The Hardest, Most Tedious Things

Do you know what this is?  This is one of the

hardest, most tedious things I have undertaken

in a long time.  It’s diced, fresh Arkansas grown

tomato. It was to garnish the shredded chicken

tacos that I fixed my wife for supper a couple of days ago.  

Isn’t it funny, and I don’t mean ha-ha funny, how sometimes it is the simplest of things that drive us the craziest?  I mean, we take on “hard” things regularly like dealing with problems at work or balancing the budget when the end of the money gets there before the end of the month or even the everyday grind of getting the kids up and dressed and fed and out the door in time for school (which will be back on us in just a few more days)!  

But then something little, insignificant comes up, like not knowing a quick, safe, good way to dice a tomato, and all of a sudden it’s like our world explodes. “There’s no way I can get everything done that I have to do!”  “Why do these things always happen to me!” “I’ll never have my wife’s supper ready when she gets home from work!” It’s like because our schedule is messed up, or we have been inconvenienced our world is going to crumble.

Did you know that Jesus had days like that, too?  In Mark (3rd book, New Testament), chapter 5, we learn how Jesus responded when He faced a similar situation.  The story starts in verse 22.

Jesus had just gotten out of a boat that brought Him from one side of the Sea of Galilee (a large lake in Northern Israel) to the other side and He was approached by a man named Jarius that Mark describes as “one of the rulers of the Synagogue”.  That would have been a man of considerable importance in their community, basically a teacher or elder at the local Jewish church. He told Jesus that his daughter lay “at the point of death” and he begged Jesus to come and heal her. Of course, Jesus agreed to.  As they traveled toward the house of Jarius the crowd that had been following Jesus began to grow larger and press in all the more tightly.

In the crowd was a woman who had a discharge of blood and had suffered from this affliction for 12 years already.  Like most of us would, she had sought out doctors and spent everything she owned trying to find a cure. The problem had only gotten worse.  Having heard about Jesus and where to find Him she worked her way through the crowds trying to just get close to Jesus. As she got close to Him she reached out and just touched the robes of Jesus because she believed that if she could just touch the hem of His garments she would be healed AND SHE WAS IMMEDIATELY HEALED.

Jesus, knowing that power had gone out of Him turned to this crowd, this mass of people and said, “Who touched my garments?”  I’m sure that as His disciples looked out across this teeming mass of people they thought what an impossible question that is to answer, but the woman knew (and Jesus knew).  She fell to her knees before Jesus and told the whole story. Jesus called her “Daughter” and told her to go in peace because her faith had made her well!

But we were talking about the way little interruptions messed our days so thoroughly.  While Jesus was still talking to the woman, someone came from Jarius’ house and said not to trouble the Master (or Teacher or Rabbi, depending on your translation) any longer.  “Your daughter is dead!” As Jesus heard the report He turned to Jarius and said, “Do not fear, only believe.”  

Jesus sent everyone away except Peter and James and John and the travelled on to the home of Jarius.  As they arrived they saw the commotion and crying and Jesus asked them why they were weeping. “The child is not dead,but sleeping.”  They actually laughed at Jesus because they had all seen dead before and that child was dead!

Jesus put everyone out of the house and took Jarius and his wife and Peter, James, and John into this 12 year old little girl’s room.  Jesus stepped to the side of her bed, took her by the hand and said, “Little girl, arise!” and immediately she got up.

Now, the reason we went through this story is to show you something about the little things that add chaos to our lives.  Now I don’t know if the woman who touched Jesus’ garments was on His agenda for the day or not, but I can pretty well guarantee you that she wasn’t Jarius’ agenda.  Even though Jesus was delayed by the woman, He wasn’t prevented from doing what He was going to do. Lesson 1: Our timetable and God’s timetable aren’t always the same (but His is always the right one).  Lesson 2: It ain’t over until God says it’s over. Lesson 3: God often has little things to teach us (like “Trust” and “Obedience” and “Proper Priorities”) that He has to make time in our schedule for us to learn.

By the way, supper came out fine.  And the easy way to shred your cooked, boneless chicken breasts is with your portable mixer at slow speed.  If you have a secret for dicing tomatoes, let me know.