We hear the screaming from up the street. We knew the voice. Although modulated by shock and pain, we immediately knew the cries of our son, Jason. Running out of the house, we found him next door on the ground. He had run his bike into a fence and a jagged piece of the metal had ripped open his sking at the knee. We could see the bone, the tissue, the skin serrated by sharp metal.
We lived 12 miles from the clinic, the only medical facility closer than another 45 miles. Placing him into the care, we raced toward the little town of Downieville. One lane each direction was all we had. The road skirted alongside the river. Places to pass were minimal and before us was a behemoth RV whose driver had – apparently – never seen a squirrel since he slowed at the sight of each critter dashing around the woods lining the road.
My frustration was quickly moving to anger as I tried to get around him – flashing my headlights and forcing the horn on my car to shrill out warnings. He never moved off the road, not even when there were pull-outs available.
At that moment, with my son bleeding and our compressing the wound – I wanted to hurt the driver for his refusal to honor the code of the mountains and pull over when he could. I was extremely agitated.
Finally, a place to pass even if it meant crossing the double line. I swerved around the hulking, shuttering home on wheels and floored the pedal. Five miles before me lay the clinic and I made it there in record time. I dropped off Janet – and my anger was so out of control – that I went out to the only way, the single road, through Downieville. I waited. I waited for the Behemoth to come through town. We were going to have a confrontation.
I think of this when I think of Jairus. His only daughter, daddy’s little girl, was dying. Jairus was a man of importance. A ruler of the synagogue. At the moment, he would surrender all his status to do one thing: get help for his little girl. He heard Jesus was in around and Jairus sought out this Healer. Ignoring his standing, Jairus fell at the feet of Jesus and begged, pleaded, besieged, cried out for Jesus to come to his home and heal his only daughter of only 12 years.
Mercifully, Jesus responded and started toward the home of this synagogue leader. But there was a behemoth in front of him: the crowds, filled to the brim with their own desperation, crushed down on Jesus – making movement difficult. Nonetheless, Jesus pressed on.
There was one need that would not be stayed, however. One woman who was desperate, too. Like the age of Jairus’ daughter, she had been bleeding for 12 years. She had spent everything to stem the flow, to stop the bleeding. There was nothing left. Not money. Not doctors. Nothing but a glimmer of hope moving through the crowd.
Pushing, grabbing, asserting herself as a last-chance-before-I-die woman, she finally reached forward and touched the edge of Jesus’ cloak. How can you describe what happened? A shockwave of healing flooded her body. The blood draining from her found its way back into her body – into all the places it was supposed to be.
Healed. In one moment. Healed.
“Who touched me?” Jesus asked.
No one would admit it. Not even the woman healed. Peter, often incredulous at Jesus’ statements, can’t believe it: “Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you.” Of course people are touching you. Let’s just keep moving forward.
But Jesus is not talking about simply contact. He is talking about the kind of touch that is filled with faith. The kind of touch that stops him from moving forward to a dying girl. Jesus delays.
However Peter may have thought Jesus to be absurd in this moment – what was Jairus thinking? I imagine maybe a little like me in a Subaru behind an unrelenting hotel on wheels. Come ON! COME ON!
But Jesus will not move. “Someone has touched me;” Jesus said, “I know that power has gone from me.” And Jesus waits.
Although she wanted to remain unnoticed, the waiting finally defeated her anonymity. Trembling, she too, like Jairus, fell at the feet of Jesus. With words filled with the anguish of 12 unhealed years, she explained why she reached out for healing.
Then, Jesus says something to her that must have struck Jairus to the core. “Daughter.” Twelve years she had bled – and his 12 year-old was soon to not bleed at all. Daughter. “Daughter,” Jesus said, “your faith has healed you. Go in peace.”
She rests in peace. Your daughter, Jairus, rests in peace now. “There is no need to bother the Teacher anymore.” Even as Jesus was talking to the woman healed by faith, another daughter slipped away into eternity.
Jesus delayed.
Maybe had Jairus fell harder at the feet of Jesus. Maybe had he been more persistent. He should have cleared the crowds – even if forceful, even if it meant losing his standing as a synagogue leader.
But why? Couldn’t these healings have been prioritized? Certainly a girl dying is triaged over a woman who can make one more day with chronic condition.
Jesus hears the report at the same time Jairus receives it. Two men – one a father, one a Son – standing between two daughters in extreme difficulty.
“Don’t be afraid; just believe, and she will be healed.” Jesus rescues a crumbling man with a word of certainty.
Have faith? Believe? The daughter just healed had faith. The daughter just died cannot whisper words of hope.
The delay of Jesus tells us something about His love for all people. A woman in need is not ignored over a young girl in need. We have to prioritize because we do not bear with us the ability to speak to the living and the dead.
The delay of Jesus was not only a healing moment for a chronically ill woman – it was an acknowledgement of a healing already given. It would not take the faith of Jairus’ 12 year-old daughter for healing. Jairus carried her to Jesus when he came to Jesus in faith. Just believe. Don’t give up now. Yes, keep bothering the Teacher. It’s no bother at all.
I stood at the corner just outside the only gas station in town. There were no roads between Sierra City and Downieville except Highway 49. No turn offs to other places. No connecting state highways to other towns. Just one road.
At that moment, I would have surrendered my standing as a pastor in a small town in order to pour out my anguish for healing delayed.
I understand what Jairus must of felt as Jesus delayed.
But there is one huge difference – a difference as big as the lumbering boat-factory-on-wheels. Jairus went to Jesus. Whatever frustration he may have felt, he felt it in the presence of the Savior. He walked with Jesus and was with Jesus in every moment of his crisis. At the end, Jairus received back his little girl as man strengthened in faith and in closer walk with Christ.
I stood on a road apart from Jesus. Against Jesus. Rage was my companion. I did receive my son back. The scar on his knee is still there. He is well. But I was not. I didn’t learn that day. I lost sight of Jason’s needs and became consumed by my anger and healing delayed.
What happened? There must have been an especially unusual squirrel cross the road that day – because the entire-city-on-wheels never came through town. He must have pulled off the road into a camping ground somewhere.
And echoing in the background I can hear: “Scott, don’t be afraid. Just believe. I will take care of your son. I will take care of you. Walk with me.”
