Following Jesus’ Touch

Until a couple hundred years ago, we didn’t understand the pathology of disease. In fact, the Jewish Talmud suggested a woman suffering like this, should carry the ashes of an ostrich egg in a linen bag in the summer or in a cotton bag in the winter. Or carry a barley corn found in donkey dung, or drink wine with alum & crocuses, or onions.

With doctors like that, no wonder it grew worse.

So now she’s bankrupt from paying all her money out of pocket to these doctors.

How many of you can identify with spending all your money on some invasive treatment or expensive drug that only makes you worse. Now you’re bankrupt and 5 steps back!

This poor woman is dealing with:

·      the pain of her worsening condition,

·      the poverty of spending all she had on a cure,

·      and the despair of knowing she’s incurable.

But on top of that, according to Leviticus 15, because of this bleeding, she was considered ceremonially unclean.