Draw vs Receive: Three Encounters in Mark 5

The same anointing, three different responses, and how to know which one is yours today

Theme

Faith · Initiative · Anointing · Drawing · Receiving · Surrender

Scripture

Mark 5:25-34 · Mark 5:1-20 · Mark 5:21-43

Beloved, I want you to picture one day in the earthly ministry of Jesus. One single chapter of the Gospel. One stretch of road from one shoreline to another and back again. And in that one chapter, three completely different kinds of people meet Him, and three completely different kinds of deliverance happen.

A woman who had bled for twelve years pressed through a crowd to touch the hem of His garment, and virtue left Him without Him even seeing her face. A mad man living in graveyards saw Jesus from far off and ran to Him, but it was Jesus who commanded the unclean spirit to come out, not the man who asked for healing. A twelve-year-old girl lay dead in her father's house, and it was the father's faith that brought Jesus to the bedroom, and it was Jesus' word that called her back from death.

Same anointing. Same day. Same Jesus. Three different doorways into the miracle. Three different responses to the same power.

And here is the question I want to put in front of you today, friend. Which one is your story this week? Because some of you are the woman, you have been bleeding for years and the Holy Ghost is whispering, Press through the crowd, daughter. Reach out your hand. Some of you are Legion, you cannot draw because you do not yet have the mind to draw, and the Holy Ghost is going to take initiative on your behalf if somebody will only stand near. And some of you are Jairus, you are interceding for a daughter, a son, a marriage, a ministry that is dying, and the Spirit is teaching you both to bring Jesus and to receive His word over what is dead. The anointing responds to faith, whether you are drawing or receiving, but the anointing never responds to the crowd.

Watch this, beloved. Mark gives us five painful descriptors before he ever lets her touch the garment. Twelve years. Many physicians. Spent all that she had. Nothing bettered. Rather grew worse. That is not a mild affliction. That is a slow, expensive, humiliating, public, unsolvable disaster of a life. By every social standard of her day, she was unclean. By every economic standard, she was bankrupt. By every medical standard, she was beyond help. By every emotional standard, she was almost surely exhausted and ashamed.

And then four words change everything. She had heard of Jesus. Hearing is the trigger of faith. Romans 10:17, "Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." She heard something about Him. She heard somebody else's testimony. She heard a report of the anointing. And something inside her woman-spirit said, if that is true about Him, then I do not need an audience with Him; I only need a finger on the hem of His robe.

So she went. And she pressed through the crowd. Look at that phrase. The crowd was around Jesus too. The crowd was physically closer to Him than she was. The crowd was touching Him, jostling Him, pressing against Him, and yet the crowd was getting nothing. She, coming behind, lower than them, reaching up at the lowest part of His garment from underneath, got everything. Friend, the crowd is not your enemy in this scene, but the crowd is not your example either. Faith reaches. The crowd merely surrounds.

And then heaven did its part. Virtue went out of Him without His permission. He felt it leave. He turned. And the woman who had not been called by name was found out, and Jesus stopped the journey to declare publicly, "Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy plague" (Mark 5:34). Daughter. The yoke is destroyed. The plague is broken. The bleeding is dried up. Faith drew the anointing out of Him.

Listen, beloved, there are some things in your life that the Holy Ghost is not going to do for you until you do something. He is not going to chase you down the street and pin you to the ground and force you whole. He is going to wait until you press. Until you reach. Until you say it before you do it, if I may touch the hem, I shall be whole. Confession of faith first, then the action of faith. That is drawing.

Friend, look closely. The man with the issue of blood drew. This man could not draw. He did not have the mind to draw. He did not have the words to draw. He was not in possession of himself enough to draw. The verse says he ran to Jesus and worshipped, but the very next conversation is between Jesus and the demons, not between Jesus and the man. The demons answered His questions. The demons said the name. The demons negotiated terms.

That is what bondage does, beloved. Bondage takes your voice. Bondage takes the steering wheel of your own mouth. Bondage answers questions about your life that you never agreed to let it answer. You ask, what is your name? and the spirit answers before you can. Failure. Rejected. Useless. Cursed. Single forever. Sick forever. Bound forever. That is not your name. That is the occupant of your name speaking on your behalf.

And here is what is beautiful about this story. Jesus did not require Legion to have the faith of the woman with the issue. Jesus did not say, if you press through and touch My garment I will heal you. Legion could not have done that, he was the man who broke chains, lived in graveyards, cut himself with stones. He was past drawing. So Jesus took initiative. Jesus drew up alongside the man, looked past the legion of voices, and commanded the unclean spirit to come out. The man did not pray himself free. Jesus released him by His own authority.

That is receiving faith. Receiving faith is faith with surrender. Receiving faith says, I cannot draw today; I do not have the strength to press; I do not even have the mind to ask correctly, but I will be still, and I will let Him do the work, and I will not resist when He moves. And the result was the same as drawing, the man was sitting, clothed, and in his right mind by the end of the encounter (Mark 5:15). Identity restored. Voice restored. Place in society restored.

Beloved, hear me. If you have been told that your deliverance depends entirely on the level of your faith and you have been straining to manufacture a faith you do not feel, let this story preach to you today. There are seasons when Jesus simply walks across the sea to a graveyard nobody else will visit, finds you when you cannot find Him, and commands what is in you to come out. Your part is to not run from Him when He shows up. Your part is to fall at His feet. Your part is to yield.

Now watch how this third encounter weaves drawing and receiving together. Jairus drew Jesus to his house, he brought the anointing to the place where the miracle was needed. That was his part. He pressed through his own pride (he was a synagogue ruler kneeling in the street). He pressed through his own theology (his school was suspicious of Jesus). He pressed through the bad news that came mid-journey (your daughter is dead, don't bother the Master any further). He kept drawing.

But the daughter herself, the twelve-year-old lying cold on the bed in the upper room, she did not draw. She could not. She was dead. She received. Jesus walked into the room. Jesus took her hand. Jesus said, Talitha cumi, little girl, I say to you, arise. And life came back into her by the word of Jesus alone.

Beloved, do you see it? Two faiths combined to release one miracle. The father drew the anointing into the territory. The daughter received the anointing in her body. And both were necessary. If Jairus had not drawn, Jesus would not have been in the house. If the daughter had been able to draw on her own she would not have been dead in the first place. Drawing brought Him in. Receiving raised her up.

That is a picture for what intercession looks like, friend. There are people in your life who cannot draw right now. They are too sick, too far gone, too discouraged, too unbelieving, too dead inside. They cannot press through. They cannot reach the hem. You can. Your faith can bring Jesus into the house. Your faith can carry the anointing across the threshold of their bedroom, their workplace, their addiction. And when He gets there, He will do the speaking. He will say the Talitha cumi over them. He will raise them up.

Beloved, here is the part I want you to write inside the cover of this book. The Holy Ghost has a different prompting for different seasons. Sometimes He says draw, go press through, take initiative, move your body, open your mouth, reach. Other times He says receive, be still, stop striving, stop talking, lay down, let Me do the work. Both are obedience. Both release power. But mistaking the season is what frustrates many believers.

You probably need to draw when:

• The thing has been long-standing, twelve years like the woman, twelve years like Jairus' daughter who was twelve years old. Anything that has been there for a long stretch is usually waiting on a violent reach of faith, not a passive wait.

• You feel stuck in the crowd. Everybody around you is religious about Jesus, and yet nothing is actually changing. The crowd is the diagnosis, press through it.

• The Lord has already shown you the answer, but you have not moved. The woman had heard of Jesus. The hearing came first. If God has told you what to do and you are still waiting for another sign, the prompting is to draw.

You probably need to receive when:

• You are overwhelmed and you do not have any fight left. Legion was past fighting. Be still.

• The Lord is speaking directly into the situation Himself. When you sense Him saying be not afraid, only believe, that is the cue to receive.

• Striving has only made it worse. Sometimes the very effort to draw is what is keeping the answer at bay because the season is for resting in His word.

Ask the Holy Ghost simply, friend. Holy Ghost, do I draw today, or do I receive today? And then act on what He shows you. Mistaking these is a tax on your peace and on your time.

Beloved, this is the line that holds the whole chapter together. Drawing and receiving are different methods, but both require contact with the anointing. No contact, no change.

The crowd had proximity without contact. The disciples had proximity without contact (they were so used to Him they had stopped touching Him with faith). The Pharisees had proximity without contact (they watched Him work and still went home dry). But the woman, Legion, and Jairus' daughter, all three had contact. One reached. One was reached for. One had a father who brought the Reacher into the house. Different shapes of contact. Same anointing. Same result. So before you close this chapter, beloved, ask yourself. Where in my life am I close to Jesus without contacting Him? In your morning devotions, are you reading about Him without touching Him? In your church attendance, are you praising near Him without drawing from Him? In the Christian conversations of your life, are you talking about the anointing without ever pressing in to receive the anointing?

Holy Ghost, teach me to discern when to draw and when to receive. I will not stay passive when You are telling me to press. I will not strive when You are telling me to be still. Whichever way You move today, give me ears to hear and a body to obey.

Beloved, the next chapter is going to take us deep into the second of these three encounters. We are going to walk with Legion from the tombs to the towns. We are going to learn what it means to be restored and sent. Because the woman went home in peace, and Jairus' daughter went back to her supper, but Legion was given a commission. He was the only one of the three who was told, Go home, and tell them how great things the Lord hath done for thee. There is a sending in some restorations that is not in others. And there is something in his story that I believe is yours.

The anointing responds to faith. Don't stay in the crowd. Make contact.