Jesus healed. He preached, he taught and he healed. And when you look at the response of the crowd, they came back and droves for the healing. They brought him cripples, demon possessed and those suffering horrible diseases. And they came from all over, even from down in Judea and beyond the river. I get it.
In 2014 I was hit with a strain of the flu. I kept waiting for the fatigue to go away. It didn’t. I slept 20 hours a day for the whole year. My adrenal system had utterly collapsed.
In 2015 I decided to get a part-time job to try to force my body back around. I could barely work 5 hours a week but by the end of the year I was up to about 15 hours.
In 2016 my mom’s health issues exploded and I quit my job to be her caregiver, working that year 100 hours per week. I’m not joking. How I got through last year was literally and only by a miracle.
In 2017 mom had her 5th unexpected surgery and was 3 months completely non-weight-bearing. It has taken everything I had to get through this year. And the last month the fatigue has bit back harder than ever. Some days I can do nothing. On my best days I can do something but it means I’ll be done the remainder of the week.
If Jesus came near, I would crawl to him for healing. In fact I do quite often, in prayer. Regularly I also go find someone for prayer and call on friends for prayer. After three years of this, I get why they came to Jesus in throngs from so far away.
For many years I used to not believe in healing. I mean I prayed for people who were ill and attended a church with a prayer list of sick people a mile long. But I didn’t believe that God healed people instantaneously and miraculous, at least not very often. My prayers were more in the wishful praying category. Healing was for missionaries because they had no doctors and needed God’s miracles to intervene since healthcare wasn’t nearby. Maybe God healed in America on occasion but it was highly suspect. It’s what I was taught. And what I believed. That is, until God healed me instantaneously and miraculously. It wrecked my theology.
Since that time about 15 years ago, I have prayed for many sick people to get healed, believing fully that he can. As of now I know of 1.5 healings from those prayer. The first one was actually doctor confirmed but it’s not what I can tell you about. The .5 was last year visiting relatives when it turned into an impromptu teaching session on healing. Then we asked the Lord who was to pray for the sick person. The girl prayed and the woman was healed. And she has stayed healed for a year now. I count it as .5 on my list since I was a sharer in the moment. I’ve witnessed God healing so many people that I no longer doubt.
And now I find myself yearning for healing again. I’ve cried many buckets of tears yet I do not doubt his goodness. Even as I type this my head is upright and swimming and spinning with the fatigue. I just want my head horizontal. I don’t know why I haven’t been healed yet. I’m also seeing lots of doctors as well (because that’s Biblical too). But being comfortable with mystery is something I’ve learned to value.
I know of one group of people who were hiking through the Himalayas preaching the gospel. On their way back to civilization a man came running to them on the trail. He had chased them through the mountains until he caught up with them.
“I heard your God could heal,” he said. “Will you pray for me?”
They did. He was healed. And they encouraged him to go home to share the good news with others.
I love that story. And it is a true one. The team was co-workers of mine. One thing I realize with this story and with this part of Scriptures is that healing is very much an attractant for the gospel. It is an incredible mercy. Increase our faith, Lord.
