Sunday, November 9, 2014

Yahweh Rophe (Healer)

A little over a year ago, when I was diagnosed with several different moderate to severe spinal problems (I am a little over 40 and have the spine of a 60-year-old) and Multiple Sclerosis, I immediately began to claim healing in Jesus’ name! One of the first things I did was go through the four gospels and re-read about the healing ministry of Jesus when he was here on earth. I compared and contrasted all the healing accounts in all four gospels. There were two common factors between many of the healings that struck me after I read these accounts.

One, Jesus healed based on the person’s faith. Many times, Jesus stated the fact that the person he was about to heal or had just healed had faith, and Jesus acted on that faith by healing the sick, diseased or malformed one. I decided then and there that I too was going to have great faith and believe God for total and complete healing in my body! One of the first times I really put my “healing faith” in action was with my chronic asthma, which I had since childhood but had become much worse and more chronic three years prior to being healed. I went to bed that night after a special healing service at church in which I had been anointed with oil and prayed over for healing and I when woke up the very next day…the wheezing and cough was completely gone! Since then, I have not touched my inhaler or asthma medication and that was about eight months ago! I was fully expecting God to heal it completely, and I even went so far as to not use my inhaler that night before I went to bed. The very next morning, I woke up and I felt like I had received a pair of new lungs overnight! Praise God! This was the first Summer where I did not feel like I was suffocating in the heat, and when I went swimming, I did not feel the normal pressure sensation I felt in my lungs when I was under the water, like they were fully inflated and about to explode like I always had before. My first thought after my first swim asthma-free was, “So this is what it feels like for a person with normal lungs to swim!”

Is the lack of faith keeping you from being healed? Abandon every shred of doubt that you may have when it comes to your healing. NOTHING is too hard for God to heal! I know people who have been healed from cancer and other serious medical conditions and have heard second-hand accounts of some very amazing healing stories from missionaries that almost sound unbelievable (but praise God, nothing is too hard for Him to handle!) I am glad I took that leap of faith, because without it I may still be suffering with asthma. God has also healed many of my spinal problems over a two-year-period. Again, it took complete, unabandoned faith on my part and total trust that He WOULD heal my spine. The difference between the excruciating pain I used to have and the limitations I had because of the pain and now is absolutely amazing! I am still believing for another miracle for healing of my Multiple Sclerosis.

Two, many times Jesus reached out and touched the one He healed or they reached out and touched Him, and received their healing. This tells me that Jesus is a very personal, compassionate, tender healer. All it took was one touch from the woman with the bleeding problem that she suffered with for years and she was instantly healed. There is power in the touch from the divine healer! All He would have had to do was say the word and these people could have been healed, but He chose to touch them instead. Many of these people He touched had diseases and conditions that deemed them untouchable in society. They had to have felt very lonely and rejected until the loving touch from the healer made them well again!

A friend I used to go to church with when I lived up North told me a story about the time when she was in college and she got to know this girl who was really shy and self-conscious. This girl had warts all over her hands and this had caused social problems for her. Nobody wanted to even touch her for fear of somehow catching them. My friend had offered to pray with her, and when she did she took this girl’s hands into hers and held them as they prayed. This young lady, who had not experienced something like this before was very, very touched and began to cry with this simple gesture. My friend told me, “To tell you the truth, I was a little uneasy at first, but I really felt the Lord was telling me to take her hands at that moment, so I did.” She was following Jesus’ example by reaching out in compassion and kindness to someone who really needed it at that moment.

I am very grateful for a compassionate, tender God who touches even the untouchable and besides offering them hope, brings them healing! I am also very grateful for the healing that God has already done in my body because of the faith I put in Him to heal me! It took a period of two years and happened in stages, but I did not lose heart because I had faith that God finishes what He starts and because He started healing me, I was excited to see the healing come to completion.

However, not everyone is healed, and sometimes the process of the disease and how the person handles it is very inspiring to others and brings God more glory than the healing would have brought. Also, God can use illness to grow the person in character and a lot of good can come through the process of dealing with the illness. I am sure there are other reasons that God does not always choose to heal, but our job is to pray for those going through illness/disease, encourage them and believe in faith with them that God will either heal them in His time or that even greater good will be brought out through the process of the illness/disease itself.

I am still believing for healing of my Multiple Sclerosis, even though I continue to get new symptoms that points toward progression of the disease. God may be trying to refine me in the process of the disease and to learn to trust Him in ways I never have had to before. Whether He chooses to heal the MS or not, I will still trust Him and believe that He will do something good through this disease, either in me or in those around me. The important thing is that God uses this experience to glorify His name and to continue tweaking me to be even more like Him. Blessed be the name of the Lord!

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