Keeping The Faith

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​First Presbyterian Church of Blackwood                          
21 E. Church Street
Blackwood, NJ 08012                                                                              
Sermon Notes (Sunday ~ June 30 2024)
Sermon Title – Keeping The Faith
Text – Mark 5:21-43
Rev Dwayne Doyle 
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There are different extremes of faith or lack of faith.  When my wife and I were on a mission trip to Belarus in 1998, we were visiting a hospital.  Our guests took us around to many hospitals and children’s homes to give gifts to patients and put on a Christmas show.  In this one particular hospital there were, as in any hospital, many sick people lying in bed.  I went over to one patient and offered to pray for him.  Suddenly one of the people who were with us said, “why pray, that won’t do anything.”  I found out later that she was an atheist from Latvia.  I was with folks who had lived through communism in the former Soviet Union.  While in Russia in 1994, I met believers who had survived years in prison, others were faithful atheists committed to the state, and others were Orthodox Christians.  I thought it was a usual practice request to pray for someone.  I disregarded the lack of belief in a God that didn’t exist and prayed with the man in the hospital anyway.  But my experience shows that faith in God isn’t accepted by everyone. 
Today, we have two stories in our New Testament Lesson.  One is about a father who just wanted to see his daughter live.  The other is about a woman who suffered from a hemorrhage.  One was motivated out of the love he had for his daughter to ask Jesus to help heal her.  The other had tried every possible means to bring healing to her bleeding, but after 12 years of trying she thought Jesus was her last hope.  Where do you go when you are desperate for help?  Most of us go to God.
When Jesus was asked by Jairus, the leader of the local synagogue, to come help his daughter, you can see his desperation.  He ‘pleaded fervently’, he fell at Jesus’ feet.  He said, “My little daughter is dying . . . Please come and lay your hands on her; heal her so she can live.”
Jesus’ reaction wasn’t to get upset with Jairus.  The scripture says, “Jesus went with him, and all the people followed crowding around him.”  Mark 5:23b
(Story about my daughter Sarah getting hurt and how it affected me as a father. I cried out to God to help her. I can in some way relate to Jairus in his concern for his daughter).
At other times in scripture Jesus said, “ask and it shall be given unto you, seek and you shall find, knock and the door shall be opened.”  “You have not because you ask not.”  “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and all of these things shall be added unto you.”  “If you have the faith the size of a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain ‘be removed into the sea’ and it will be moved.”  Jesus was often disappointed in the disciples’ lack of faith when they couldn’t heal people, doubted that they could survive a storm at sea with Jesus in their boat.  Putting our faith in Jesus is the first step to believing that he is alive and real.  Acting on our faith as we follow Him is like developing our faith muscle.  The more we exercise it, the stronger it will get.  How is your faith muscle?
Meanwhile, getting back to today’s scripture, “As Jesus was going to help heal Jairus’ daughter, a woman saw Jesus in the crowd.  She thought to herself, “If I can just touch his robe, I will be healed.” Mark 5:28.  Probably to her surprise, when she touched his robe, the scripture records, “Immediately the bleeding stopped, and she could feel in her body that she had been healed of her terrible condition.” Mark 5:29. 
Before we try to analyze what took place in this story, let’s first of all recognize the beautiful thing that happened.  A woman who was suffering from an ailment for twelve years, was finally freed from her suffering.  That is great news!  And the amazing thing is that Jesus didn’t even know who had touched Him.  The scripture records, “Jesus realized at once that healing power had gone out from him, so he turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who touched my robe?”
And Jesus’ reaction again to someone seeking to be healed from Him was not to get upset.  In fact, when the woman realized that Jesus was seeking her out, the scripture records, “Then the frightened woman, trembling at the realization of what had happened to her, came and fell to her knees in front of Him [Jesus], and told Him what she had done.” Mark 5:33  Your suffering is over.
Jesus’ reaction was one of compassion and encouragement to the woman.  He said, “Daughter, your faith has made you well.  Go in peace.  Your suffering is over.” Mark 5:34. 
There is no shame in asking for help.  On several occasions, when someone asked Jesus for something, He answered in a way that did not seem at first encouraging.  The Syrophoenician woman who sought healing for her daughter, Jesus’ mother Mary asking Jesus to help when the wine ran out at the wedding.
And what about people who earnestly ask God for a healing and never get one?  We’ll come to this in a minute.
Just to let you know . . . I am not for pain.  I believe we should do what we can to relieve the pain from which we are suffering.
Jesus does not condemn us for coming to Him with our concerns.  He came for this very purpose, to heal the sick, free those who are prisoners, raise the dead, preach the gospel to the poor.  He came for all of our needs.
Getting back to our story, Jesus has now dealt with the woman’s hemorrhaging problem and is back to helping Jairus’ dying 12-year-old daughter.  But at that time . . .  the troubling news comes to Jairus, “When he [Jesus] was speaking to her [the woman healed of her bleeding], messengers arrived from the home of Jairus, the leader of the synagogue.  They told him, “Your daughter is dead.  There’s no use troubling the Teacher now.” Mark 5:35
Jesus’ reaction to Jairus, and I would dare to say, to us, was “Don’t be afraid.  Just have faith.” Mark 5:36  “Don’t be afraid.  Just have faith.”  I am going to say it again, “Don’t be afraid.  Just have faith.”
Has anyone been trying to discourage you lately?  Jesus was not easily discouraged as we shall now see.
As Jesus, Jairus, Jesus’ disciples, and the crowd approached Jairus’ home, there was much commotion.  Jesus said to those at his house, “Why all this commotion and weeping?  The child isn’t dead: she’s only asleep.” Mark 5:39.  The crowd replied by laughing at Jesus.  “But he made them all leave, and he took the girl’s father and mother and His three disciples (James, John and Peter) into the room where the girl was lying.  Holding her hand he said to her, “Talitha koum.”  Which means. “Little girl, get up!”  And the girl who was twelve years old, immediately stood up and walked around!”  
Note that the word ‘immediately’ is used extensively throughout the gospel of Mark.
The reaction of everyone in the room was that they were “overwhelmed and totally amazed.” Mark 5:44
Jesus gave them strict orders not to tell anyone what had happened and then He told them to give her something to eat.” Mark 5:43
Jesus was doing the ministry that His heavenly Father had told Him to do while here on earth.   It was the one time in history that God came to the earth from heaven as one of us.  We could touch and feel Jesus.  He talked to us.  He cried with us.  He had compassion on us.  He healed our infirmities.  He didn’t judge us.   We should feel comfortable bringing every one of our concerns to Him today.  He is not going to be upset with us for asking.  He only wants to help.  Why don’t we bring our concerns to Jesus?  Why don’t we intercede to God for others who are suffering?  I am not saying that we shouldn’t go to the doctor, or to counseling, or take mediation, but what is stopping us from going to Jesus first to ask for his help?  I know, of course, that many of us do take our burdens to the Lord.  But I think it is just human nature to first worry and then try to fix things on our own before going to God.
What about those with long-term illnesses?  Is there ever a point where we just accept our plight in life, or the plight of another person’s life? 
(Example of the man from Mt. Holly who had a huge tumor growing in his stomach.  When I asked to pray for him, he just asked me to pray that the Lord would take him home to be with the Lord.  Also, another man from my church in Washington State desperately wanted to be with the Lord, but he felt that his family wanted him to stay around for their sake.  He had had open heart surgery and wanted no more rescue attempts made on his life.  These are difficult situations I had to discern how to pray for in my congregations as a pastor.)
I remember hearing about Joni Eareckson Toda sharing how, that when she found out she would be a quadriplegic, i.e., paralyzed from the neck down for the rest of her life, wanted to at one point to end her life.  Because of her situation, she asked someone to help her to take her own life.  She didn’t want to go on if she could never be a whole person.  This was true of another young man, Nick Vujicic, who was born without the arms or legs of a normal person.  He too contemplated killing himself.  When we get that desperate and think it is time to end it all because we believe we will never be healed or whole again, that is a point in time when we need to give our condition to the Lord and ask Him to do with us whatever he wants to do.  He created us, he allows things to happen to us.  He knows what we can take and cannot take.  “God will not tempt us beyond that which we can handle but with every temptation will give a means of escape.”  (my paraphrase)  But for all of us, we need to give our lives to the Lord and trust that He will help us to get through whatever it is we are feeling or experiencing from our situation. 
More things to learn from Joni Eareckson Toda and Nick Vujicic about coping, accepting, and living with life impairments.
Nick Vujicic.  An Australian man born without arms or legs, has shared his story in a ‘60 Minutes’ Australia’ episode titled ‘Man with no arms no legs tackles daily obstacles”.  In his testimony, Vujicic discusses his rare condition, tetra-amelia syndrome, and the challenges he faced growing up.
Nick wanted to take his own life at age 10 because he thought he had no purpose in life, he would always be dependent on his family, he would never marry.  He didn’t go through with it because he thought it would cause his family more grief than good.  He went on to live and was bullied in school.  Today he is married with four biological children and speaks all over the world.  He is a Christian. 
For Joni, God permits her to continue to be a quadriplegic in order to keep her dependent on Him.  Every morning, she has to ask God for the strength to get through the day.  Some people rush through their morning, do a quick quiet time and then go the rest of the day without any acknowledgement of God in their lives.  Also, Joni feels as though she wouldn’t have met as many people as she would have met with disabilities who are even worse off than she is.  They remind her that because they have great need, God’s presence in their lives is bigger.  Joni believes that many Christians are not really living lives for Christ.  She sees her condition as helping her to bear her cross as Jesus had to bear His cross.  Some day she will have her reward in heaven.
Both characters have spouses to support them.  We need friends, family, and the church to see us though our difficult circumstances.  The point of these stories is that at times, God allows people to have ailments.  For Joni and Nick’s testimony it seems clear that they see God’s hand in their lives, disability or not. 
“For God works all things together for the good for those that are called according to his purpose.” Romans 8:28
He (God) promises to be with us through it.  We must trust Him.
The real things in life--Sometimes, life is exceedingly difficult, and we want to throw in the towel.  We want it all to be over.  In those cases, you need to turn to Jesus to ask Him for help, to give your very life to Him.  Ask Him to take charge of your life and help you.  But when you have done that and you are still feeling as though you want to die, you need help.  You need Christian brothers and sisters.  You need your Christian family praying for you reaching out to you.  And if you are still feeling depressed or suicidal, you may need to talk to a counselor and take medication to help you through your depression and thoughts of suicide.  There is no shame in this as a Christian, asking for help.  Jesus can work through counseling and the use of medication.  He created those things.  There is no shame in asking for help.  In fact, you are actually very wise to ask for help.  The point is, don’t try to do it on your own.  And it is never right to take one’s own life.
(My experience in seminary when my roommate signed me up for counseling when I was extremely sad after my girlfriend broke up with me.  I went to the counselor and his advice was very helpful for me.  I was, however, a little shocked that my roommate had made an appointment for me without first asking for my permission).
The Apostle Paul was a perfect example of someone who asked God several times that some ailments of him be taken away.  But God’s response was definite, “My strength is perfected in weakness.’ 
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a huge crowd of witnesses to the life of faith, let us strip off every weight that slows us down, especially the sin that so easily trips us up.  And let us run with endurance the race God has set before us.  We do this by keeping our eyes on Jesus, the champion who initiates and perfects our faith.  Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame.  Now he is seated in the place of honor beside God’s throne.  Think of all the hostility he endured from sinful people, then you won’t become weary and give up.  After all, you have not yet given your lives in your struggle against sin.”    Hebrews 12:1-3NLT
In the meantime, do what you can to encourage one another.  Jesus is coming.  Keep the Faith!