Sunday Reflections

This Sunday’s gospel tells us the story of Jesus’s performance of two miracles happening in quick succession.  Both are a reminder of the power of faith and where the focus of a miracle should be, not on the performer of the miracle but on the one receiving the benefit.

The woman afflicted with hemorrhages pronounces her faith, “If I but touch His clothes, I shall be cured.” Jesus also demonstrates his openness to each one of us when he asks, “Who has touched my clothes”, when he is being pressed upon by a large crowd.  We are reminded at the beginning of the story that many doctors had been unable to heal her and then she turns to Jesus.  First her act and then second His love shows us what can happen when we turn to Jesus. 

With the second miracle, Jesus demands secretiveness with the bringing back to life of Jairus’s daughter.  “He gave strict orders that no one should know this” (the miracle he has just performed).  He wants the focus on the girl brought back to life, not on Him as the one who performed this miracle.  Right after the miracle He doesn’t boast of what he has just performed but says, “she (the daughter) should be given something to eat”.

We are also reminded in today’s first reading that “God did not make death”, as in the death of Jairus’s daughter.  He offers life.  And Psalm 30 is a song of thanksgiving for recovery from grave illness, for both the women and the young girl.  And again, Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians reminds us of ‘the gracious act of our Lord Jesus Christ” as described in today’s gospel.

Will we turn to God in our troubled times because of our faith?  And when we serve others will our focus be on the good, we can do, not being acknowledged for our act?