The Courage to Reach out
A sermon by Carol Howard Merritt, Pastor
Western Presbyterian Church
Washington, D.C.
June 8, 2008

Text: Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26

We recognized our Sunday school teachers this morning. You do an amazing and important job. Not only do you let our children know that we care for them enough to give up hours to prepare and teach, but you tell them the stories that will form and mold their lives for years to come.

These stories in the Bible are interesting to read. They us a glimpse into an ancient culture, an idea of how people lived and what they thought. And it’s not just a small glance; we can read about so many things. We learn how they prepared food and how they rested. We can find out about how they relieved themselves and got rid of their garbage. We explore all sorts of ideas in this peculiar society, and we find out how so many of our notions evolved--even some of our most personal things.

And this passage this morning includes one of those central, revolutionary moments. We have a familiar scene. It’s hot and dusty. Jesus is walking and talking. He just finished a meal, and it was not with the religious leaders of the community, it was with tax collectors, people who took money for Caesar and they were known to hold back a bit for themselves. In fact, Jesus chose Matthew, one of the collectors, to follow him. To be his disciple. People wonder why Jesus is doing this, why he’s eating with the sinners.

Jesus answers them by saying something interesting, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.”

The leader of the synagogue makes his way through the crowd, comes before Jesus, and tells him about his daughter, who died. The people part for the grieving man, because he gets down on his knees, and asks Jesus to heal her. In one short paragraph Jesus goes and raises the little girl from the dead. That is clearly the point of the passage.

But something happens along the way. Like a good “West Wing” episode, some of the important dialogue happens as the characters walk. And also like Aaron Sorkin’s scripts, we can miss a lot. Lifetimes are often captured in a few words. Great liberating moments occur in a mere couple of sentences. And that is precisely what happens the Matthew passage this morning.

Because aside from the little girl dying, there’s something else going on here. Another character slips in through the crowd and barely slips into the sentences. A woman’s here. 

I have heard many, many sermons about the tax collectors, and about Jesus raising the little girl from the dead, but somehow, I’ve never heard one about that woman.  It’s terribly easy to glance over her. While Jesus teaches along the way, the crowd presses upon him, trying to hear exactly what he has to say. They do not want to miss a word from his mouth. And they want to be able to witness the miracles. And Jesus has just been asked to do the impossible, the miracle of all miracles, to raise a small child from her death. And so he is moving, quickly in a sea of people, when he is touched.

And perhaps the gospel writer himself was tempted to leave this small couple of sentences out. They seem unimportant, after all. As he’s writing the story, he is trying to get to the larger point. He has shortened the story from the gospel of Mark’s version, even though the book of Mark usually uses the least amount of words to get a point across. Matthew seems to be hurrying to get to the climax of the story, the part with the crying and the laughing and the music. The moment when Jesus tells the little girl to arise, and all of the mourners are amazed.

The woman, the touch, it’s peripheral. There are a mere three sentences, a small miraculous pit stop on a much more important journey. We are just climbing the plot line when it happens, when we read:

Then suddenly a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years came up behind him and touched the fringe of his cloak, for she said to herself, “If I only touch his cloak, I will be made well.” Jesus turned, and seeing her he said, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.” And instantly the woman was made well.

It made it into the story. In fact, Matthew, Mark, and Luke include it. And so we get a hint about other parts of the narrative by looking at the other books.

For instance, there is this strange exchange when Jesus asks, “Who touched me?” Consider how many people are moving about Jesus, pressing in upon him.

And it doesn’t seem that anyone’s willing to answer. And the disciples think it’s awfully strange that Jesus would ask. And yet he did, “Who touched me?” He felt the power draining from him. Somehow. He knew that someone had been healed from touching the hem of his garment.

And the woman confessed. With fear and trembling, she falls down before Jesus, just like the religious leader did, and she explained what she has done.

We don’t know her name. We don’t know the names of many women in the Bible. They are typically referred to by their social status. The rich widow. The poor widow. The important man’s wife. The leader’s daughter. She was simply a woman who has been hemorrhaging for twelve years. She was known by her sickness. But the author did add the story. He did put it in there. There is much about Jesus life that is not in the Scriptures, but this particular, this particular and very personal story made the cut.

We don’t hear about the story much from our pulpits, which is understandable. Menstruation is not something that any of us like to talk about in public settings like this one. It’s pretty uncomfortable, and makes us quite squeamish.

And yet, this bit of narrative that is quickly referred to by the gospel writer is too important to ignore. This touch does not go unnoticed by Jesus, by the gospel writers, or by us this morning. For this touch, the one that saved this woman from her years of hemorrhaging, liberated women everywhere.

According to ancient Jewish laws, women were unclean during that time of the month.

It began in the Garden of Eden, after Adam and Eve have eaten of the fruit, and the curses are being handed out to the snake and the first man, because Eve seduced Adam into eating the fruit, she was given the curse of pain in childbirth. One fourth of her life during childbearing years, she would have symptoms of the curse and would be unclean.

When you take a good look into Leviticus, the book where many of the laws are spelled out, it explicitly states that menstruating women were considered to be unclean. They were seen to have an infirmity and anyone who touched her would be considered unclean. In fact, everything she lies upon, everything she sits upon would be unclean. If anyone touched her bed, he would have to wash his clothes, bathe with water, and he would be unclean until morning. The woman absolutely could not touch holy things.

Women were sent to the outside of the city walls, and they lived in a tent for a week. When I read about successful businesswomen in the Scriptures, I’m always amazed, because can you imagine having a career when you’re on sick leave for one-fourth of your life?

Of course, women were very clever, and used this time to their advantage. For instance, one woman, Rachel, was escaping from her father’s house, and as a bit of an insurance policy, she took some of his household gods. When her father went after them, she knew just what to do with her loot. She took them out to the tent, sat on them, and told her father that “the way of women” was upon her. Her father quickly moved on.

When a woman hemorrhaged past her seven days, she had to be even more careful. Even after the bleeding stopped, she had to wait an additional seven days. Then she had to go through a ritual cleaning and she had to go to her priest and offer a pigeon as a sacrifice to atone for her sins.

The prophets often use this time in a woman’s life as a symbol of great and terrible sinfulness. Ezekiel especially. He’s very fond of the metaphor. But the most worn-out example of this comes from the prophet Isaiah when he says:

Come now, let us argue it out…
though your sins are like scarlet,
they shall be like snow;
though they are red like crimson,
they shall become like wool.

This was the world in which this woman lived. Not only did she have a physical health problem, but it was seen as a spiritual problem, a deeply moral problem. And she knew it. She knew that every one who surrounded her thought in these terms. And so I wonder what this woman was thinking when she came in from the outskirts of town, where she had been banished for 12 years. Here she was completely, utter unclean, reaching out and touching this holy man

And you can almost hear her making excuses in the passage, as she thinks, “I just need to touch his cloak and then I’ll be healed.” As if she is reminding herself, I don’t even need to touch Jesus, I just need to catch the edge of what he’s wearing.

That’s exactly what she does. She reaches out to Jesus, amid the throng of people, it’s as if she is hoping that he will not notice. She reaches out, touches his cloak, and quickly she is healed.

But then Jesus does notice. He stops. Looks around, and asks, “Who touched me?”

And the woman drops down before him, with fear and trembling. I wonder what she expected at that moment. Surely she expected Jesus to follow the laws, to make sure that she stayed unclean for seven days. To make sure that she made a sacrifice for her sins. And to realize that Jesus himself was defiled and unclean.

Yet, he did none of these things. Instead he looked at her, he said, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well. Go in peace.”

What beautiful words. Not only does he refuse to chastise her for touching him, but he calls her his daughter. He doesn’t demand sacrifice, but gives mercy. The most amazing part of the miracle? He says that she is responsible for it. It was her faith that made her well. It was her courage that moved her from her place of seclusion and isolation, that led her to healing, even through the curse. It is her courage that moved us all of this banishment. It frees us to understand women in a healthier light, as a part of our families, as co-creators who are made in God’s image.

For as we look at this text, we realize the importance of this moment. Jesus welcomed the touch. He did not see her as unclean, but as part of a greater family.

Now may this revolutionary moment, contained in three sentences and one touch, give us all courage to reach beyond our cultural boundaries, and allow for wholeness and healing.

To the glory of God, our Creator,
God, our Liberator,
and God our Sustainer. Amen.