As I begin 2014, I find myself quite thankful for my health. Starting in the summer of 2012, and through the summer of 2013, I battled a nasty illness. Still today, none of my many doctors, nurses, or surgeons, understand exactly what happened to me. I weighed in at about 210 pounds when it all started, and at my lowest point I was right around 145. I stand at an unimpressive 6 feet tall, making 145 not a great place to be. Sometimes I only slept 8 hours in an entire week. In short, I was a disaster. And with those sleepless nights, I had plenty of time to talk with God.
In Matthew chapter 8 we get the privilege of following Jesus around as He heals multiple people, casts out demons, calms a storm, and generally just amazes people. It's really a pretty loaded chapter of the Bible. And so on many of my sleepless nights I would attempt to talk with God and understand why it was that I couldn't experience this same healing. Did I simply need more faith? Was I asking the wrong way? Was there a sin I was being punished for? I believed God had the power to heal me - so what was the deal? I was anointed with oil and prayed over by the elders. I was sharing with my small group community. I was serving my church faithfully. Still day after day, week after week, test after test, things just became worse. I was three or four weeks from being admitted to the hospital and put on a feeding tube to bypass my stomach. My wife was pregnant during this entire sickness and we began seeing a marriage counselor to keep things together. It was a tough run for sure.
I was healed, but first He had a few things to teach me about what real faith looks like.
When I read Matthew Chapter 8 now I have a new perspective. I see two things that are significant. First, Jesus doesn't heal everyone in the crowds. He only heals a few. It appears to me now that those miracles are not about individual people. We're not supposed to focus on the people, the healings are about Jesus. They are intended to display His power and inform us of who He is. You know, all of the people Jesus healed in Matthew chapter 8 still got sick and died. None of them are still alive today. The death rate still hovers around 100 percent. Jesus didn't come to heal our physical sickness, he came to heal our spiritual sickness. But wait, there's more.
Jesus healed those who approached Him. In fact, He makes a very big deal of the centurion's faith. Faith, it appears, is what Jesus is after. The most significant lesson I learned is that our faith lies not in the healing, but in the One who heals. I do have an expectation that God will move when I pray. I have faith He can act, but for His glory and not for my comfort. It's not that different from the Apostle Paul when in the book of Acts. He was arrested, betrayed by his own people, sent to Rome for trial, shipwrecked on the way, bitten by a poison snake, stranded on an island, all to arrive in Rome and be thrown under house arrest. It was a tough run for sure. And yet Paul is so admired for his faith and God is so glorified in the story.
The most significant lesson I learned is that our faith lies not in the healing, but in the One who heals.
If God would have removed my burden early on, my faith would be much simpler than it is now, and there would be so much less glory for Him. And it's in this reality that I see a clearer picture of how God both cares for me and is fully about His own glory.
What is that you're asking God for these days? Have full faith that whatever it is you're dealing with, God is bigger. He can heal, restore, and redeem. Eventually, He did it for me. But first, He had a few things to teach me about what real faith looks like. He needed me to grow. What is He teaching you?
