Friday, January 18, 2008
Miracles needed and wanted
Acts 3 tells the story of Peter and John healing a lame man in the name of Jesus. Peter and John were not Jesus, they were ordinary men, no different from anyone else. Peter acknowledges in verse 16 that it is in Jesus’ name that the man was healed, not through the power of Peter and John. It was through the name of Jesus that Peter had the authority to say in verse 6 “in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk”. Did Peter just assume he had the authority to say that or did he receive a message from Jesus telling him to say that? Last week at Casa Damasco we prayed over a man that is in great pain. He had a leg injury of some kind (I don’t know the whole story) the doctors put a metal rod inside his leg and now he has a very bad infection, his leg is all swollen and the flesh did not heal around the rod and now seems to be shrinking, the rod is almost completely exposed now. It is a horrendous sight and I feel pain just looking at it. We laid hands on him and the Pastor prayed (as we always do) and when he finished another gentleman said “but we didn’t pray for a miracle of healing, that is what the man needs” so we prayed again, for miraculous healing to take place, when we finished we all shook the mans hand, gave him a hug and wished him well and went on our way. When we finished praying I noticed that no one asked the man to pull up his pant leg so we could see if he had been healed.....why? Why did I not ask? Could the answer to that possibly be the same reason why a healing did not take place? I didn’t ask him to pull up his pant leg because I didn’t think he would be healed, why did I bother praying then? Why did I just know that I didn’t have the authority to say “in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk”. I prayed in the name of Jesus Christ, I believe that Jesus can still heal; I believe that Jesus does give the power of healing to us ordinary people. Is it my faith that is stopping the miracles from happening? Yesterday we had another instance when we felt we were on the brink of a miracle but nothing happened. There is a lady that lives on the Island that I am on that has MS, she is in a wheelchair and cannot use her hands anymore at all, her fingers are so clawed that she can’t even turn the pages of her bible, she’s a very devout Christian. Her husband and her two young sons (17 & 19) have to take care of her completely; I can’t imagine how humbling that must be for her and my heart just goes out to her. Since she can’t come to our Bible study we go to her house to do a bible study with her once a week. This week the La Vina had a missions team from the US come so about 4 of the team members were with us as well, just before we left we prayed over her (as we usually do) we were saying our good-byes and one of team members was just over come with the Holy Spirit and she felt that there would be healing taking place so we laid hands on her again and prayed, the lady was crying out, most of us were crying in anticipation of a miracle and nothing happened. Two of the people had visions of her getting up and walking, she said she felt her feet get extremely hot and felt that she should be floating.....but nothing. As I was wiping her tears my heart was just breaking for her, I felt like we had gotten her hopes up and then failed her. Why did God hold back? This is the kind of miracle that this Island needs to bring glory to God; I think an amazing miracle that this would do amazing things for Gods’ Kingdom. The devil has ruled here for so long why is God not taking this opportunity to take back some territory? Or is it not God that is holding back, is it us and our weak faith that is holding God back? I feel like I’m way over my head here.
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3 comments:
Mary, have you asked God for the gift of the Holy Spirit to help you with this? The Holy Spirit will help boost your faith and the Holy Spirit prays through you for these people when you don't know enough about the person you are praying for.
It's so familiar reading this post. I'm at the same place. I'm praying, and in a similar situation (mine is a matter of the 'heart' rather than the body)- I was praying that someone would accept an invitation to attend a Christian function. I found myself praying that it would happen, but assuming it wouldn't. Suddenly, I had this humbling shame come over me.... we are to pray with authority in Christ Jesus and faith. Where is my faith really?
I changed my prayer & attitude then. Though I still firmly believe we only hold that authority within God's will- He may not want what we want, right? Paul was kept humble in his affliction. Others I know testify to this... sometimes healing just isn't for the best.
The Bible says in Luke 10:19 "Behold I give unto you power to tread on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy: and nothing shall by any means hurt you." But also read Luke 10:20 where He says to rejoice that God gave us this power. When we pray for a miracle we must take that power God already wants to give us and declare it for ourselves, (on earth as it is in heaven) accept the power. Then rejoice and be glad for Gods power that He wants to pour through us when we worship Him and praise Him. We don't always know when the miracle will come, some pray for the sick for hours, days, weeks, sometimes fasting, but always have faith and rejoice and trust God to decide when. God is good, all the time, on His time, when we are faithful, forgiving, and rejoicing.
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