Healed

Imagine feeling so certain that if you did one simple thing, you’d have
your deepest desire fulfilled. What if that desire was to be healed from
years of suffering? And what if, after spending all you had on doctors, you
heard about someone who could heal you, even when doctors couldn’t?

This is the story of the woman who believed that if she could only touch
the hem of Jesus’s clothes, she would be cured. This woman was an outcast,
shunned by others because of an illness that caused her to bleed
continually. This made her unclean, so she couldn’t go to the temple or
synagogue to worship God, and those who touched her or sat where she sat
would also be unclean. But she hears about a Rabbi—some even called Him the
Messiah—named Jesus. This woman sees Jesus’s power and believes she simply
needs to get close enough to touch His clothing, and she will be well.

But how? The crowds are pressing in. Yet, desperate to be healed, she
reaches through the throng of bodies to be transformed by the Son of God.

And she instantly feels a change. She feels her body healing, being
renewed. And Jesus feels it too. He stops and says, “Who touched me? I
know that power has gone out from me” (Luke 8:45-46). Normally, Jesus is
face to face with whoever He heals.

This woman, transformed by Jesus’s power, admits what she’s done and why.
Jesus isn’t angry. He has compassion for her and all she’s suffered. He
accepts her and blesses her, saying, “Daughter, your faith has healed you.
Go in peace” (verse 48).

Jesus is the long-awaited Messiah, the One God promised to send to save His
people. And this event—with such power emanating from Him, and such
knowing, and such compassion and forgiveness—reveals the love of God.
Whenever we are suffering, Jesus invites us to come to Him, like this woman
did. Lord, give us faith to reach out to you too. • Lisa A. Wroble

• Do you have a deep desire? Jesus invites us to come to Him with all our
longings. Sometimes, He answers our prayers with a miracle. Other times, He
reveals His love for us in a different way. But if we know Jesus, we are
never alone in our suffering. And because Jesus died and rose again for us,
we get to look forward to the day Jesus will return and suffering will be
no more.

She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately
her bleeding stopped. Luke 8:44 (NIV)

Read Verses:

Luke 8:43-Luke 8:48