READING: Luke 8 – The Women, Sower, Stormy Sea, Demoniac, Bloody Issue, & Jairus’s Daughter

Luke introduces women who followed Jesus for He healed them: Mary Magdalene, Joanna wife of Chuza, and Susanna with “others who provided for them.”  

The Sower Parable, explained by Jesus, is the prototype parable, teaching how to interpret parables. Jesus told of a Sower sowing seed falling on a path, rocky ground, among thorns, and good ground. Birds ate seeds on the path; seeds on rocky soil sprouted quickly but died in the sun; seeds among thorns did not mature, while seeds on the good ground produced a crop.  

Jesus explained: the seed is God’s Word; seeds on the path hear, but the devil “takes away the Word so they may not believe and be saved” (only Luke says why the devil takes away the Word); seeds on rocks receive the Word joyfully but fall away when persecution comes; seeds among thorns “hear, but are choked by the cares, riches, and pleasures of life, and fruit does not mature” (this is where many Christians are located); seeds on good soil produced grain (Luke does not differentiate thirty, sixty, and hundred folds). “Pay attention to how you listen” is the parable’s message. 

Jesus said, “Let’s go to the other side” (where Gentiles live). He slept, and a storm swept down the lake. Water was filling the boat; they woke Him, shouting “Master, we’re perishing!” He rebuked wind and waves, saying, “Peace! Be Still!” There was instant calm. They wondered, “Who is this that wind and water obey Him?” 

On the other side, a naked demoniac met Jesus shouting, “What do You have to do with me? Don’t torment me,” for Jesus commanded demons to come out of him. Jesus asked, “What is your name? He said, ‘Legion,’ we are many.” The demons begged Him not to send them back to the abyss but let them go into a herd of swine nearby. Jesus okayed that; demons fled into the swine that rushed down a hill into the lake and drowned. 

Herdsmen went to the city and told what happened. People came to see; they found the demoniac “sitting at Jesus’s feet in his right mind. They were afraid and begged Jesus to leave.” He left, leaving the demoniac to witness to all Jesus had done. 

In Galilee, a synagogue ruler, Jairus, begged Jesus to heal his dying twelve-year-old daughter. As Jesus went, a woman suffering from hemorrhages twelve years came behind him to touch his clothing. He felt power go from Him and asked, “Who touched me?” Knowing she was caught, she confessed. Jesus said, “Your faith has made you well,” or saved you. 

About then people came from Jairus’s home to let him know his daughter had died, so Fhe need not bother Jesus further. Jesus said, “Fear not. Only believe and she shall be saved.” At Jairus’s home, He took three disciples and the parents into the room. “He took her by the hand, and said, ‘Child, get up.’ She got up at once.” 

Where are you in this chapter? 

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PRAY FOR YOURSELF 

Father, my God and Savior, I see women following Jesus; He accepts them as disciples. I see that being a disciple of Jesus is not restricted to men. Let me as a woman follow Jesus as His disciple, for this is my prayer, in Jesus’s name I pray, AMEN! 

MY PRAYER FOR YOU (and for me) . 

Holy Father, I pray for all who may read these words (and for myself) that we will find ourselves in this chapter. Are we financial supporters of Jesus’s work? Which soil are we? Are we Jesus’s family who want to take Him home because He is out of His mind? Or His family who hear Him and do God’s will? Are we the disciples who wonder who Jesus is? Or are we the people from the city who begged Jesus to leave their region? Or are we the demoniac who has been redeemed and becomes a spokesman for Jesus in the Decapolis? Or maybe we have been saved by our faith? (The word for ‘save’ and ‘heal’ is the same word) Or are we Jairus whose world is coming apart because his daughter has died, but Jesus says, “Do not fear; just believe and she will be saved.” This is my prayer, in His Holy Name, AMEN!