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"Healing Faith"
by Mai-Anh Le This is my reflection on John 20:29 - "Blessed are those who have not seen me and yet have believed,". They came from near and far seeking the Ultimate Healer of Nazareth. They have never seen, touched, heard, or felt Him before, but they believe He is the true Son of God. They were never present to witness any of the miracles that He performed, yet through their faith they know that He's their Healer. Who are these people? In Jesus' time, they were often the dumb, deft or blind. They were also sometimes the dead and other times the gravely ill, those who were too ill to be aware, sensible or logical, but there was never any doubt in their minds or hearts about the God-man Jesus was or the great powers He possessed. Perhaps it was because they harbored in their hearts complete faith in the Lord and that is why they were healed. Christ is not a doctor by our world's definition, just like He is not a magician or wizard. His powers are not wrapped up in lotions or potions, or magic words and magic wands. Christ's healing power is the true power of faith, and of love. Thus, devout faith is needed to be given by us before divine faith can be ministered to heal. So what does this mean for us and others who need Christ's healing touch? It means accepting Christ as who He is without requiring Him to bare proofs of His greatness to us. Those whom Jesus healed did not become whole because they needed a great sign from heaven so that they may believe. Neither God nor Jesus will ever need to prove their greatness to anyone. Those who were healed already had deep belief, such as the blind man at Bethsaida. Never having seen Christ or anything that He can do, the blind man "begged Jesus to touch him. 23He took the blind man by the hand and led him outside the village. When he had spit on the man's eyes and put his hands on him, Jesus asked, "Do you see anything?" 24He looked up and said, "I see people; they look like trees walking around." 25Once more Jesus put his hands on the man's eyes. Then his eyes were opened, his sight was restored, and he saw everything clearly," (Mark 8:23-25). In the same way, the two other blind men did not need to hear a booming voice from heaven crediting who Jesus was before they ran to Him calling out, "Have mercy on us, Son of David!" 28When He had gone indoors, the blind men came to Him, and He asked them, "Do you believe that I am able to do this?" Immediately they replied, "Yes, Lord." 29Then he touched their eyes and said, "According to your faith will it be done to you"; 30and their sight was restored," (Mathew 9:28-30). Such show of genuine, sincere, and honest faith was what healed those men. Over and over again, those who were given no reason and no proof to believe in Christ did wholeheartedly believe in Him, like you and I do today. I can only imagine how much this sentiment meant to Him for I recall Him saying, "blessed are those who have not seen me and yet have believed," (John 20:29). And once again, blessed was another blind man who was from Jericho and name Bartimaeus. As he sat from the roadside begging, he overheard that Jesus of Nazareth was just then walking by him. He began to shout, "'Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!'" When Christ called him over He asked Bartimaeus, "51'What do you want me to do for you?' The blind man said, 'Rabbi, I want to see,'" (Mark 10:46-52). And that answer was all it took, for after the man washed his face as Jesus had instructed him to, immediately his sight was restore. Again, Christ told the blind man and us, it was his faith that healed him. In all three examples from the book of Mark, not once did we hear Christ say 'it was because of Me that you were healed' or 'it was because of My Father your charity your donation etc. It was never any of those things. The gift of healing was given by the Lord to those blind men solely because of their demonstrated and committed faith that they had for Christ. We too share that deep faith for God though we have not yet seen Him. And unlike what it would cost us to seek healing from a human healer, all the Divine Healer asks for is our continued faith in Him. There is no magic in how or why the people during Christ's time received healing from Him. The very same total healing has always been available to us and to all mankind for all times. To make it happen faith is all that's ever needed or have ever been needed. With what other healer would the charge ever be so cheap? My name is Mai-Anh Le. I'm a 35 year old Catholic woman who's currently suffering from a complicated case of chronic lyme disease though I am healing. Before this illness I was an mechanical engineer for NASA. I loved my work and the things I was able to do, but the lyme has changed much of my lif Article Source: http://www.faithwriters.com |