When Are We Healed?

There is a group of 12 of us that have begun a journey together to examine the healing miracles of Jesus that appear in scripture.  This class has a significant writing component, in that each of us will have a blog where we answer the questions "What lesson(s) have you learned about healing from this account? Here I examine John 5:1-17

When, we are asked,  was the man by the pool healed? I wonder, could he have been healed long ago, but had not known it?  In our OSL guide we are asked “Of all the disabled people there (at the pool of Bethesda), it seems that Jesus singled out one man…”   Why did Jesus single this man out?  What was special about him or his case?  I wonder if maybe Jesus could see/knew that the man had been already healed, but was not behaving like one who has been healed.

² In Jerusalem near the Sheep Gate in the north city wall is a pool with the Aramaic name Bethsaida. … ³ and a crowd of people who were sick, blind, lame, and paralyzed sat there.^[a] 5 A certain man was there who had been sick for thirty-eight years.  (John 5:2-5, CEB)

Could the man have been healed years before, but had continued to live in the lie that he was still paralyzed?  Being healed implies a change to one’s current circumstance,  and when that change is unimaginable the healing may not be realized.  So Jesus asks:

“Do you want to get well?”

It’s a great question because I think sometimes we want to be healed of the symptoms but not the wound.   I’m not talking about the severe cases where it seems unlikely that someone will ever get well, but the times when staying sick, or unhealthy is truly a choice we choose, and choose over and over, even though we have been healed, we choose to act otherwise. 

⁷ The sick man answered him, “Sir,^[b] I don’t have anyone who can put me in the water when it is stirred up. When I’m trying to get to it, someone else has gotten in ahead of me.”

What if the man was already healed and all Jesus did was see that in him and his potential; seeing things not as they are but as they could be.  

It is really too bad that the story continues on past verse nine because it brings to light the fact that people do not always show gratitude.  I know I should not want the gratitude, and yet sometimes I do. I want my part in it to be recognized, but doesn't that steal or at least compromise the glory to God?

⁸ Jesus said to him, “Get up! Pick up your mat and walk.” ⁹ Immediately the man was well, and he picked up his mat and walked. 

What sins (wounds) have we been healed from, but are not able to pick up our mats and go on with life?

LiveCast of Bess Komm Memorial Service

On Sunday January 27, 2012 there was a LiveCast of the Memorial Service for Bess Komm.  The service was held in our historic chapel.

Here is a link to that service of worship: 

http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/28862302

Sorry, it starts a few minutes before the service begins.

When Jesus Healed

There is a group of 12 of us that have begun a journey together to examine the healing miracles of Jesus that appear in scripture.  This class has a significant writing component, in that each of us will have a blog where we answer the questions "What lesson(s) have you learned about healing from this account?   This week we are examining the healing of a woman with fever (contained in Matthew 8:14-15; Mark 1:29-31; Luke 4:38-39), and the healing of  a leper (contained in Matthew 8:1-4; Mark 1:40-45; Luke 5:12-16)

It used to be that when I would pray for someone who was  sick, I generally I just asked for an alleviation of the symptoms, (to be relieved of the pain...), but did not ask specifically for them to be healed.  

This week I have been praying for Laura, a singer I used to work with at my previous church.  She was a student at Southwestern, and sang both in the praise band and choir.  We enjoyed her theater performances at Southwestern.   

Over the week-end I received an email from her mother telling me that several weeks ago, they had rushed Laura to the ER with joint swelling and lesions on her hands.She was admitted to ICU for three days and then the cardiac unit, and later was diagnosed with  ANCA vasculitis, an auto immune disease. 

Her mother writes: 

She realized today that all her "instruments" have been attacked! The doctor told her not to speak or whisper at all since so much strain has been put on her vocal chords. After he left she was brought to tears realizing that her "gift" has been completely silenced!   

I remember when one of my gifts was silenced, our second year in Ghana [read here] when my shoulder was dislocated and fractured by a large wave while swimming in the ocean.  While I healed, I was unable to play guitar, type on the computer, cook, ride a bicycle, or really do much else.  While the pain was unimaginable, what I really felt was the loss of who I was and what I could do.  If I could not do these things, then who was I, and what good was I to anyone around me?  I imagine that is what Laura is feeling right now, and maybe God can use this in her life to teach her that she is so much more than those things that she did.

I find it interesting how in each of the tellings of this story, they end with "and she got up and began to wait on them."  It was the fever that was keeping her from doing those things that definer her, and once healed, she returned to do them.  Knowing the marvelous instrument that God gave Laura, I can imagine that is going to be one of the first things she does when she is healed...begin to sing God's praise.  When I say "I can imagine," I am not using a turn of phrase, it is really my prayers for.  I go to my prayer place, and imagine her singing, not as a memory, but as a soon to see future in her life.  Praying now with words, but with images to let God fill in the details of how to get there.  

In the second healing account, the one of the Leper being healed, I like how in each case he says "if you are willing..." never doubting that Jesus was able (even though it happens very early in the ministry of Jesus).  Prayers like that must pull at God's heart, and I hope so, for that is my prayer for Laura, saying "If you are willing..." and then imagining Laura singing God's praise.  

I so look forward to how God will heal Laura, and hearing her amazing voice she sings glory to God with gratitude.  Will you pray with me too?