The people of Capernaum were ranting and raving about what he had done. They had never seen anything like it before. This man who called himself Jesus had just exorcised a man with an unclean spirit in the synagogue. Peter must have sensed that Jesus wanted to get away from all of the commotion, because he invited Jesus and the disciples go over to his mother-in-law’s house to relax and get a bite to eat. But when they got there, they found Peter’s mother-in-law in bed with a fever. Jesus without hesitation went to her, took her by the hand, and lifted her out of bed and immediately the fever left her. Well, it didn’t take long for the news to spread about the power of Jesus. Pretty soon the sick and spiritually oppressed were lined up outside the house seeking to be healed.
Jesus makes it seem so simple: a word here, a touch there. People crippled from birth being able to walk. Blind people being able to see. Sometimes we wonder why miracles of healing don’t take place like that today – or do they?
They may not be as dramatic, with a touch a fever is broken. With the command to rise up and walk a cripple stands up and begins walking for the first time.
I remember when I was a junior in seminary a group of my classmate and I went on a road trip to "Holy Hill." "Holy Hill" was actually the nickname of a Roman Catholic Carmelite monastery in southern Wisconsin. Even from several miles away you could see the monastery which sat on top of a hill. On this particular day the golden dome of the church was glistening in the sun. After we parked the car we went into the church and as we were walking down the side aisle toward the Our Lady chapel we saw a wall full of crutches. Now some seminarians tend to think that they now it all and can be rather flippant at times. Even though we were startled to see all the crutches and what they implied, many snide remarks were made about how the crutches actually got there. That image of what seemed to be hundreds of crutches has been burned in my memory. Now after many years in ministry I am not as suspicious about how they got there. I never saw anyone throw down their crutches and begin to walk without assistance, but I have come to believe that it has and can happen.
In the Order of St. Luke meetings we have had many discussions about the healing miracles of Jesus and the ministry of healing ministry today. While many if not most of the healing miracles that are recorded in the Gospel state or imply that the individual was cured of their infirmity, there is also the repeated reference to being made well. If we take the incident of Peter’s mother-in-law, by what we are told, she was cured of her fever, implying that she was also cured of whatever caused the fever in the first place. In the case of Bartimaeus, who was blind, Jesus tells him, "Go; your faith has made you well." Bartimaeus was cured of his blindness, but he was also made well. Within Jesus’ statement to Bartimaeus is a wholeness of his healing, we might say the healing of body, mind, and spirit.
While it does seem that the miraculous curing of individuals is not as prevalent today, as say in Jesus’ day, we do need to remember that Jesus did not cure everyone. That is, he only cured those who were brought to him. We might say that that is unfair. What about all of the people who could not get to where Jesus was, shouldn’t God or Jesus have healed them too? Well, I don’t have a very satisfying answer.
The miracles that Jesus did, all of them, from the healing miracles, to walking on water, the feeding of the five thousand, and so on, were not done just to perform a miracle. All of the miracles were done to reveal who Jesus was. Yes, Jesus cared about people and did not want them to suffer, but more importantly he came to tell and reveal God to the people of the world. That is why he said, "Let us go on to the neighboring towns, so that I may proclaim the message there also; for that is what I came out to do."
The greatest cure that Jesus performed, and is still performing today, is to cure us of our sins. Now, as we all know, to accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Savior does not take away the desire to sin, or the act of sinning itself. But what Jesus does is to take away the eternal consequences of sin – that is, separation from God. Jesus, even though he raised three people from the dead, knew that we will all die someday. His mission in life was to draw us to God in order to receive the gift of eternal life with him in the kingdom.
To be cured of a disease or illness is what we desire in this life. We want to be saved from the ravages of cancer, Aids, and all of the diseases and illnesses that plague our bodies. I am not the one who will say that God does not hear our prayers and respond by curing us. It does happen sometimes. But what about when it doesn’t happen. Does that mean that God doesn’t care? Does it mean that our faith is not sufficient?
I don’t believe that is the case. Jesus came to show us that God does care about us. Yes we will be cured sometimes, but more importantly Jesus seeks to make us well, to be in harmony with God.
In the past month we have prayed intently for Charlie and now Barbara. Charlie is doing well. It is almost as if he is a new person. Our prayers, and the prayers of many others, I believe have made a difference in his surgery and recovery. Barbara still faces many hurdles in overcoming the cancer that has invaded her body. The surgeon will do all that he can to remove the cancer from her body. Chemotherapy will be introduced to kill the cancer cells. Yet it is ours prayers that will sustain her in the days and weeks to come. And I believe that through our prayers, offered up to Almighty God, that she will receive healing of body, mind, and spirit.
It is an awesome thing to pray with someone who is very ill, praying to God for deliverance from their illness. By awesome I mean intense, moving, and frightening. I personally cannot intervene in the struggle for health. What I offer is my faith, that God does not abandon us even in our darkest moments, even when despair, pain and helplessness overwhelm us. I, we, in prayer surround those we pray for with the compassion, light, and love of God in Jesus Christ. I, we, provide hope for them – the hope that God is present and has not forgotten them and what they are going through.
The first petition of the Litany for Healing in The Public Service for Healing says, "God the Father, your will for all people is health and salvation…" That is God’s will for us! That is what we pray for! That God’s will be done on earth as it is in heaven. It may not always mean that we are cured, but God helps us to be made well, to connect us to him who is the giver of life, so that we may receive the abundant life in his kingdom.