Getting Things Straight

The old Women’s Devotional Journal had not been completely filled. I began to use it mid December as I had completed the other with devotional notes and jots and doodles. 

I began to glance back through the years of unfinished notes. Some of the journal pages are from 2005, others are dated 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2013 until I again picked it up to complete my 2014 Devotional notations. Good intentions…left undone.

Some of the entries are filled with the wonder of a new journal that begs to be stained with ink and the wonder of simple study and devotion. Other entries are the angst of a wayward family member. Others surround the shock of a heart attack and subsequent lifestyle change.

I also documented the decision to leave one church and return to my Methodist roots. That was a difficult transition of sorts, especially for my Hubs. It’s just that you know, that you know, that you know when a door has been closed.

Some of the notations are from sermons. Please don’t misunderstand what I’m saying, but by taking notes during the sermon, I am more apt to “pay attention” than to let my mind wander randomly.

I began to read sermon notes from 2009. The sermon was titled "Getting Things Straight."

The bible gives us three accounts of this act in Matthew, Mark and Luke. It is about the woman who had been bleeding for twelve years. 

Twelve years…can you imagine? So many doctors…so many treatments, only to have the condition worsen. 

In that climate, in that environment, a woman who was bleeding could not go to the temple to worship as she was considered “unclean.”

Picture it…this woman ostracized by her own people, possibly bent over with disability and pain. A handicap in biblical times was equated to being “less than perfect.” She was outcast, made to stand in the back. Possibly even her own family didn’t want to be around her. Truly, this was a social disease as she was made socially unacceptable.

Yet she heard the Messiah was in town and was filled with hope, with anticipation. With all the persons clamoring around him, she made her way to him and as the King James Version reads, she, who had an “issue of blood,” touched the hem of his garment. She was immediately healed.

Jesus felt the “power” leave him. He turned and said, “Who touched me?” The disciples were incredulous and said, “Look at all this crowd, who can tell who touched you?” Yet this woman heard him, she fell at his feet and confessed that it was she who had touched his garment and pleaded for forgiveness. In my mind’s eye, he possibly knelt towards her, took her by the hand and said, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.” (Tamara’s paraphrase)

Getting Things Straight, indeed! She could now stand with her head held high; she could worship freely and no longer be relegated to the back.

So…what’s your issue? What’s keeping you from fully and freely worshiping?

Wishing you grace, every single day,

Tamara