Mark
1:40-45
“The Touch
That Heals”
“The worst
part right now is the loneliness,” she said to me.
“You mean loneliness for your ex-husband?” I asked. Her divorce had just been finalized after a
year or so of separation. “No, I mean
the loneliness of friends not calling, of people avoiding me at work.” “Why do you think they do that?” I
asked. “Well, I suppose they’re not sure
what to say. Maybe some people feel like
they have to pick him or me to be friends with now. But here’s what it feels like: it feels like they don’t want to catch what
I’ve got. So they stay away.”
That conversation came back to me as I read an article by
Bishop Will Willimon who had a conversation—in almost exactly the same
words—with a man who’d been laid off from his job. I know it sounds strange, irrational,
Willimon writes, but it happens all the time.
There is a sense in which we regard anyone in trouble or anyone who is a
victim of deep misfortune as being almost contagious.[1] We have a tendency to want to avoid them
“like the plague,” if you will.
That was certainly the way it was for the man in the gospel
today. He is a leper, someone with the
terrible skin disease leprosy. Because
leprosy could spread from person to person, lepers were isolated. They were not entirely quarantined, as in
modern leper colonies, but they were excluded from public gatherings, even from
Temple and synagogue. According to
Leviticus, a leper is considered unclean, and therefore no one is allowed to
touch them.
But Jesus, of course, had a way of doing things you weren’t
supposed to do. The man came up and
begged him, “If you choose, you can make me clean.” And right away Jesus stretched out his hand
and touched him, and said, “I do choose.
Be made clean!” And it was
so. The leprosy left him
immediately.
That was the physical healing. And Jesus did a lot of physical healings—the
paralyzed, the blind, the deaf, even raising the dead. He did these healings partly out of sheer compassion,
to ease people’s suffering. And I
believe that God still does miraculous physical healings. But even Jesus didn’t heal everyone who was sick. Healings are not the reversal of our
mortality; there is no promise of long life and perfect health. Healings rather are signs of God’s
power. Not everyone receives physical
healing, but everyone can witness to the power of God for good in the world.
A deeper level of healing in this story is the man being
restored to human community. That’s why
Jesus sends the man to the priest—so he can be examined and declared free of
leprosy. Then he can join his family
again, come to the Temple. Then he can
belong again.
It was one of the main things Jesus
did—he restored people to human community.
If fact, he expanded the boundaries of community to include the
excluded. He ate with sinners and tax
collectors. He talked to women and
Gentiles and servants. He refused to
allow a woman caught in the act of adultery to be treated as an outcast.
Jesus healed the man physically. And Jesus restored the man to human
community. All of that is true and
good. But what is most important of all
to me is the way Jesus did it. No doubt
Jesus could have stood off at a distance and shouted at the man, “Be healed,”
and it would have worked. No doubt Jesus
could have knocked the guy on the forehead like a TV evangelist. Jesus could have healed the man any way he
wanted. But the way he actually chose to
do it was this: he stretched out his
hand and touched him.
Against the rules, against all expectations, against medical
advice, Jesus reached out and touched him.
And for a leper who hadn’t been touched in years, it was the touch that
heals. For someone going through
divorce, who’s lost their job, for someone who is avoided or excluded for any
reason, it is the reaching out and touching that matters most. It is the touch that heals.
In Jesus’ day it was assumed that when someone unclean
touched someone else, their uncleanness rubbed off; they made the other person
unclean too. The unclean ruined the
clean; the bad was more powerful than the good.
But Jesus turned that around. He
assumed that when someone holy touched someone unclean, their holiness rubbed
off; they made the other person holy too.
The clean healed the unclean, good is more powerful than bad, and love
is stronger than fear. And Jesus, of
course, was right. It is the touch that
heals.
A hospital chaplain in Georgia tells about walking into a
frail man’s hospital room, wearing the required gloves and gown and mask. The patient had AIDS. and the year was 1983,
when it wasn’t yet widely know how AIDS can and can’t be spread. The chaplain says, he glared at me, resentful
that even I, a representative of God, would wear the gloves that separated him
from human touch. Day after day, I came
back, put on my mask, my hat, and my gloves.
And day after day, he cursed me and told me to leave his room.
One day I asked him why he despised me so badly. He replied, “You come in here all the time
wanting to help me. But you’re like
everyone else; you won’t touch me. You
say you care, but your actions don’t match up.
Do you know how long it’s been since someone really cared about me, how
long it’s been since someone touched me?”
I took off the mask, she writes, tore off the gloves, took
his frail hand in mine, and held it gently.
I wasn’t wondering if he could give me AIDS. All I could think about was reaching out to
him in God’s love. Later, he smiled and
said, “The prayer was nice, but what really counted was that you touched me.”[2] It is the touch that heals.
A couple of months ago, a woman called me. She’d gone to church here as a youth. Her mom was a member here and I did her
funeral several years ago. She was
calling me now to see if I’d visit her mother-in-law who was terminally ill and
asking faith questions. I went to see
her in her hospice room. We talked about
her fears, her spiritual journey, what it might mean for her to die with a sense
of assurance. At last I stood up to go,
and I asked, “Is there anything I can do for you before I go,” thinking she
might need some some water or something.
“Well, yes there is,” she said.
You know, my husband has been dead for 30 years, and I’m a pretty
touchy-feely person. I don’t get touched
a lot.”
“Would you like a hug?” I asked.
She just nodded, a tear in her eye. And I held her for several minutes. Later her daughter called me and I asked if
her mom had said anything about my visit.
“Yes,” she told me. “She said,
‘Oh, he touched me.’” I learned it from
Jesus: it is the touch that heals.
When I was a young teenager—7th, 8th,
9th grade, I was an untouchable of sorts. My hair was always greasy, my face had more
area covered by pimples than not, and I dressed badly (worse than now, I
mean). But more than that, I was surly,
insensitive, reclusive (worse than now, I mean). I was, I suppose, the typical 15 year-old
boy, only worse than most, I think. I
did my best not to let anyone get close to me because on the inside I believe
that no one would really want to be close to me.
But there was this one woman at church, who every time she
saw me, she always said, “Come over here and give me a hug.” And the thing is, I did. Always.
Now part of me didn’t want to.
Part of me didn’t want to hug anyone, let alone an older, unattractive
lady with thick glasses and too much lipstick.
But part of me did want to, too.
Part of me knew somehow that I needed to be restored to human community;
I needed to know that there was someone who wanted to touch me. So for several years going to church meant a
pretty good Sunday school lesson, a pretty so-so sermon, and a hug from the
lady. And over time, it healed me of
some of my anger and self-loathing. It
is the touch that heals.
Before we go on, will do one thing for me? Will you humor me in this one way? I’d like for you to stretch out your hand and
touch someone near you. If you’re seated
a ways off from others, you’ll need to move.
If you see someone alone who doesn’t move easily, go to them. If someone is truly uncomfortable, of course,
we will respect that. But it can be as
elaborate as a hug or as simple as a hand on the arm. Remember that Jesus stretched out his hand
and touched the man. And it is the touch
that heals.
In a minute we’re going to sing a song called “Jesus’ Hands
Were Kind Hands.” It is a children’s
song, really, so you might be tempted just to skim the words, not to take it
seriously. But let me encourage you not
to do that, but to be attentive to the words, to pray these words as you sing
them. As you turn to the song, #273 in
the hymnal, let me read the words to you:
Jesus’ hands were kind hands, doing good to all,
healing pain and sickness, blessing children small,
washing tired feet, and saving those who fall,
Jesus’ hands were kind hands, doing good to all
Take my hands, Lord Jesus, let them work for you;
make them strong and gentle, kind in all I do.
Let me watch you, Jesus, till I’m gentle too,
till my hands are kind hands, quick to work for you.
My friends, it is the touch that heals.