“Just reach out if you need anything!”
That phrase gets a lot of mileage in our lives. Maybe too much mileage… It’s the standard line that we offer to friends, and that they offer us in return. But how often do you actually take someone up on that offer? I know I rarely do. Even when I know I need it… even when I know the offer’s sincere… I hate actually asking for help.
“Just reach out if you need anything!”
My lips might say, “Thanks!” but my heart is saying, “Noooo… I’ll handle this all on my own, thank you very much!” Internally, I cross my arms and dig in my heels. Much of the time, I have zero desire to turn to anyone else. I’d rather rely on myself. I’d rather reach my roots down, right here where I am, and stick things out with the strength that I have. And maybe some of you are with me in that…?
Now, this approach could be fine, at least while life’s going well. But what about when things go wrong? What about when I’m sick or hungry, or even exploited and ridiculed? If I’m relying on my own strength when hardship comes around, will I be like that tree that Jeremiah praises? Will my life still be fruitful in a spiritual drought? Or will I be more like that lone desert shrub he laments? Will I wither and wilt trying to go it alone? Will I wish that I’d reached out my roots to the stream?
I don’t know about you, but in my experience, relying just on myself usually leaves me feeling some combination of anxious, exhausted, and defeated. But the crowds around Jesus in the Gospel today give us a glimpse of what life is like when we do reach out our roots.
Luke tells us that Jesus comes down from the mountain into the midst of a multitude looking for him. These people had gathered from all the neighboring regions, coming to hear a word of hope. They’d brought him their sick and afflicted, hoping for a cure from this holy man. And then, before Jesus starts to speak, Luke makes a brief observation: All in the crowd were trying to touch him.
Pause and picture it for a moment: All in the crowd were trying to touch him. Everyone was trying to touch Jesus.
There were too many people there for this to have been subtle. Imagine a sea of outstretched hands reaching towards Jesus. Arms and fingers extended and tangled trying to grasp at this Son of Man. These people are hungry for healing and thirsty for freedom. They’re reaching their hands out like roots towards Christ because they know at some deep level that he is the stream they need in the drought. They have no illusion that they’ve got this alone. So they turn to the Lord and reach for his Son.
Jesus in Luke’s Gospel invites us—challenges us—to join them in this: to surrender all pretense of rugged independence or collected composure, to turn to him, to reach out, to touch him ourselves. Because if I’m honest? I don’t got this on my own. I can’t give selfless love to my spouse on my own. I can’t give gentle support to my friends on my own. I can’t give humble service to the poor on my own. I simply don’t have the strength in and of myself for the life of perfect love that God calls us to.
So when the going gets tough and I don’t look around me—when I turn to myself instead of God for resolve, I cut myself off from the streams of true strength—true life. I stay in that desert Jeremiah describes. And I wither and wilt.
But if I reach out my roots, if I stretch towards Christ instead of myself, then the power—the healing—that comes out from him will flow into me and sustain me. The blessings Jeremiah and Jesus proclaim—the promises God makes us—they’ll come true! If we are weeping, we will laugh. If we are hungry, we will eat our fill. If we are poor, we will inherit the Kingdom of God. The love I give to my spouse will flow from Christ’s selflessness. The support I give to my friends will flow from Christ’s gentleness. The service I give to the needy will flow from Christ’s own humility.
When we turn to the Lord, when we join those crowds reaching out to touch Jesus, the power that comes out from him will work in us too. The waters of grace we soak up through our roots when we reach out and touch him, will nurture good fruit—even in hardship.
This fruit doesn’t grow in the blink of an eye. These blessings don’t unfold when and how we’d like. They certainly didn’t for the crowds around Jesus in the Gospel. But those crowds challenge us to never stop turning to God. They challenge us to keep on reaching towards blessing in Christ. Throughout Jesus’ earthly ministry, the crowds continue to seek after him. They continue to reach out their hands just to touch him, to grasp at the hem of his garment with hope, to stretch towards his power like a tree reaching for water. Hoping to be saved—to be blessed, to be watered—by the powerful man in their midst on that day.
Of course, we in our day know he’s not just a man. He is God himself, who became one of us, lived as one of us, died as one of us. And who rose from the dead, as Paul passionately reminds us! Christ isn’t bound by the grave or by space or by time. He isn’t just there on the plain in Luke’s Gospel. Christ is in our midst—now and always.
That stream of living water is flowing among us, present in sacrament and neighbor. As we embrace each other in the peace of the Lord, as we reach out our hands to receive his very Body, we can also reach out the roots of our hearts and draw from the stream of Christ’s power in our midst: The power that makes good on the promises made to that crowd. The power that sustains us through anxiety and drought. The power that brings forth good fruit in our lives. That power—that grace—is continually present and offered to us.
We need only reach out our roots and accept it from Christ.