Grace for Our Greatest Needs

What is our greatest need?  In Mark 5 a woman met Jesus as He was going on an urgent errand with a man whose daughter was dying.  To the man that was certainly the most urgent need.  To the woman it was not.  The woman had suffered at the hand of doctors for twelve years and had been impoverished by their failed efforts.  She felt her sickness was her greatest need and shyly approached the Savior to have it met.  She didn’t trip Him or block His way.  She merely reached out and touched the hem of His garment.  And what happened?  She was completely healed.  What else happened?  Jesus stopped and talked with her and told her that it was her faith in Him that had made her whole. 

What is our greatest need?  The man in this story still had a daughter who was dying. But while Jesus paused to talk with the woman, a messenger came from the man’s house and told him it was too late; his daughter was dead.  Jesus, seeing the man’s despair, said, “Don’t be afraid.  Only believe.”  Believe is the verb form of the word faith.  What the woman had shown in her healing was what Christ now called on the man to show in his great need.  Jesus then went to the man’s house and raised his daughter from the dead. 

What is our greatest need?  Our greatest need is that the sickness of sin be washed away and that the death sentence of sin be pardoned against us.  After that our greatest need is to trust our Savior who has done both things for us. 

John Beebe wrote a hymn, “Made Whole”, that covers both the physical and spiritual aspects of this account in Mark.  His first stanza reads, “The press was great, the throng was wild, and I, a sinner all defiled, how could I reach my Savior? Reach Him I must, without delay, and in the press, with fear, dismay, I, trembling, sought my Savior.”  He sees first in this hymn that which is our greatest need - a Savior.  Then in His last stanza he concludes with the sense of double healing, spiritual and physical.  “Go thou in peace, O hear Him say; from all Thy plague be healed this day; Oh, what a blessed Savior! To heal the body, save the soul, the vilest of the vile make whole, Oh, how I love my Savior.” 

What is your greatest need today?  There is One who can meet it.  With grace He will take care of His children.  With grace He will receive the lost.  Look to Him today for the grace that you need and then love the Savior.  

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