By Erin Elizabeth Austin
Can you believe it? We’re finally on the last segment of our mini-series on healing and deciphering what God’s Word actually says about it. Over the course of the past month, I’ve had some interesting and often intense discussions with many of you about this topic, and I want you to know, I applaud your tenacity in doing this study. By no means, is this an easy topic. I’m proud of you for seeking God through this issue! So, once more, let’s step into the last part of our study and see what God has to say about healing and death.
I think, more than any other subject, death is probably one of our greatest struggles in believing God. Honestly, I’ve lost count of the number of people who’ve approached me disheartened, ready to quit on God because they prayed for a loved one to be healed and God allowed the person to die. They quote verses like Psalm 103:2-3, which says, “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget none of His benefits; Who pardons all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases,” and then they feel God lied by allowing their family member/friend to die. We discussed this two weeks ago, but let’s stop here for a moment so there’s no confusion. Verses like these are a wonderful promise from God, but if you actually study the original language, it’s written in future tense, meaning God will heal your diseases in Heaven. We all will be completely healed when we reach Heaven, so when you pray for God to heal your loved one and the person dies, God did in fact answer your prayer. The problem is, He didn’t answer your prayer the way you wanted. Again, let me be clear, you should pray and ask God to heal you in this lifetime, and He does sometime answer that prayer; however, you need to be ready to accept whatever His answer may be.
Can you believe it? We’re finally on the last segment of our mini-series on healing and deciphering what God’s Word actually says about it. Over the course of the past month, I’ve had some interesting and often intense discussions with many of you about this topic, and I want you to know, I applaud your tenacity in doing this study. By no means, is this an easy topic. I’m proud of you for seeking God through this issue! So, once more, let’s step into the last part of our study and see what God has to say about healing and death.
I think, more than any other subject, death is probably one of our greatest struggles in believing God. Honestly, I’ve lost count of the number of people who’ve approached me disheartened, ready to quit on God because they prayed for a loved one to be healed and God allowed the person to die. They quote verses like Psalm 103:2-3, which says, “Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget none of His benefits; Who pardons all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases,” and then they feel God lied by allowing their family member/friend to die. We discussed this two weeks ago, but let’s stop here for a moment so there’s no confusion. Verses like these are a wonderful promise from God, but if you actually study the original language, it’s written in future tense, meaning God will heal your diseases in Heaven. We all will be completely healed when we reach Heaven, so when you pray for God to heal your loved one and the person dies, God did in fact answer your prayer. The problem is, He didn’t answer your prayer the way you wanted. Again, let me be clear, you should pray and ask God to heal you in this lifetime, and He does sometime answer that prayer; however, you need to be ready to accept whatever His answer may be.
This is where it gets tricky. People are temporal, meaning even though we know about Heaven, we can’t fully grasp the concept that there’s more to life beyond the here and now. We see what’s in front of us; we feel the pain and hurt of now, and we fail to truly understand we have an amazing future promised to us in Heaven if we have a personal relationship with Christ. Even worse, whenever we encounter problems, we get desperate. We can become so focused on resolving our problems that we miss what God is doing in our lives.
I never truly understood this until I met Sharon. Even though I only met Sharon once, she changed my life more than anyone I’ve ever met. After speaking at a small church, a friend of Sharon’s asked me to go visit her because she only had a few months left to live. She was dying because of ALS, better known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease. For those who don’t know, there are two common ways to die from ALS – either your diaphragm is paralyzed and unable to make your lungs work so that you literally suffocate, or you choke on food, drink, or your own saliva because you lose the ability to swallow, and you asphyxiate. It’s an incredibly painful, agonizing illness which slowly kills you, which is why I was so surprised to meet one of the happiest people I’ve ever met. I went to Sharon’s home and spent several hours with her talking and laughing. When I asked her how she was so joyful, Sharon’s response changed my life. She told me that for the longest time she was too focused on her illness and her healing, or lack thereof. As months passed, God challenged her to not be so focused on her death that she forgot to live. So, she began to daily ask God to help her see Him throughout the course of the day, and He answered her prayer. She saw Him in her granddaughter’s laughter, in her husband’s tender care, in the sound of the ocean crashing on the shore, and in the kindness of a stranger who was willing to hug her when most people were scared to touch her.
That moment challenged me and changed me. You see, two weeks after I turned eighteen, I was told I had one of the most severe forms of lupus and would live a maximum of ten years. When I met Sharon, I was eight years into what I called my prison sentence. It was in that moment I realized I was more focused on my healing than I was on the Healer.
Don’t we all do that? We find ourselves in the midst of a major trial and we so desperately want the problem to go away, we become more focused on the solution than we do on the Problem Solver. Even worse, when God does step in, we often thank Him once and then move on in celebrating the fact our problem has gone away. As I’ve studied Jehovah-Rapha, “The Lord is my healer,” I can’t help but feel we’ve all done God a huge injustice. We get angry if He doesn’t answer our prayer the way we want, we pout like a two-year-old, and then turn our backs on Him. We say He’s not trustworthy, even though He’s daily walking with us through our trials, bringing good into a bad situation.
I took Sharon’s words to heart, and began to ask God on a regular basis to help me see Him in each day. His answer blew me away! When I stopped focusing on the negative, I saw God do things I never thought possible. The amazing thing is I just celebrated my thirty-third birthday. I’m five years past my expiration date. I’m still sick, but by the grace of God, I’m still here. Yet, I’ve realized over the years, my healing isn’t nearly as important as I once thought it was. More than anything, I want to see God in each day.
What about you? What is your focus? Do you see God in each day? Are you focused on the healing or the Healer? Are you so focused on the possibility of dying that you’ve forgotten to live? What do you want more than anything?
Don’t we all do that? We find ourselves in the midst of a major trial and we so desperately want the problem to go away, we become more focused on the solution than we do on the Problem Solver. Even worse, when God does step in, we often thank Him once and then move on in celebrating the fact our problem has gone away. As I’ve studied Jehovah-Rapha, “The Lord is my healer,” I can’t help but feel we’ve all done God a huge injustice. We get angry if He doesn’t answer our prayer the way we want, we pout like a two-year-old, and then turn our backs on Him. We say He’s not trustworthy, even though He’s daily walking with us through our trials, bringing good into a bad situation.
I took Sharon’s words to heart, and began to ask God on a regular basis to help me see Him in each day. His answer blew me away! When I stopped focusing on the negative, I saw God do things I never thought possible. The amazing thing is I just celebrated my thirty-third birthday. I’m five years past my expiration date. I’m still sick, but by the grace of God, I’m still here. Yet, I’ve realized over the years, my healing isn’t nearly as important as I once thought it was. More than anything, I want to see God in each day.
What about you? What is your focus? Do you see God in each day? Are you focused on the healing or the Healer? Are you so focused on the possibility of dying that you’ve forgotten to live? What do you want more than anything?
“Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial; for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.” ~ James 1:12
© March 23, 2017
© March 23, 2017
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