I heard Edwin McManus speak at the National Pastors Convention (2008). He was talking about the lack of grace in society. In what first appeared to be a side comment, in describing a situation of gracelessness, he commented: “Outside of the church, I haven’t seen this kind of gracelessness in years.” Of course, what at first felt like a side comment was really the main point.
Today in my reading I came across the story of Jarius and the woman who was healed of her bleeding. Jesus can feel that healing power had gone out of him and asked who touched him. His graceless disciples respond, “‘You see the people crowding against you,’ his disciples answered, ‘and yet you can ask, ”Who touched my clothes?”’”
Let’s put this comment in perspective. They were the students; he was the rabbi. They had already witnessed countless healings and exorcisms. He had healed leprosy, the paralyzed man let down through the ceiling by his four friends, restored a withered hand, exercised sovereign control over the wind and the sea, and just recently exorcized a legion of demons from a man whom no one could control. Pretty impressive you would think.
