Unclean

Advent 2025, Day 23

Luke 8:40-48

I can see him ahead of me, through the thick crowd. I do not dare. I cannot. Even now, standing here in public with so many people jostling me, I am risking too much. If these people find out who I am. If they see the truth. I should not be here.

But how can I go back? I would rather die than live like this any longer. I have prayed to die. So many times.

I used to long for home and family, for the one I love to love me in return, to look at me and find me radiant. That dream is long buried. I know that I can and must bear this loneliness until the end. But to be soiled, untouchable, worse than invisible—all too seen in my infirmity. To be someone others recoil from. To have that word shouted before me everywhere I go:

Unclean.

I am dirty. Unholy. Contaminated. And worse, I am contagious. All who touch me become unclean.

This is what I can no longer accept, can no longer be. I cannot watch the eyes of fear and pity that always turn away from me. I may as well be dead.

But I have seen the Healer. I know what he can do. I have heard of his miracles, that he is even willing to touch the skin of a leper. I know I can never ask him, though. Me, an unclean woman? The heralds of my shame would announce my coming long before I could get close to him.

I see him now, making his way through this jostling crowd. Just one touch. If I can get to him in this press of people, no one will ever suspect. He won’t even notice, and I can slip into blessed anonymity.

The people push around him—needy, anxious, searching people, hungry for a sign, eager for more miracles. They want a spectacle, but I need him—oh, how I need this healing, Jesus. Please, please. . .

There he is. Just there, if I can only!—I lunge forward, fall to my knees, fingers just brushing the hem of his robe.

Instantly, I know. The flow of my wretchedness has stopped. It is done! I release the shuddering breath I did not realize I was holding, and then I notice the silence. Jesus stands in the road, and he’s looking right at me. The unclean who just dared to touch him. The one who took what she did not ask for.

“Who touched me?” says Jesus, still looking at me. The crowd shakes their heads. The disciples protest: everyone is touching Jesus. But he just keeps looking at me.

I see I cannot hide. My uncleanness has once again announced itself. How could I have thought that someone with such power would not know what I did? And he’s standing there, calling me out, waiting for me to confess.

I’m shaking. Exposed in my shame. Again. But before him this time. I cannot stand before this man, so I stay on my knees, eyes on his feet. “It was me,” I whisper. “I touched you. And you healed me.”

The crowd draws a collective breath of surprise, wait to see what Jesus will do. I just want to melt into the ground. And then his hand is grasping mine—he is touching me!—and he’s pulling me to my feet. I stand, lift tearful eyes to his and see his smile. “Daughter. Your faith has healed you. Go in peace.”

No outrage. No condemnation.

Daughter.

With that word, he calls me back to the world. He makes whole all the parts of me I thought would never live again. I am a daughter. His daughter.

I didn’t realize how deep this healing would go. I sought only for my outward misery to cease. I came to him looking for one small thing. But then he came to me.

He stopped. He called me out, wouldn’t let me hide. Because he saw all the way into my pain. He saw how it defined me, how I would continue to wear this shame even in my healing.

But when he comes to you, he heals you all the way, if you let him.

Daughter. Hear that word. Feel his touch on yours. This is the love that has come to us. You can go in peace.