David Bahn – Reflections

Matthew 4:23-24

Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people.²⁴News about him spread all over Syria, and people brought to him all who were ill with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed, and he healed them.

When we learned more than 4 1/2 years ago that Nici had cancer our world was rocked. Nici is wife to our oldest son, Matt, and as a 30-something was an unusual candidate for colon cancer. She has endured several surgeries, countless procedures, doctors appointments, visits to the hospital (including the famous M.D. Anderson cancer treatment hospital in Houston), chemotherapy, radiation therapy treatments, and with all the difficulties and challenges that a battle with such cancer brings. She is now staying at her mother’s home, about 60 miles from her and Matt’s house, under her mother’s care and with Matt at her side when he can be.

Today the people from a local hospice care center will visit and Nici will enter hospice care.

Jesus’ ministry was marked by healing the sick. He was famous for it – so much so that people would flock to Him from all around to be healed. There was nothing he could not heal. No demons could resist His command. No pain, seizure, or paralysis escaped His healing touch. Matthew simply tells us, “and he healed them.”

While this healing ministry was a significant hallmark of Jesus’ earthly ministry, it wasn’t all that He did. Sometimes He taught. Sometimes He confronted the self-righteous. Sometimes he forgave sins. Sometimes he went off by Himself and prayed. And as all these things were happening, surely there were other ill people who were not healed. Jesus healed on those occasions when the time was right.

I do not know why some were healed and others were not. And while this is an emotionally unsatisfying non-answer, it is where we must go when faced with situations such as Nici, or any loved one who suffers. In place of receiving the answer to why, we are called by God to trust in him (Proverbs3:5-8) with the promise of healing in the context of such faith and trust.

The perfect and total healing to which God calls us comes by way of Jesus, God’s Son. That is the resurrection, and it will be perfect, total, awe-inspiring, and eternal. In the end, this is our only true hope. Even for those healed in Jesus’ day, the resurrection at the Last Day soon became their hope; none of them remained alive beyond the decades appointed for them on this earth.

We say that God heals all diseases – either by his miraculous intervention, or by medical means, or by merciful release. Certainly those who experienced Jesus’ healing touch that day in the beginning of His ministry were deeply thankful. And whenever we receive help at  M.D. Anderson, the Mayo Clinic, or any other place where the healing arts are practiced, we thank God, for He is the true healer. But the greatest and purest thanks and praise will come at the end of time when we receive the ultimate touch of His healing hands.

Isaiah says of Jesus, that “Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows” (Isaiah 53:4). That began here in the first days of Jesus’ earthly ministry. Right now I am looking forward to the consummation of that healing, and praying for God’s mercy to sustain Nici, Matt, and our families.