Right now I am meditating on the woman with the issue of blood. I remember how she hemorrhaged for some twelve years, and when she touched the hem of Jesus’ garment, her bleeding stopped; she was healed immediately. Her story has often encouraged me at times when I was not optimistic, when I did not know how to move beyond my physical circumstance into the sphere of faith.
What was the “thing” that kept this bleeding sister searching desperately for healing? The Bible says she went from doctor to doctor. I imagine the type of doctors she visited. I imagine she visited an allopathic doctor, a naturopath, a homeopathic doctor; I imagine she even went to one of those old fashion faith healers. And yet, she was not healed. She grew weak, weaker. The Bible says the life of the body is the blood. Literally, this woman was losing blood; therefore, she was losing her life. However, she had hope. This HOPE energized her body to get out of her house, to go into the crowd. Jesus was in the crowd. That woman, my historical sister in Christ, went out into the crowd weak. What encouraged her?
I believe the woman was trapped in the promise of healing. She understood inherently that the consciousness of the Comforter available to each believer spoke to her. Although she lived in the not yet of being healed, God had, I am convinced, led the woman in the spirit.
That is where we experience God in the deepest sense, in the spirit. The woman’s physical condition suggested that she would probably bleed to death; however, the Holy Spirit urged her to move out into the street in a weak state. She followed the leading. She was so weak; the woman did not touch the top of Jesus’ garment; she touched the hem, which means that she was on the ground.
Lesson: Sometimes in order for us to obtain healing, we must get down on the ground, and, crawl.
Trapped in a promise, going ground level to receive the promise of healing. That is a lesson for the Christian believer about the healing God offers each one of us.
If the woman with the issue of blood lived in contemporary society, I would say she is a woman who went skinny. She did not concern herself with the crowd. She focused on the target of healing, Jesus. There is a powerful message in this liberation performance act for the Christian believer, and that is this: Healing comes when we become free enough to crawl into the presence of God and touch the bottom of his garment. By going to the bottom, the woman with the issue of blood was able to get up. She was healed. And how ironic: it was not the touching that actually healed the woman. It was, says Jesus Christ, “ … [the] touch of faith that made [her] whole.” Luke 8:48
Reference: Blanco, Jack J. Clear Word Bible. 1994
