“The Lord is near to all who call on Him;
to all who call on Him in truth.
He fulfills the desires of those who fear him;
He hears their cry and saves them.”
Psalm 145:17-18
As we struggle in my family with the aging and health difficulties of some we love so dearly, I’ve been thinking about Jesus’ habit of healing.
Jesus while He was here on earth, healed many to honor God. But we must remember, when those he healed came to their time to die, they eventually did. None was healed permanently and even Lazarus died again.
Some don’t want to believe in God because they say “he doesn’t heal.” Well,He does! I know people all around me who should have died years a go, but didn’t. Fully recovered cancer patients, mothers who became sick when their kids were elementary and lived to see their children graduate. People who were supposed to live six months and lived yeras.
What we are really saying when we complain about God’s healing is that we’re angry that death is still around – stealing those we love and causing tragedies we cannot understand.
“Why is there death?” is really our question — as if healing could put an indeterminable stop to the encroaching pallor of death.
Well, Jesus is the One who DID conquer it and it is clear that it is the path of a Christian to die but once.
I birthed three children and had to walk through that path, three, separate, distinct times. But I will only hve to die but once (unless Jesus comes back first.) I WILL have to die, when it is my time.
We are angry at God about death, when death wasn’t in His plan to begin with. Death was chosen for us by our ancestors who rejected God and thought they knew better than Him. Death is confirmed by us when with the apple of our hearts we bit at the tempation of lies that we think we know better than God: overeating, lusting, being jealous, gossiping, hurting others, being angry, not forgiving — these are the things that give us common identity with our forebearers and confirm that indeed our flesh is corrupt and deserves to die… but only once if we are a Crhsitian.
For, if we are a Christian, we will have a new body that is not corrupt. It will be a glorified one without traces of innate sin but will allow us to more closely identify with Jesus.
If one is not in Christ, they have no new body, only the old corruptible one and therefore must spend eternity with their corrupt, inadequate body, separated from the God who gave them a chance! Such sadness!
The God who heals does heal. he heals us in life. He heals us after death so we may live eternally with him.
All the while being criticized by these ants He has created and elevated to call friends, brothers, and sisters! Oh, God is a tremendous God and One we cannot understand!
But know this. He still heals!