Jehovah-Rapha, The Lord Will Heal

Have you ever prayed for something you really wanted to happen and then it doesn’t? You really wanted things to go that way and your answer was a clear no or maybe you got no answer at all and things just kept continuing along. What did you do? Did you stop praying for it. Did you beg for it? Were you angry or hurt, did it change your perception of how much God must love you?

I came to the realization this week that in may I will have lived a whole two years without a dependable, working pain free right foot. I’ve lived 1 year and 8 months in this state of recovery from a back injury. I’ve had 4 sets of epidurals, 10 total months of physical therapy and been treated by 3 different doctors. My therapist has described my current mental state as grieving a loss. I know there are others, who are caring so much more pain and grief than me but I also know that for me this is a lot. So everyday I pray God please heal me. Please heal my nerves and some days I get no answer, and some days I get “I am healing you.” even though I don’t see it and some days I get “No, not today.” But I keep asking because I know He alone has everything it takes to heal me.

Healing is weird. Lots of people I’ve know and talked to who have received healing directly from God have just miraculous, weird testimonies. I have received healing from God and my testimonies are so weird that doctors didn’t believe me.  I can remember three major instances prior to my injury where God just put his hand on me and miraculously healed me. One time I didn’t even realize it had happened until after the fact it was so gentle.

I volunteer at a convention call Karitos based in Chicago, Ill. In 2016 we were having a mini version of it in Indianapolis called Karitos-Indy. I had been seeing a doctor for a pinched nerve in my neck that was causing pain and numbness running down my arm. I had injured my neck in a car accident years before and the disc’s were swollen and pinching the nerve. We had tried two types of medications for nerve pain and I did not do well on either so I was just bearing it. I was also in physical therapy for it. The day before the conference I had to load my van with supplies and had no help. I pulled my back trying to take apart the car seat and put the seats down to load it. The first day of the conference I was in tremendous pain. I had to have my friends help me lift and carry the registration tubs I needed for the conference. I can remember about an hour after registration sitting on the floor sorting files and realizing that my arm didn’t hurt and my back wasn’t in pain from how I was sitting. I thought back and realized my arm didn’t hurt at all while I was registering guests for the conference. God had healed my arm and back. The pain in my arm has never returned. I went to my follow up visit  with the doctor and told him about my experience at the conference and he was very skeptical. I told the physical therapists, they were in awe at how i could move without out pain but skeptical too. It didn’t matter, I believed I was healed and haven’t had the same kind of pain their again.

A year before at the same mini convention we had decided to have a worship night just for faculty a day before the conference started. During worship one of the leaders was speaking healing over the audience. I was standing next to my daughter who had sprained her ankle a few months before and was having tremendous pain from it off and on. I began to pray that God would heal her ankle. But I heard the worship leader say “Someone in this room is Bi-polar, God is going to heal you of your Bi-polar.” I was diagnosed with Bi-polar 2 in 2010 and had been on medication every since. When I heard that I was dumbfounded. At first I didn’t believe it could be me, I was surprised, and a little angry that God didn’t heal my daughter’s ankle ( But looking back he healed it enough for her to dance all weekend at the conference, ) and I didn’t know what to do. After talking to my best friend and my therapist at that time, who is a christian, I received and believed he was going to heal me. Within 6 months I was off all medications and no longer having episodes of depression or mania. I was medicine free until recently. The episodes haven’t’ returned I am being treated more for depression and trauma from my accident.

The third healing I received is very different from the ones before. I had suffered since high school with severe migraines. I’ve been thru a slew of medications to try to find out what might work to slow them down or stop them. If your a migraine sufferer you know how debilitating they can be. The January before my accident my OBGYN put me on a birth control to treat endometriosis episodes I have had. We had tried the Merina and my body had rejected it so she was trying a low dose of estrogen. I had told her that birth control pills had always cause me to have more migraines. The pills gave me migraines that lasted 2 and three weeks at a time even after stopping the medicine. When I reported it to the OBGYN the nurses answer was always just to give it more time. I was also experience numbness in my hands as well as missing work and my neurologist at the time wanted me to take a EMG to see if I may have fibromyalgia. At the prompting of my parents I went to the elders of my church and asked them to pray over me. In two weeks I saw a new neurologist who put me on different medications. The numbness stopped. I saw a new OBGYN who changed my medicine to a hormone, progesterone and since all of this I have had maybe one headache, not debilitating migraine but manageable headache every few months. I count this as a healing. Yes it took doctors prescribing the right medicines but thank God for those doctors and those medicines and for leading me to the right doctors for this healing.

So I know God can heal. I’ve seen it in my life so significantly. I think that is why I can pray for it every day. I don’t know why this time I’m having to wait longer, struggle more but I know God has a purpose for it, maybe just so I can tell my story to help you with yours. Is there something in your life you need God to heal? Don’t be afraid to ask. The journey to healing is never easy, its not. The woman mentioned in the Bible in Mark chapter 5 had a bleeding issue, she was unclean and was supposed to yell, I’m unclean! when anyone got within 10 feet of her but she entered the city, entered the crowd surrounding Jesus and touched his outer robe. She broke every mosaic rule just for her healing. Friends of a paraplegic had to climb on top of a house, break open the ceiling and lower their friend down thru the ceiling in front of Jesus for him to have healing. Another man laid by a pool for 38 years unable to climb in first before Jesus came to him and healed him. Can you imagine laying in the same place for 38 years! Its not easy to wait on healing friends, but it is worth it. God promises he is the God who heals and I am so thankful for the times in my past he has and that he promises to do so again. I feel that we need to start giving him credit not only on the miraculous hearings but the inmiraculous ones too because he is the orchestrator of it all.  I challenge you to comment and share of a time when God has healed you, miraculously or not.