Luke 8:40-48

content/bible_journal/luke_8:40-48.md

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+title = "Luke 8:40–48"
+date = "2022-11-26"
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+
+### [Read the passage.](https://biblia.com/bible/esv/Lk8.40-48)
+
+Back in Galilee, maybe in the city of Capernaum, a crowd of people are waiting
+for Jesus's return from His trip across the lake. The ruler of the synagogue,
+named Jairus, comes to Jesus with a request to help his dying daughter. Jesus
+agrees, and they set off across town.
+
+Before they can get to Jairus's house, they are interrupted by a woman trying
+to be healed in secret. To understand the secrecy, it's necessary to understand
+the ritual purity laws in the Law of Moses. In order to come before God in
+worship and offer acceptable sacrifices, one must be clean of a whole host of
+impurities. Touching a dead body, having various skin diseases, or having some
+bodily discharge can all make a person unclean. Now, being unclean wasn't
+sinful or caused by committing sins, _per se_, but it did represent sin and
+death and therefore cut a person off from their relationship with God.
+Uncleanness is also infectious according to the law, so in severe situations
+the unclean person was excluded from the camp and lived in isolation until they
+were made clean again.
+
+The woman who touched Jesus's cloak had been discharging blood for twelve years
+straight. Normal menstruation caused a woman to be unclean for seven days, but
+not only herself but also her bed and her chairs and anyone who touches her or
+those things. This woman had spent all her money on physicians to try to get
+well, but nothing had worked. She saw an opportunity to be healed in Jesus, so
+she touched His cloak believing it would help her.
+
+And it does, but Jesus catches her. She explains why she grabbed His cloak,
+which may have disturbed some of the people who heard her. ("She might have
+made this holy prophet unclean!" 😱) Jesus treats her gently and declares
+before everyone that her faith has made her well. Now she can go make the
+necessary sacrifices to atone for her uncleanness and rejoin society, and now
+everyone knows that she can.
+
+* * *
+
+Show us how pervasive our sin is; wash it from us and make us clean.