God the Healer

“Lord, if you want to, you can heal me.” Jesus said, “I want to.”

“For I, the Lord, am your healer.”  Exodus 15:26

There are many possible explanations for why a person is healed: the natural defenses of the human body, and various types of treatments and medications.  Occasionally, doctors see a healing that science cannot explain. My mom was miraculously healed of a terminal heart condition in her ’50s. No medical explanation. Cardiologists were stumped. She lived thirty more years. God is the Great Physician; earthly physicians  are His instruments.  He has given them the knowledge to cure many illnesses, but I wonder how many doctors know how much they have been prayed for when they do their work.

God created the body, and He certainly knows how to repair it. Without God there would be no healing.  He identifies Himself  as our Healer and so He is. When healing happens, we get a glimpse of God’s power and His heart. It is His ultimate plan is to heal all creation. In heaven, all are healed in His presence because He is Life, and in Him there is no death.

Healing Virtue

Desperation reaches, stretches…

Healing of any kind is a mystery, but that’s no surprise because the human body is a mystery: its complexity, multiple functions and systems, why it works at all.  The body is pre-programmed to monitor itself, heal and repair itself, fight off invaders, keep everything according to original specifications. Of course, the body, like all creation, is under the curse, the universal law of decay. Separated by sin from our Creator, our molecular structure lacks the power to renew itself, and so it breaks down slowly, even though it was “fearfully and wonderfully made.” It is a strange contradiction that we were made in the image of God, but we die (Psalm 82:6-7).

To solve this paradox, the Creator God takes on human flesh and is anointed by God the Holy Spirit and in the power of the Spirit heals the sick. One day, Jesus is en route to heal a 12-year-old girl. He is swamped by disciples and curiosity seekers. In fact, the huge crowd is pressing in from every side.

A desperate woman who has been bleeding internally for 12 years, weak and pale, crawls through the crowd among the moving feet and legs. She has missed the opportunity to talk to Him face to face, but if she can just touch Him, even the fringe on His robe…

She does.

At that instant, “healing virtue,” the power of the Holy Spirit (the Holy Spirit Himself?) flows from Jesus into the woman and instantly she feels the bleeding stop. She is healed without going through proper religious channels or asking permission, as everyone else has. She is amazed and joyful but a little worried that perhaps she did something wrong. Jesus also feels the “flow” instantly and  turns to reassures her, “Your faith has healed you.”

I enjoy scenes like this, because I like to try to meditate on Bible things that cannot be visualized or understood rationally. That’s how I get “God glimpses.” First, I think about forms of power and energy that we know about, like fire or electricity. Both can be used to cauterize a bleeding wound, but such a procedure would be painful and leave a horrible scar.

Not so with God’s power, the Holy Spirit of Healing Virtue, stops the bleeding and restores the woman’s body to original specifications in the twinkling of an eye. That means that the “power” is not fire or electricity because it is intelligent, carries the knowledge and authority…in fact, the Person of the Creator via a healing “Ointment.” I can’t wrap my finite mind around that any more than I can understand the Virgin Birth, but that’s how miraculous healings happen. That’s a glimpse of Jehovah Rapha, “I am the Lord, your God, your Healer.”

The touch of faith.