Sometimes God is Silent

For twelve years she endured this affliction.  For twelve long years she had a slow, persistent hemorrhage.  With this thorn in her side, twelve years is a long time to settle and accept.  

She had been to every doctor she could find in her search for a cure.  However, the doctors only made her condition worse.  So she prayed.  She prayed to a God that she wasn't sure she understood.  She lived by His ordinances in the slim hope that He might hear her and grant her petition for healing.  For twelve years she piously did whatever she could to appease Him.  But her God was silent.  

Then one day she heard of a miracle man that came into town.  She heard stories of sick people who were made well.  Men who were lame from birth could now walk.  People who lacked sight now could see.  Some people who once could not talk, now spoke praises of this man.  A glimmer of hope sparked in the dark, cold embers of her heart.  Still, she steadied herself.  She had been let down so many times before.  It was better not to get her hopes up.  Too often she rode the heights of hope only to come crashing down to earth.  

The town was a buzz with excitement.  Electricity filled the air.  Great crowds pressed in around this man.   From a distance, she caught a glimpse him.  Just the sight of Him caused a quickening in her heart.  She felt herself walking toward the throng.  With each step, a purpose formed in her mind. I must touch the man's cloak.  No, I am not worthy.  I'll touch the fringe of his garment.  

Women in that day were second class citizens.  With the illness which resulted in her poverty, she was but a person who occupied space.  The town’s people normally ignored her as she went about the village scrounging for her existence.  But this day, she walked with purpose.  Her quest was to touch the fringe of the man's cloak.  

As she reached His vicinity, there was a wall of humanity that separated her from the man.  In the past, she would have gone no further.  She would have accepted her lot and retreated back into the shell of her mind and existence.  Today, with all the strength her anemic body could muster, she pushed her way through the crowd.  

Everyone in the village was pressing in on the man.  Everyone wanted a moment with Him.  The man's friends were carving a path for the man and a synagogue official who asked Him to heal his daughter.  As they were leaving the square, the woman finally reached Him.  Pressing her hand between two bodies, she felt her fingertips pinch together on some fringe but the movement of the masses abruptly jerked her hand away.  Instantly, the hemorrhage dried up and she felt a rush within her that whispered she had been heard.  

The man turned and asked who touched him.  Dumbfounded, his friends looked at Him.  They said to Him, "Lord, everyone is pressing in around You.  The whole town is here pushing to touch You.  Who didn't touch You?"  

The woman, knowing that she had been found out, trembled with fear as she walked toward Him.  She fell at His feet and, with a tone that begged forgiveness and fearing repercussions, told Him everything about her affliction and how she was healed when she touched His garment. He gazed into her eyes with a look that somehow said He understood her condition.  He said, "Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace."  

What is the silence you have endured for so long?  Have you given up hope?  Sometimes God is silent.  Be it a still small voice or a rushing wind the gently waters your desert, when the silence breaks you will be completely and profoundly changed. 

#faith