Go in Peace and Be Freed from your Suffering

Okay, we all know the story of the woman with the “issue of
blood” as they refer to it in the King James version, who touched Jesus’ robe
and was healed. I was reading that this
morning in my Bible study and got to thinking about something. I got to wondering about something I had
never wondered about before and that I had never heard preached on before even
though I have heard this particular story preached on many times in the
past. I started wondering why, since
He’s Jesus, why did He wait and look around and act as if He didn’t know who
had touched Him. I mean, after all, I’m
sure He knew exactly who it was that had draw the power out of Him. He’s Jesus. He knew. Why then, did He wait and ask and make her
come forward and say. She was scared,
trembling and terrified. Why did He decide to put her through that? And I’m not
asking in an accusatory way as if I think Jesus was doing something wrong and
He needs to explain it to me! I’m asking because I think there must be a lesson
in there somewhere and I want to know what it is. After all, it seems to me
that when I look at it, there are lessons in everything Jesus did. He didn’t do things that were meaningless.
Everything He put His hand to had some meaning for us and actually seemed to
have multiple meanings. I notice that God usually does things that accomplish
multiple purposes, never just one purpose, so I’m thinking that Jesus’ action
of asking the woman to come forth and declare herself must have had a purpose
but I can’t quite figure out what that purpose is and what the lesson is.

Here’s the story again from Mark in the NIV. I’ve gone to Bible Gateway and read it in
many other versions too, including the literal translation and that hasn’t
given me any further clues.

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Mark 5:24So Jesus went with him. A large
crowd followed and pressed around him. 25And a woman was there who had been
subject to bleeding for twelve years. 26She had suffered a great deal under the
care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better
she grew worse. 27When she heard about Jesus, she came up behind him in the
crowd and touched his cloak, 28because she thought, “If I just touch his
clothes, I will be healed.” 29Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in
her body that she was freed from her suffering. 30At once Jesus
realized that power had gone out from him. He turned around in the crowd and
asked, “Who touched my clothes?” 31“You see the people
crowding against you,” his disciples answered, “and yet you can ask, ‘Who
touched me?’ ” 32But Jesus kept looking around to see who had done
it. 33Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his
feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. 34He said to her,
“Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your
suffering.”

Now, I’ve imagined the scene several different ways. I’ve imagined Jesus saying, “Who touched my
clothes,” in sort of a stern and almost frightening way as if he might even be
angry but then being so kind and compassionate when she came forward. This
scene would almost be like a father playing with a beloved daughter pretending
to severe but actually being mild and I pictured her relief and love when she
felt his compassion.

Then I’ve imagined the scene if Jesus asked, “Who touched my
clothes?” in a compassionate voice with care in his tone and puzzlement on his
face. How much easier would it have been for that woman to come forward and,
still trembling, certainly desire an even closer encounter with this miracle man!

The third way I’ve imagined it is Jesus not having focused
on his garment so genuinely not knowing at first who it was who had touched His
clothes but realizing immediately as He scanned the crowd just who it was and
why she had done it then feeling compassion for her situation and loving
kindness for her faith. Perhaps this
scenario is closest to the truth. While
I walk THIS earth I won’t know truth but I can certainly try to figure out what
lesson may be here for me. I just can’t
seem to quite get it but I feel like there is some tidbit that God suddenly
extended to me this morning. Somehow, though, I just haven’t grasped it.

One thing I have tried to do lately, and it has made for a
much different Bible reading experience, is to picture everything Jesus says
and does coming from a perspective of compassion in love instead of from a
perspective of annoyance, judgment, and anger.
Somehow (and I suspect I know why—you don’t need to be a psychiatrist to
know what damage a screwed-up childhood can wreck on a person) I have lived my
life under a God that I have perceived to be quite disappointed, angry, and
condemning of me with his son being only one level up from that. In my mind He died for me, and there would
never be anything I could do to make up for that horrible thing. I will carry
that guilt all my life and on into eternity.
His sad eyes would always be a testament to the horrible person that I
am and I would be a constant disappointment to Him, forever making Him sad and
forever putting Him on the cross. Only
in the past year have I begun to see my savior as someone that I could please
and someone that loves me in happy ways too.
I have begun to see Him as someone who maybe smiled sometimes and had a
sense of humor as does God.

There was a mini-series called Jesus that I saw and loved. I
bought a copy of it. Jesus, in that, was portrayed as even being sort of
chipper sometimes. He splashed well
water on the apostles and laughed sometimes.
It was wonderful. I fell even
more in love with Jesus when I saw that.
Then just the other day, I heard a sermon where the preacher was talking
about when Jesus said that the guys praying loudly in the streets already were
getting their reward and he said that Jesus said it perhaps with a smile and a
wink, almost making fun of them. What a
novel idea that was! I had always pictured him saying it with great seriousness
and condemnation but maybe that preacher was right. Maybe Jesus was really so
wonderful that He didn’t leave everybody with this horrible heavy guilty
feeling! Maybe He left everybody feeling as if there was hope for them! And
maybe the last scenario I painted in my mind is really the right one (for me to
imagine anyway) and perhaps therein lies my lesson. I am fearful and trembling and crawl to Him
but He receives us all with great compassion and love and only wishes us to “go
in peace and be freed from our suffering!”