Lent: Bleeding woman

Mark 5:24-34

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12 years of bleeding. 12 years of lost energy, wasted money, desperate loneliness. This woman is incredible: she still enough energy left to push through the crowd; she still has enough money left (from begging?) to survive one day to the next; she still has enough hope left to believe in Jesus' healing power; she still has enough faith to trust that it will be enough to simply touch His clothes even if He doesn't touch her or speak with her. For 12 years this woman lost who-knows-how-much iron and other nutrients, she spent her money seeking a solution without finding one, and she lived without human contact (or at least from other Jews who knew of her condition and were forbidden by Law from touching her without becoming unclean themselves). By nature it seems like she should be beyond faith while those who saw Jesus as He grew up in Nazareth should believe in Him based on the evidence of their eyes in witnessing His differences from the other children of the town. Yet instead this woman had the faith to believe that this time everything would be different while those who knew Him personally rejected Him.
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Just as one who has been forgiven much will love more than the one who has been forgiven little (Lk 7:47), the woman healed of a crippling infirmity responds to Jesus differently from the people who saw Him but never experienced His personal intervention in the problems of their lives. Bringing our problems to the Lord is an opportunity not only for Him to bless us but for us to renew our faith and increase our love for Christ Jesus as we see Him work in our lives. We can choose to be the people of Nazareth and reject His power to transform us or we can choose to be the bleeding woman and bring our difficulties to Him, then respond with greater faith and greater love as we see Him work in our lives.
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What life difficulty will you bring to Jesus today?