As Jesus is in the middle of a conversation about fasting and wineskins, a man comes and kneels down in front of Jesus. Matthew 9 doesn’t name the man, but only identifies him as a leader/ruler. This is not a person in the habit of kneeling down before other people. He doesn’t defer to others; others defer to him. He doesn’t ask to be led; he is the one always sought out for leadership. But none of that matters. He will gladly shed the exterior of his social and professional status because – his daughter has just died. Being a leader of men is of no help now. He needs Jesus, and he will place himself at the center of the scene, interrupting a conversation in order to get to Jesus.
But before Jesus can get to the man’s house for a healing, there is another interruption. A woman who has been losing blood for the last twelve years needs Jesus now, too. I wonder if we can relate to having health and livelihood, joy and purpose, slowly drained out of us. She’s been thinking to herself, if I can just get close enough to touch him… So she sneaks up behind him and grabs his cloak. He turns, sees her, and says, “Take heart, daughter, your faith has made you well.” Sure enough, the plague of twelve years in gone in an instant. Now he arrives to bring a little girl back to life. There are some at the house who openly laugh at the idea of resurrection, but Jesus gets rid of them. He takes the girl by the hand and she lives.
As Jesus moves on, two blind men find out that Jesus has come near. To make sure they are heard, they yell. “Have mercy on us, son of David!” “Do you have faith that I can do this?” Jesus replies. “Yes, Lord,” they answer. “According to your faith, let it be done,” he says as he touches their eyes and makes them to see. As soon as they have moved on to go and behold their new and brightly lit world, a demon-possessed man is brought to Jesus. He won’t come himself, but appears to have some faithful friends who want him to be better. The demon makes the man unable to speak. Something about a person not being given a chance to have their voice heard is supposed to alert us to the presence of evil. When a person is not allowed to be heard, the heart of Jesus reacts. He casts the evil away. He heals. The man now has a voice.
The approach. The push. The desperate reaching out. They come in a variety of ways – kneeling, interrupting, sneaking, grabbing, shouting, and reluctantly carried by someone else. This is faith in the Gospel of Matthew, to get to Jesus (smoothly or not so smoothly) and surrender to his healing, transforming power. And no matter how they come, how quietly or loudly, how submissively or aggressively, he heals. He renews. He takes them by the hand. He touches their eyes. He removes what stops them from speaking. He says to them, “according to your faith, let it be done,” and “Daughter, your faith has made you well.”
Get to him. Kneel. Interrupt. Grab. Yell. Surrender to his healing, transforming power. And be made well.