Pentecost 6 Mark 5:21-24a, 35-43 “Don’t Be Afraid, Just Believe”
There was once a physics teacher who was instructing his class about the law of the pendulum. A pendulum swings from side to side, and it always decreases in the length of its ark with every swing. The teacher had hung a rope to the wall just above the blackboard. He had attached a soccer ball to the end of the rope. When he asked how many really believed in the law of the pendulum almost everyone raised their hands.
He pulled the ball to one side and marked its location on the board. Then he let go of it and every time the ball swung back, he put another mark where it stopped. Finally, the teacher had a lot of marks; all closer to the center than the one before, thereby proving the law was true. He asked again how many really believed in the law, and everyone raised their hands.
Then he took the whole class to the gymnasium. Right at center court, he had hung a thick rope from the ceiling with a wrecking ball tied to it. One young man volunteered to help with the experiment. The teacher took told the young man to stand perfectly still on an X he had taped to the floor. He took the weight, and carried it over to about an inch from the boy’s nose. The teacher asked the boy again if he believed in the law of the pendulum, and the boy said “yes” but you could see the worry in his face. The teacher smiled and said, “Don’t be afraid; just believe.”
He let go of the huge weight and it swung way across the gymnasium, and then the pendulum began to swing back towards the boy. Well that young man wasted no time in running completely out of the gym. Did he really believe or did he just pretend to believe?
It is very easy to think you believe when there is no risk involved. It’s more difficult to believe when you may be hurt or risk losing something very important to you.
That’s the problem Jairus was having. His little daughter was sick, so sick that she was dying. As a ruler in the synagogue he had a very important and honored position. Jairus did not get into a position like that just by sitting around. No, he had worked hard to get where he was. Even today that is how the world operates. In order to get ahead in this life, we must earn the respect of others and earn promotions at work. We may hear that the best things in life are free, but when it comes to the things of this world, it all has to be earned. And of course, most people when asked how one goes about getting to heaven believe it also must be earned by what we do. Jairus followed the Law of the Old Testament. He knew the 10 commandments and the promise that God had made to Abraham.
Jairus and many of the Jewish people believed they had to follow all the laws of the Old Testament and by doing so they would be blessed in this life by God Almighty. Some of the Jews did not believe in an afterlife at all, so this life was all that they had and the more closely they followed the law, the better they and their families would live. But when his only child became sick, the Old Testament Law did not give him any help.
Because He believed God to be fair and just, Jairus could not help but wonder, what sin could this poor child possibly have done have done to deserve to die so young. Or perhaps He blamed some sins that He had done for the terrible predicament that faced his family.
Jairus most likely knew the text from Lamentations, “Though He brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is His unfailing love. For He does not willingly bring affliction or grief to the children of men.” Nevertheless this man who had served God willing had only seen the grief of his little daughter’s illness, but the compassion of the Lord was about to enter into his life.
Jairus, being a wealthy man had tried everything he could to save his daughter. A man of his importance would have know doctors and healers and they must have tried everything they knew in order to save her life. But try as hard as they might, her conditioned had worsened to the point that she was now dying.
But somewhere along the line, Jairus had heard about a man called Jesus. Perhaps he heard Him speak in the synagogue. And since Jesus had cast out demons and healed the centurion’s Servant and the nobleman’s’ son in the area, He was aware of our Lord’s abilities. And Jairus believed that Jesus could heal his precious daughter.
Jairus had a problem, however. The Sadducees, Pharisees and chief Priests of the temple hated Jesus. If word got out that Jairus had gone to Him for help, there was a good chance that He would lose his position in their synagogue. But Jairus also knew that the people of the temple could not help his little girl and he believed that Jesus could. So Jairus set his fears aside, went out in public among the great crowd, fell at Jesus feet and pleaded for Jesus to come to his house and heal his daughter.
It took a great deal of courage for Jairus to do what he had done but he had taken a stand for what he believed in. But then to make matters worse, some men came and gave him the bad news that his daughter had already died. Jairus had taken a chance and stood before Jesus and now it looked like the risks he took were in vain. But Jesus didn’t even comment on what the others said. Instead, he turned to Jairus with compassion and said, “Don’t be afraid; just believe.”
Now you have to admire Jairus at this point. It would have been easy to say “Forget it, its too late.” It would have been easy to just walk away from Jesus and go and mourn the loss of his daughter. But Jairus still had faith in Jesus and hope for his daughter. Even when they got to his house, those there laughed at Jesus when He told them that the little girl was not dead but sleeping. They had seen enough dead people to know when someone was dead. Still, Jairus went up to the room still clinging fast to his faith in Jesus.
I pray that each and every one of you acquires that kind of faith. For I know that you will face severe trails in this life. Jesus Himself tells you that in John chapter 16 (31-33) “You believe at last!” “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” We all go through a period or periods of severe testing in our lives. These tests come to believers and to unbelievers and are meant to show us that we cannot overcome the world and all of the troubles that occur here on our own. These periods of testing are meant to turn unbelievers to Christ and to strengthen the faith of believers in Jesus Christ.
But God’s testing has nothing to do with punishment for you sins. Yes, there are consequences for you sinful actions, but God does not punish you or your family when you sin. Again Jesus tells you so in His encounter with the blind man and his family in John (9:2) “His disciples asked him, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind? “Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the work of God might be displayed in his life.”
The trails you face are meant to turn you to Jesus, to believe in Him and to know that He has overcome the world for you. He lived a life free of sin and yet He accepted the responsibility for sins of the world at His baptism. He carried the sins of the world to the cross and suffered the wrath of God out of His love for all mankind. And when He rose from the dead He was given all power and authority in heaven and on earth.
Jesus had the power to raise people to life before He died on the cross, imagine the tremendous power He has now to give you eternal life. It does not matter what kind of life you have led in the past or what regrets you now have. Jesus is willing to forgive you for those things. In all sincerity, He already has forgiven you through His death on the cross. There is nothing else you need to do except to believe.
When you know in your heart that Jesus has won eternal life for you, it makes it easy to have that peace of mind; that faith that helps you stand steadfast when the wrecking ball swings toward your life. “Don’t be afraid; just believe.” Now I am not saying that you should just let bad things happen in your life. You do need to get out of the way of trouble when you can, but when trouble hits you hard, don’t think that God is punishing you or that it does you no good to turn to Him for help.
You can be faithful like Jairus. He went upstairs with his wife and witnessed a true miracle—the restoration of life to a precious little girl. Jairus was willing to risk all of his worldly possessions to save the one He loved. Jesus left everything in heaven for the ones He loved. Jesus gave His life for those He loved so that all who believe will have life forever. When you stand with Jesus, you stand forever blessed. In Jesus Name, Amen.