in.  But that same word can also be used to describe the flip side, which is the faith that we bring in trusting in God.  So it’s almost like two sides of the same coin, right?  Jesus is completely trustworthy.  He is faithful, and so because of that the proper response is that we should be full of faith in him.  We should put our complete trust and faith in him because he’s worthy of that trust.”

Thanks Ben.

So Jesus tells this man Jairus, who has a deep longing for his daughter to be healed, not to fear.  But to what?  Believe.  To place his trust in Jesus.   Just like Ben said, if you if you see a chair and you say that it looks trustworthy, that’s different than sitting in the chair. Jesus is saying “Follow me” to Jairus, right? “Only believe”

He did not let anyone accompany him except Peter, James and John James’s brother.  They came to the leader’s house, and He saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly.  He went in and said to them, “Why are you making a commotion and weeping?  The child is not dead, but asleep.”  They laughed at him.  Why did they laugh?  Because the child was dead.  But notice that Jesus is not oblivious to the fact that this child is dead.  Jesus just sees the Kingdom of God breaking in in this moment and recognizes that for those in the Kingdom, it’s not death.  It’s sleep.

They laughed at him, but he put them all outside.  He took the child’s father, mother and those who were with Him and entered the place where the child was.  Then he took the child by the hand.  Notice Jesus is touching a corpse.  This also would have been a no-no for His ethnicity.  You don’t do that.  You don’t take corpses by the hand.  It renders you unclean.  It’s similar to being touched by a demon-possessed person.  It’s similar to being among the tombs.  It’s similar to being touched by a woman with a chronic flow of blood.  Jesus is constantly allowing that which is unclean to touch him and what’s interesting is that he doesn’t become unclean.  Is Jesus giving His cleanliness to them?  Jesus doesn’t catch what they have, so to speak.  He takes the child by the hand and says to her, “Little girl I say to you get up.”  Immediately the girl got up and began to walk.  That’s a weird detail.

Have you guys heard of anything that lasted for twelve years anywhere else in this text?  Do you notice the pattern?  It seems like what Mark is doing is saying for as long as the woman with the flow of blood was sick, that’s how long this girl has been alive.  He seems to be tethering them.  I think he’s intentionally tethering them.  Because do you remember what Jesus called the outcast woman?  Daughter.

At this they were utterly astounded.  Then he gave them strict orders that no one should know about this and told them to give her something to eat.  Do you give ghosts something to eat?  No, you don’t.  In fact, this foreshadows Jesus’s own resurrection, where one of the first things He does with His disciples after he rises from the tomb is He says “Can you guys give me a sandwich?  I’m hungry.”  He says “Do you have any fish?  I need to eat.” Ghosts don’t eat.

For me, this text has helped expand my understanding of what my role is as a disciple of Jesus.  I hear people saying things like “just preach the gospel.”  I think what they mean is primarily that our role is to simply proclaim out loud the verbal truths of the good news of the Kingdom of God.

I would just kind of push back against that a little bit and say, is that what Jesus is doing?  Notice Jesus is not only teaching and proclaiming the Kingdom, but he’s also living the Kingdom now, right?  Do you see that Jesus is living the values of the Kingdom of God?  Wherever death and decay seem to have invaded, He steps in and drives them out.  He reclaims His territory, so to speak.  And I think for a Jesus follower, that’s really important for us to notice that our role is not simply to use our words.  Our entire life should be shaped by Jesus.   We should be living the Kingdom values now.

So I said I wasn’t going to do an application, so I won’t.  I’ll just ask you a question.  Does this matter?  Does this have any implications for you?  What might your life be like if we were to live the Kingdom of God?

I’m going to invite our worship team out and I’m going to pray for us and we’ll just kind of sing one last song in response.  So would you join me as we pray.  Lord, we love you.  We give you thanks for your many provisions and blessings.  We’re thankful for this Word, Lord.  In Mark five we see in beautiful display how You are reclaiming what is Yours.  You are restoring that which darkness and decay have corrupted.  You are delivering us from our affliction.  And yet we also see, Jesus, that you call us to follow you, and so that I think means to do likewise.  And so we ask as a church family Lord, that you would, by the power of Your spirit, shape our minds and our hearts to see people as You see them.  To see the world as You see the world.  And to live Your Kingdom now.  We want to be a people who put into practice that great prayer that you taught us — that Your Kingdom come and Your will be done on Earth, as it is in heaven.  Would you empower us to do so, Lord.  We pray these things, knowing Jesus, that you love us and you’re powerful to bring them about.  And so we entrust ourselves to you.  Amen. ###