Healing upon Healing
Galatians 6:11-18; Luke 8:41-56

Many people are squeamish at the sight of blood, some even faint away. This is because of fear – we know that loss of blood can lead to loss of life. The blood flowing in our veins is life. In this Sunday’s Gospel, the Lord encounters a woman who has had a hemorrhage for twelve years – life is slowly seeping away from her. But death cannot remain in the presence of Christ, and merely by secretly touching his garment, she is healed by his power. Today’s Gospel contains this healing within a healing, a raising form the dead. Our Lord is on his way to raise the twelve-year old daughter of Jairus, where he redefines death as sleep, ““Do not weep any longer, for she is not dead, but sleeping. (Luke 8:52)” See that for God, time is without meaning, for the woman with the hemorrhage, twelve years seems an eternity, but for the little girl, twelve years is much too short. For the Jews at the time of Jesus, blood signified life. When animals were sacrificed, the blood was poured out as a libation, for the life belongs to God. While our Lord stopped the flow of the blood for the woman, and gave life to the little girl, he instead shed his own blood for the life of the world and died on the Cross to bring us all resurrection. He invites us to share in his blood, “Then he took a cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, and they all drank from it. He said to them, ‘This is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed for many.’ (Mark 14:23-24)”

What would seem to be a curse, the shedding of blood unto death, becomes a blessing for the life of the world. Jesus once asked his disciples, James and John, “Can you drink the cup that I drink ? (Mark 10:38)” This is interpreted that we too must share in suffering for others as did the Lord, but it is also a blessing, for we drink the cup of our Lord’s blood in Holy Communion “for the forgiveness of sins and life everlasting.” In the Epistle, St. Paul, who asks us to be imitators of Christ as he is (1 Corinthians 11:1), tells us, “But may I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world….. I bear the marks of Jesus on my body (Galatians 11:14.17)”

Some try to separate the sacred and the secular, but see here that they are united to each other by the nails of the Cross, and it is by Christ’s death on the Cross and by our sharing in his sacrifice by our own lives, by our own praise of God, and by our own obedience to his will, that we redeem the world. The priest begins the Liturgy at the Table of Preparation by the first words he speaks, “You have redeemed us from the curse of the Law by your precious blood.” Today it is by the blood of Christ that we are given life.

Meditation by Archpriest David Petras