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"What does it mean to take a risk?" I ask the assembled children. As the seconds of their silence lengthen I wonder if today's topic is going to be too ephemeral for their concrete way of thinking. Just as I am about to answer my own question, I hear a soft voice inquire, "Does it mean to do something dangerous?"

"Yes!" I reply. "Taking a risk is often dangerous because taking a risk means that you might lose something that is important to you. But sometimes it is necessary to take a risk in order to gain something that is even more important than what we stand to lose.

"The Bible is full of stories about people who take risks, one of whom was a woman who had been bleeding for twelve years. She had been to all sorts of doctors looking for a cure. In fact, she had spent all her money paying them to treat her. But nothing helped.

"Then she heard about Jesus, and she knew that if she could get near enough to him just to touch his robe she would finally be well. But there was a BIG problem.

"You see, the condition from which she suffered made her an outcast in the society in which she lived, because a person who was bleeding was thought to be 'unclean.' That meant she was not allowed to touch any other person -- and no one else could touch her.

"Can you imagine what that would have been like? For twelve long years not even her own family had so much as given her a hug. It was as if she didn't exist. It must have been just awful. Why, twelve years is longer than any of you have been alive!"

By now the children are wide-eyed with attention. They know they would not like to have to do without hugs.

"Still, the woman knew she at least had to touch Jesus' robe if she was going to get well. But there was another problem. Jesus had gotten pretty famous and wherever he went, there was usually a big crowd. It may have looked something like this crowd." I hold up an aerial photograph of 8,000 people gathered for the Boston Marathon.

"Now, just imagine that Jesus is right in the middle of all these people. Would it be easy to get to him?"

"Noooo!" the children answer.

"Would it be possible to get to him without touching anyone else?"

"Probably not," several children reply.

"No, probably not," I agree. "So, you see what a big risk this woman was taking. She wasn't supposed to touch ANYONE, and yet she was going to worm her way through a huge crowd of people and try to get close enough to Jesus at least to touch his robe. Why, if anyone realized who she was and what she was doing she might have been killed! She was taking a really big risk!

"But the risk was worth it, because for her life wasn't worth continuing the way it was. So, she went out to the countryside where Jesus was walking down the road in the middle of all these people. And she managed finally to get close enough just to touch the hem of his robe. Instantly, she felt his power flow through her, and she knew she had been healed.

"However ... Jesus felt the power flow out of him! He knew someone had touched him. In fact, he turned to the disciples and asked, 'Who touched me?'

"Well, they almost laughed at him for asking such a thing. 'Hey!' they said to him. 'Look around yourself. You're in the middle of a huge bunch of people. How are we supposed to figure out who touched you? It could have been anyone.'

"But the woman had heard Jesus' question too. So then, even though she knew people would probably recognize her as the 'unclean' one and she might get in all sorts of trouble, she told Jesus she was the one who had touched his robe.

"And do you know what Jesus did?" The children just shake their heads, waiting expectantly for me to continue. "Jesus wasn't at all angry. He said to her, gently, 'Daughter, your faith has made you whole. Go in peace and be healed of your disease.'

"You know, sometimes our faith requires us to take a risk too. And when it does, it helps to remember that even God takes risks. God takes an enormous risk by giving us the freedom to choose what we will do, how we will act, whom we will love. God wants our love, but God will not force us to give it. If God did, then it wouldn't be of any value to God. So God takes a risk on us, giving us life and the freedom to choose how we will live it. But God finds the risk worth taking -- because the possibility that we will risk returning God's love is worth it. God risks everything on us in the hope that we will risk everything on God."