Thursday, July 30, 2020
This is a story of God’s choosing to heal one person and another being healed in eternity. Psalm 103:1-3 reminds that one way or another God will heal. Our job is to accept, adjust and cooperate with what God is doing. Rather than giving you a formula or a method, let me remind you that healing involves a relationship. God knows you better than you know yourself. He knows what you need, before you even ask.
So why not start with a broader view in mind. Before getting into specifics, ponder ask God these questions.
Six Questions to Ask God when You’re Sick
1. Why do I want to be healed?
2. How will my healing honor God?
3. How can I grow and mature through my illness?
4. Who can I influence for good in my suffering?
5. How can I know and relate to God in a deeper way in my affliction?
6. God, what is your will in my situation and how can I cooperate with what You have in mind?
A Story of Healing
Here’s a doctor’s story shared in A Spoonful of Courage for the Sick and Suffering. Here the doctor tells the story of two different ways God chose heal. One through conventional medicine. And one through divine healing and prayer.
A stinging pain pulsed through my back, down my leg and onto my big toe. I left the hospital and hobbled to clinic unable to feel my left foot. On the way, the nurse from the recovery room called my cell phone. “How many more units of blood do you want to give this patient?”
I sighed over the phone. “Give two more units of packed red blood cells.”
I thought about the ruptured spleen, I had just removed. The patient weighed four hundred pounds. My back pain began when I bent over and pulled out his spleen. A crazy thought entered my mind, “Can a doctor sue a patient if they have injured him?”
When I arrived at my office a patient walked out of the door. Disgruntled, he saw me approaching. “How was the golf game?”
I bit my lower lip. Explaining where I had been for the last hour would only have delayed his visit further.
I entered through the back door and rushed into the first exam room. A red-faced child screamed when I entered. Her face red, her eyes closed. I looked at the mother, looking faint in the chair. Her face white, her hands clutched the seat. Four people held the kid still while I injected Novocain into her leg. I injected anesthetic into the screaming girl, bending over into an awkward position. A stinging pain ran down my leg. I needed to schedule an appointment with a doctor, if only I knew a good one. My back locked up.
I left the room, giving the anesthetic time to settle in. I walked to the next door, struggling with pain. Behind the door, a lady waited for her biopsy results. Last week I found a cancer in her colon. To complicate the issue, she had cirrhosis. I reminded myself of a surgical proverb: Cirrhosis plus surgery equals death. But what happens when you add cancer to the equation? My issues paled in comparison to what she was experiencing. I grabbed the doorknob and looked to heaven, “Lord, how much more can I endure today?”
Elsa sat on the table with her pastor.
“Elsa, how’s it going?”
“I’m doing a lot better than you are doctor.”
I winced, straightened my back and took Elsa’s hand. “You have colon cancer.”
“I knew it,” she said. “I should not have waited so long to have a colonoscopy.”
She bowed her head. Tears fell down her face.
Elsa’s pastor placed his hand on her shoulder, providing much needed comfort.
I went through her options. “Your real risk lies not in the surgery but in how your liver will respond to the stress.” I straightened my back and grimaced. “The liver helps the body heal. Your cirrhosis slows down the healing process.”
The pastor interjected. “Doctor, we know you are good surgeon, but you cannot heal. Can I pray for the both of you?”
We both nodded. The pastor placed one arm on Elsa and the other around my back. “Let’s ask the Great Physician for help.” He voiced a simple prayer. “Heal Elsa’s liver and let the surgery be successful.” He paused for a moment and then continued. “Lord, this doctor is doing your work, heal his back.”
I received a dose of healing.
I thanked the pastor, scheduled Elsa’s surgery and returned to the first room. The child still wailed uncontrollably. My back pain did not change until I began to drain the kid’s abscess. I bent over again and noticed the flexibility in my back had improved.
After draining the abscess, I moved on to the next room. With each patient encounter, my back pain disappeared. Progressively through the afternoon, my back pain receded, my flexibility increased and the numbness disappeared in my leg. Driving home after a long day, I felt the presence of God’s love like never before.
Coincidence? No. I believe, God healed my back. A week later, He also healed Elsa, but in a different way. God healed my back with a simple prayer, but Elsa’s colon cancer with a scalpel. Her surgery was a success. The cancer removed. Her liver held up through the stress of surgery.
God heals in many ways
I cannot explain how God did it—in either case. Considering her risk factors, Elsa’s was even more miraculous as mine. Are you willing to let go of your preconceived notions and give God the room to intervene in your behalf in whatever way He chooses? Sometimes, healing comes in eternity.
Asking with the right motive
The power in the pastor’s prayer was not what he asked for, but why he asked. He did not pray for God to relieve my pain. The intent of his prayer wasn’t to alleviate Elsa’s suffering. The pastor asked for healing so both Elsa and I could honor him with our lives.
God honors the prayer which honors Him. Our petitions typically revolve around relieving our discomfort, intervening in our circumstances, cleaning up our mess. Selfish. Self-centered prayers. We ask amiss, petitioning God to intervene in our situation. Instead pray for things to enhance His reputation and give Him credit.
Just Pray
Ask God to show you His will in your circumstances. Pray for insight into what to pray for. He has no intention of keeping you in the dark. Pray for healing. Pray for your doctor. Pray for your friends. Pray for difficult things. Pray. Pray. Pray. He is the Lord. The impossible happens when we pray.
“Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” (James. 5:16, NIV).
A Spoonful of Courage for the Sick and Suffering are stories about how to change focus in your health challenges. Some of the stories are about God’s divin healing. This story is one of how God choose to heal one person of his brain tumor, a miraculous healing. The story also shows another instance of when God doesn’t heal. Often our perspective is wrong, God does promise to heal, but not always on our timetable. To see more quotes on healing, click on the link below: