Talitha Cumi!
”Talitha cumi.”
Mark 5:41
THIS is a strange text, isn’t it? You never heard this language spoken. Nobody speaks it now, exactly as it was spoken in old times. It is what is called a dead language. Doesn’t it sound odd? But you know who said it, don’t you? It was Jesus. Shall I tell you the story how he came to say these words that seem so strange to us? You know that when Jesus lived here on earth, because he was the Son of God he could and did do many very wonderful things. He could make sick people well just by speaking to them or touching them, and very many people came and asked him to make them well, or their friends. One time there was a man named Jairus, who was a very nice man, and he was highly thought of by the people. He held a high position in the synagogue. That was a kind of church. He was a very good man too. He had a little daughter, twelve years old, and she got very, very sick. Now he had heard somehow that Jesus could make sick people well, and so when he heard that Jesus was nearby he left his home and his little sick daughter, who was about to die, and went in search of Jesus. He felt that if Jesus could just get there to the house before the little girl died he could make her well again, as he had done to others. So he came to Jesus, and begged him that he would come and lay his hand on her. Jesus went, and his friends went along with him. It took him a good little while to get to the house, because there were so many people that they crowded around him, and a poor sick woman stopped him to cure her. Don’t you know Jairus was worried because of the delay? How anxious he was! And sure enough, before they could get home to the little girl she died. Some of the servants, or friends, from the house came and told Jairus that it was not worth while to trouble Jesus any more, for the child had died. They did not have any idea that Jesus could make her live again, and it may be that Jairus felt that way himself. But Jesus knew that he could not only make people well, but could bring them to life again, and he was so sorry for Jairus that he paid no attention to what these people said, but told him not to be afraid, but only believe in him. I dare say Jairus was not perfectly satisfied, but still he trusted the Lord, and they went on to the house. On coming to the house they found a crowd of friends and others who were weeping and crying and making a great noise because the child was dead. That was a curious way of doing in those days. They even hired people to come and play sorrowful music so as to make them cry. This all seems very strange to us. We would rather be quiet in our sorrows. But even now there are some people that like to have a great outcry and do not know how to control themselves when there is trouble like this. But Jesus did not like it, and he told those who were playing on instruments and crying out to stop making all that noise. He said,;’ The child is not dead, but is asleep.” Of course she was dead, and they knew it, and Jesus knew it, but he knew he was going to make her alive, and that she was lying there so still and sweet that it looked as if she was only asleep. No doubt he said this also to comfort the father and the other loved ones, as well as to rebuke those who were making the noise. But the people who were there for curiosity and to make an occasion of the funeral broke out laughing. Think of that! They just laughed at Jesus for saying she was asleep. They did not understand what he was going to do. He made those fussy people go away, and took the father and mother of the little girl, and his nearest friends, Peter and John and James, and went into the room where the little girl was lying dead.
There she lay, just as though she was asleep, still and lovely, and Jesus must have felt very sorry for her parents, and yet very glad that he was going to bring her back to them. Then it was that he took the child by the hand and said these beautiful words to her, which seem so strange to us, ”Talitha cumi.” You know what the words mean? ”Maiden, arise.” And then we are told that her spirit returned, and she rose up immediately. Wasn’t that wonderful? Don’t you think her mother must have kissed her, and her father, and were full of joy and thankfulness that Jesus should have done even more than to make her well from sickness, but called her back from death just the same as if he had roused her from sleep? Then there is another thing to remember here. He told them to give her something to eat. There is a noticeable thing about people when they are getting well from sickness, and that is they get very hungry because they have been made weak by the disease.
Jesus knew the little girl must have good nourishment. Can’t we imagine how gladly that mother went to prepare something for the little girl to eat? That’s something mothers like to do, and probably no mother in all the world ever prepared nourishment for a child who was getting well with more joy than did this wife of Jairus. Then we must think about the little girl too; how strangely she must have felt. Why she was twelve years old, and so could understand things, and she knew something that none of us know. She had died. Her spirit had’left her body and had come back. Don’t you suppose she would talk to her parents and friends about that wonderful experience? Nothing is told us about it in the Bible, but we just can’t help thinking how wonderful a thing it was to come back from the dead. I have no doubt she lived a very happy life, and loved Jesus all her days. Nobody could ever have done that for her but Jesus only. Now we must think of some things this story teaches us.
First of all, it makes us feel very sure that Jesus loves children, and that he cares when they are sick. Children are often sick. A great many are sick in New York now, with a very strange disease (Infantile Paralysis, July, 1916). And we must know, that though Jesus is not here in the body, yet he cares up in heaven when the children are sick; and when we get sick we ought to think that Jesus can be near us in our thoughts, and that he likes for us to think of him and to want him when we are sick. Somehow we think of the little girl in her sickness rather than as having died, because she was dead only a very little while, and it was as if she had dropped off to sleep and waked up again. What we need to think about is that Jesus can be with us and help us in sickness and in death too. Sometimes children die, and it is a great comfort to their parents to feel that Jesus is with them, though he is not in the body to talk with them, or to heal the sick by the touch of his hand. But when there is sickness and sorrow in the home we can feel very sure that Jesus comes just as he did to the home of Jairus. How much we need Jesus when we are well, as well as when we are sick. We need him always, and then when we come to die we shall need him most of all, for he knows how to take care of us even then, and to make us live on in another way. It is only Jesus who can bring us through death to the happy life beyond it so as to make death itself seem but a little sleep. Let us love and trust him always so that in sickness and in death he will be near us to help us.
The next thing we must think is that Jesus can make us well when we are sick. We must have a doctor and sometimes the nurse, and we must take medicine and try to get well, but when we really do get well it is because God blesses the medicine. Sometimes sickness is a good thing for us. If it makes us think of God, and of our Saviour, it may be a blessing to us all our life. Perhaps some of you already know about this. I am sure there are many people who have been brought to God through sickness. Somehow they have learned how nobody can help us as much as God, and then when we get well and feel that he has helped us through our illness, we love him for it, and want to do something for him. How we want to show our thankfulness to Jesus and also to the doctors and nurses who have helped us in our sickness. I must tell you about a good old doctor that I knew once. He was a very kind man, and everybody loved him in the neighborhood. A little boy got sick, and his parents were very poor and did not know how to take care of him. So this good old doctor not only came to see him, but stayed a long time when he came, and helped to nurse him and show his parents what to do. The little boy got well, and he and his parents both were very thankful to that good doctor, as they ought to have been. One day the doctor drove by the house, and the little boy knew he was coming back that way, so he gathered some apples in a little bag, and had them ready, and when the doctor came back he ran down the hill and got the doctor to stop and poured out the apples in the buggy. It wasn’t much to do. The apples were not very good, but they were all the little boy had, and that was his way of showing his love for the doctor. The good doctor liked it very much. He was very much touched, and said to his friend, ”Gratitude is better than money.” So when Jesus makes us well we ought to try to make him glad.
Another lesson we must learn is that Jesus can cure us of our sins as well as of our sickness. He can help us to be good as well as to get well, and that is the main thing he came into the world to do. He can touch us in our souls just the same as he took this little girl by the hand, and say ”rise,” and he does this in our conscience when there is something inside of us that says we must quit being bad and come to Jesus. That’s Jesus saying, ”Get up, be something, do something for God.” Sin is described in the Bible as sickness and as death. Paul speaks of being dead in trespasses and in sins, and our souls in a way may be like that; dead to goodness. That’s right hard for children to understandfor anybody indeedbut it’s something like that when we are bad. The good in us is dead, and it is a terrible sort of death. But Jesus can make us alive out of the death of sin. That is what we need more than bodily life. It is to be alive to God; to everything that is good.
Still another thing is that we must do what Jesus says. Suppose the little girl’s soul had refused to come back to the little body! What a strange thing that would have been! She was dead, and yet somehow her soul could answer and come back when Jesus told her to get up. And it’s just that way with us in our sins. We do not feel strong enough to be good, but if we really answer when Jesus calls us, he can make us alive in our hearts, just the same as he made the little girl alive in her body. But I think the little girl must have been glad to answer back to Jesus and come and live again to make her parents happy and to serve the Lord through her restored life. And even so it must be with us when Jesus makes our souls alive. We should answer back and say, ”Yes, Lord, I will try to live the Christian life, and be what you want me to be, and do what you want me to do always.”
The last lesson we must learn is that Jesus took care of the little girl when she got up. He told people about to give her something to eat. She was very weak and she needed food. And so it is when Jesus makes us well in our hearts and minds. He tells good people to take care of us. Our parents and loved ones, and our Sunday school and our church are they who should feed our souls. The food is the Bible. God tells us in the Bible what he wants us to know, and to be, and to do. It is by learning and doing what the Bible says that we grow strong in soul, in character, in life.
So may we all hear and heed when Jesus calls us to life from our sins, and then may we feed upon his word that we may be strong to serve him all our days!