When Faith Trumps Fact

Luke 8:40-56
Those who mourned the death of Jairus’s daughter openly ridiculed Jesus when he came to heal the girl. “And they laughed at him,” Luke tells us, “knowing that she was dead” (Luke 8:53). But Jesus did heal the girl, and in doing so he demonstrated that even when we are faced by that which is factual, faith allows us to move beyond, to a deeper level of truth, one that opens up possibilities we might otherwise not consider. It’s hard to fault those who had come offering comfort to Jairus and his wife. The crowd had no reason to expect the girl to recover. Jesus’ assertion that she was only sleeping sounded foolish at best. So they laughed. Considering that up until then they had been “weeping and wailing for her” (v. 52) this was quite a turnaround. What they did not appreciate was the power of God to transform mere fact into a greater truth. A little girl who is dead according to human standards may, by the will of God, rise up and live.

Are there situations in our lives where, based on “the facts,” we make certain assumptions only to find that God still has something new to reveal? Are there those who we dismiss as worthless, of redeeming value, unworthy of our consideration who, by God’s grace, can be raised to a new lives of purpose? Are there circumstances where all the data tells us to walk away, to cut our losses, to move along but where God still has a word to speak? Too often the answer is yes, we have accepted “facts” where God was offering “truth.” But new days bring new challenges and new opportunities. By learning to trust God to be at work in our lives we will find ourselves living in ways we did not imagine possible, sometimes in the face of “facts” that might have led others to write us off.

Even when we “know” something to be factual there is still room for God to work, and at those moments may our laughter be caused by joy and not by derision.

Prayer: Lord, give us faith to see all that you are doing in our world and in our lives. In Jesus’ name. Amen.