2nd Sunday After Pentecost, Proper 5A – Mark S. Winword
“Thus says the Lord… ‘For I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.’” – Hosea 6:6
Ordinary Time, Extraordinary Calling
Today marks the beginning of the season of Pentecost, also known as Ordinary Time. In the rhythm of this church year, we have awaited the coming of the Messiah in Advent, celebrated his arrival in Christmas and Epiphany, confronted our need for redemption in Lent, walked the way of the Cross during Holy Week, remembered Jesus’ death for our sins on Good Friday, celebrated his glorious Resurrection and Ascension at Easter and Ascension Day, and rejoiced in the coming of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. Now we enter a season in which we live all of that out in the ordinary course of daily life.
We mark our lives by significant events: births, deaths, marriages, baptisms, graduations, and birthdays. Yet most of life is lived in the spaces between those milestones. During the season of Pentecost, we reflect on our day-to-day discipleship – what it means to embrace our faith, receive God’s grace, and go forth rejoicing in the power of the Spirit.
That’s why I’ve asked the Altar Guild to leave the doves up throughout the season of Pentecost. If Pentecost celebrates the gift of the Holy Spirit that we receive in baptism, then the season of Pentecost is the rest of the story: what we do with that gift. So, when you see these doves throughout the season, remember that you are surrounded by people empowered by the Holy Spirit to bring healing to a world desperately in need of Christ’s touch.
We enter today’s Gospel at a moment when Jesus’ messianic mission is unfolding very differently from what many expected. Rather than overthrowing the occupying Romans, catering to the religious elite, and establishing Israel as the dominant power in the world, Jesus heals those they rejected – breaking down political, purity, and gender barriers to the Kingdom of God. As a result, resistance to Jesus and his challenge to the established order begins to emerge.
Matthew: Called from the Margins
It starts with a tax collector named Matthew. Tax collectors, drawn from the local population, were required to collect a certain amount of revenue for the Roman authorities and were permitted to keep whatever they collected beyond that amount – which they usually ensured was quite generous for themselves. Having enriched themselves through Roman occupation, they were regarded by their fellow Jews as traitors.
Still, ignoring all of this, Jesus simply says to Matthew, “Follow me,” and Matthew rises and does exactly that. It sounds simple, but for Matthew, discipleship meant abandoning service to the Roman governor and walking away from a lucrative livelihood. While fishermen could always return to fishing, there was no going back for Matthew. He was all in. His response to Jesus’ call represented nothing short of a miraculous transformation.
The Pharisees, priding themselves on being strict adherents of the Law and guardians of the religious establishment, wanted no part of it. They seized the opportunity to attack Jesus, accusing him of eating with tax collectors and sinners. In the ancient world, sharing a meal carried enormous social and religious significance. It defined who belonged – who was in and who was out: and tax collectors were definitely “out.” Socially and politically, the Pharisees saw tax collectors as traitors. Religiously, their constant contact with Gentiles and their exploitation of the people rendered them ritually unclean and spiritually suspect. Yet Jesus ignores these boundaries and continues to share table fellowship with them. The irony is that the Pharisees are so consumed by their own righteousness that they fail to recognize their hard-heartedness, elevating ritual above love of God and neighbor.
The Woman and the Ruler: Faith and Healing
The Gospel then shifts to Jesus being begged to visit the home of a ruler, identified in Mark and Luke as Jairus. Before he arrives, however, he is interrupted by a woman who has suffered for twelve years from menorrhagia, a chronic menstrual hemorrhaging condition. Like the tax collectors, she too is socially isolated and ritually unclean. Despite this, trusting in the power of God, she ventures into the crowd and touches the edge of Jesus’ cloak. Ignoring her social rejection and ritual impurity, Jesus responds, “Take heart, daughter; your faith has made you well.” Not through a magical garment, but through faith in the power of God revealed in Jesus, she reaches the place where healing becomes possible.
Finally, Jesus arrives at Jairus’ home, walking into the chaos that follows the death of a child. The cries of mourners rise and fall as family and friends grieve. When Jesus suggests that the girl is only asleep, they ridicule him. Nevertheless, he enters the house, takes the hand of the ritually unclean body, and, as the other Gospels record, commands her to arise. The girl immediately rises, restored to life.
The Miracle Beneath the Miracles
So what does this mean for us?
In each of these encounters, the deepest need lies beneath the surface. The hemorrhaging woman and the grieving father certainly faced urgent and painful circumstances. Yet Matthew and his companions, the Pharisees, the afflicted woman, and Jairus all shared a condition that ran deeper than their outward situations. Matthew, the woman, and Jairus recognized their need and embraced the healing Christ offered. The Pharisees, sadly, did not.
To the astonishment of his contemporaries – and even many people today – Jesus did not come primarily to perform miracles. Had that been his mission alone, he wouldn’t have been especially successful during his brief three years of ministry among a people whose lives were, in Thomas Hobbes’s memorable phrase, “poor, nasty, brutish, and short.” Poverty, famine, disease, and suffering were widespread to a degree difficult for us to imagine.
The crowds sought wonders. Jesus offered something far greater.
From the beginning of his ministry, the arrival of the Kingdom brought about the greatest miracle while often being the least noticed. It addressed a malady before which all other illnesses pale in comparison – a condition that only the Great Physician can heal. It lies at the root of the pain, suffering, and brokenness of the human condition. Our greatest need is not physical, political, or social. It is the deepest need of all, found within every human heart: it is our estrangement from God.
The Pharisees just couldn’t see it. They were so focused on outward actions that they neglected the inward condition of their own souls. Jesus called a tax collector to be his disciple, dined with sinners, healed an unclean woman, and raised the dead – all to demonstrate that no one is beyond the reach of God’s grace – except those who refuse it. Without that message, his miracles would have been little more than temporary remedies applied over a far deeper spiritual wound.
Steadfast Love, Not Sacrifice
And that brings us back to Hosea’s words: “I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.” The miracles in today’s Gospel are not merely displays of divine power. They are signs pointing to God’s deepest desire: to restore broken people into relationship with himself. Matthew found that restoration. The hemorrhaging woman found it. Jairus found it. The tragedy of the Pharisees is that they stood face to face with the Savior and couldn’t recognize their own need for him.
As we embark on this long season of Pentecost, let’s make this an opportunity to look deep in our hearts. Are we content with outward religion, or are we seeking the knowledge of God? Are we relying on our own righteousness, or are we trusting in his grace? The same Christ who called Matthew, healed the woman, and raised Jairus’ daughter calls us. Through the power of the Holy Spirit, he continues his work of healing, restoring, and reconciling. And when we recognize our deepest need and entrust ourselves to him, we discover that the greatest miracle isn’t merely that God can change our circumstances, but that God can change our hearts – and through changed hearts, transform the world. Amen.