One of the most difficult obstacles to Faith is
understanding why God does not, at times, intervene in adversity and
affliction. I believe God is absolutely sovereign... that nothing happens to
His children without His allowance... His permission. I believe... absolutely,
that God heals, and have personally experienced His healing power. And, I
believe that small, mustard seed size faith can move mountains, “if we ask
according to His will.” So, for example, when a saint’s child is suffering with
the final stages of cancer and the healing God does not intervene... well, that
is hard for my faith to overcome. We live in a time when most of our
proclamations of God’s healing power are nebulous declarations involving
assorted aches and pains. The serious stuff... cancer and such, usually prevails,
or we declare God’s healing after a costly stay at some clinic, coming under
the edge of a surgeon’s knife. And many of these “wins” are really delayed
losses, as time so often demonstrates.
Maybe our tendency to
rely on man’s healing power, adding God as an afterthought, is part of the
problem. We take aspirin for our heart,
Tylenol for headaches, Aleve for pain, Nyquil for colds, Z-Pac for the flu, an
assortment of meds for blood pressure, cholesterol, etc., and, of course, we go
to the dentist for a cavity or tooth ache. No wonder we run to man for help
when we get something really bad, letting God play second fiddle... if He is
allowed to play at all, it is the habit we have formed... conformance to the
ways of the world. Of course God can use doctors to heal, but the scripture
basis for this as His methodology of choice is nonexistent. This position is
all too convenient... and safe, implying we are more comfortable when man takes
the lead and God just “helps.” So, our faith in the healing power of God is
eroded by our ongoing daily experience... is it not? Perhaps, to see a real
unadulterated miracle one must be willing to die in faith of God’s healing
power rather than be “healed’ by conformance to the world’s ways. Maybe... just
maybe, this exemplifies Jesus’ command to “Have faith in God.” Could this be
why the first century church experienced healing miracles as a way of life,
because technology had not advanced enough to allow man’s medical science to
supplant God’s power?
Adversity and affliction know every saint’s address for we
are, as Paul stated, “appointed to this”... it is called “life.” We will all
face these decisions at some point in our journey home to Him. Maybe, in the
final analysis, we are far too concerned with the length and quality of our
earth-life, and not focused enough on the Blessed Hope we have in Christ. For
the saint, to be allowed to go home... at any age... by any manner, is, as Paul
put it, “far better” and should be cause for rejoicing, for to be forever with
the Lord is the greatest miracle of human experience. And yet, with the
speaking I realize these words are still in my head, and not fully in my heart.
I am not advocating anything with this thought, only sharing the rumblings of a
heart in hot pursuit of knowing God.
HAVE FAITH IN GOD
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