Touching Jesus...in Trust

“As Jesus was on his way, the crowds almost crushed him. And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, but no one could heal her. She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped. ‘Who touched me?’ Jesus asked. When they all denied it, Peter said, ‘Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you.’ But Jesus said, ‘Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me.’ Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet. In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. Then he said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace’” (Luke 8:42b-48 NIV).
 
I’ve long found powerful the story in Luke 8 of the woman who suffered terribly from hemorrhage. But it isn’t just the fact that she was healed by Jesus, as amazing and wonderful as that truly was. To me, it’s a signal lesson about the way we (metaphorically) touch Jesus—and, crucially, whether our touch “touches” Him sufficiently in a way that merits or warrants His response to us.
 
The people milling and crowding around Jesus weren’t only pressing against Him, most likely they were touching and grabbing at Him. After all, this was a celebrity crush, and everybody wanted a piece of the star! Granted, the folks touching Jesus were doing it for a variety of different reasons and motivations. And yet, none of it seemed to matter as Jesus continued moving through the crowd, unflinching and impervious to their “molestations”!
 
But only the touch of 1 person—the woman suffering from hemorrhage—mattered in this case, at least to Jesus. It was her touch that He felt. She didn’t even approach Him from His front, but from His back. And it wasn’t even a body part of the Lord that she touched—let alone grabbed—it was but the briefest brush against the edge, the hem, of His cloak! And yet He felt her touching Him. She might as well have body-slammed Jesus!
 
What does this tell us? All of us can touch Jesus. You and I might have touched and grabbed at Him, metaphorically. We can all touch Jesus, but like the crowds that day that were touching and grabbing at Him, our touches might have meant little to Jesus, they might not even have been worth His noticing them.
 
However, like the woman in this story, do we touch Jesus in and with trust? Do our touches grab His attention? Jesus tells the woman, “Daughter, your faith has healed you” (Luke 8:48). Oh, may that be said by the Lord of us as well!