Faith in Action Day 3

<span;> GOOD MORNING AND WELCOME THIS IS PASTOR LUCY PAYNTER WITH YOUR DAILY INSIGHTS AND TODAY WE CONTINUE WITH OUR SERIES FAITH IN ACTION DAY 3.
<span;>Picture this, a woman, sick to the point of poverty. Sick to the point of exhaustion and resentment. A woman rendered untouchable by her sickness. A woman considered by the society too unclean to even be in contact with anyone, to the extent that everything she comes into contact with  let say, a seat she sits on, a cup she has drunk from, a door knob she has touched, everything she touches, is considered contaminated. A woman so pale and anemic from a perpetual loss of blood. A woman who cannot go to her local church, or synagogue because it’s not only illegal, but everyone would be running away from her as if what she has is contagious. Now, imagine having to live this way for over a decade. Perhaps, even married a couple of times each ending in divorce because no man would stand her. Can you imagine the loneliness, the desperation and grief that she had to have gone through for an entire twelve years?
<span;> The Bible tells us of this woman in Matthew 9:20-22. Just then a woman who had suffered for twelve years with constant bleeding came up behind him. She touched the fringe of his robe, for she thought, “If I can just touch his robe, I will be healed.” Jesus turned around, and when he saw her he said, “Daughter, be encouraged! Your faith has made you well.” And the woman was healed at that moment.
<span;> Sometimes we are faced with challenges we can’t seem to overcome for so long that we fall into questioning God’s plan. We ask for how long we are going to suffer. How long till we are relieved of our pain! But look at this woman! Twelve years of suffering. Twelve years of humiliation, and she still had faith that someday, healing would come her way. Year in, year out, dealing with the same problem and still she did not give up or let the sickness run her life. This kind of persistence, this kind of hope and patience, can only be sustained by an active faith. Faith that God, in His own time, shall bring you to the time and place of your healing. Faith that there has got to be more to your life than suffering. Faith that there is more to you that what what you are at the moment.
<span;> The book of Mark 5:25-29 says of the same woman that she had suffered for twelve years with constant bleeding. She had suffered a great deal from many doctors, and over the years she had spent everything she had to pay them, but she had gotten no better. In fact, she had gotten worse. She had heard about Jesus, so she came up behind him through the crowd and touched his robe. For she thought to herself, “If I can just touch his robe, I will be healed.” Immediately the bleeding stopped, and she could feel in her body that she had been healed of her terrible condition.
<span;> Here, Mark gives an even deeper account of this woman’s long suffering. She had been disappointed, driven to poverty and perhaps even into depression by the doctors who had attempted, genuinely or otherwise, to help her. Perhaps the reason she couldn’t talk to Christ was due to her assigned uncleanliness, or perhaps her faith in the healers of her time had been worn so thin over the years. But still, she had faith. However little it might have been, however feeble and incomplete, it was genuine faith and she dared to put it into action. And therein, in the incompleteness of her faith, lay her healing.
<span;> That faith, albeit as tiny as a mustard seed, was adequate for her healing. It was that faith that Christ answered with so much grace. It is this kind of faith that Jesus desires to see in us. The kind of faith that a woman who had not touched anyone in twelve years, lest she make them unclean, had in her to believe that the man she was about to touch could not be made unclean by her sickness. The kind of faith that she had in Jesus to trust that his power would reach where nothing else had been effective. And for the mere act of putting her faith into action, her life was restored, her seclusion and uncleanliness were no more.
<span;> The book of Luke 8:43-48 gives us a slightly different account of this woman. A woman in the crowd had suffered for twelve years with constant bleeding, and she could find no cure. Coming up behind Jesus, she touched the fringe of his robe. Immediately, the bleeding stopped. “Who touched me?” Jesus asked. Everyone denied it, and Peter said, “Master, this whole crowd is pressing up against you.” But Jesus said, “Someone deliberately touched me, for I felt healing power go out from me.” When the woman realized that she could not stay hidden, she began to tremble and fell to her knees in front of him. The whole crowd heard her explain why she had touched him and that she had been immediately healed. “Daughter,” he said to her, “your faith has made you well. Go in peace.”
<span;> Sometimes, our lives can be fraught with so much suffering and questions we have no answers to such that the pain drains all hope from us and sends us down a path of despair. Sometimes we enlist the help of the best of doctors and professionals of whatever field in which we think our hope might yet  lie, with no luck. Years of unanswered prayer can drive you into a destructive misery. There are times in life when even great commitment to a course doesn’t work, when even well thought-out plans fail. But know this now, that Christ does make a difference. Put your trust in him. Hinge your faith onto his word. Have faith that he will save you. It does not have to be an infallible faith. It only has to be true faith in Christ, a faith actively placed on Him alone. As the woman reached out to touch the hem of Christ’s garment, have faith that your efforts are not in vain. Have faith. Put that faith into action and leave the healing and its time to Jesus.
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