I'm Hurting

Really I am, in a couple of ways. As I sit here my hip and hamstring muscle down the back of my leg hurts as well as my calf and ankle; both of which have had a constant dull to moderate ache for about two weeks now as the result of once again injuring a compressed disc in my back. If I move wrong the pain goes from being just bearable to … "ouch" … I don't want to do that again.

I believe it's called a ruptured or a herniated disc. I had one four years ago that needed surgery to repair and remove the pressure on the nerve that causes the pain. As if the pain isn't enough, my toes and the bottom of my foot go numb so that I can't feel them … weird. Last time I couldn't walk; but this time I can.

Physical pain … that's the first way I'm hurting. Spiritual pain, if I can call it that, is the second way that I'm hurting. Why call it spiritual pain?

I trust God daily to watch over my family, which He does. But I was hurt this time doing what I considered "the Lord's work." If I had been playing around doing something I shouldn't have then okay Lord, I'm on my own. But I was loading a 60 lb. dinner bag of "Meals on Wheels" into my van and twisted my back the wrong way. "Come on Lord, I was trying to help." Did you ever feel that way?

It sounds like "poor little me" doesn't it? But I know better, for I haven't had to shed my blood like many in the past have while doing the Lord's work.

Part of the hurt, part of what causes the spiritual pain, is the fact that what I see in the Word of God that looks to me like … a promise for healing … most of the time doesn't work, and I just don't understand why not. Last week I called upon "the elders of the Church" to anoint me with oil and pray the prayer of faith over me as it says to do in the Book of James, believing that the Lord would heal this disc and raise me up.

Well … it's obvious; if I'm still in pain then the Lord chose not to heal me at this present time. But I believe He will … because it's in the Book … and God doesn't lie. There has to be a reason, so what is it? Am I supposed to learn something from this; or was it that I wasn't really believing, you know … with the kind of faith needed … the kind of faith that Paul said caused God to "call things that were not as though they were." Should I have done something else … if so, what?

Like most people I have been sick in the past and had to go to the doctor for an anti-biotic prescription to fight infection. When I picked up my meds I received more than just one pill. I needed two each day for ten consecutive days, because one "dose" just wouldn't fix the problem. It wasn't enough. I had to get more of the prescription inside of me.

So why do we think that just one simple little prayer will always "fix" the problem?

Could this be the reason Jesus said in Luke 11:9 …"Ask, seek, and knock and you will receive." In fact, I like even better the way verses 9 & 10 reads in its more useful translation in the Amplified Bible …

"So I say to you, Ask and keep on asking and it shall be given you; seek and keep on seeking and you shall find; knock and keep on knocking and the door shall be opened to you.
For everyone who asks and keeps on asking receives; and he who seeks and keeps on seeking finds; and to him who knocks and keeps on knocking, the door shall be opened."

In other words Jesus is saying don't give up concerning prayer. God certainly can heal or give the answer immediately … He has that right. But I also say, "if God so chooses" … He likewise has the right to keep you talking to Him, asking, seeking and knocking at Heaven's door. Remember, He alone is God.

But getting back to my hurt, not the physical but the spiritual, it's not just that I wasn't healed; this is not "all about me," it's more than that. How can I pray with the "faith needed" when asked by others to pray with them or for them … when I can't even get myself healed? What's the problem? Is healing a "promise" or is it just a "hope" we have in Jesus?

What do I do with the words of James when he said … "pray one for another that you may be healed?" Are these empty words or can they be taken as a promise? Do I have to qualify by my performance as a believer to receive healing? The answer should be …"no"… or none of us will ever receive an answer to prayer. We must trust Him no matter what the answer is … but I would still like to know.

I'm going somewhere now … be patient and stay with me.

I'm reminded of Peter at the gate to the Temple; he didn't pray for the lame man did he? Peter had something within himself and he knew it. He didn't have to ask for it in prayer; Jesus had already given Peter the right and authority to declare by faith the power that was and is today in that name … "but such as I have give I thee: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk."

Now I'm thinking of Paul in A.D.67 as he writes Timothy while facing death under Nero in a Roman prison ... "Trophimus have I left at Miletum sick." Paul left this man sick. I would assume that Paul had already laid his hands on him and prayed for him … but he left him sick. Paul is the one who taught the church about the gifts of the Spirit, including healing, but he … "left him sick." Did Paul change … not in what he believed, his doctrine, his faith … but maybe in the importance or the effort it takes to receive "healing?"

I wonder why Paul told Timothy to … "use a little wine for thy stomach's sake and thine often infirmities." So I ask, where is healing in this counsel from Paul? Had he given up after years of prayer for Timothy's infirmities that up to then had not been healed by the Lord?

I'm going now to John on the isle of Patmos 60 years or so after the death of Jesus. John is an old man, dying a natural death; there would be no healing for him now either. He had reached the number of his appointed days.

What am I trying to say with just these few examples? We know that Jesus never had any failures when He healed people who asked it of Him. We also know that Peter spoke and acted on the authority he believed Jesus had left him and the other disciples. But a few years later Paul had to leave a man still sick; his healing didn't come immediately, if at all, as it always did with Jesus and as far as we know also did with Peter and those of the early church. Paul instructed Timothy to take a little wine … why? What happened to healing?

Would I be doing the scripture injustice if I were to conclude that over time things have changed … not the power of God … but maybe how, why and even when God gives the anointing to speak healing unto the sick and dying? I'm just thinking out loud here … for I have no answer as to why we don't see healings like the church saw when they first started preaching Jesus.

Could one answer be just exactly what Paul reminded Timothy of when he wrote to him these words … "Wherefore I put thee in remembrance that thou stir up the gift of God, which is in thee by the putting on of my hands."

This gift … perhaps healing … was still in Timothy, and yet it seems as if there was some decline, a cooling off and an indifference to exercise it; he might have been too negligent or forgetful of the gift; so the apostle reminds him to "stir" it up. The phrase "stir up" is a metaphor taken from the coals of a fire covered with ashes, as if almost extinct, and the need to be blown up into a flame by stirring up the ashes. Was Timothy just like us … a little unsure that God could or would use him?

The gifts of the Spirit, especially "healing" can be and has been allowed to burn down from the burning flame of the early church to just embers today, covered up by the ashes of past miracles and these embers are now at the point that if we don't "stir up and rekindle the flame" … they will die out.

Remember … I'm hurting … not for me, but for all those I have prayed for over the years who were not healed; some of which even died and went to be with the Lord. Well, maybe it is also for me … for it does hurt … it hurts my faith.

I have to remind myself often about the heart of God, about His motives and purposes and all the blessings of God's Providential care which proceeds from that heart, which is "a heart of love"; including all the tests and trials … and pain … which really seem, or are thought to have come from God fulfilling His design, purpose, counsel, and "will" for our lives.

We should have enough confidence in God's conduct toward us to believe that all His dealings are ordered from that heart of love. But if … He takes away our possessions, or visits us with pain, will we lose all our confidence in Him? Will we still submit to God without a complaint only during good times … or even when painful natural events come in their place?

The breath we breathe, the food we eat, the health and freedom from "pain" we enjoy are God's … but if … He takes one or all we have away, do we feel that He has taken only what belongs to Him … of which we have no right or claim to anyway?

I can't answer your questions about unanswered prayer … especially healing … I can't even answer my own. So what am I to do? I'm going to try and "stir up" those embers in my life if they are still burning … so that the flame burns as it should.

Why am I taking the time to sit at my keyboard … still in pain … writing about this?

I have been inspired by a man I know who wants others to see only Jesus in him.

Let each of our flames burn bright and not be just smoldering embers under dead ashes from the past.