Mark 5:21-43; Talitha Cumi

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Now, as you're turning in your Bibles or scrolling in your devices to Mark, chapter 5, let me just remind you about the gospel of Mark.

Mark 5 · chapter mention

Some of us men really like Mark because it's the shortest gospel account, and those of us with high energy, like Jason and Martin, we also enjoy it because it has the word immediately in it many, many times.

That is quick action.

It's a moving gospel and Mark, you know, was good friends with the apostle Peter and a close follower of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And so we get largely Peter's perspective in Mark's gospel and it's very interesting.

But Mark makes it very simple for us.

Mark's gospel is divided in halves.

The first half is about who Jesus is.

That's a very important question who is this?

And in fact, when Jesus calmed the wind and the waves in Mark, chapter 4, what did the disciples say?

Mark 4 · chapter mention

Who is this?

We thought we knew him, a Jewish rabbi.

But he's calming the wind and the waves with the word who is this.

Mark sets out to answer that question who is this?

And the first half of Mark's gospel culminates in chapter 8 when Jesus is asking his disciples who do you say I am, and you remember?

Peter says you're the Messiah, and you remember, peter says you're the Messiah.

Now, that is the summit of the first half of Mark's gospel.

And then, right after that, in the end of Mark 8, and for the rest of Mark's gospel, jesus begins to teach them that he must suffer and die.

And indeed that's exactly what he does.

So the second half of Mark's gospel is to show us not just who he is, but what he has done for us.

So who is he?

What has he done?

Person of Christ and the work of Christ is what Mark sets out to do.

Now, in this first half, which is where we are in the first half of Mark, discovering who Jesus is, we see several things about Him.

We see that he is sovereign over the wind and the waves.

He's sovereign over the demons.

He casts them out with a word.

He is sovereign over sickness, even death itself, and he's sovereign over His church.

Three times in Mark's gospel you get a calling of the apostles.

It is at Jesus' calling that they come and they answer his bidding and obey him.

So he is the Lord of the crown of God's creation, human beings, which is the greatest sign of his lordship.

Well, in the first part of chapter 5, where we are this morning.

You remember that Jesus needs to teach his disciples an important lesson about the sphere of God's sovereignty.

It's not just in the church, it's not just in Israel.

No, we're going to go across the Sea of Galilee.

I'm going to take you to the land of the demons, the land of the Gerasenes, and you're going to see what sovereignty is all about.

And there, of course you know, he casts out the demons in the Gadarene demoniac.

Well now, from the first part of our text, we'll see that now Jesus brings them back to the west side of the Sea of Galilee, which is where the Jewish people largely lived.

And we're going to see he not only cares about the nations, which, of course, churches like this know very well, we give so that people in the nations will know the Lord, jesus Christ, but now he's coming home and we're going to see how much Jesus loves you, his people, and you're going to see that he really does in a powerful way.

Would you stand with me and we'll read together this latter half of Mark, chapter 5, and let us go to the Lord in prayer and ask for his help.

Mark 5 · chapter mention

Lord, these words on the page would simply stay on the page were it not for the power of your Holy Spirit, who enlightens our minds and our hearts and warms our affections towards you, so that we receive the word and take it deep into our hearts, with every hope and expectation that you will change us, even as we wait before you.

Speak, o Lord, for your servants.

Listen through Jesus Christ, our Lord.

Amen, mark, chapter 5, verse 21.

Mark 5:21

Hear the word of God.

And when Jesus had crossed again in the boat to the other side, a great crowd gathered about him and he was beside the sea.

Then came one of the rulers of the synagogue, jairus by name, and seeing him, he fell at his feet and implored him earnestly, saying my little daughter is at the point of death.

Come and lay your hands on her so that she may be made well and live.

And he went with him and a great crowd followed him and thronged about him.

And there was a woman who had had a discharge of blood for 12 years and who had suffered much under many physicians and had spent all that.

She and she said, and immediately the flow of blood dried up and she felt in her body that she was healed of her disease.

And Jesus, perceiving in himself that power had gone out from him, immediately turned about in the crowd and said who touched my garments?

And his disciples said to him you see the crowd pressing around you and yet you say who touched me.

And he looked around to see who had done it.

But the woman, knowing what had happened to her, came in fear and trembling and fell down before him and told him the whole truth.

And he said to her Daughter, your faith has made you well, go in peace and be healed of your disease.

While he was still speaking, there came from the ruler's house some who said your daughter is dead.

Why trouble the teacher any further?

But overhearing what they said, jesus said to the ruler of the synagogue do not fear, only believe.

And he allowed no one to follow him except Peter and James and John, the brother of James.

They came to the house of the ruler of the synagogue and Jesus saw a commotion, people weeping and wailing loudly.

And when he had entered he said to them why are you making a commotion?

People weeping and wailing loudly?

And when he had entered he said to them why are you making a commotion and weeping?

The child is not dead, but sleeping.

And they laughed at him.

But he put them all outside and took the child's father and mother and those who were with him and went in, where the child was Taking her by the hand.

He said to her Talitha Kumi, which means Little girl, I say to you, arise.

And immediately the girl got up and began walking, for she was twelve years of age, and they were immediately overcome with amazement and he strictly charged them that no one should know this and told them to give her something to eat.

All flesh is grass and all of its glory is like the flower of the field, the grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God stands forever.

Amen.

Please be seated.

We obviously live in a very broken world.

You live in a broken body and a broken psyche.

We see evidences all around, including a presidential candidate who gets shot at yesterday, bringing trauma to our entire country, wondering what has happened to us.

This vitriol and this very negative rhetoric that we've been enduring for years is now turning to physical violence.

In fact, not just now, but every week on average, we have at least one mass murder in our country, which is new.

If you're as old as I am, you never saw this, not one week in a year.

You never saw it in the 1950s.

Things have changed and we know it.

Business men and women are being arrested and indicted and convicted for massive fraud against their clients.

Universities and colleges seem to have lost any sense, not just of theological sense but common sense about human beings that they're supposed to be educating.

And in the church we find massive disruptions.

I come to Faith Presbyterian Church and I just go oh how wonderful.

I mean, I know you have your problems, but you're experiencing God's rich blessing in your church.

So many churches in our nation right now are not.

God's rich blessing in your church.

So many churches in our nation right now are not.

And we at the Gospel Coalition are very busily trying to be of whatever help we can be to unify and renew the church in the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And we, we here in this room in a healthy church, recognize ourselves, don't we, as needy people, or at least we should.

Mark's point is to be sure in this text that we both know who Jesus is, what he has available to give us, and secondly, that we successfully access what he has to give human beings.

And you'll notice both things are true in this text.

There is a variety of personnel in this text.

We're going to see that these two stories are intentionally intertwined.

You're probably familiar with the story of Jairus.

You've probably learned that story in Sunday school.

Those of you who are children, you've probably already heard it.

You know the story of how his daughter was raised from the dead.

It's a wonderful story.

You've also heard the story of the woman with a 12-year bleeding problem and you've seen that she was healed.

Some Bible teachers would like to just focus on one story, but when you look at the text and you can look at it now we just read it.

How do you untangle these stories?

Not just because they happen on the same day, but look at the way that Mark tells the story.

He tells you a little bit about the man and then he tells you a little bit about the woman, and then he tells you more about the woman and then he tells you more about the man.

You can't possibly segregate these stories.

They're meant to be intertwined and here's why we're going to see that Jairus and the woman are very different, but we're going to see that Jesus deals with them in the same way and that they both successfully access what Jesus has to offer because of one thing they trust Him.

So Jesus is presented to us as a compassionate Savior.

At the same time, what's presented to us is what people do who come to benefit from who Jesus is.

They are people who trust Him with their whole lives.

Now let's look at the text.

I want you to notice it's kind of broken into half.

The first part of the story is how Jairus and the woman encounter Jesus.

So we'll see that they're encountered and what we'll learn here is that Jesus deeply loves you, his people.

Whether you're Jairus or you're this woman, you'll see that he loves you, his people.

Whether you're Jairus or you're this woman, you'll see that he loves you.

And that's verses 21 through 28.

Your Bible doesn't break out the paragraphs there, but I want us to notice the story breaks at that point, because at verse 29,.

Then what we're going to see is that Jesus not only loves you deeply, but he saves you completely, and we'll see how Both the woman and the man.

So this is the structure of the stories that Mark is telling, but they all unite to make one major point that we desperately need in our own day.

I have no question in my mind that what we need in this country and in every country, is to know and trust the Lord, jesus Christ, with everything in our lives.

That is the answer for all people.

It will always be the answer for all people.

Now let's look at the text.

Notice that Jesus loves you deeply in these first seven verses, 21 through 28.

And first of all, he loves the prominent.

This is verses 21 through the first part of 24.

Who is the prominent?

Well, he's a synagogue ruler.

Jesus is encountering a man who is very well respected in his community, who is very well respected in his community.

Synagogue ruler is not clergy, it's not pastors, it's not priests, it's a lay person but it's the key lay leadership role in the synagogue.

So it'd be kind of like being clerk of session, if you will, here at Faith Presbyterian Church, and I don't know who your clerk is.

But that's a key role and oftentimes we kind of look at the clerk of session as being our key lay leader.

That was this man.

He obviously was well-respected.

He, we know, had a family, he owned a home.

It looks like he was very prosperous and one thing that's really important about him is that, unusually, we're given this man's name Most of the names we're giving in the New Testament, with exceptions like Nicodemus and a few others, joseph of Arimathea.

They're all disciples of Jesus, but here's a man who, before he meets Jesus, doesn't really seem to be a believer.

But we've got his name.

The reason is he's got a name Everybody knows Jairus.

He's a respectable man.

Now, this morning, or rather last night, I got in my elevator to go up to the second floor of my hotel, and entering with me were two cute little 10-year-old girls.

They're here for cheer camp, and so before I asked them why they were here, one of them, who's very friendly, spoke up to me and said sir, why are you in Birmingham?

And I said well, I'm a Presbyterian pastor and I'm going to be preaching tomorrow morning.

And so the door now opens to the second floor and she says what is a Presbyterian?

I didn't have time for an elevator speech because the elevator door opened.

All I could say was we love Jesus, but when I think of Presbyterians, I think of people like you.

This is, I mean, of course I love our reformed theological doctrines and so on, but it's the people of God.

And you know the thing about Presbyterians, though, if I'd had more time to explain that to this little girl Presbyterians I mean culturally generally we're kind of churches like faith, presbyterian.

I mean.

You can look around Everybody seems to be eating, just fine.

You've looked in the mirror before you got here.

I can tell you look good.

Probably most of you have professional careers and none of you looks like you're starving or impoverished.

And not that we're proud of it, but frankly that's kind of what Presbyterians experience in our churches, that is, you're prominent.

You may not think of yourself as prominent, but if you travel the world, I'm telling you the world knows you're prominent because you are in the midst of the wealthiest culture in the history of humanity, the American economy.

You're prominent.

And here's the problem with prominent people like Jairus.

When you're respectable, you give charitably, you're involved in your community, you're trying to make life good for other people.

You have general respect from other people.

We begin to think of ourselves, including pastors, as being somewhat self-sufficient, don't we?

You know I can do this.

I can solve this problem.

Things are generally in order.

When I think about the gospel, you know, what I really think about is all the lost people who really need Jesus, including the people from around the world, the poor people.

And so, as a prosperous Presbyterian, when I think of the gospel.

I often will think of what other people need, and I suppose Jairus was just like that, but you know how tragic that is, because you desperately need Jesus yourself.

What does God do to teach us these lessons?

He often brings the difficulties into your life and I know some of your difficulties and sorrows are so massive that it could sound trite that the preacher is speaking of it so quickly this morning.

But let's be clear the Lord is sovereign over the wind and the waves.

He's sovereign over all of your sorrows, all of your griefs, all of your pains and disappointments.

And I don't know what all of His purposes are in your life, in these troubles, but I do know this he intends, with every one of them, to bring you closer to Himself.

Here's a prominent synagogue ruler bowed down before Jesus, begging Him, begging Him for help.

He is completely helpless With all of His self-sufficiency.

He is discovering that the most important things in life cannot be solved by your wit, your cleverness, your experience, your good looks, your athleticism.

You can't solve the most important things in life, like keeping your children alive.

And this man is quickly learning it.

And he begs for the life of his 12-year-old daughter because she is sick and apparently very close to death.

Now I have a theory that there's something special about cross-gender parental relationships.

You mamas seem to have a special place in your sons' lives that I don't think I ever quite had.

We daddies have a place in our daughter's life if our homes are generally healthy and I know some of you didn't experience this and I'm sorry, but generally speaking, daddies have a special affection for their daughters.

We're their protectors, we're the ones who teach them how men are supposed to treat them.

We care for them, we build them up, we tell them how beautiful they are and how lovely their souls are and how proud we are of them.

It's a very special relationship and men get all choked up about it.

You know, I'm sure there have been many weddings in this room and I certainly have done a number of them, not in this room but in other rooms and while everybody's watching the bride as she comes down the aisle, I'm having fun watching the father of the bride, because most of them are my friends and I'm, you know, I'm watching them trying to grab a hold of themselves.

They don't want to be the center of attention, but the tears are starting to come and they can't control themselves because their prized relationship is on their arm and they're getting ready to hand her over to a moose head.

So maybe that's why they're crying.

I don't know.

But it's a special relationship.

So maybe that's why they're crying.

I don't know, but it's a special relationship.

Some years ago this text was being read at Second Presbyterian Church in Memphis and I was over on the pulpit side and I was watching our reader and I think we made a mistake, martin.

We thoughtlessly asked a man to read it who had a daughter and he got into this text and he couldn't go on.

We had to help him.

It's just a classic case of a father who was relating this text and, knowing how this man felt, bowing before Jesus and saying Please, please, would you just put your hand on her?

I've seen you put your hand on people and I know there's power in your hand.

Would you just touch her?

He begged him.

So we find that Jesus indeed helps him.

It's amazing.

I think the most precious part of this first part of the text is verse 24.

When we're told Jesus went with him.

Jesus answered his request to come, come to my house.

Jesus went and I want you to know prominent people you ask him to come with you, he'll come.

He's with you.

He's never turned to anybody who genuinely said Lord, would you come with me?

I want to come with you.

But then, of course, there's this tremendous interruption which leads us to the second point in the first part of this text.

He loves you, prominent people.

He also loves you, powerless people.

Here's a very different person who comes to Jesus and she comes to him, not to his face.

Person who comes to Jesus and she comes to him, not to his face.

She sneaks up on him.

And the reason is this she has a massive physical problem, a flow of blood for 12 years.

We don't know the details.

You could use your imagination, but what it has done for her is, first of all, made her homeless.

She has apparently no family, no marriage, no children.

It's made her not only family-less but homeless.

She has no place to live.

And the reason is she's been going to physicians for 12 years.

She has spent everything she owns to try to get help and they've not helped her get better.

Those physicians made her worse.

She's homeless, she's penniless and she's a physical wreck.

And you have to notice that, although Jairus is named by name, she is nameless.

She doesn't have a name, she has no significance.

She's a complete outcast and the worst part of her condition is not her poverty or her physical disease.

The worst part of her condition is not her poverty or her physical disease.

The worst part of her condition is that she's unclean, ritually unclean.

She is like a leper and is treated the same way.

You know lepers, we know from the Bible.

Wherever they would go, they had to announce that they were in public, unclean.

Unclean, and everyone would scatter, because not only do you not want to catch leprosy if you could catch it that way but you don't want to be ritually unclean because you're disqualified from the synagogue worship and from temple worship.

So anyone who's unclean is not to be around other people.

They're completely isolated, no family, completely lonely.

This woman breaks every social convention.

She comes into a crowd without announcing her corruption.

She sneaks up on Jesus because, as we find later in chapter 6, many people were touching the hem of his garment and being healed and she had seen this and she says if I just touch his cloak, perhaps I'll be healed.

She touches his cloak and she's immediately, immediately healed.

Of course we know the reason her blood stopped was because his blood would be poured out for her one day.

She's immediately healed.

As soon as that happens, she not only feels the power of Jesus in her body, but Jesus feels he can feel it.

His power has gone out to heal another person.

So he says who touched me?

And the disciples are looking at him quizzically saying what do you mean?

Who touched you?

Tell me who touched you.

It's like if you saw Trump carried off the platform yesterday.

If he got off into the car, he said who touched me?

Well, he was just surrounded by Secret Service.

Everybody was touching the president to get him into his car.

Jesus was there.

Everybody in this massive crowd was touching him.

Who touched you?

What do you mean?

He didn't even bother to answer his disciples, he just looked.

He was looking for her.

Why was he looking for her, ladies and gentlemen?

Because of this.

She had come to know Jesus and experienced Jesus well enough to benefit from him in some way.

And you know, the writer of Hebrews talks about how people can come to church and benefit in a lot of ways, including partaking, in some ways even of the Holy Spirit, life, but not being converted.

He loved this woman.

She was not going to just walk away as a healed woman who later would die soon later would die and go into her grave.

No, he was looking for her.

He called her out.

He didn't call her out to try to humiliate her or embarrass her before all this crowd because she had, as an unclean person, touched a rabbi, for heaven's sakes.

No, he called her out because what she needs is to know him personally and to know that he knows her personally.

The message he was sending her is sister, you are somebody, sister, you are somebody, you're somebody worth knowing, you're somebody worth healing, you're somebody worth loving, you're somebody worth knowing me and being my friend and family member forever.

That's what he was saying to her.

And so we're told that, having experienced his power, she now was in fear and trembling.

Now she comes to him with fear and trembling.

Some scholars would think well, she's in fear and trembling because she's now going to be disclosed as a person who broke all the social customs and risked all these people becoming unclean.

That's not the reason she's in fear and trembling.

The text says it.

She came because she experienced His power and that's the reason that when we gather as worshipers, there is a reverence, there is a holy fear, there is even trembling at the presence of Almighty God, who lives with us, cares for us and heals us with His power.

We're in amazement, abject amazement at Him, in fear and trembling.

She comes to Him this way and here's what he says to her.

He says you know, because you touched my cloak, you're healed.

No, no, because you trusted me, you're made well.

And the word there in Greek is the same as you're saved Because you trusted me.

She touched his cloak because she trusted him.

Brothers and sisters, no matter who you are, no matter what you think about yourself, you may be a nameless, homeless person, but there's one who deeply loves you and you're unclean and you think you can't touch him because you make him unclean.

You'll notice the exact opposite happened.

The unclean touches.

The clean doesn't make him unclean.

No, no, the clean makes her clean.

She became clean.

Her corruption was removed because she now had a relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ.

And, ladies, let me tell you, your corruption is removed.

Some of you feel powerless, some of you feel shame.

Maybe some youthful indiscretion, maybe some broken relationship, maybe some deficiency in your appearance or your performance.

He knows you're somebody, somebody worth loving, somebody worth knowing, so that he shows us that he saves us completely from our despair, our corruption, our sicknesses, our diseases, all the miseries of this life.

He is saving us from it, and we know why.

Because when he died on Calvary's cross, he removed the sin which is the ultimate cause of all the brokenness in the world and the brokenness in your life.

It's because of sin.

When Jesus paid for sin, he removes the guilt, but he removes the pollution, and that's what he did for this woman.

He cleansed her and His ultimate act of cleansing was dying for us on Calvary's cross.

Now notice, as we come to conclusion, that Jesus is showing us not only that he loves you deeply, but that he saves you completely.

And he does this first of all with the woman who is powerless, and he saves her from her misery and her corruption.

But notice now, as the story proceeds, that he's saving us completely even from death itself.

You'll notice in the text if you'll look at verse 35, that while Jesus was carrying on this conversation with the woman, here comes the representatives of the woman, here comes the representatives of the powerful, prominent man, probably his servants, and they come to tell Jairus sorry to tell you, but your daughter died.

There's no need to bother the preacher anymore.

There's no need to bother the preacher anymore.

He's a preacher, let's let him preach.

He's a teacher, let him teach.

But the party's over.

There's nothing he can do.

Don't even bother him.

You notice in the text, jesus overhears this.

Do you know that?

He overhears everything you're saying Well, let me go deeper.

He overhears everything you're thinking.

He overhears everything you're saying Well, let me go deeper.

He overhears everything you're thinking.

He overhears it.

He knows all things.

And he looks at Jairus and notice what he says Do not fear, only believe.

Here we have it again Faith, the power of faith, which is a gift from God which connects us to His life.

Don't fear what this world is throwing at you, even death itself.

Jairus couldn't possibly have understood the full ramifications of what's being said to him.

It's impossible he or anybody else would have understood it.

Peter, james and John didn't fully understand it, but he just said don't fear, only believe.

And Jairus shows that at least he believes this much.

He's going with Jesus.

Jesus had promised to go with him.

Now Jairus is trusting him enough at least to go with him.

They get to the house and the professional mourners are all there.

This was common Jewish practice.

Someone dies in your family.

There's a local group that kind of like undertakers.

Part of their ministry is to provide professional mourners who will wail out loud and cry and help you get your crying out.

It's therapeutic.

And here they are.

They show up very quickly because you know Jairus will probably tip them.

Well, he's a prominent man.

And they're making quite a commotion by the time Jesus gets there and he says to them and it appears to be very disrespectful what are you doing?

She's not dead, she's just asleep.

They start laughing.

I imagine they said preacher, got some news for you.

We checked the pulse, we've checked her breath.

There's nothing there.

She's already turning cold.

You're an idiot.

Ha ha ha, good luck.

That's probably what they said.

You notice Jesus keeps them outside.

And let me say to you, if you're not a believer in the Lord Jesus this morning, the one thing that will keep you away from him is mocking him, scorning him, just discounting him completely, before you even examine anything, before you even look at the evidence or look at the facts, before you even read the Bible.

It's just ridiculous, this religious thing, this Jesus thing.

You people are far too exercised and excited about Jesus.

That person is always left out.

But you'll notice the person like Jairus that doesn't understand everything about Jesus.

That person is always left out.

But you'll notice the person like Jairus that doesn't understand everything but is willing to check Jesus out and at least take Him in His Word.

For now he's going to have an experience.

Something dramatic is going to happen to this man.

He is going to be stunned at the power and love of the Lord Jesus Christ, because he simply walked with him.

He goes into the room and Jesus just takes her hand and says Talitha Kumi, that's Aramaic, that's Jesus' native language.

It would have been the language of the synagogue ruler.

Talitha Kumi, which just simply means little girl, get up.

Probably fathers in that time, many, many times, just like fathers today, we go into our daughter's bedroom when they need to get ready for school and we just say my little girl, it's time to get up.

Little girl, get up.

That's what Jesus said.

And ladies just say my little girl, it's time to get up.

Little girl, get up.

That's what Jesus said.

And, ladies and gentlemen, when he said that, to the absolute astonishment, there was no category for this.

No one had ever seen anything like this that 12-year-old girl gets up and starts walking around and surely someone is thinking it's a ghost.

She was dead, I know.

I checked her pulse.

She's cold.

This is a ghost.

And Jesus said give that ghost something to eat.

You'll know.

It's no ghost.

This is Talitha, little girl, and she got up and everyone saw and witnessed the power of the Lord Jesus Christ to save completely, even from death.

In my 22 years at Second Presbyterian Church I think I added it up one day I think we lost 750 members to death in my 22 years and about three or four years ago I just had occasion to have that whole list of people before me and I just experienced all over again the grief and the sorrow this person and that person and this person and that person.

And the older you get, the longer the list becomes.

But when it's in your family kids, I know you love your parents.

It will take you several decades to understand how much they love you, and when this man saw his little girl come to life, he was never the same again.

Do not fear, only believe.

And I say to you who are willing not to fear the challenges of this life, even of your own decaying body, but only believe and trust in Him, come to know Him and trust Him.

I say to you, there's going to be a day when he visits this house and he says to the daughter of God, the bride of the Lord Jesus Christ, he says Talitha Kumi, my little daughter, rise up.

And all the people of God are going to rise up from their graves, people from thousands of years ago, everyone who refused to fear and simply put their faith and trust in Jesus Christ and come to know Him.

They're going to rise up and walk about with great joy forever and ever and ever.

This is who we are, because this is who Jesus is.

That's what Mark wants us to know.

I close with this.

Back in the 19th century we had several prominent Presbyterian pastors, southern Presbyterian pastors who were very well known.

One of them was James Henley Thornwell, who was an academic.

He was the youngest moderator ever in the Presbyterian church, I think at 37 years of age.

He was elected moderator.

He was brilliant, very fine scholar.

He also pastored for a season First Presbyterian Church, columbia, south Carolina.

He had multiple children, eight or nine children.

He lost one in infancy and then he lost a son in his teen years, but he still had several children.

The one everyone said was most like him was Nanny.

His daughter probably called Nancy, but he called her Nanny.

Everyone said she's just like the old man.

She's theologically attuned, she has a pastoral heart, she's godly, she's missionally oriented.

She was engaged to be married and Thornwell was thrilled because she had selected, of course, a very fine Christian man.

They had put out invitations months ahead of time.

You can imagine in the 1850s.

You know you have to get the invitation out months ahead of time, give them the date and the precise time and then you know, a week before the wedding they'll start traveling and make their way to Columbia, south Carolina, and be there for the wedding During the week of the wedding.

They'll start traveling and make their way to Columbia, south Carolina, and be there for the wedding During the week of the wedding Monday, Tuesday.

The wedding was to be Sunday afternoon.

During that week, monday, tuesday, nanny became very ill and Dr Thornwell was actually concerned about her life and he was reported to have knelt at her bedside many times and prayed for the Lord to heal her, and he prayed something like this Lord, my girl is to be married to a very fine Christian man.

I desire for her to know the pleasures of a Christian marriage.

Please have mercy upon her and preserve her life.

What we read from Dr BM Palmer, who tells the story?

He says that actually Nanny began to minister to Dr Thornwell and she said things like this Daddy, if the Lord is to take me home, how delightful that would be to be with my ultimate groom and to enjoy the pleasures of life evermore.

And so the pastor was duly chastened.

Sure enough, by the end of the week she died.

In those days there was no way to tell the wedding guests.

You couldn't get the word out.

So they're all coming in for what they think is going to be a wedding, but it turns out to be a funeral.

So on Sunday afternoon they had a funeral for Nanny Thornwell.

Do you know what she was wearing Her wedding gown?

Do you know what's printed on her gravestone to this day, as a bride adorned for her husband?

Don't fear, only believe.

And if you'll just walk with Jesus, he will show you how he loves you deeply and he one day will show you how he has saved you completely.

Father, help us to believe these things and to live them out in this day and generation, with all of our concerns and challenges.

We pray in Jesus' name, amen.