Who Is The One Who Touched Me?

I've been thinking about marketing as I was preparing this sermon. I was thinking about marketing and how it works and that it works. And it works in a strange way. People pay for billboards because they actually communicate something to us. We actually gain. We get knowledge from them. And oftentimes when something's being marketed, it's... The marketer's job is to try to figure out what you want. And then their job is to tell you that if you get this product, if you buy this thing, if you do this thing, you're going to get what you want. And oftentimes it's not the product that, I mean, they're selling you a product, but often they're selling you an experience. You think of Starbucks or McDonald's or wherever you want to think of, and they're selling you an experience. It's something that you would desire.

And so what happens is when you believe marketing, you identify with it. So we have different companies that are particularly good at this. So Starbucks is the best coffee there is, right? Well, if it's not the best coffee, why isn't it the best coffee? What? Marketing, you say it's not the best coffee because of marketing? Yeah. And what does it say about you if you have Starbucks? cool you're sophisticated you have good taste and people who see that they they they should know you have good taste now think for a second about the you know you see so you have a guy who has his starbucks and then next to him you have a guy that has a big speedway insulated mug that's 64 ounces and it's it's got this big accordion straw sticking out of it now these These two cups communicate something to you about the person, right? And you're making judgments about them, about whether, you know, who do you identify with? Do you identify with the guy who got 16 ounces of caffeine for $5? Or do you identify with the guy who got 64 ounces of caffeine for $2, maybe? And the seventh one is free, right? Huh? So this is marketing, okay?

And marketing is made for you to identify with people, with classes, with things like that. And it teaches you this is good and this is bad. The reason marketing works is because you have an appetite in yourself to be accepted, to be approved, to be important. And so, you know, we all do things. We buy things. And we don't even necessarily think about it. But we're always... And inside of us, in the back of house, we're processing, what does this mean? What do I get from it? You get a cup of coffee and then the cup of coffee is gone. But it means something about you. You have an iPhone instead of an Android. That communicates something. Some people think, oh, you're cool. And some people think, you're an idiot. And if you have the phone, you think, oh, look, I'm cool. And then you look at the other guy and you go, well, you just clearly don't know.

That your phone's not as good as mine. And what I want you to see is that you, I, we are always processing and trying to find our place in this world. And the reason marketing works is because it helps define your place. Oh, you wear this kind of computer. Oh, you drive this kind of car. Oh, you wear these kind of clothes. Or these kind of glasses. You drink this kind of coffee. And all of these things help you define yourself. This is who I am. This is what's important to me. We're always working on that. And largely it's vanity. But you have to realize it's the temptation that we all face. Now why am I talking about all of this? Well, I'm talking about all of this because in our text this morning, Jesus heals or performs two miracles. One is that he raises a young girl from the dead. And the other is he heals a woman who's sick and has had a hemorrhage for 12 years.

And as you come to this text, you think, okay, who are the people in here? And should I do what they did? Should I emulate them? So just think of this text in terms of marketing. Do you want to be like Jairus? Do you want to be like the woman? Or do you not want to be like them? And if so, why? That's how we're going to approach the text this morning. And what I want to do is I want to first convince you that you should want to be like them. And then I'm going to convince you that you shouldn't want to be like them.

And then we're going to end with me saying, no, actually you really ought to be just like them. Okay? Would you please stand for the reading of God's word? From Luke chapter 8, verses 40 through 56. This is the word of the Lord and it is eternally true. And as Jesus returned, the people welcomed him. For they had all been waiting for him. And there came a man named Jairus. And he was an official of the synagogue. And he fell at Jesus' feet and began to implore him to come to his house. For he had an only daughter, about twelve years old, and she was dying. But as he went, the crowds were pressing against him, and a woman who had a hemorrhage for twelve years and could not be healed by anyone came up behind him and touched the fringe of his cloak, and immediately her hemorrhage stopped. And Jesus said, Who is the one who touched me? And while they were all denying it, Peter said, Master, the people are crowding and pressing in on you. But Jesus said, Someone did touch me, for I was aware that power had gone out of me.

When the woman saw that she had not escaped notice, she came trembling and fell down before him and declared in the presence of all the people the reason why she had touched him and how she had been immediately healed. And he said to her, daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace. While he was still speaking, someone came from the house of the synagogue official saying, your daughter has died. Do not trouble the teacher anymore. But when Jesus heard this, he answered him, do not be afraid any longer. Only believe and she will be made well. When he came to the house, he did not allow anyone to enter with him except Peter and John and James and the girl's father and mother. Now when they were all weeping and lamenting for her, but he said, Stop weeping, for she has not died but is asleep. And they began laughing at him, knowing that she had died. He, however, took her by the hand and called, saying, Child, arise. And her spirit returned, and she got up immediately. And he gave orders for something to be given her to eat. Her parents were amazed.

But he instructed them not to tell anyone what had happened. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. And so at the beginning of the text, it says Jesus returned. He's just been over the sea, over in the land of the Gerasenes. He's just healed the Gerasene demoniac. And they said, when they saw what he did, they said, you can't be here. You've got to leave. Would you please leave? Because they were scared. And so Jesus leaves. He's returning back to Galilee, to the land of Galilee. And he's greeted with... And as he's being greeted, this man Jairus comes up. Now Jairus is an official in the synagogue. So we know that Jairus is a Jew. And he's got a daughter who's sick and dying. And it's his only daughter. And he knows something. He believes something about Jesus Christ because he came to him saying, Teacher, I need your help. My daughter's dying. And so then as Jesus is on the way to Jairus' house, all this whole group of people are going with him.

And this woman discreetly touches him. But not even him, just his cloak. She touches him and he stops and says, who did it? And the apostles are going, dude, look at all these people. And he says, no, I know someone did. So then she's found out. She says, it was me and here's why. And Jesus is kind with her. He's tender with her. Sends her on her way. Then immediately someone comes from Jairus' house and says, he can go home. She's dead. And Jesus says, no. We're going to go. She'll be made well. You need to believe and she'll be made well. And so he gets there and everyone's kind of smirking and kind of like, you know, she's going to be made well. They all know she's dead. They're not wrong that she's dead. They know this young girl has passed from life into death. And now Jesus has come and he said, she's not dead. She's just sleeping. And their weeping turns into laughter and mockery and ridicule of him. And so he brings in only his closest disciples.

Peter, James, and John, plus her parents, and he raises this girl. And then says, don't tell anybody about it. And so at this point, do you want to emulate Jairus and this woman? Do you think, that's the sort of thing I should be willing to do, the sort of thing I should want to do? Most of us would say, yes. They had a problem. Both of them had a problem, and they came to Jesus for help. And that's a good thing. And it really is a good thing. It means that they both believed in some degree that Jesus was able to help them. They were both distressed and they were scared. They begged Jesus for help. It says that the man named Jairus was an official of the synagogue. He fell at Jesus' feet and he implored him to come to his house. Implore means like beg, grovel, plead earnestly. Please, I need your help. It's not like, well, if you get a chance, could you swing by and help me out?

I've got a water leak at my house. Implore is screaming and yelling. And please, anyone who is within earshot, stop what you're doing and come. I have a problem now. And so this is how Jairus comes to him. And Jairus comes in the midst of a crowd. Consider yourself, when you have problems or you have needs, do you want to present them in front of people? We never want to present them in front of people unless the problem is really serious. And then all of a sudden, you forget who's around. And you're not composed anymore because you need real help. And you're no longer concerned about what people think of you. He was a man who would have been respected. He was an official in the synagogue. And here he is on his knees begging Jesus to come save his daughter. He was very distressed and he was scared. The same is true of the woman. It says that when she saw that she had not escaped notice, she fell down. She came trembling and fell down before Jesus. And she's begging and pleading with him.

scared. She was scared. But for now, what I want you to see is that the things that Jairus and this woman did are commendable. They're good things. They were humble people who believed that Jesus could help them with their present problems. And therefore, they came to him. The man came publicly. The woman came secretly. But they came to Jesus Christ. And so ought you to emulate them. Absolutely, you should. want to show you i want i'm i'm gonna you know here here i've i've done my best to market to you like them identify with them do what they did and and you go okay well i'll yeah i'll try well so now what i'm going to do is i'm going to flip it and i'm going to show you that what they did was was not good so jairus he's he's a man of respect he's a he's a he's a leader and i want you to compare the way that he came to jesus in your mind

with how the Roman centurion came to Jesus. Both of them in very similar situations. Jairus' daughter is dying. The Roman centurion's servant, whom he loved, was dying. And so they both approach Jesus Christ, but there's a huge difference in the way they do it. Do you know that the Roman centurion, he never spoke to Jesus Christ. Never came and spoke to Jesus Christ himself. He sent messengers twice. And the reason he said it is because, you know, we say Jairus had respect. for Jesus' ability to help. He saw the power of God, and so he came. And I say, yeah, but he came in pride, thinking he was worthy. Because the Roman centurion, he said, I'm not even worthy to come into your presence. That's why I sent messengers. And you don't have to come to my house. If you'll just speak the word, my servant will be healed. And so the Roman centurion, who did it better? Who did it better? Did Jairus do it better, or did the Roman centurion do it better?

Well, we know the Roman centurion did it better because of what Jesus said about him. Here this man is. He's not even a Jew. He's a Gentile. And Jesus says of him, wow, I haven't seen faith like this in all of Israel. This man knows who I am. He believes. So, should you be like Jairus? All of a sudden you go, well, I don't know if I should be like, I should be like the Roman centurion. Because he did it better. Got a discreet problem. It's not the sort of, you know, Jairus is, you know, if someone were to, you know, Jairus' problem was the sort of thing that you don't really talk about, but people aren't going to be put off if you do talk about it. She's got a problem that's much more private. And she's been bearing this burden for 12 years. And she's bankrupt herself trying to get healed.

The woman had a hemorrhage for 12 years and could not be healed by anyone. And you think, okay, who's anyone? Anyone or doctors, physicians, you know, people, there's no, there was no help for this woman to be found. And she was out of resource. She was out of, she was out of hope. And so she comes to Jesus Christ and she's processed in her mind. I don't have any money. I don't have anything else to give. What I'm going to do is I'm going to, if anyone can help, he can help. It's sort of this like last ditch effort, this sort of hail Mary. kind of approach to jesus christ and while her her burden is uh private and not the sort of thing that you you just broadcast she comes as if to to you know she comes like a like a crumb snatcher there's all of there's jesus christ and there's all of the power and the authority that he has and here she comes in under the cover of the crowd she comes

trying to snitch a little bit of a way for herself, quietly and without asking, when Jesus finds her out, because she was trying to steal a blessing. She wasn't forthright. You think, what should she have done? Well, now we're all thinking and we're going, well, what she should have done is she should have, to the women that were in the crowd that were close to Jesus and passed the message along, or she should have suffered silently because it was just not the kind of thing you talk about. But what she does is she comes in a crowd and just says, if I can just touch him, I'll be better. And so she does. And then she gets caught. And then out with all of it. So all of the discretion and all of the modesty that attended her initial approach, it's all thrown away now. Now she's telling everybody what happened and what's wrong. She came trembling and she fell down before him and declared in the presence of all the reason why she had touched him. That's not modest, is it?

That's not the sort of thing that you'd want to be accused of doing. There's got to be a better way to get it done. Burden silently and by yourself rather than to come and be exposed in this way. She's declared in the presence of all the people the reason why she touched him and how she'd been immediately healed. And so there's this weird, there's this mix going on inside of her. She's telling people, here's why I touched him. I've spent all my money and I've had all my resources and I'm sick. And I can't get any help. Touched him and I'm healed now. I can feel in my body I'm healed. A woman, if she did something like that, I'll tell you that there are times that the modesty that she demonstrated initially was a good thing. And in our culture, it's something that's lost. Things that ought not to be spoken of are commonly spoken of in our culture. And so I do actually commend her modesty in not broadcasting her problem to everyone.

initially, it was good that she didn't come and say, here's my problem. And yet then, if I say that, then I'm left saying, well, then it was wrong. So was it wrong for her to conceal it and try to steal a blessing? Or was it wrong for her to be immodest and to tell everyone afterwards? You think there's got to be a better way to do it where those sorts of difficulties don't ever present themselves. What I want to say to you is life doesn't happen that way. It's not that neat and clean. She's got a real problem. And she's hopeless. She's without any help and without any hope. So is Jairus. This respectable man and this poor woman have no other choice. And what's very common for us is we're sitting here going, so are they? I just want to know what I'm supposed to do. I talked a little bit about this in Sunday school. Am I supposed to do what they did or am I not supposed to do what they did? What we want is just a black and white, yes, do what they did exactly.

No, don't do anything like what they did because it was wrong. And what I want you to see, what you have to realize is that life doesn't happen that way. Not for you and not for me and not for your kids and not for your spouse. Life's not that neat and clean. When you come to Jesus Christ, you will not come perfectly. If you wait to come to Jesus Christ until you can come respectfully, your daughter will be dead. And so the first thing you learn is you think, well, should I do what Jairus did? Should I do what the woman did? And I say, yeah, you should. But you have to realize that you're going to do it like they did it. You're not going to do it perfectly. You think, well, will Jesus receive it if I don't do it perfectly, if I don't do it right? What if I say it the wrong way? Well, I want you to take comfort from this passage. I want you to take encouragement because look at how he deals with this woman. What does he say to her?

He says, daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace. In the older translations, it doesn't say daughter. It says, fear not, child. Fear not, but your faith has made you well. And so we think, well, if that was the response, then I should have done, I should do what she did. Exactly. And I say, well, we have to be more discerning. Because life, it's not that neat and clean. You know, Dan and I talk regularly about schedules and plans. You know, he calls me and how's your day going? And I say, well, this is how it's supposed to go. And this is how it's gone so far. And it's not like how it was supposed to go. He tells me the same thing about his day. And this is just how life goes on. Things don't go how we would plan them to be. We don't have that much control. And the beauty of this is that Jairus and this woman are consumed with a desire to have control of everything.

I have to control myself. I have to control, I have to do it perfectly. I have to control Jesus' response. To get the response I want from Jesus, I have to come to him in just this perfect way. As if we can manipulate the Son of God into giving us what we want. And so Jairus comes consciously thinking, I'm important. The Roman centurion didn't come like this. I should come like the Roman centurion. No, his daughter was dying and he came to Jesus and said, I need help. And would you come to my house, please? Because she's dying. What we don't have recorded here is, you wonder, so after the woman's healed, go in peace, daughter. Then Jesus is still on his way to Jairus' house. And a messenger comes and says, don't bother him, Jairus, your daughter's dead. What did Jairus say to Jesus? Because all we have is Jesus' response. Do not be afraid. Only believe and your daughter will be made well. He say to Jesus.

Did he say, don't bother coming. She's dead now. They lose faith. On the way, they're on the road and some new bit of information comes and they're determining, do we continue to do this? What can a doctor do for someone who's dead? I mean, declare they're dead. That's what a doctor can do. But we know that that confirmation has already been realized because the people are weeping and wailing. And in parallel accounts, they've gotten out the instruments and that's what they do when people die. They played music. So there's no question about this girl's life. She's dead. And so there's no good in just bringing in a physician at that point. But then we pick up and we've realized, well, okay, so Jesus ends up at their house. Like there was this messenger that said, you don't need to come. Then Jesus said, don't be afraid, only believe. And then when they get to the house, Jesus says to everyone, she's not dead. And they all start laughing and mocking.

And so we see that Jesus goes on to the house, even though this girl's dead. And we see the extent of the faith that Jairus and these messengers had. We have faith that you can save her while she's alive, but we don't have faith that you can raise her once she's dead. And so should we emulate Jairus' faith? Well, he came, and he was honest. He came to Jesus' face. He didn't come try to, you know, kidnap Jesus. steal a piece of his cloak to take home and touch his daughter with or something. And so we think, well, that's good. But then we see that he's fearful and we see that the people are laughing and they're mocking and should we do what Jairus did? What I want you to realize is that we spend far too much time posturing ourselves and presenting ourselves well. I had a guy ask me earlier this week, very bright man, asked me, he says, do you believe in demons?

He's published, he's written books, he's a professor, and he's asking me, do you think demons are real? And this guy's a believer. Do you think demons are real? How do you process demons? Do you think people can be demon-possessed? That was his question. Do you think people can be demon-possessed? And here I am, I just preached on the Gerasene demoniac, and here's this well-to-do, accomplished, written professor. And he's asking me if I think people can be demon-possessed. And this is a strange question from him. And so we had a good conversation, and I said, you know, yes, I do. And I said, biblically, I have to deny what Scripture says. There are lots of crazy things in Scripture that have to do with demons and raising people from the dead and magic.

There's just all kinds of weird things in there that if I'm left to myself, I go, that doesn't make any sense to me and I don't think that should happen. But there it is in the pages of scripture recorded that it did happen. And so I said, yeah, I believe in demon possession. That it's a thing that it's happened. That it does happen. Now, can I point around and say, that person's demon possessed. I'm not nearly so comfortable doing that. We all have these thoughts though, don't we? When you look around at people and you think they're really crazy, and you think, I wonder if they're demon-possessed. But you would never say it. You wouldn't ever give voice to it. But you're just wondering in your head, are they just really sinful, or do they have a demon? Because if they have a demon, I don't know what to do with them. We don't have a category in our brain to think about. And what I said to the guys, I said, listen, you know, I believe in demons.

But if you push me really, you know, I said, and you said, I do too. We just don't know what to do with it. And I said, yeah, you know, if you really pushed me on it in public and you really said, now, really, really, really tell me what you think about it. Tell me where you see it. Tell me. All of a sudden, we just get really uncomfortable with the conversation. Because we don't want to be seen as just nuts. Because we care about what people think about us. And we shy away from the things that are clearly in scripture because we say, people will just look at you crazy. You'll lose all respect for you if you identify and say, yes, that's true. Now you can go to other countries and you can talk about demon possession and you won't lose any respect. You may well gain respect, but not in America. We spend far too much time worrying about what other people think of our convictions, of what the Bible teaches and whether we believe it or not.

And Jairus and this woman, they were beyond that. They were beyond worrying about what the people thought. They were beyond worrying about what Jesus thought. Did I come to him the right way? Because if I don't come to him the right way, I don't know if I'll get what I want. Here's Jairus begging. Here's the woman secretly trying to steal the blessing. One of the first things we learn about this is you can't have too high of a view of yourself or how you're going to go about fixing your problems. Or how serious your problems are. This woman had a real problem. So should you emulate Jairus and the woman? The answer is absolutely you should. And you should not say you should emulate them because they did everything perfectly. They didn't. And you don't. I don't. But why should you emulate them? You should emulate them because they had faith to come to Jesus Christ. Because the thing that was actually most important to them was not themselves.

And we spend so much time worrying about what people think of us and what people think of what we believe or how we act or what we do. And at the bottom of that, what we're focused on, when we posture and when we present and when we try to project a certain image or garner a certain response from people, what we're doing, all of that is built on the foundation of only thinking about yourself. It's what's front and center in your mind. What will people think of me? Can I get what I want if I do this? How can I prevent that bad thing I don't want? And all you're doing is thinking about yourself. And the thing you see in Jairus and this woman that's most commendable is they weren't thinking about themselves and how people were going to receive them. Both of them came to Jesus Christ because they had some degree of faith that he could heal them. And we sit and go, well, their faith wasn't good enough. The Roman centurion was better than Jairus.

You can't come to Jesus until you're like him. And I say, if that's what we actually think and believe, then we say that Jesus responded inappropriately to Jairus. Because what did Jesus do with Jairus' weak faith? How did he respond to it? He met it. And he granted his request. And you can't live thinking, my faith has to be perfect. I have to get all cleaned up and present well before I can come to Jesus Christ. Because you see in this text that Jairus wasn't perfect. And we have the Roman centurion being praised in a similar situation. And yet Jesus doesn't treat them any differently. He heals both the Roman centurion's servant and Jairus' daughter. And so you need to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that Jesus answers imperfect requests. He hears and deals with us in our weakness.

You won't come to Jesus Christ if you think you have to be strong and all put together. He didn't come to heal the healthy. He came for the sick. And I don't want you having a roadblock in front of you saying, I can't come out with it because it's not all polished and neat and pretty yet. That's okay. That's perfectly fine. Both Jairus and this woman could have done better. And Jesus grants both of their requests. In Isaiah 55, 1 and 2, The prophet writes, ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters. And you who have no money, come, buy and eat. Come, buy wine and milk without money and without cost. You think you've got to be all cleaned up to come to Jesus. You don't. You can't clean yourself up. You can't fix your sin. You have no remedy for it.

It's like going into a room and it's covered in dust and you come in and try to clean up the mess. All you do is stir it up. You cannot clean it up. You can't make it more presentable. And it's foolish to try. One who thirsts, come to the waters. Well, I don't have any money. Come and buy without money and without cost. Why do you spend money for what is not bread and your wages for what does not satisfy? Listen carefully to me and eat what is good and delight yourself in abundance. That's the call of Jesus Christ to you. Come now. Come as you are. You're a mess and you don't have it straightened out. He already knows that. You think about the woman. Did Jesus really not know who touched him? He knew who touched him. That's what omniscience is. That's what being all knowing is. He knew the exact moment she would put her hand on his cloak. He could have anticipated it. He could have pulled his cloak away. And he said, who touched me? And the apostles say.

There's all these people. What do you mean who touched you? I know someone touched me because power went out of me. That power went out of him, not because she stole it, but because he granted it. He allowed that power to go out. He accomplished her healing because he was willing to. Why do you spend money for what's not bread? Why do you worry about what people think? Why do you worry about the implications of your sin? Why do you worry about what's going to happen if I do that? If I say that, what will people think? why do you worry about yourself so much? Come to Jesus Christ. He sees you for who you are. You've been stuck in it years and years, and you don't know why. It's so bad, Pastor. You can't imagine how awful it is. Maybe I can't, but Jesus can. And he does. And it's not a failure for you to come to the only place that you can find help and hope. On this text, Matthew Henry says, strong faith shall be applauded.

Like the Roman centurion. I've not found faith like this in all of Israel. Strong faith shall be applauded, and yet weak faith will not be rejected. It gets more difficult, because I've been talking this whole time, saying, come to Jesus Christ, as though, you know, it presumes that you never have. As if I'm saying, you should come for the first time to Jesus, and yet some of you are sitting there thinking, I have come to Jesus. I have brought my burdens. I've done what Jairus and the woman did, and you know what? I didn't get the answer. I want it. And what I say to you is you, in the midst of your burdens and in the midst of your difficulties, still have to come to Jesus Christ. And if he chooses, in his wisdom and in his infinite love and mercy, if he chooses not to give you exactly what you want when you want it, that's for your good. I can't explain here.

I might be able to have a better chance of doing it one-on-one to explain how it's for your good, but I'm convinced by scripture that it is for your good. And that doesn't mean, our good doesn't mean our pleasure or our comfort necessarily. When God works all things together for the good of those who seek him, those who love him and are called according to his purpose, that doesn't mean that you get an easy life, that you come to God and that he says, oh, my people won't suffer for a time. No. God's people often suffer. And that's not in contradiction with his goodness or his kindness in answering our calls when we come to him. And so if you're tripped up and you say, I came and didn't get what I want, then what I say is, then it wasn't a good thing for you to have. And it requires humility of you to acknowledge before God and men that God knows better than you about what you need. This place is not your home.

Trump's not your king. He ain't going to save you. Neither is your husband, neither are your children, neither is your job or a bunch of money. This place isn't our home. We are only here for a little time, and then we're on to eternity. And so if God brings into our lives and allows for this season struggles and trials and hardships like a hemorrhage for 12 years, I asked you, how many of you guys have a burden that you would like Jesus to remove? I think most of you would say yes. And if I said, okay, have you had that burden for 12 years? A lot less of you would say yes. Some of you would. Some of you would say, I've had things that I've carried and dealt with for a long time. And you need to see that Jesus was merciful to this woman and he also allowed her 12 years of this suffering.

she still came. She'd exhausted the possibilities in terms of finding healing. And when Jesus came, she said, I will come to him. If there's help to be had, it will be found in him. Daniel was the guy blind or deaf, the one that Jesus healed. And they said, was it because he sinned or his parents? He was blind. I was just trying to remember. Huh? He was born blind. Yeah, you remember this account of the guy being born blind. And Jesus, you know, spits in the mud, you know, the dirt and makes mud and rubs it in his eyes. Gross. And then he can see and everyone's going, why was he blind then? Did he sin or did his parents sin? And what did Jesus say? Neither. He was given that burden so that God would be glorified, that his grace would be on full and full display and full view. And so you have to have a theology and under doctrine and understanding of your own suffering.

as not being in contradiction with the will of God. You may well have burdens in your life that you will bear until you die and not a day sooner. You may not. You may have temporary burdens, things you deal with now that in time God will remove through this mean or that or whatever means. But you may well have things that you're going to carry with you until you die. And that does not, does not prevent you. from coming to Jesus Christ. If it does, it's because you're more concerned about your comfort and your ease and this life than you are about your soul. And I don't want that to be true of any of you. I don't want you to be so concerned about this life and what you have now that you don't come like Jairus and this woman. So there are two applications. The first has to do with you. The second has to do with others. The first is that, as I've already stated, but I want to state more clearly, your eyes must...

At all times, especially in times of trial. Do you hear me? Especially when things are hard. Your eyes must be fixed on Jesus Christ. Hebrews 12 says, Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run the race that is set before us. We all have different races, right? Let us run the race that is set before us with endurance. fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before him, the same joy that's set before us, for the joy that's set before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of God. For consider him who endured such hostility against himself, such hostility by sinners against himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. Do you think Jairus was tempted to lose heart?

When the messenger came and said, your daughter died. Absolutely. And what did Jesus say? Don't be afraid. How could you not be afraid? Jesus says, don't be afraid, only believe. And your daughter will be made well. This is the hope, the only hope that Christians have. We don't have a hope of a comfortable life. God may well give us comforts in this world, and we praise him for it. But we're not guaranteed those things. And our happiness and our joy is not dependent on those things. We must run the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith. That's what you must do. If you want to be able to process through the burdens of this world and of your life and your body and your marriage and your job and your money and your kids and all of that, you must keep your eyes fixed on Jesus Christ. When you lose sight of that, you'll see all kinds of other things, and all they will do is destroy you. You must fix your eyes on Jesus Christ. Now, what about others? When you think of someone who needs you, is dependent on you, that you're responsible for, some way or another, some person, most of us can think of, unless you're a particularly young child, you have people, we have responsibilities to other people. Children even have responsibilities to their parents.

Parents are somewhat dependent on their children. Children can really derail a day, just for instance. And so we all have people who are dependent on us. And so how many times have you thought, when the person who's dependent on you, how many times have you been unwilling to meet their request, to even hear their request, because they didn't approach you the right way? You didn't say it right. Husband says, you didn't say it respectfully. I couldn't hear. What you said, because it was so disrespectful. Wife says, I couldn't hear it because you were so unloving, you were so harsh. If you would just say it the right way to me, then I would be willing to do it. But as a discipline to you, because you didn't say it right to me, the answer is no. And I say, that's unbiblical.

That's unbiblical. What you're teaching the people under your care, if that's how you behave, is that God will not hear them or condescend to them or meet them in their trials unless they can do it right first. Jairus' daughter would have been left dead. This woman would have been left with her burden. If Jesus would have said, you didn't do it the right way, it doesn't mean that other people couldn't approach you more appropriately. Could a husband be more loving to his wife in the way that he leads her? Yes. And should he? Yes. But that's not any excuse. You know, you were mean. You didn't say it the right way. It's no excuse for not doing what he was requested of you. Your wife yells at you. You never this. I wish you'd do that. Why don't you? As if you can now, I don't have to listen to you because you didn't say it respectfully and you're supposed to be respectful. This is not how it works. These sorts of thoughts don't honor Jesus Christ. And we see in this text,

That Jesus was gracious with the people who approached him less than perfectly. And we ought to be as well. Jesus graciously met their needs. And as a part of meeting their needs, he forgave their sins. What you see in this passage is you see his help, his mercy, his kindness joined together with his forgiveness. Even as they approached him imperfectly, he forgives them and he heals them. And that's how we ought to respond to one another. And you say, well, but they've just always been so nasty to me. Always said such hurtful things to me. Always withheld that's love. And I say, you're not to respond to them according to the way they've treated you. Because that's not how God has treated you. In Christ Jesus, he's been merciful to you. When you were his enemy, when you were dead in your sins, when you spent your life.

fomenting rebellion against him, he was merciful. We love because he first loved us. And we love in the same way that he loved. If we love God, then we will love our neighbors. And we ought to love our neighbors the way Jesus loved his enemies. If you set up this world where people can't approach you unless they do it properly, you think they'll learn to do it the right way. But do you know what will actually happen? They'll stop coming to you. That's what will actually happen. You men, you tell your wife, you've got to be respectful if you come talk to me. If you want me to hear, you've got to be respectful. You know what will happen? She'll stop talking to you. You tell your kids that they must always, always, always, Daddy, may I please? And their manners are the like, if you don't do this, the answer is no. You know what happens with those kids? They just stop asking. But they don't stop doing. They just stop asking for help.

And so don't believe the lie that I'm teaching you respect. Because that's not the point. If you're in a position of responsibility for someone else, as Jesus was for them, your job is to care for them. And yes, part of your work is to teach them to be respectful and to be loving and to be kind and to be gracious and all of those things. And the primary way that you will teach them those things is by how you demonstrate that stuff. You want them to be gracious and yet you're not gracious with them when they sin? They ain't going to learn it. You have to work. As a Christian, you have to work to be approachable. And that means that people will sin against you. If you're approachable, then they will approach you. And when they approach you, they won't approach you perfectly. They'll approach you sinfully. And they'll say things and do things that you don't appreciate, that you don't like. They'll do things that hurt. Consider him who has endured such hostility by sinners against himself. Consider him. You see him in this text.

Consider him so that you won't grow weary and lose heart. Father, we are humbled by the mercy and the kindness of you sending your son to this world. We're awed by his kindness and his compassion towards sinners that don't deserve his kindness and his compassion, who are unworthy of it. Father, you've loved us with a perfect love, and we ask that you would create in us a clean heart, that you would... Make us alive through Christ Jesus, by his blood, and that our life would be manifested in our love for our brothers, in our love for our spouses and our children, in our love for our mothers and our fathers, our co-workers, those who know you and those who don't, Father. Your son Jesus loved both, and so we ask that you would help us to love them as well, to love as he loved and because he loved. We pray in Jesus' name, amen.