“For he had healed many, so that those with diseases were pushing forward to touch him.”
Mark 3:10 (NIV)
It’s kind of a natural assumption to think, “If Jesus wants to do this for me, He will do it,” but scripture shows us that the greatest miracles happened when people added some type of action to their faith. Jesus healed many who “pushed forward” to touch Him. It makes me wonder if more persistence through action is required of us, in order to receive the answers or the miracle we are praying for.
Jesus can do anything in any way, for anybody, but the greatest miracles in the gospels happened when people took action to push through obstacles and persisted in reaching Him. They did it by either calling Jesus repeatedly or pushing through a crowd to touch Him.
The woman who was bleeding for twelve years crawled through a dense crowd, until she could reach out and touch the fringe of Jesus’ garment. She wasn’t going to stand still and wait for Jesus to notice her. As soon as she touched Him, Jesus felt power coming out of His body, so she actually initiated her own healing by her actions. (Luke 8:43-48)
Two blind men followed Jesus down the road, for a long distance, calling out repeatedly, “Son of David, have mercy on us!” The crowd was increasingly annoyed by their loud shouts, and rebuked them, telling them to be quiet, but they kept shouting until Jesus stopped, touched them and healed them all of blindness. He could have healed them after their first shout, but He seemed to wait for them to show their persistence by asking repeatedly. (Matthew 20:29-34)
Ten lepers stood at the required distance from the crowd and kept called out to Jesus asking Him to have pity on them. Without ever touching them, Jesus told them to go show themselves to their priest. As they turned to go toward the temple and see their priest, they looked down at their skin and were thrilled to see that they were completely healed of leprosy. By doing what Jesus told them to do, their action resulted in their healing. Jesus shows us a pattern of persistence through taking action of some sort, in all of these stories. (Luke 17:11-19)
Today’s scripture verse uses the phrase, “Pushing forward to touch Jesus”. Faith is something we do, whether it is pushing forward when we feel like giving up, or putting our faith into action by repeatedly asking Him for help. Jesus is not bothered when we repeatedly ask the same thing of Him. He gave us these gospel examples to show that repetitive asking is one of many ways that we show our love and trust in Him.
Jesus showed His love for us through actions, by suffering and going all the way to the cross, becoming our sacrificed lamb. We can now show our love for Him by putting our faith into action.
Lord, help us to be persistent so we can push forward, and touch you in a way that will turn our faith into a new phase of action, that is pleasing to you. Amen
