Mark 5:30

Mark 5:30, in plain English

Jesus instantly knows that power has gone out from him. He turns around in the crowd and asks, 'Who touched my clothes?' He felt it — he knew someone had been healed.

Why it's here

Jesus doesn't let the woman slip away anonymously. He wants more for her than a secret healing — he wants her to experience a personal connection with him.

Who's speaking

Jesus speaks to the crowd, looking for the person who touched him.

Where it sits in the story

Jesus could have let it go. But he stops in the middle of an urgent mission to find this woman. He wants to look her in the eye and affirm her faith. She matters that much.

The scholarly reading

Jesus perceives (epignous en heauto) that 'power' (dynamin) has gone out from him, indicating that healing virtue flowed from his person in response to faith. His public question 'Who touched my garments?' initiates the woman's public confession.

Language and setting

The concept of power (dynamis) departing suggests that healing cost Jesus something and was not merely automatic. The question serves a pastoral purpose: drawing the woman from anonymous healing into personal relationship.

Voice

Jesus turns to the crowd and asks who touched his garments, aware that power has flowed from him.

Significance

Jesus immediately senses that healing power has left him. He stops in the crowded street and asks who touched him — not for information, but to draw out the woman for a deeper encounter.

28For she kept saying, “If only I touch His garments, I will be healed.”

29Immediately her bleeding stopped, and she sensed in her body that she was healed of her affliction.

30At once Jesus was aware that power had gone out from Him. Turning to the crowd, He asked, “Who touched My garments?”

31His disciples answered, “You can see the crowd pressing in on You, and yet You ask, ‘Who touched Me?’”

32But He kept looking around to see who had done this.

Read all of Mark 5 — A man possessed by a thousand demons, a woman who has bled for twelve years, a father whose daughter has just died — all healed in a single chapter.