Overhearing what they said, Jesus told him, “Don’t be afraid; just believe.” (Mark 5:36, NIV)
Faith is an incredible thing because it is something with real substance in this world but completely unseen at the same time. In fact that is pretty much how the preacher to the Hebrews puts it, saying “Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen (Heb 12:1, KJV). So if faith has real substance, yet is totally unseen, how do we know we have it? Well to put is simply; we know we have faith because we can see the effects of it in our lives, but sometimes we don’t see those effects until that faith is teased out and tested by the kindness of God. The story of Jairus is a good example of this.
You see we are told in Mark 5:21-24 that Jairus was a synagogue leader (meaning he was a well respected Jew in the Jewish community) yet his twelve year old baby girl was dying. He more than likely was part of the audience that saw Jesus cast out an impure spirit and heal a disabled man, being shocked at Christ’s power (Mk 1:21-27, 3:1-5), yet when push came to shove, he sought Jesus out to heal his daughter (you can imagine the Pharisee’s recoil). Jesus agreed to go, yet as they made their way to this desperate man’s house, a crowd followed Jesus (Mk 5:24b). It was while they were on the way that Jesus suddenly stopped and asked who touched him. Now imagine Jairus’ reaction, “I’ve just pleaded with this guy, I’ve just thrown my reputation away with the town and now He’s in the mosh pit worried about who touched his clothes!?!” Yet it was for a reason. You see there was a woman in that crowd that put all her faith in touching Jesus’ clothes, because she thought to herself, if she just did that she would be healed (Mk 5:28). She was right, but Jesus didn’t want to leave it there. He called her out of the crowd, not to embarrass her, but for her to testify about what was going through her mind when she reached out to touch Jesus, because she needed to know he wasn’t wearing magic clothes, but power had come out of him (Mk 5:30-34). This also did something else. You see as this woman was testifying about what faith in Jesus had done for her, friends and family had come from Jairus’ house to tell him that his little girl had died and that Jesus shouldn’t be bothered anymore (Mk 5:35). Jesus overheard this and said “Don’t be afraid; just believe.” (Mk 5:36b). Jairus indeed had a choice to believe, to believe his friends and walk away from Jesus or believe and continue with him. The choice was made and Jairus’ daughter was returned to him safe and sound (Mk 5:42-43).
When push came to shove Jairus sought Jesus, when friends and family told him to stop bothering with all this Jesus stuff, he continued to believe. We even read up to the final moment of miraculous resurrection of the girl, people mocked the Jesus that Jairus had put all his hope in, yet he remained steadfast (Mk 5:40a). You see in this man’s desperation, he sought Jesus, and Jesus knew exactly what the man needed to continue with Him all the way, he needed to hear that faith in Jesus really does something, yet it was tested wasn’t it? There was moment in the midst of a perilous emotional storm that Jesus stood still, drawing out the testimony of another but notice the timing of it all, as Jairus was hearing about God’s saving work, he also was hearing about death’s devastating effects. You see, Jesus wasn’t testing Jairus’ faith willy nilly, no, he was testing his faith to strengthen him for what was coming next and that was that Jairus would have to have hope against all hope in one man.
We live in a world that is consistently telling us to stop bothering with all this Jesus stuff. Some of you might have even been laughed at and others may have been mocked because you have said “no” to the world and “yes” to Jesus. That is called faith brothers and sisters, that is called trust. Yet we are never too have faith for faith’s sake, but we have this gift of faith, which must be directed towards a person and that person is Jesus Christ. Now it is a wonderful thing to have this awesome gift and hope in this world, so we must never think that something is wrong when the master craftsman is testing his workmanship, because like any good carpenter (which Jesus just so happened to be), he is not testing it to destroy it, but testing it to strengthen it so that it might be used for better and greater things. So this morning if you feel like you have reached out to Jesus and left all behind to put your trust in him, yet are wondering “where are you in this situation Lord?” Then don’t be downcast, don’t be disheartened in the midst of it because you might be in the moments of a wonderful testing, which will result not in shipwreck, but in the miraculous.