‘It is I, the Lord, who gives you healing’
Exodus 15:26
God said these words to the Israelites, when they were
thirsty and grumbling in the desert. He
then led them to the living water at Elim and eventually to the Promised
Land, flowing with milk and honey. God offered healing to the Israelites
repeatedly, in the psalms and through the prophets. The Old Testament records
eighteen individual and collective physical healings. In a wider and fuller
sense, healing in the Old Testament meant repentance and reconciliation with
God: ‘It is he who forgives all your guilt, who heals every one of your ills’ (Psalm 102:3).
Jesus, too, brought healing, so that ‘all those who touched
him were cured’ (Mark 6:58). He sent out his disciples to cure the sick (Luke 10:9; Mark 16:18; Matthew 10:1,7) and many
were cured. (Mark 6:12). This healing work continued in the early church. St Peter
healed the bedridden Aeneas at Lydda (Acts 9:34) and St Paul refers to healing as a
ministry.
(1 Corinthians 12:9).
But how can this promised healing be real for us today, for
the aging, the disabled and those with terminal illness? Human need of every kind cries out to God for
healing. We cannot cure mortality. The healing miracles in the gospels, like those in the Old
Testament, were often associated repentance and with faith. The Good News,
‘repent and believe’
(Mark 1:15) brought healing to the sick. (Luke 7:22) Jesus’ forgiveness
healed the paralytic on a stretcher. (Luke 5:25). Faith saved the blind beggar. (Mark 10:52), The
gospel healings were not just medical cures; they were ‘signs’ to inspire faith (John 2:12; 20:30), conversion, and a healing of the heart.
This healing of the heart often takes place without any
physical healing. St Paul discovered that his prayer for healing was not
answered in the way he hoped. God said, ‘My grace is enough for you: my power
is at its best in weakness.’ So Paul ‘delights’ in his weakness, ‘that the
power of Christ may stay over me. For when I am weak, then I am strong.’
(2 Corinthians 12:9-10). His healing was a strengthening in his relationship to God, transforming his
attitude to his physical frailty.
The penitent thief on the cross, unlike the other thief, did
not ask to be saved from death. Rather, he asked Jesus, ‘remember me, when you
come into your kingdom’ ( Luke 23:42). He was hoping for a salvation beyond death and
Jesus answered him: ‘Today you will be with me in Paradise’ (Luke 23:43). For the good
thief, as for St Paul, suffering with Christ brought, not physical healing, but
a healing of the heart. Death became the gateway to paradise. .
Jesus performed his last healing miracle in the garden of
Gethsemane, healing the high priest’s servant. Here he faced his greatest
crisis, the imminent prospect of pain and death. He was totally alone,
abandoned by his disciples and the great crowds who had followed him.
Jesus resolved this terrible crisis not by miracles but by
surrender to God’s will. ‘He accepted death’ (Philippians 2:8). He prayed, ‘let your will be
done, not mine’. ( Luke 22:66). His constant rebellion against sickness and death was
over. ‘Although he was a son, he learnt to obey though suffering.’ (Hebrews 5:8).
Surrender to God’s will was a continuing process, finding completion in his
last words, ‘Father, into your hands I commend my spirit’ (Hebrews 5:8). The physician
did not heal himself. The saviour did not save himself. The one who raised the
dead, died.
So the promise of healing, meaning to make whole, contains a
paradox. Physical and mental healing restores health and reduces suffering. But
healing, in the deeper sense of reconciliation with God, comes through
acceptance of suffering, because suffering leads to salvation and death leads
to victory (1 Corinthians 15:5).
We are all pilgrims, like the Israelites in the desert. The
promise of healing is real, because the journey is not in vain. ‘For we know
that when the tent that we live in on earth is folded up, there is a house
built by God for us, an everlasting home, not made by human hands, in the
heavens.’(2 Corinthians 5: 1). Jesus made peace by the blood of his cross (Colossians 1:20). ‘He will give
light to those who dwell in darkness, those who dwell in the shadow of death,
and guide us into the way of peace.’ (Luke 1:79).
Geoff Bignell
March 2016
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