If You Really Listen - Sometimes You Get the Message

Sometimes in Mass on Sundays - I miss everything. I can be reading along with the Gospel and miss the whole thing.

Other times - I hear but I don't take anything away from the message.

In these moments, I feel that maybe I'm just not holy enough. Or not trying hard enough. If I were more prayerful, if I trusted God more... maybe He would speak to me. Maybe I could be uplifted. I just must not be trying hard enough.

But sometimes, God hits me right between the eyes.

Our Gospel reading this Sunday was from Mark 5:21-43. A story I am familiar with... but this time I learned something new.

There was a woman afflicted with hemorrhages for twelve years.
She had suffered greatly at the hands of many doctors
and had spent all that she had.
Yet she was not helped but only grew worse.
She had heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd
and touched his cloak.
She said, "If I but touch his clothes, I shall be cured."
Immediately her flow of blood dried up.
She felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction.
Jesus, aware at once that power had gone out from him,
turned around in the crowd and asked, "Who has touched my clothes?"
But his disciples said to Jesus,
"You see how the crowd is pressing upon you,
and yet you ask, 'Who touched me?'"
And he looked around to see who had done it.
The woman, realizing what had happened to her,
approached in fear and trembling.
She fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth.
He said to her, "Daughter, your faith has saved you.
Go in peace and be cured of your affliction."

Who touched me?
Are you serious? This huge crowd has been jostling you the whole way and now you want to know who touched you?!
But the Lord felt His healing power leave His body. She only touched His cloak.

Jesus doesn't ask me to be perfect. Not even perfect in prayer. He only asks that I reach out to Him. To reach out to Him, confident that He will help me.

That's an area I struggle with. Sometimes I come to Jesus in prayer with a flawed mindset. "Lord, please heal my loneliness. Show me a good man who loves You. Someone I can love, marry and have children with. I mean, I know You're not going to give me a husband, I'm pretty sure you don't even want to... but I'm asking anyway."

That is no way to reach out for His cloak! No! When we reach out to just touch his cloak... reaching out in faith, even among all the other people in the world... He knows it. He feels it!

I had to blink back tears with this realization!
I had to tell a friend! My friend MIME listened to my news and reminded me... what about the other part of the story? The part that sent Jesus walking through town at the request of the synagogue officials, Jairus whose daughter was near death. Jairus asked Jesus to come touch her and heal her.

While he was still speaking,
people from the synagogue official's house arrived and said,
"Your daughter has died; why trouble the teacher any longer?"
Disregarding the message that was reported,
Jesus said to the synagogue official,
"Do not be afraid; just have faith."
He did not allow anyone to accompany him inside
except Peter, James, and John, the brother of James.
When they arrived at the house of the synagogue official,
he caught sight of a commotion,
people weeping and wailing loudly.
So he went in and said to them,
"Why this commotion and weeping?
The child is not dead but asleep." And they ridiculed him. Then he put them all out.
He took along the child's father and mother
and those who were with him
and entered the room where the child was.
He took the child by the hand and said to her, "Talitha koum,"
which means, "Little girl, I say to you, arise!"
The girl, a child of twelve, arose immediately and walked around.
At that they were utterly astounded.
He gave strict orders that no one should know this
and said that she should be given something to eat.

MIME reminded me, when these people doubted that anything could be done - Jesus put them out.
You don't have faith? Get away from me!

This is our God. He doesn't ask us to be perfect. He asks us to believe. To have faith. Even a little bit of faith. Like a mustard seed. Just this little bit of faith - He knows. He knows your need. He knows your faith. He feels it. It matters. He cares.

If we ask or expect without faith - forget it.
Fair enough if you ask me.
I need to line up my thinking and remember that my God wants the best for me. He longs for me to have the desires of my heart. If I only have FAITH.

Scripture copied from: United States Conference of Catholic Bishops - New American Bible
Image: http://getfiredup.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/bleeding-woman.jpg