Questions – Mark 10:46-52

I did not know my parents and grandparents as well as I would have liked. Other than what I could infer about them by their behavior, I didn’t really know who they were. I knew a little of the what of them but I wanted to know more of the why. In the event, my children or theirs cared to know the why of me, MwM is available. Prompted by Bartemaeus, and a compulsion to tell my story, I have answered a question …

Does Jesus still heal people?

I do believe Jesus still heals people but as one who lives unhealed with chronic pain, this question has haunted me. Holding on to a belief, as the apparent evidence to the contrary, is a set up for deferred hope which will also make the heart sick. If you want to know the why of me, you will need to know where my “Yes” regarding healing began.

My life in Christ began in 1976. It was like being shot out of a cannon. Because of the immediate changes he made in my heart and the love which he inundated me with, I had every reason to believe this Jesus I had encountered was the same guy in the bible who healed people and did miracles. I concluded that the New Testament must be God’s yardstick – life was to measure out in a New Testament-or-better way.

I had grown up as a social paralytic … painfully shy. However, when Jesus entered my life I had a story to tell and I could not shut up. He had set me free and, by God, he intended to do that for all men! After all, I was not special. I wondered, who was this guy jabbering on and and on? The whole thing was like an out of body experience.

As I looked down on motor-mouth Rob, a strange thing was happening – I noticed a cloud forming between him and other (more mature?) Christians. What’s up with this? Upon hearing my story, they would shut down or even walk away. Others tried to gently break the news to me that Jesus really isn’t doing the miracle thing anymore. Your kidding! This was quite disorienting to me as a young impressionable Christian. As, a recent miracle, I was dubious.

I didn’t know it, but I was born again right on top of on one of the larger fault-lines of Christianity. On one side there were Christians who believed miracles and the gifts were childish things, done away with after the death of the apostles. The bible (the perfect) had come and was now the only source of inspiration for them. In this camp, the Holy Spirit’s main job was to interpret scripture.

I sincerely didn’t want to be rude to the sola scripture – segment of my new family but I knew God was still revealing himself to men and speaking to them because he had just done this with me. As I told my story, I watched a cloud form which, I learned, could become stormy and even threatening. As I gave an account of the new hope within me, the right hand of fellowship was withdrawn. I loved these people. This made my heart sick.

On the other side of the fault line there were those who were excited, like myself, that Jesus was the same then, now and forever. They were zealous in their exploration of New Testament life. The Holy Spirit was right in the middle of it all. Admittedly, on this side of the divide, there were plenty of things to raise an eyebrow or even a scriptural-based question but nevertheless, it was among this group that I took my first steps as a baby Christian. Since this tribe was pursuing a biblical reality and happened to be the only ones who would accept me, I threw my lot in with them. Miracles, here we come.

At least that is what I anticipated. However, after I watched hundreds of prayers for healing go unanswered, many of which were prayed in behalf of my body, my heart started feeling sick all over again. As my expectations were undershot by a few miles, I had to ask, “What is wrong with me that I do not experience divine health which, I had been taught, is my birthright?” It was as though I were lost again, except this time – within Christendom.

I became very discouraged trying to connect theologically to either side of the family. Each believed, with certainty, theirs was the way regarding the miraculous. Sadly, the more prideful, insecure and often prominent, would train their doctrine guns at the more obvious heretics across the line.  I have been caught in many a crossfire and, to be honest, doctrinal arguments whizzing through my brain and over my head effect my heart in a sickening way.

As I have continued to trek along the fault lines, how often I have thought I would love to have a systematic, air-tight theology that removed the mystery and answered my myriad questions. But the Lord, I believe, has prevented this. It seems that mystery, at least for me, is the context where faith, hope and love must grow. The absence of certainty is the odd yet fertile place where faith grows best in my life.

Here Along The Fault Line (that was Dylan song wasn’t it?) I have made a choice that I am not going to be offended when I fail to get miracles on demand. Yet, I am going to presume Christ is still a healer and pray along that line. On grounds of my biblical understanding and personal experience, I am going to reject the notion that Jesus has changed his mission. Just because I haven’t experienced my miracle doesn’t prove they no longer exist.

Jesus is, in the essence of his being, a healer. This reality is not altered by my incomplete experience. I have wanted outcomes to hedge my faith bets. Instead, God wants faith to precede outcomes. He says faith itself is the assurance of these things we hope for.

Perhaps, like Bartemaeus, we too have issues with our vision. Perhaps, the cry from our hearts should be the same as his, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on us !” If we feel some heartache  regarding the division within Christ’s Body,  or we find a longing for miracles, perhaps in the midst of our deferred-heart pain, if we will bear it for a while, we will hear Jesus asking us …

What do you want me to do for you?

I believe we too, if we will persevere and not feint by giving into disappointment, will one day, perhaps very soon, hear Jesus say to us …

Go your way; your faith has made you well.

Father, open the eyes of our hearts. Grant us the spiritual courage to ask questions. Grant us the perseverence to lay hold of that for which we were laid hold of – things which eye has not seen nor ears have heard – these good works which you have prepared for us to walk in. Lord, may your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Amen.

 

 

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