What If I Didn't Get Healed? (Or Stay Healed?)

A few months ago Trinity Church hosted a guest speaker who led a weekend of healing services. There were some amazing reports of miraculous healings. Many of those who were healed are enjoying their new freedom. Praise the Lord for that!

But some people received prayer and didn't get healed. And others had their symptoms disappear, only to have them return again.

What's going on?

Some people say this kind of thing proves God doesn't really heal, it's all in people's heads. Others say it proves God is capricious or arbitrary or he plays favorites. Some say if you didn't get healed, you don't have enough faith, or the person praying didn't have enough faith, or the church doesn't have enough faith. Some say if something doesn't work every time, it isn't scientific, so forget it.

I don't buy any of that.

People don't get healed every time they go to a doctor. Does that mean all medicine is a fake?

People who do find relief through medicine sometimes find their symptoms returning. Does that mean we should forget the whole thing?

I believe God wants us well. The Bible refers to Christians as the children of God, the body of Christ, the bride of Christ, and the army of God. What loving Father wants his children sick? What head wants its body sick? What groom wants his bride sick? What general wants the army sick?

God so much wants us to be well that he has given us numerous redundant systems to make it happen.

In the natural realm, God put healing in our bodies through an incredible immune system. He gives us medicines, surgery, nutrition, exercise, and alternative therapies.

In the supernatural, the Bible describes a wide range of ways in which miraculous healings are ministered. I have seen people healed in many of these ways.

For a long time I didn't pay a lot of attention to the subject of healing, though I always believed in it and prayed for it and from time to time would see miracles.

Recently, though, God has brought this much more to my attention. In fact, I'm currently working on a book about what I believe are some neglected aspects of the subject. I appreciate your prayers for this project.

The ultimate healing, of course, comes after the death of this mortal body. That's when we receive our new resurrection bodies, fit for eternity. But God wants us well in this life.

God's will is not always done on earth as it is in heaven - that's why Jesus told us, in the Lord's Prayer, to pray for that to happen more. So sometimes people are not well. But that doesn't mean sickness is God's will.

To paraphrase Dr. Robert Tuttle, it's not a sin to be sick and die. But it is a sin to allow someone to be sick and die without doing everything we can to alleviate it.
That includes physical and spiritual remedies.

So I'm learning what I can, and doing what I can. I don't think any of us can do less.

P.S. I always appreciate comments, but I would really like to hear from you about this subject, especially if you have stories or questions.

Non-rehearsed Children's Christmas Eve Pageant

We're doing it again this year. Trinity's 7:00pm Christmas Eve service will feature a non-rehearsed children's Christmas Eve pageant.

What, you ask, is a non-rehearsed children's Christmas Eve pageant?

I figure every church needs at least one time a year when the kids can dress up in costumes and the grandparents can take pictures. Christmas is a great time for that. Unfortunately, the traditional children's Christmas pageant requires several weeks of rehearsals to get ready, creating a lot of stress on everyone's schedules just at the time they don't need more stress.

The solution? A Christmas pageant with no rehearsals!

Every child who shows up at Trinity's Christmas Eve children's service will be invited to be a part of the pageant. We will provide the costumes, the script, the coaching, the music, and the microphones. The kids take it from there. The more the merrier! We especially enjoy and welcome new children and families.

We did the NRCCEP ("Non-rehearsed Children's Christmas Eve Pageant") last year for the first time, and it was ... it was ... well, it's kind of hard to describe what it was. Let's just say it wasn't a time of solemn reflection. It wasn't even "A Charlie Brown Christmas." But everyone had a wonderful time and everyone definitely wants to do it again. And I firmly believe all the children came away with a greater understanding of the Christmas story.

So we're doing it again this year.

I hope we'll see you there. And bring somebody with you!

Thanksgiving and Christmas

Just a quick thought -

What if everyone made a list of the things they were thankful for at Thanksgiving, and then for Christmas tried to find at least one person who didn't have one of those things and give it to them?

I don't mean things like a DVD or a box of candy. I mean the more meaningful ones.

For instance, at Thanksgiving I said I was thankful for my wonderful family. This Christmas, how can I bless someone who doesn't have a family?

At Thanksgiving, I was thankful for the bountiful food. This Christmas, how can I bless someone who doesn't have enough food?

You get the idea. What did you tell people you were thankful for this Thanksgiving. How can you give someone else the opportunity to be thankful for the same thing this Christmas?

God Will Provide - Really?

I found the discussion fascinating. I expected it to be boring, a rehash of things I already knew, but the variety of people and experiences made it everything but.

The setting was a monthly meeting of United Methodist clergy. The subject was (stay with me here) stewardship. Often that means, here’s how to get people to give money to the church. But this was very different.

It started in the plenary session when Chris, the leader, read from Mark 7 where Jesus castigates the temple leaders for their concern with worldly acclaim, then points out the widow who put her last pennies into the temple offering. I have always heard this held up as an example of great faith on the part of the widow, but Chris read an interpretation saying the real point is the scurrilous scribes who are living high on the backs of the gullible poor. Then someone referred to a news story about a church that was being sued - the pastor promised that if people gave money to the church, God would double it for them in nine months, and it didn’t happen.

We moved into smaller groups and continued the discussion. How do you preach about money when people are losing their jobs and their homes? How do you expect people to think about spiritual things when money is such a real and pressing issue? What does it mean to trust God to take care of us?

One African-American pastor told of being a poor seminary student in Mississippi. He had almost nothing, but his pastor had asked everyone to contribute $100 towards missions work. About the only thing he owned was his clothes – a few casual clothes, and (as required by the church culture) four suits. He privately determined to sell two of his suits to raise the $100 to give to the church. Just then he received a letter. A couple in his church had been praying, and this pastor had arisen in their hearts. They had talked about it and decided to do something to help him out. Enclosed with the letter was $500.

I told a similar, though less dramatic, story of a time in seminary when someone brought my family a bag of groceries at a crucial time. Several others agreed that God always comes through.

But another pastor told of a church she served in Appalachia where families were struggling to live on $12,000 a year. She told of several women who would faithfully put money in the church offering plate every Sunday, only to see their children go without food for one or two days each week because the money was all gone. She said there was no question of the faith of these women, or their genuine love for God. So why was God allowing their children to suffer from malnutrition?

Other questions came up along the way. Is giving out of gratitude for God’s gifts the only really spiritual motivation for giving? Is it wrong to expect something from God in return? Is tithing a legalistic Old Testament relic or mandatory for Christians or somewhere in between?

We didn’t arrive at a clear agreement on any of these points. Some felt that preaching tithing to poor people drives them further into poverty, while others agreed with my experience that tithing has proven to be my lifeline out of deep financial distress. Some felt that we give as a response to what God has given us, while others said that we have to give first, as you have to plant a seed before you can expect a harvest.

I had never heard of God failing to come through for people who were genuinely trying to put him first, as in the case of the poor women who couldn’t feed their children, and I said so. A couple others agreed with me. It really caused me to think. And here’s what I think.

God does his work through his people. The church is the body of Christ, and Jesus is the head. A head can’t get anything done if the body doesn’t cooperate. If that couple had not listened to God and followed through by sending something to that poor seminary student, he would have had to sell his suits. If the people that brought my family a bag of groceries had failed to listen to God and obey him, we would have been pretty hungry.

Does God provide for his people? Absolutely. But he does it through other members of the family of God. And we haven’t always come through very well. May God have mercy on us all.

Musings from Vacation, Part 1

After a long day in the air and in four airports (Baltimore, Detroit, Salt Lake City and Oakland), we finally arrived in California, complete with luggage. We had tight connections and delayed flights - in Salt Lake City we had 15 minutes from the time we deplaned at one end of the airport until our connection was scheduled to depart from the other end - and due to overbooking our carry-on luggage wouldn't fit in the cabin and had to be checked through, and we had not time to buy meals in the airports and no meals were served on the planes, but we made it. I will never again wonder about Paula bringing "just-in-case" food in her purse.

On the shuttle to the airport we met a very friendly Southwest Airlines pilot who was staying in the same motel. He warned us not to try to walk to a restaurant, so we ordered a pizza and shared it and conversation with him. He seemed very interested when we told him of the healings that we saw in the revival services last week, and said he would love to see something like that - he has had very little experience with church. We will be praying for him.

Due to the three hour time difference, Paula and I went to bed around 7:30pm and awoke at 4:30am. The RV folks won't pick us up until around 10:00am, so we have had several hours to just sit in the room. That could sound very dull, but in fact it's very nice. Between reading, napping, and surfing the net, we are finding it very relaxing already, and we aren't even out of the motel! There really is something to be said for getting away from everyday responsibilities - I guess that's the main "musing" for today. I tried a "stay-cation" for two weeks in June, taking vacation time but staying at home, and while it was nice, it really wasn't what we needed. This two weeks in the mountains and along the Pacific coast, away from all normal responsibilities, promise to be wonderful. I guess God really knew what he was doing when he commanded us to take a rest day every week, and set up all those mandatory annual feasts in the Old Testament. They were basically big community barbeques when nobody worked and everybody ate. Some of them even required people to go to other cities or camp in tents for several days. A great idea from our loving God!

More the next time we have internet access. Blessings from vacation!

People Were Being Healed All Over the Place

You had to be there to believe it. People were being instantly, miraculously healed all over the church.

During special services last Friday and Saturday nights, and after the two regular Sunday morning services, at least twenty people I can identify personally received what John Wimber used to cautiously call “significant symptomatic abatement” immediately after receiving healing prayer. Many more from other churches reported being healed as well.

I haven’t contacted anyone for permission to use their names, but anyone familiar with Trinity Church can identify most of these folks.

One woman had not been able to kneel for ten years. After prayer, she was kneeling at the altar and rejoicing.

Another woman well into retirement age suffered from stress fractures and compression in her back. After prayer she was not only pain free, but touched her toes! – something she had not been able to do, in her words, “for a long time.”

At least three people came into the meeting with one leg shorter than the other. We watched as the legs grew out to the same length in front of our eyes. One reported the next day that it was the first time in years that she had been able to finish a worship service in normal shoes without her feet hurting.

A woman was healed of a deviated septum – she kept going around sniffing to demonstrate!

A woman had broken her wrist some time before and it had healed into a “frozen” position, unable to pivot back and forth. After prayer it had the same range of motion as before it was broken.

A woman I have known very well for a long time wore hearing aids in both ears, and had been almost completely deaf in one ear. After prayer she regained her hearing in both ears without hearing aids.

These are just some of the amazing things God did for us.

For me, perhaps the most exciting thing about it was that Dan Mohler, the Pennsylvania Bible teacher who led the meetings (www.neckministries.org), did not personally pray for most of them. Instead, he led the ordinary members of the church to pray for each other. It was their prayers that resulted in these healings.

In fact, one man was part of a group praying for a woman’s back and neck pain. She received healing. Then the man noticed that his own back no longer hurt. When he told me about it I asked how long he had suffered from the back pain. He said, “Ever since childhood” – which would mean about fifty years!

Jesus said, “Those who believe in me will do the same things that I do, and even greater things” (John 14:12), and, “These signs shall follow those who believe . . . they will lay hands on the sick and they will recover” (Mark 16:17-18). This weekend proved that those promises are still good. True, not everyone received immediate healing, but that does not invalidate what did happen.

Our task now is not to let this become something we look back on as an exciting event that happened once, but as the beginning of a new exciting ongoing ministry. I am open to ideas for how we as a church can encourage each other in stepping out in this ministry, not only in church services, but everywhere we meet people in need. I also urge you not to wait for the church to come up with some program. Go pray for someone!

God is good, God is faithful, God doesn’t change. There are people in need all around us. Let’s go out and demonstrate God’s love and power.

Alone Time With God

It’s been a couple weeks since I wrote anything on this blog. I have a good excuse, I really do.

Two weeks ago I took four days to backpack into the Dolly Sods Wilderness Area of West Virginia to spend some alone time with God. The next week Paula took five days to go to a silent retreat at a Trappist Monastery to spend some alone time with God. I’m not quite sure how Paula’s absence that second week kept me from writing my blog, but somehow it seemed to.

But what I want to talk about is alone time with God. It’s absolutely vital, and in our modern society it’s very hard to get enough of it.

Of course, it doesn’t need to be four or five days at a time. A little time every day, a little more time once a week, can make a huge difference.

Writer Henri Nouwen tells of the time he visited Mother Teresa. He spent quite some time telling her all the concerns he had about his life and his spirituality. Her response was simply this: “Well, when you spend one hour a day adoring your Lord and never do anything which you know is wrong, you will be fine.”

Wow!

The first part reminds me of St. John of the Cross, who would spend hours just “gazing.”The second part reminds me of John Wesley’s definition of Christian perfection: to reach a place where you are not aware of committing any known sin, and everything you do is done in love. Put them together and I think Mother Teresa was on to something.

Paula told me a great phrase she came across on her retreat: Christians should seek to take what is implicit in Christianity, and make it explicit. What is implicit? God is love; God made us to love; when two people love each other, they love to be alone with each other. You make that explicit by getting alone with God.

It doesn’t have to be four or five days, it doesn’t have to be a wilderness or a monastery. It can be your car while you drive to work, if you can just turn off the radio. It can be your house before anyone else wakes up, if you can ignore the newspaper. It can be the church when nobody else is there. It can be your basement or back yard or a closet.

Wherever it’s just you and God is fine. Lovers find a way to sneak off someplace and be alone together. There’s no special way you have to do it. Just find a way, and get alone with God. And listen.