Have you ever, like me, prayed this prayer: “Jesus, I know you CAN heal, but I’m not convinced that you even WANT to.”
Every Monday we hold our weekly staff meeting at church and we spend some time writing down the names and stories of people from our church and community who are in need of prayer. We have a big whiteboard where all of these requests are written and each week I feel completely overwhelmed by the number of issues plaguing our church family. Death. Divorce. Cancer. Miscarriage. Illness. Financial troubles. Broken relationships.
In his sermon on Sunday, Drake spoke about Jesus the healer. I loved when he said, “Jesus doesn’t just have the ability to heal, he also has the desire to heal.” For me personally, I’ve never doubted Jesus’ healing power. I know he has it. I’ve heard incredible stories about lives being saved in ways that doctors can’t explain or illnesses and symptoms suddenly disappearing for absolutely no reason. I know what Jesus can do because I see it throughout scripture, like the story of the men who were blind and the man who was mute in Matthew 9. I’ve seen families reconciled and lives restored thanks to Jesus’ saving grace and his ability to redeem all things. I’ve never doubted his power, but when it comes to my own life and need for healing, I struggle with doubting his desire to offer it to me.
Have you ever felt this? Have you ever, like me, prayed this prayer: “Jesus, I know you CAN heal, but I’m not convinced that you even WANT to.” I start to think through all of my past sin and the guilt that I carry and I convince myself that I have run from him far too many times for him to want to offer me healing. I relive my worst moments and allow Satan to trick my brain into thinking that there’s no way the Savior of the world would want to reach out a hand to me and offer me a way out of my pain.
It’s in these moments that I think back to the story we talked about a couple weeks ago of Jesus healing the woman who was bleeding for 12 years and the beautiful grace he showed her. She was so desperate for healing and she knew if she could only touch his garment that she would receive it. We don’t get much insight into her life from the text, but I wonder if she may have struggled with some of the same kind of doubt that I had. She knew that Jesus had the ability to heal her, but did he have the desire? She was an outcast. She was considered unclean and a burden to society. Why would the son of God want to touch her and change her life?
But then, in one of the most tender moments of Jesus’ ministry, he turns to her and instead of dismissing her as a dirty, sick woman, he calls her “daughter” and tells her she is healed. It is in this moment that we so clearly see Jesus’ desire for his people to be made new. He knows the beauty of the healing he can offer, and he gives it according to his perfect plan. Rest assured today that Jesus doesn’t just have the power to heal us from our brokenness and reconcile us back to him, but he has the desire to as well.
