Sermon: Reach Out and Touch Someone - 06/28/09

The Rev. Bill Adams
Fourth Sunday after Pentecost, June 28, 2009
St. Clement’s Episcopal Church
Rancho Cordova, CA
Reach Out and Touch Someone

Have you ever been in the presence of someone who had the capability of making you feel as though you are the only person in the world at that moment? There can be 25 people in the room and a whole lot of things going on, but this person never takes his or her eyes off of you, and they listen and they reach out to you emotionally with the clear message that you are truly important. . . that you really matter! In this hurry and scurry world it’s rare to find a person like that isn’t it? . . . And when we do run across such a person, we tend to remember them don’t we?

Jesus was like that to a fault! So much so, in fact, that he broke with the traditions and norms of the day, but oh, when you were in his presence, you mattered . . . you were important . . . you counted . . . you were touched by the very hand of the love of God.

On warm summer nights in Southern California, every now and again, my dad and I would climb up on the roof of the house. We would lean way back and just stare up at the stars. Sometimes we would look for satellites and sometimes we would just gaze into the cosmos wondering about what or who was “out there,” and whether it would ever visit us. I cherished those moments, and wish my Dad was still around so we could do it just one more time.

It’s no surprise to me that 60 years after the fact, people are still interested in what happened in Roswell, New Mexico. It’s no surprise to me that tabloids, carrying pictures of little dome-headed beings with almond shaped-eyes, should dot the check out aisles at every supermarket. And even if we don’t get that carried away, we still wonder, don’t we? This isn’t a mystery to me. . . I really believe that it’s part of how God has designed us. God has designed us to be spiritual beings with spiritual yearnings.

Was it one of the long distance companies that coined the slogan, “Reach out and touch someone”? Well I think God gave us that spiritual yearning to look up in the hope that someone will one day “reach out and touch us”. It’s the spiritual yearning that we try to re-create liturgically every Advent, just before the birth of the Christ into our world.

I think today’s Gospel of the bleeding woman and the dying girl serves to remind us so powerfully that we really don’t need to look up any more. Because that someone. . . that Savior . . . has already walked among us; that someone... that Savior... is reaching out to touch us even as I speak of it from this pulpit. That’s what our Gospel today is all about: “The ministry of reaching out and touching someone”. First, there is the woman who touched the hem of Jesus cloak as he moved through the crowd while trying to make his way to the dying daughter of Jairus.

How dare this woman attempt to touch a holy prophet of God! But what is more amazing is the way that the holy prophet of God touched her. This woman had suffered from bleeding for 12 years, but I submit to you: THAT WAS THE LEAST OF HER PROBLEMS. Because of her condition, she was considered ritually UNCLEAN.

For 12 years this woman was literally condemned to a silent and lonely death under the Levitical Purity Codes. Every bed she lays upon, every garment she wears, every house she enters and every Rabbi she touches, automatically becomes unclean as well. It’s hard for us to understand this in the 21st century, but this woman was literally forced into an oppressive confinement.

But . . . on this one particular day, this brave woman ventured out. She ventured out to touch Jesus. You see, it was commonly believed that all one had to do was touch the garment of the Messiah and one would be healed. So in her desperation she decides to negotiate the crowds.

Now it’s not really any wonder how she is able to make it to Jesus so easily. People would be more than happy to move out of her way. I mean God forbid they should even accidentally touch her. And when she gets just close enough, she reaches out and touches the Christ of God, and he immediately stops. The whole crowd comes to a stop. This is an important detail in this gospel, and shouldn’t be overlooked. This crowd of probably hundreds if not thousands with all it’s forward velocity and momentum comes to a screeching halt. . . and Jesus wants to know who touched him.

The disciples are almost laughing out loud . . . “What do you mean Jesus... who touched you? Look around you there are hundreds of people on every side of you”. But here’s what I want you to remember: Jesus WILL NOT proceed . . . even though he knows that the little girl that belongs to the powerful and influential Jairus has precious little time. . . Jesus WILL NOT PROCEED until he finds this woman in need.

And when he finds her, she is in great fear, and all the while trembling, falls down before Jesus. She certainly should be afraid. By First-Century social standards, Jesus had every right to be angry with her. By touching him she made him unclean, and technically took away his right to worship in the synagogue and in the temple. With one touch she made him a social outcast also. But that’s not an issue with Jesus. People always come before law. Gosh, I wish our Diocesan and General Conventions worked that way more often.

Instead, Jesus stands over her, and looks straight at her and says to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well; get up... go in peace, and be healed of your dis-ease”. He calls her “daughter”! Did you hear what he called this woman whom Mark gives no name at all? He calls her “daughter”. Can you even begin to imagine how that must have made her feel after so many years of abject rejection?

Jesus touches this woman in such a way that he restores her dignity. I have come to believe that the most common miracle that Jesus performed was the restoration of people’s dignity. Maybe that’s why one of our baptismal vows states that we “will restore the dignity of every human being”. So we can promise to be miracle workers. Others would reject this woman through and through, but Jesus makes her one of the family, his “daughter”.

That’s the Jesus you and I follow. It’s compassion and a love that simply never quits, never gives up, never grows tired. That’s why Jesus is and always will be my hero. . . as well as my Lord and Savior. When Jesus touches you, you don’t just get SOME-THING, you get SOME - ONE! Jesus was on his way to touch the daughter of one of the leaders of the synagogue, but he stops long enough to also touch one who was rejected by that very same synagogue.

He’s on his way to touch the daughter of a prominent family in town, but when he meets one who has no family, he makes her HIS daughter and welcomes her with the open arms of love! Jesus is willing to touch the “touchable” and the “untouchable” alike – the wealthy and powerful and also the unclean, the poor and the rejected. When it comes to love and compassion, Jesus ignores all boundaries and blurs all borders.

Finally Jesus moves on down the road, and he enters the home of Jairus and he goes into the room where the little girl is, and he TAKES HER BY THE HAND and says “Talitha cum,” which, in Aramaic means “Little girl, get up”. Now, I want you to notice that he didn’t just raise his staff and bark an order. Jesus is the new Moses. No. . . HE TOOK HER BY THE HAND. He reached out and touched someone.

Jesus could have staged this whole thing in such a way that it made a scene that would have buzzed through the whole district. But to spare the little girl anxiety and fear, he takes only the family into the room. He could have won the admiration and applause of the people for many years to come, but what are the first words that come out of his mouth the dying girl stands up? Do you remember? He said, “GIVE HER SOMETHING TO EAT"!

“Forget any attention you might be tempted to give to me and nourish this poor little girl. Feed her. She’s all that matters right now!”

The Gospels are full of fantastic miracles that Jesus performed, but as miracles go, there’s nothing that can hold a candle to lifting up the least, the lost the last and the little. There’s nothing like feeding those who are physically and emotionally hungry. My dear friends in Christ, there are so many ways to say those words, “Talitha Cum.” ---“Let me help you, be lifted up”.

I suppose that the real question today is: “Is this kind of ‘touching’ part of our ministry”? Are there people who need for us to treat them, for the moment, as though they are the only ones alive? I work in a hospital as a Respiratory Care Practitioner, and when I’m finished giving a treatment, and listening to someone’s lungs with my often cold stethoscope, and assessing their oxygen supply, and I ask, “Is there anything else I can do for you,” it breaks my heart when they ask, “Oh, do you have to leave”? Sometimes just five more minutes of time, sitting and talking with them is as good as saying, “Talitha Cum.” It’s as good as any miracle ever performed.

Are there people out there clamoring for our attention? Maybe we, like Jesus, should be asking on a regular basis, “Who touched me”? Is it possible that we could become less task oriented and more touch oriented? Are there really churches out there that are more concerned about keeping the carpets clean than the fact that there are people sleeping just outside the narthex in the bushes?

Someone once said, “To be a Christian is to stop saying, “Where the Messiah is there is no misery”, and begin to say, “Where there is misery there is the Messiah”. Who is trying to touch you?

The church has been symbolically encouraging this kind of touching by encouraging all of us to look at each other rather than just at the altar on Sunday mornings. The church understands that the people of St. Clement's Church have to reach in and touch each other before they can reach out and touch someone. Whatever else you might think about that part of the liturgy called THE PEACE, it is risky business. Remember when we used to just come to church and sit in the pew and not be bothered by all this friendly touching?

Remember when you could come to church and leave “untouched"?
Remember when responding to the person next you was not really a consideration. Now look what the church has gone and done. She has made certain that we look into the eyes of another. It’s risky business. You might see pain and grief in those eyes, and then you might have to care!

The person next to you might hold your hand very tightly because that person hasn’t been touched in a long time, and you’ll have to reach out and touch them. And when you do begin that kind of caring, then others will realize they don’t have to look up in the sky any more . . . because the Savior has come. And should they find the Savior in you, they will know that they have witnessed the greatest of all miracles.

May God bless you in the journey.