I want to talk about this little lady here in chapter number 8, this woman with the issue. facilities that we go to, the meadows and the oaks. We meet a lot of folks there, and we get to hear a lot of their stories. And some of them, their story is just about them, and some of them, their story is about somebody else. Maybe it's somebody in their family or maybe it's a grandson or a granddaughter or somebody a little distant from them that's got great need. And they can't do anything about that need except pray about it. And it causes me to think about the heaviness that they live in. I don't know if that's the right term to use, but I think they probably wake up in the morning and they're looking at the same four walls and they're not going to get out and run down to the mall or run up and down the street somewhere. They're going to get up and they're either going to eat their oatmeal there in their room or they're going to go downstairs to the dining room and eat somebody else's oatmeal. And then in a little while they'll meander around some and everybody they talk to. They would say, well, how are you doing? And then it would be, well, I've got this pain and that pain and a pain and a pain and a pain. And they move on to the next person and it's, well, how are you today? And, well, I've got this pain and that pain. And finally, they'll get around to talking about their own pain when somebody asked them, how are you doing today? And, you know, it's kind of a, a bleak world for them, if you will. And we just get attached to them. Three weeks ago, Marilyn and I was over there knocking on doors and we run on to a lady named Yetta Cohen. And she invited us in and an hour later we finally got to and move on. And she told us some interesting things about her and her life and her parents and her grandparents and how she came to be in America. Oh, she just had a story to tell. She showed us her original little Bible that the rabbi gave her. You know, it's an Old Testament. It's about that thick. I think it takes more writing space for Hebrew than it does for English. You know, we write sea cat run and they write a whole line or two to say sea cat run. But anyway, she's a delightful lady. Between then and this past Saturday, she's had a fall and whacked her head and got a big knot and blood was everywhere. A neighbor finally checked on her and found her in that condition. And they've got that kind of stuff going on. And I don't know how many of them feel like they're drowning. But circumstances, they just overwhelm us. And when you get overwhelmed in circumstances, we don't always make the best decisions. When COVID first started, the media had us all dropping like flies. And you either took the shot or you tried to find your own way of being Safe, maybe, is the term. And of course, Mary Ellen's mom was still living there. We took the shot and still got sick. So that didn't work. So we had to find something else to do. And maybe not making a real good decision on my part, but I started taking 1,000 milligrams of vitamin C in the morning and 1,000 milligrams in the evening before I went to bed. And I mean, I was juiced up on vitamin C. It was wonderful. I've been doing that ever since COVID started. And the other day, right about there on my tongue, it got to hurting like somebody was sticking a needle in my tongue. And I didn't want my tongue to fall off. What in the world would I do then? So Mary Ellen, she suggested that I go see the doctor. And the doctor suggested that I was probably vitamin deficient and needed to take on more vitamins. But I got a daughter-in-law who works at one of them herb stores, one of them health food stores. And I was talking to her the other night and she said, you know, you might be a redneck if you're taking too much vitamin C. So I just cold turkey quit it. And my tongue feels better. I'm just saying we don't always make good decisions when we get overwhelmed with what we are made to believe maybe is going to happen or that type of thing. I wonder why this lady waited so long Let me read these Scriptures, and if your heart doesn't get bothered by it, well, okay, but mine does. Verse 43 of chapter 8 says, And a woman, having an issue of blood twelve years, had spent all her living upon physicians, neither could be healed of any, came behind him, and touched the border of his garment, And immediately the issue of blood staunched. And Jesus said, Who touched me? When all denied, Peter and they that were with him said, Master, the multitude thronged thee and pressed thee, and sayest thou, Who touched me? And Jesus said, Somebody hath touched me, for I perceive that virtue is gone out of me. And when the woman saw that she was not hid, she came trembling and falling down before him. And she declared unto him before all the people for what cause she had touched him, and how she was healed immediately. And He said unto her, Daughter, be of good comfort, thy faith hath made thee whole, go in peace." Now there's a couple of things about those six little verses that are just kind of unique. I just thought I'd mention them in passing. One of the things that's so curious about this particular miracle is this miracle happens encased in another miracle. Jairus' daughter is laying at home dead, and Jairus has come to fetch Jesus, and Jesus gets word that Jairus' daughter's dying, and he starts to go, but he can't go real fast unless he does one of them supernatural things where he's on this side of the lake, and then he's on that side of the lake. But I think he's trying to kind of ease along with Jairus. But there's such a crowd. Because who wouldn't want to see a miracle? I mean, especially moms and dads with a young'un that's in bad off shape, they'd want to see a miracle. And if it wasn't your young'un and it was somebody you knew's young'un, and they was fixing to have a miracle, you'd want to see their miracle. And in the middle of that miracle, this woman, this woman who has no name, She's got six verses in the Bible about her, but she don't have a name. That puzzles me. I think maybe God didn't give her name so that you and me could maybe plug our name in there. And remember that while He's doing your miracle, He can do my miracle. And while He's doing my miracle, He can do your miracle. Whatever my circumstances are, it's good for me to remember that God's big enough to handle all of our issues and our troubles. This woman, she didn't just dilly-dally around about that issue. She labored with that thing for twelve years and totally exhausted all of her living. She didn't have anything left. She had nothing. That's what it says. And if that's what it says, then I take that to mean she didn't have a roof over her head. She barely had clothes on her back. She probably didn't know where her next meal was coming from, because the Bible says she exhausted everything trying to take care of her circumstance. Now, I also thought about this. You might want to think about this a little bit. She's had this for 12 years. Jesus didn't start His ministry public until around 30. He goes to the cross about 33. And in that time of those few years, this woman approaches Him. To me, it makes me consider, way back there, before He's gone to the cross, He knows about this woman, but He didn't do anything about her issue until she come behind Him and touched Him. But He knows about it, because He knows everything. He knows her worrying. He knows her fretting. He knows how she's exhausted all of her livelihood. He knows all of that, but He didn't make one move to help her until she touched the hem of His garment. Now it says that she come behind. I'm trying to hurry because yesterday over at the Oaks, I get to preaching and sometimes I lose track of time. Brother Ben, you might need to jump up an hour, hour and a half from now and wave your arms or something. She come behind him. I don't know when she decided to go touch Jesus. I don't know if it was a last minute thing when that crowd had already gotten past her. Or if she was so weak, 12 years of an issue that cannot be stopped, not by any physician, not by any medication. She's weak and feeble and frail. At some point in time, she decides, I'm going to go see what Jesus can do about it. I don't know that she would call him master yet. I don't believe that. I believe she just found out the miracle man is passing by, and I want to try to get him to help me. And she decides to go, but she comes from behind. Have you ever had an illness that you didn't want to share with everybody else? Have you ever had a sickness? Have you ever had a family issue? Have you ever had a neighbor issue that you just didn't want to make it public, but you needed help with it? I remember back probably before Mary Ellen and I got married, that was just after Noah got off of that ark, I had had several jobs that my boss at the funeral home would have called menial. But they were jobs that paid money and that's why I worked there. But somehow working at the tire shop or digging ditches for an irrigation company or somewhere I got this stuff on my hands. It was the awfulest looking thing that you ever saw because my hands would just bust open and bleed and stuff would ooze out of them and it was embarrassing. So I walked around with my hands in my pockets. My daddy always taught me not to have my hands in my pockets, but I didn't want nobody seeing it. It was ugly. It was embarrassing. And I'm going to be honest with you, I was just right ashamed of it. I went to doctors, they gave me ointments and pills and antibiotics and all kinds of junk and nothing ever happened. I guess Mary Ellen felt sorry for me and said yes anyway and we got married. I actually, I know this is going to sound sissified, but I actually thought about having some makeup put on my right hand for when she put the ring on it, nobody else would notice it. I don't remember whether I did that or not. Probably not. No, I don't think I did. But it was embarrassing, terrible embarrassing. I don't know how many doctors I went to, and I couldn't get it fixed. So finally I just said, if the Lord wants me to have ugly hands, I'll just have ugly hands. And I got a job working for Caterpillar. And I worked at different stations in their shop, and I got in different kinds of fluids. I got in clean stuff, and I got in dirty stuff. I mean, I got in some stuff that you would never want to put your hand in, and I had to put my hand in it. But I want you to know, after a little while, I may not fret over that no more. And you're saying, Lord, whatever you want it to be, it's alright with me. My hand's just cleared up. And I hadn't had that in 40 years. God's able to do stuff for us. I'm talking about this woman's approach of Jesus. She didn't come running boldly to the throne room of grace like you and I can. She come from behind. She's got a secret that she don't want nobody to know. And as far as I know, anybody else that knew about it didn't say nothing about it, and didn't know about it. That crowd didn't know. Listen, in verse number 43, she's got it. In verse 44, she came behind and touched Him, and now she don't have it. That quick, God took care of her issue. She just touched the hem of his garment. Now, I don't know, I can't stitch up anything. I'm glad they come up with Krazy Glue. It'll fix just about near anything. That and duct tape, you're in good shape. But if I know anything, I think I would be right in saying the hem would be down at the bottom. Now, I don't know this woman's approach to Jesus, but I do know she came from the back. It's a secret thing. She touched the hymn, and the moment she touched that hymn, she's made whole immediately. That's what it says. That's a wonderful thing. The other thing that's curious about this particular miracle, this miracle happened without a single word being said. You don't have to broadcast what you need. He knows. We just need to approach Him. We just need to come to Him. Just bring it to Jesus. You don't have to say anything. You know, some folks can be real beautiful in their words. And then others of us are just cornbread. But all we really need is, Lord, help me. And we don't even have to say it. We just have to mean it. This woman approached him like that. Remember, he's on his way to Jairus' house. Now, I don't rightly know how far Jairus' house was. I don't know how many people were there. But when she touched His garment, nobody else was aware of it but Jesus. And I believe He stopped right there and waited a second and said, Who touched me? And I believe that when He said, Who touched me? I think He scanned that whole crowd of people. I think he looked that little woman right in the eyeballs. And she didn't say a word. She's still ashamed, even though she's been made whole. After 12 years and all of a sudden you're made whole, I don't know what your reaction would be. She's probably in shock. Who touched me? You know what? When somebody gets saved, the world hardly takes notice. They certainly don't know for sure if anybody got saved or not. There's only two people that really know whether a person gets saved or not. That's the Lord Jesus and the person that had the need. He just stops. Who touched me? I don't know, Church, you reckon sometimes we get in our hustle and bustle of life that we don't slow down enough to really say to anybody, who touched me? We get out there and we're knocking on them doors. I can't believe that one place lets us actually go in the buildings and go down the halls and knock on the doors and try to witness to people. It's amazing to me that God has opened that up to us. I mean, they got COVID, they're just like the other places. But I have to remind myself, Brother Joe, that while I'm talking to you, and I know I got another door over here to knock on, and somebody cracks that door open, wouldn't it be an awful thing if I'm right in the middle of telling you the gospel, if I lose that attention and turn over here to Brother James, and go to talk, probably never would get a chance to come back to talk to you. I'm just saying we've got to slow down a little bit. And we've got to take time with people. I didn't get saved like that. It took a long time before I got saved. I had to get good and lost before I could get saved. I really think that. This woman, she touches Jesus. She's immediately healed. His disciples, like the rest of the crowd, they say, Lord, we're in this big crowd of people. Everybody's pushing and shoving. I'm wondering how that little lady even got to Him. Think about it. She's frail. She's falling apart on her feet. How in the world did she get through that crowd, through that press, to touch Jesus' hymn? She didn't do it in her own ability. She didn't do it in her own strength. God had to part some waters for her to get to Him. She touched Him. Immediately healed. And Peter said, you're asking us who touched you? And then Jesus said, well, somebody touched me. I want you all to know somebody touched me. I think that's pretty neat that God wants people to know when people get touched. I think that's a wonderful thing. Can you remember when you first got saved? I was a mess. Got saved. I just wanted to go sit down in a corner somewhere and just bask in salvation. I was so glad to be saved. I didn't know what to do other than just, whoo, I'm saved. That's pretty good. A little while down the road, though, just a little ways down the road, I started telling folks about getting saved. My friends that I grew up with in high school, There came a time I had to say, hey boys, I'm not doing what you're doing no more. I got born again. I got saved. I got washed in the blood. And I'm not headed in that direction no more. This lady, God wants her to share what's happened to her. In verse 47, notice these words in this verse. It says, And when the woman saw that she was not hid, You know, Adam and Eve had to find out they weren't hid either. And we need to know we're not hiding. We can't keep anything from God's view. He sees the very intent of our heart. He knows my rotten attitude. He knows my wicked thoughts. I can't keep anything from Him. He knows it all anyway. She saw. You know, when you get born again, when you truly get saved, the Bible becomes alive. It's not just a book anymore. It's the breathed Word of God. And when you pick it up and you start to read it, it's alive. We have those little programs for reading the Bible through in a year. Start reading and you're supposed to read two or three chapters a day. It's hard to stop at two or three chapters. Sometimes we just flip over to another book and read some more over there. But if you get in these kind of chapters like this, you just want to keep reading that. Where's He going to next? Who's He going to do a miracle for next? Where's He going to pull coins out of a fish next? What's God going to do next? In our life, it ought to be that way. Maybe we ought to wake up in the morning. You know, Monday morning's a morning that everybody hates, because that's go back to work day. Except if you're retired, it's okay for me. I'm thinking more about, well, what are we going to have for breakfast? But maybe we ought to wake up in the morning and think to ourselves, I wonder what God's going to do today. I wonder what God's going to do before lunch. You know, when you get my age, everything's based on a meal. It's breakfast, lunch, and supper. So, maybe we ought to think in those time frames what God's going to do. She saw that she was not hid. Boy, can you remember your hiding days? I remember the things I used to try to hide from my parents. It's amazing how dumb I was. I didn't have a clue that my parents knew everywhere that I went. They knew my hangouts, Brother James. Can you imagine that? My parents actually knew where the Freezet drive-in was. This is where all the teenagers went to hang out. I suspect now looking back on it, probably every parent in Hernando County or Osceola County, Florida, probably every parent in that county knew where the Freezet was. Because if anything was going to happen on a Friday or Saturday night, it was going to happen at the Freezet. And I didn't know that my parents were sitting on one side of the freeze-it while I was sitting on the other side of the freeze-it. And they saw everything that I was doing on my side of the freeze-it from their side of the freeze-it. And the next day, early in the morning, for Saturday morning now, you know, Saturday morning, teenagers won't sleep until about 11 o'clock or so. Early in the morning, my dad came to my bedroom and said, rise and shine, boys, we've got work to do today. And about an hour or so later, he let my brother go, but he never did let me go. He worked for me all day long. I was so hot and tired and dirty and nasty. But it was all because Daddy had seen what was going on last night at the frisette, but he didn't let the cat out of the bag that he knew what I knew. But after the end of the day, I knew that they knew more than I know. So trying to fool them was not going to work. Just wasn't going to work. Now, I'm not going to tell you what I was doing, because it ain't none of your business. She saw I'm thinking what a wonderful thing it is when you get saved and you begin to see things that you didn't see before. You begin to feel things you didn't feel before. I know salvation is not a feeling, but it sure comes with some feelings. They grow on you later on. This woman, you look at her in verse 47, the Bible says, now she's not coming behind, now she came trembling. You reckon she saw in whose presence she's standing? See, at the beginning of this, she was unclean. Based on the Old Testament, she was unclean. While she's unclean, she can't approach God. While she's unclean, she can't approach the temple, the tabernacle, none of them holy places. She can't approach any of them because she's unclean. She's got to go through all that. legal stuff before she's ever pronounced clean to be able to get there, but now she's in His presence and she's clean, and now she comes trembling to Him. She's in that state of reverence now that she's never known. Weren't you like that when you first got saved? It was glorious to be saved, but now I'm in His presence. And then it says, not only was she trembling, but falling down before Him. Now she's doing obeisance. She's worshiping Him. That's what that is. She's gone from thinking, well, maybe He can help me, to bless Him for healing me. She's worshiping Him. Then it says in verse 47, she declared unto Him before all the people for what cause she had touched Him. She's not ashamed anymore. It makes me think of that verse, you know, that if you're ashamed of me, my Father's going to be ashamed of you. She's not ashamed anymore. She don't care who knows. Now that she had an issue, she didn't want nobody to know when she had it, but now she don't have it. She don't care whether you know or not now. Let me just tell you, hey, I'm thankful that God saved me. I'm glad I'm on my way to heaven. I thought about that little lady. She had a coin. She's got that great big Old Testament. She reads it. She don't see what we see. Still got them blinders on. Oh, I'm praying that God will let us go back and visit and love on that lady and be sweet to her. I was talking to a preacher friend of mine the other day, and I was talking about this missionary overseas that he has Hebrew New Testaments. I said, I don't have any anymore. I had some when I was pastoring. He said, oh, that's not a problem. I've got one I'll send you. So I've got one still in the wrapper. Now I understand it's fixed to be Passover pretty quick now. I'm not sure about the date, but somebody told me it's pretty quick to be Passover. I think that would make a real good gift to her. Give her a New Testament in Hebrew. And if I'm sweet enough and Mary Ellen's sweet enough on her, she might just read that. And if she reads it, God will be all in it. And she might get saved. I'm just saying, this woman, she wasn't afraid to declare the truth. And we ought not be afraid to declare the truth. Hey, we've got the only thing that's worth having. You talk to folks that are saved, do you know any that regret being saved? I don't. She's declaring what exactly she came to touch Him for. And then it says, and how she was healed immediately. That's twice it says immediately. I'm glad when you get saved, you get saved. Like right now. Now you might not really know all that you get when you get saved, But at least you'll know you're saved. And later on, you start understanding the benefits and the blessings and the wonder of being saved. When you start reading your Bible and it starts making sense to you. She got saved there, I think. I believe she did, because of verse 48. I believe she had one of them life-changing experiences What's that the preacher says? The pastor says that thing about you have a spiritual awakening. Isn't that what he says? You've been hearing him for 30-something years. That's what he says, isn't it? I believe she had one of them right there. And I believe that Jesus recognized that she had one right there, because He said, daughter, be of good comfort. That sounds like relationship. In verse 43, she was just a woman. But in verse 48, she's a daughter. She went from being a them to an us. That quick. He said, daughter, be of good comfort. Hey, she got relationship and she got comfort. It is a comforting thing to know that you're not going to go to hell. Really, it is. I don't think it's a bad thing if you get saved and miss hell. It's a pretty good comfort to know you're not going to hell. There are other comforts that come with it, but that's a pretty big comfort right there. You don't really realize all the blessing of what it's going to be like to be in heaven at the beginning of this thing. But whew, I'm glad I missed hell. And then he says this. She got this on top of relationship, on top of comfort. Thy faith hath made thee whole. Now I take that to be complete. If you're not saved tonight, you're not complete. You've got a big empty spot. You've got a place that nothing satisfies. The devil tells you that this will satisfy and that will satisfy. Oh, try this, this will satisfy. But all of that stuff never works. But whenever you get saved, that empty spot, it gets filled up with God. That's what it gets filled up with. the Holy Spirit moves in and takes up His abode, and you become complete in Christ. That's what it is. Listen, the day I got saved, there was a day before I got saved, the day I got saved, and the day after I got saved. Physically, there wasn't a whole lot of difference in those three days, except for what you couldn't see. on the inside. When the Lord moved in, that Holy Spirit of God moved inside of me, I didn't know what to expect. I've been going to church all my life, and I just, I could tune it on, tune it off, you know. If mom and dad was watching me, I'd perk up like I was listening. As soon as I noticed they wasn't watching, I'd just go back into that la-la land where I'm thinking about something that hadn't got anything to do with church. But after that, the Holy Ghost came in and took up His abode in me. Things begin to change. God living in you begins to move your furniture around. Things that are cluttering up the way, He'll just move them out. You don't even realize he's doing it. He's just moving things out of your life that aren't there, that aren't necessary. Now, I remember Mary Ellen and I hadn't been married long. One of my good friends, he came over to the house and, boy, he wanted to come in and just hang out like we used to do. And I said, well, you can come in if you want to, but you don't need to bring that with you. We don't do that no more. I wasn't mean, I wasn't arrogant, nothing like that. He was my friend. That was the last time I ever saw him. If he couldn't have that, he didn't want me. He wasn't much of a friend, when you think of it in those terms. But God just starts, friends you don't need, God will start weeding them out of your life. The closer you get to God, the more weeding gets done. And the closer you get to God, the more good things get added in. Before I got saved, maybe you're different than I was, but before I got saved, I didn't talk to God. I talked at God, but I didn't talk to God. You understand what I'm saying? You can be in the same house with somebody and not talk to them, but talk at them. They have to get saved, that changes. I want to spend time with him. I want to talk to him. That's why being alone isn't such a bad thing, because when you're alone, nobody interrupts your conversation. That's why being in a truck all day long with no one, nobody can bother you. You just get to spend time with God. It's a wonderful thing. I'm talking about that completeness. I want to say tonight in closing, you get a lot more when you come to Jesus than you ever thought you were going to get. I know that we have circumstances that overwhelm us, and it's a wonderful thing when God takes care of that circumstance and relieves that pressure and relieves that stress. That's a wonderful thing. But if He didn't do it, just the fact that it draws us closer to Him is a wonderful thing. Would you stand with me tonight? I wonder if I'm the only person in the building tonight that's got issues. This woman had a blood issue. I've got different kinds of issues. You might be here tonight and it's a financial issue. You might be here tonight and it might be a family issue. I don't know. There's all kinds of issues. I've got some friends and I saw the other day they were having transportation issues. That's a big thing today is transportation issues. When you've got one car and it quits, that's an issue. Got to have a remedy. Now I'm not sure God's going to give you a new car, but God can sure help you through the issue. He can do that for you, and He will. He wants to. He wants to. All we have to do is just approach Him. That's what that woman did. She just decided to approach Him. I wonder tonight, with heads bowed and eyes closed and nobody looking around, I wonder tonight, Would you just say, Preacher, I've got issues, and I need God to help me with, and let me pray with you about those things. I wonder, would you just slip your hand up and say, Preacher, I've got issues. Yeah, all over the building. I wonder tonight, would you come and just approach Him tonight with your issue, whatever that issue is, We're going to pray in a minute and ask you to come. You know what? Somebody here tonight in our little group, heads are bowed, nobody's looking, just me. Somebody might be here tonight and you've never trusted Christ as your Savior. You could approach Him tonight and He'd save you. He'd be so quick to save you, He'd do it immediately if you just approach Him. Draw nine to me, and I'll draw nine to you is what the Bible says. Is there anybody here that says, Preacher, pray for me? I'm not sure I'm going to go to heaven when I die. Just raise your hand and let me pray for you. Anybody? All right, Father, we love you tonight. We're thankful for the time. Lord, I pray you'd help us with our issues. Lord, folks have raised their hand all over the building. I pray, God, you'd help them tonight. As the pianist plays and they begin to come, Lord, I pray you'd help us with our situations, our issues, and our heartaches. Lord, I pray you'd bless in this moment. We'll thank you for it in Jesus' name. Amen. Heads are bowed and eyes are closed.