Day 24 - Healing for all the Right Reasons

I admit it, I totally don't get God sometimes.  He does things I don't understand. His timetable is not the same as mine. And get this...Sometimes His will doesn't go with mine.

But you know what?  It is ok.

It is ok for us not to fully understand God and His will.  I don't think we are supposed to.  It isn't important for us to get Him all the time. What is important is that we have faith in Him all the time.

I love the scripture for today.

And it happened when He was in a certain city, that behold, a man who was full of leprosy saw Jesus; and he fell on his face and implored Him, saying, “Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean.”

Then He put out His hand and touched him, saying, “I am willing; be cleansed.” Immediately the leprosy left him.  And He charged him to tell no one, “But go and show yourself to the priest, and make an offering for your cleansing, as a testimony to them, just as Moses commanded.”

However, the report went around concerning Him all the more; and great multitudes came together to hear, and to be healed by Him of their infirmities.  So He Himself often withdrew into the wilderness and prayed.
Luke 5:12-16

There is much to think about here and take in.

Here is a man who is unfit to worship.  Think about that, UNFIT TO WORSHIP.  He had a disease which made him unclean.  For the Hebrews, those deamed unclean were  isolated from others and not allowed to approach anyone.  The were required to call out "unclean" to avoid spreading the disease if they were near others.  They certainly wanted to avoid accidental contact.

I can't imagine not being able to worship because I was unfit.  Honestly, we are all unfit.  We are not worthy to be in the presence of our God.  But because He loves us, we can fearfully approach God in prayer, worship, and praise.  In fact, He desires that. 

To have to call out "unclean?" How humiliating! Can you imagine us walking around calling out, "Sinner!"  so others know we are unfit?  But as the words are finding there way here on the screen, I am thinking that maybe we should call out to others that we are sinners.  It is ok, we are approachable. God loves us and forgives us. He offers us His grace so we may be in fellowship us.  He desires to be a part of our lives.  I gladly call out, "sinner" so others may know what God has done in my life.

I now think about the awesome faith this man had in Jesus.  Obviously he knew of Him and what He could do.  I love what the man says to Jesus:

"Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean."

This man had it!  He knew what Jesus could do.  He also knew that it was a matter of HIS will, not his own.

So many times, we are busy telling God what we want, when we want it, and how we want it.  We don't care about His will.  Fortunately, God knows what's best for us.  He has a purpose and a plan.  He knows which prayer requests will be answered and which ones won't. 

We have to understand that just because we don't get what we want, doesn't mean that He doesn't love us. It means HE DOES LOVE US.  Putting our faith in His will means we trust His love.

Maybe I am reading too much into it, but the following words stand out to me, "Tell no one, but go and show yourself...."

In my experience, there are some people you just can't talk to. You can say things over and over until you are blue in the face and they still just don't get it.  They have to see it.  I have a coworker like that. I tried talking about Jesus to her one day and she was very headstrong in her beliefs about Him, and she wouldn't really listen to me.  She is one that I have to SHOW her who He is.  I think we can all talk the talk.  It is so easy to throw out the name of Jesus and praise His name to your friends and all over the blogworld and Facebook, but if you don't exercise that faith in all that you do, then your words are wasted.  I know some one who will just praise God over and over, yet, she is such a negative person.  She is discouraging to others and brings them down. To me, that is talking the talk, but not walking the walk.  This guy in Luke 5:12 had faith and he proved it!

It was so humbling of him to ask that the Lord's will would be done.  Honestly, that is hard to do.  Many times I selfishly want what I want. (Carson says that when we ask him what he wants to eat. He says, "I want what I want.") I may not particular care what He wants because I just want out of whatever valley He may have me in at that time. But I have learned to include in my prayer requests "please let me be accepting of whatever your will is."

I don't pretend to know and understand everything.

I don't understand why a fourth grader at our school has cancer.

I don't know why God chooses to heal some people and not others.

I don't understand why God allows children to die.

I don't know why God allows some of us to go through pain and suffering while others of us are healthy all through our lives.

I don't understand how He chooses who will go through what.

I simply know that I have to trust Him. I have to have faith in Him. I have to accept whatevr His will brings in my life.