Last night, we studied the story of the hemorrhaging woman who was healed when she merely touched the hem of Jesus’ garment. It’s a story I’ve heard so many times and one I’ve always loved, but I read it with new eyes this week as I prepared to discuss it with our group. After our study, as I slipped off to sleep, I couldn’t help but ponder the story and what I can learn from it. 

The story is told in 3 of the 4 gospels:

• Matthew 9:20-22
• Mark 5:25-34
• Luke 8:43-48

In all accounts, the stage is set that Jesus is walking in the midst of a crushing crowd. In my mind, I would imagine it like the mob scenes created by Black Friday sales at electronics stores. This was the kind of crowd that I try to avoid at all costs — I’m pretty certain there isn’t an offer or discount to be made that would convince me to go anywhere near a crowd like this. But this unnamed woman had her reason — she desired to be healed.

Her Affliction

All three authors detail that she had suffered with bleeding for 12 years. Matthew, perhaps the least comfortable talking about this “woman issue,” stops there, but Mark and Luke explain her suffering further. She had endured years of “treatments,” likely in the form of astringents, tonics, and superstitious practices. The medical indignities she  must have endured alone are heart-breaking, but that none gave her any relief is just tragic. She had spent all of her money and efforts searching to be cured. She was left penniless and hopeless.

Have you ever experienced an unexplained or untreatable medical problem? The frustration, the despair, the uncertainty can be absolutely devastating.

Years of bleeding would have left her pale, weak, and tired. We might also deduce that she was barren and unmarried, which in her day would make her a societal outcast without a purpose. Who would want a broken woman such as this?

By Levitical law, her bleeding would also mean she was ceremonially unclean, as any woman was deemed unclean during her monthly period. Anything she touches, any bed on which she lies, and anyone who touches her would also be considered unclean. Anyone who knew of her condition would likely shun her.

She wouldn’t have been allowed to attend ceremonial occasions, worship in the synagogue, or even mingle in the market with other women. She may have had to hide her face just to join this crowd of people around Jesus — presumably, they were more interested in Jesus and His disciples than in her.

She had no doubt heard the stories of miraculous healings done by Jesus. Might He be able to help her where no human being had?

Her Action

So she pressed her way through this crowd with a singular thought, “If I can just touch His garment, I will be healed.”

I wonder if she was also thinking, I dare not address Him or stand before Him, unclean as I am. Maybe touching His cloak was the most she dared. She recognized the power before her and she reached out through the crowd and touched his garment.

Mark tells it like this, “Immediately her bleeding stopped and she felt in her body that she was freed from her suffering.” (Mark 5:29)

How could she know that she was healed? She just knew. To me, that assurance was further evidence of her remarkable faith. Not to get too graphic, but it would seem to me it would take a little time to be sure the bleeding had stopped, but not for her. Immediately, she just knew.

As I read this account, I realize that often, the same power that coursed through Jesus Christ — The Holy Spirit — is right before me, if only I will reach out and touch it. As Christians, we have that power living within us. Am I doubtful of that power? Am I afraid to use it? Is my faith not as strong as hers?

I pray that I will always display that kind of faith — to reach through the crowd and touch the hem of His garment, calling on all the power of heaven to work in my life. And once I have called upon that faith, that I will just know, immediately that the Spirit has heard my prayer and has moved in my life. She was bold and she was certain.

Her Discovery

But the story didn’t end there. Jesus felt the power leave Him and he asked, “Who touched me?”

The disciples must have thought He was losing it because with the size and density of that crowd, there were likely dozens of people touching Him at any given time. But only one touch leached power from Him — the touch of a sickly woman’s hand on his garment. Only this woman had the faith to identify the magnitude of His power, to call upon it, and to receive it. She probably wasn’t even the only one in the crowd with an illness, injury, or affliction, but she was the only one who received His healing power when she touched him.

Imagine how she must have felt when she realized she was caught in the act. Having spent most of her life trying to avoid being noticed, Jesus Christ had just called her out in front of this enormous crowd of people. Would He be angered by her boldness? Might He even reverse this miraculous healing?

As I try to put myself in her shoes, these are thoughts that would cross my mind? Was I wrong about this man? Was I wrong to fearlessly approach Him for help? I imagine she wanted to just disappear at that very moment.

Let’s look at Mark and Luke’s account of what happened next:

Then the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell at his feet and, trembling with fear, told him the whole truth. (Mark 5:33)

Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet. In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. (Luke 8:47)

She immediately knew Jesus was talking about her and , “seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at His feet.”

Her whole strategy had been to come in secret, be healed, and go on with her life, but she realized she had been very much noticed by Jesus Christ. This speaks to me in a powerful way — those among us who go unnoticed and discarded by society do not go unnoticed by our Savior and Lord. He is very mindful of every one of us. He is aware of our suffering, aware of our fears, and aware of our attempts to step out in faith.

She was trembling in fear. Perhaps more than anyone in that crowd, she was intimately aware of the immensity of His power — she had felt it course through her body and heal her affliction. And she was scared. Would He chastise her? Would this mob turn on her? She shouldn’t even be here.

Her Humiliation

In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. (Luke 8:47)

Can you imagine having to admit before a crowd of people the indignity of your affliction, the boldness of your actions, and the healing you had just received? I don’t know if she was just trying to explain her actions or if she wanted to tell everyone how Christ had healed her — maybe she was too scared to know herself.

But why did she have to be embarrassed like that? The account puts me in mind of junior high gym class, sheepisly handing a note to the P.E. teacher explaining why I couldn’t swim today. Utter humiliation. Why did a loving Christ put her through that? The only explanation I can come up with is that sometimes, to demonstrate our faith and Christ’s power in our lives, we have to be humbled.

To be delivered from addiction, for  example, we must first admit the power it has on our life. When we have admitted our own powerlessness and yielded to His authority in our life, we allow that power to work. In 2 Corinthians 12:9, we read, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”

Then, once brought through such a trial, we may never want to share that dark period of our life with anyone again. But when we share our story, God is glorified and His power is revealed to others.

Her Vindication

He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.” (Mark 5:34)

After hearing her story, I wonder if the crowd eagerly anticipated the wrath of Jesus Christ, reprimanding this woman for even coming near Him in her uncleanliness. And how dare she actually touch His garment? She has sullied every person she has come in contact with.

But that is not what happened.

The events the followed, I believe, give us a glimpse of God’s economy, which is upside down from ours. Christ took this woman who had been outcast by society and held her up as a standard for everyone there. He commended the strength of her faith and in fact, gave credit to her for bringing about her own healing. Essentially, He was saying to her, “it wasn’t my power that healed you, it was your own faith.”

It reminds me somewhat of the scene in The Wizard of Oz, when Dorothy is told that she had the power to go home all along.

I also think Jesus was rebuking the others in the crowd. After all, they had access to the same power she did, but it was only when she touched His garment that the power was released. How many people in that crowd were left with burdens simply because they didn’t have the faith to reach out and touch His hem?

It bothered me a little, that this woman who demonstrated such remarkable boldness and faith was left nameless across the 3 accounts of the story, ever to be known as, “the bleeding woman.”

But maybe that is just as it should be. Her anonymity leaves us open to see ourselves in her role — any of us could be that woman. All we have to do is have the boldness of faith to reach out and claim the power that has been there for us all along.

I’ll call her Stacy. What will you call her?