Tragedy Strikes: Pressing through the Crowd #1

Ancient Pages: A Glimmer of Hope in a world of Despair

Inspired by | Luke 8:43-48 | Matt 9:20-22 | Mark 5: 25-34 | and the song |Pressing through the crowd |

My name is Miriam. For twelve years, I’ve lived as a shadow. You would never have believed it if I told you. I don’t think I would have believed myself. I was so happy.

It began one morning, just after my thirtieth birthday. I remember because the market was bustling that day, full of chatter and laughter. My husband, Ezra, teased me about the gray hairs he claimed to see in my braid. I laughed and brushed him off. Life was ordinary, simple, and good.

But that afternoon, I felt the first pang. By evening, the bleeding had started.

At first, I thought it would pass, as all things do. But days stretched into weeks. Ezra brought me herbs from the healer, and I drank them obediently, gagging on their bitterness. Nothing changed. Weeks turned into months. The bleeding didn’t stop.

And then came the whispers.

“She’s unclean,” they said, though never to my face. It didn’t matter. The law was clear: A woman with an issue of blood was unclean. I could no longer touch Ezra. I couldn’t prepare meals for him or sleep beside him. I couldn’t enter the synagogue. I couldn’t even sit on a chair without it being defiled.

For twelve years, I lived outside of life.

Ezra tried at first—oh, he tried. He stood by me for months, insisting that we’d find a cure. He sold his tools to pay the physician, then his cart. But the physicians only brought false hope, their remedies draining what little strength I had left. I saw the light in Ezra’s eyes dim, day by day. One evening, he didn’t return.

I don’t blame him.

The years blurred together after that. I sold my jewelry to pay for another healer, then my cloak, until all I had was the thin, patched robe on my back. People stopped looking at me, stopped speaking to me. I became invisible, a ghost that wandered the outskirts of the village.

“Why me?” I asked God every night. “What have I done to deserve this?”

There was never an answer.

One morning, I sat by the well, watching the women fill their jars. They didn’t notice me in the shadows. I’d learned how to blend in, how to be unseen. But then I heard a name that made me sit up straight.

“Jesus of Nazareth.”

“He healed her,” one woman whispered, glancing around as though sharing a secret.

“Who?” another asked, leaning in closer.

“Leah, from Bethsaida. She had that… that withered hand. She said He touched her, and it was as though it had never been broken.”

I felt my heart quicken. Healing? I hadn’t dared to hope for that word in years.

Another woman joined them, balancing a jar on her hip. “He’s coming through here soon, isn’t He? My cousin saw Him last week in Capernaum. She said He healed a blind man. Can you imagine?”

The women left, their laughter fading into the distance, but their words stayed with me. Jesus. A man who healed lepers, the blind, even the lame. Could He heal me?

The question burned in my mind for days. But with it came the doubts.

What if He won’t see you? What if He’s disgusted by you like the others?

Still, I couldn’t let go of the thought. If I stayed here, nothing would change. But if I could find Him…

That was when I made the decision. I didn’t know what would happen or if I’d even be able to get close to Him. All I knew was that I couldn’t give up.

For the first time in years, something stirred in me. It wasn’t joy, not yet. But it was hope—fragile, trembling, and alive.