A sermon by a guest preacher, June 28, 2009
Mark 5:25-34
Scripture:
Miriam’s Story
I would like to tell you my story – it’s there, right in your Bible, in fact Matthew, Mark and Luke all tell how I met Jesus. I’d like to tell it, not because they got it wrong, but they did miss a few details. Like my name…none of them got my name. I’m Miriam, Miriam of the house of Levi, named for Moses’ sister Miriam, the one who hid him in the bulrushes so that pharaoh wouldn’t have him killed. Ironically, that’s been the story of my life…being hidden.
Let’s get something straight from the jump: I didn’t have any idea what I was going to do that morning. I was just desperate. After the birth of my last child, Jacob, 12 years ago, I didn’t stop bleeding. It left me weak and confused and worse still, in our religion, it meant that I was unclean, like when a woman is having her time of the month, but for me it was ALL the time! I don’t know how to tell you what that’s like. I’m told you all have hot showers, so you’re never really dirty, and you don’t talk about people being unclean. But for us, I was an outcast, like I was a murderer or a leper or some heathen foreigner or something. I couldn’t care for my children. I couldn’t even go to the temple to pray. And I know I stank horribly.
My husband divorced me. They could do that, you know, just by saying it three times. “I divorce you, I divorce you, I divorce you.” I had a little money and I tried to get help from doctors, but some of their cures seemed to make it worse and some just seemed downright foolish, like carrying the ashes of an ostrich egg in a linen rag in summer and a cotton rag in winter. Yeah, like that would help me!
I would have been homeless, except my older son, Thomas, was married, and he took pity on me, letting me live in a little shack behind his house. I couldn’t be with him and his family though. My grandchildren ran away from me in fear, all of my friends abandoned me, and mostly I had to beg for food.
That morning I heard about Jesus coming through our village. I had heard that he had healed many people, and I wondered… Like I said, I was desperate. I didn’t have any idea how I would get close enough to him to ask for help. I was sure he wouldn’t be caught dead with the likes of me, but I thought maybe, just maybe he would have compassion, show me some mercy, speak a word of healing.
I covered myself up as best I could so I wouldn’t be recognized and waited by the side of the road. I wasn’t prepared for the crowd that was following Jesus on all sides. They were pushing and shoving and calling out to him. I almost left in despair, but then I thought, if I could just touch the edge of his prayer shawl, I’m sure I would be healed. No one seemed to notice as I followed and worked my way closer and closer until I could just reach out and touch the tassel of that shawl. I felt it immediately, like a purifying breeze running straight through me. My strength returned; I wanted to jump and dance and shout “Hallelujah!”
I knew that might get me stoned, so I just edged out of that crowd slowly. And then it happened, he stopped! Right there in his tracks and I heard him say, “Who touched me?” Uh oh! I thought I was safe; the disciples knew everyone was jostling Jesus. But then his eyes scanned that crowd, and they found mine. They weren’t accusing; they were full of love and they seemed to understand how desperate I was and what had happened, and they said “Don’t be afraid.” So I came forward and confessed what I had done. And Jesus said it, I was well again. He even said that I had a huge faith to do what I did! Wow! When he said, “Go in peace,” I was filled with peace. I knew that there was no place to go, but to follow him. So that’s what I did.
Let me begin with my thanks for your support of the Protestant Hospital Ministry at Maine Medical Center. You have been generous in your financial support over many years. Your gifts assure that patients who desire spiritual support and counseling while they are in the hospital have someone at their bedside. It’s hard to believe, but this month marks the end of my 12th year as your chaplain.
Exactly a year ago I began an extraordinary sabbatical journey: along with three companions, I walked the 500-mile pilgrim route known as the Camino de Santiago de Compostela across Northern Spain. Camino simply means “way” in Spanish, the Way of St. James. We walked from St. Jean Pied de Port, in southwestern France, over the Pyrenees, through Pamplona, where the bulls ran a few days later, across the wheat fields of the Meseta, through lush vineyards and eucalyptus forests, to Santiago in northwest Spain, and its beautiful cathedral dedicated to St. James. It took us 36 days, and, except for blisters and some tired muscles, we arrived safely for the Feast of St. James on July 25th.
The Camino is the third most famous pilgrim path in Christendom, after the road to Jerusalem and the road to Rome. In the 21st century, it may be the most popular pilgrimage route, with thousands of pilgrims walking from all over Europe, many coming from South America and as far away as Australia. Santiago is named for the apostle James, brother of John, the brothers Zebedee. They were cousins of Jesus, and the death of James is the only account of the martyrdom of an apostle. In the book of the Acts of the Apostles, King Herod has James put to death in 44 A.D. But prior to his death, legend says that James made a missionary journey to Spain and that his body was buried there under the beautiful Cathedral of St. James in Santiago. I had read a number of books on this pilgrims’ walk, but it was after talking with one of my women patients whose life was profoundly impacted by walking the Camino that I determined to follow in the footsteps of so many pilgrims from St. Francis of Assisi to many of the popes to Shirley MacLaine. The physical exertion was a good change from my life as hospital chaplain, but I found that there were lots of points of similarity between pilgrims and patients. Pilgrims give up their usual clothing, food, comfortable bed, daily routines, language and even identity to become totally dependent upon the kindness of strangers. And so it is with patients who come to Maine Medical Center.
This morning, I would like to share one of the many insights that continue to impact me and my ministry from my sabbatical journey. It seems to be a lesson at the heart of Miriam’s story.
At the end of Day Five of our trip, one of our foursome had developed severe blisters on her feet that required her to take a bus to our day’s destination, a small town named Estella – which means “star” in English. Apparently blisters are not unusual at this point on the Camino, because the Cruz Roja or Red Cross had set up a foot clinic just a few doors down from our pilgrim hostel. The clinic had a delightfully jolly Basque doctor, with long, curly, dark hair and brown legs in Bermuda shorts. He giggled and readily gave out bear hugs, while speaking no English, and, it seemed, minimal Spanish, as pilgrims related their complaints. His assistant and translator was a stunning young woman from Brazil. Simone had attempted to walk the Camino, despite having had four open-heart surgeries. When she developed breathing difficulties, her doctors told her that her heavy backpack was straining her still-healing sternum. They strongly encouraged her to stop her walk. Greatly disappointed but having fallen in love with a volunteer at the clinic, Simone decided to stay and help other pilgrims. She was sympathetic to our companion’s blistered feet and swollen ankles, and she wisely confided, “The Camino is about stopping.” Not about the walk itself, but about stopping.
The lesson comes home to me in many ways and situations. The sabbatical was about stopping my normal day-to-day ministry at the hospital, filled with rushing from one emergency, new admission, trauma, or tragedy to another, responding to pages, voice-mail, and referrals. In its place was a totally different activity, one that was physical and strenuous, but also often isolated and contemplative. Stopping came in the form of needing to ask directions, when we couldn’t find the yellow arrows or scallop shells that mark the way. Stopping came as we waited in the heat of the day, with our backpacks lined up along with those of other pilgrims at the door of a hostel not yet open. Stopping came in order to retrace my steps when I left something behind, like my sunglasses or walking stick.
But stopping was more importantly stopping old habits of impatience and judgments and what the Buddhists call “the Monkey Mind” of distracting thoughts, obsessions, and scattered-ness. These keep me from being in the present moment and staying focused on each step toward a deeper relationship with God, with my companions, with those around me, and an attitude of gratitude and prayer.
Joyce Rupp, a Roman Catholic sister and prolific writer of devotional books, was one of my inspirations for walking the Camino. She undertook it some five years ago at the age of 60, and her book about that journey is entitled Walk in a Relaxed Manner: Life Lessons from the Camino. The title came from the advice of another pilgrim: “Drink more water and walk in a relaxed manner.” Like Rupp and her companion, we sometimes felt the pressure to hurry and move on in order to get a bed in the next pilgrim hostel. She writes: “Our unspoken motto became: Push onward. Push forward. Push, push, push. Rush, rush, rush. We soon discovered that the rushing and pushing caused us to lose our enjoyment of the walk itself…(we) had a good talk and both agreed the stress of hurrying denied us our inner harmony and the spiritual adventure of the Camino. We decided to slow down…(we) reminded each other of this often by simply saying:…Time to stop hoofing it!”
And so we come to Jesus’ encounter with the woman with the flow of blood. Listen to the account in Mark’s gospel: “And a large crowd followed Jesus and pressed in on him. Now there was a woman who had been suffering from hemorrhages for twelve years. She had endured much under many physicians, and had spent all that she had; and she was no better, but rather grew worse. She had heard about Jesus, and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak, for she said, ‘If I but touch his clothes, I will be made well.’ Immediately her hemorrhage stopped; and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease. Immediately aware that power had gone forth from him, Jesus turned about in the crowd and said, ‘Who touched my clothes?’ And his disciples said to him, ‘You see the crowd pressing in on you; how can you say, ‘Who touched me?’’ He looked all around to see who had done it. But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling, fell down before him, and told him the whole truth. He said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace, and be healed of your disease.’”
I am struck by Jesus’ willingness to stop. What precedes this passage in Mark is an encounter Jesus has with a leader of the synagogue named Jairus, whose daughter is dying. This important man has begged Jesus to accompany him home and save his child. Jesus is on his way. He’s in a hurry. The urgency of a little girl’s life, hanging in the balance, is pressing him on.
Indeed, by stopping to find out who touched him in the crowd, Jesus seems to miss that opportunity. Some people come from Jairus’ house to say that his daughter has died. “Why trouble the teacher any further?” they ask.
Oops! Jesus blew it! He didn’t get there in time. A father’s hopes have been dashed. But, no, Jesus continues on to Jairus’ house and raises the girl from her deathbed. The whole set up of these stories points to how important it is for Jesus to stop. It gives testimony to his compassion, his valuing each individual life, each need as the most critical one of the moment. Ironically, although the woman was healed of her ailment, it is Jesus’ stopping and making the healing public that will truly restore her to her community. By stopping, he proclaims God’s power manifested through him in her life, praises her for her great faith, and brings her back into the life of the village that has ostracized her for twelve years.
The woman’s stopping also impresses me. She stops being a victim; someone oppressed by her disease and by the taboos of her society that say her illness makes her unclean, unworthy of human contact or even the love of God. She has had enough, and she risks her very life to stop what has been happening to her.
And the disciples stop, confused, aware that they should go on to Jairus’ home, but following the footsteps and the stopping of Jesus. It becomes a teachable moment, a deepening of their understanding of who Jesus is and the compassion and faith that must undergird their and all of our lives, if we are to be followers of the Christ.
Joyce Rupp’s last lesson of the Camino is pause to reflect. “Pausing to reflect,” she says, “is my inner stop sign. In my hurried life, it is essential to ‘stop, look, and listen’ before crossing to the next piece of life’s journey.” Like Rupp, we four pilgrims often paused at the top of a rise, sure, to catch our breath, but, more importantly, to look back on the gorgeous countryside and to congratulate ourselves on the distance we had traveled. Stopping is important for looking back, for staying in the moment, and for re-orienting ourselves for what lies ahead. It is in our stopping that gratitude can grow. Joyce Rupp writes of her beloved companion, Father Tom, who died suddenly just six months after their return to the US. “Tom said, ‘I thought about the many little things that really helped our pilgrimage.’…bunk beds by a wall to provide a tiny bit of privacy, ladders between the top and bottom bunks making the climb up and down easier, those little bits of shade on the mesa, soft grass cushioning our weary feet, village fountains to fill our water bottles, stones, logs, and benches on which we sat when we needed a rest. His naming of these things restored my gratitude for them,” Joyce reflects.
Where do you find the need for stopping in your own life? Is it the need for paying attention to the small, everyday blessings of life? Is it an occasion for responding to someone in need? A family member? A stranger? Is it a time for reevaluating what matters in your life, where you will expend your energies, what new direction calls for your attention? Stopping is the underlying principle of Sabbath rest. We stop our regular routines to gather in a house of worship. It is in stopping and reflecting that balance is restored to our lives, that teaches us compassion and deep gratitude. What would stopping mean for this congregation? Are there new ways of being faithful to your call to be a liberal presence of faith in this community that require your stopping what you are currently doing in order to explore? I don’t have answers, but I do know how valuable stopping the usual, the ways we’ve always done it, the press of everyday life can be. It is in that place of stopping that faith and compassion and new growth are born and nurtured. May it be so for all of us. Amen.
The Rev. Dr. Judith Blanchard