Christian Living

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CURE VS HEALING

Most of everyone has been sick sometime in their life. In some cases it’s bad enough that we have to seek medical attention, be prescribed medication, and take time off from work or school. Other times we simply just ride it out and time is our best medicine. I recently heard someone say something that I thought was really interesting. Before then, I regarded the words, “cure” and “healing” as interchangeable, but now I have a different perspective. The way this person explained it made me look deeper into it and even how it translates to our spiritual life. He went on in saying that “cure” is what’s prescribed to us, whether it’s medication or therapy – its given to us by a doctor to make us feel better and help take away what has been bothering us. “Healing” is the natural process of your body getting better without the medicine or after medical treatment has been given and completed. Working in a medical setting, I have often seen doctors tell patients in great discomfort that he won’t be giving them any medication and the symptoms will have to be left alone to go away on its own. Though the doctor was making a sound, expert medical judgment, I see patients take it like a blow. They visibly appear betrayed and neglected by the medical professionals. Most go away disheartened. Some have the courage to plead for the last time saying, “couldn’t you do something”, only to be met by the doctor’s resolute, “No”. The patient leaves feeling worse than before, because not only does he still have the ailment that he originally came in for, but now it’s compiled over by his emotional helplessness. Coming to a doctor’s office is bad enough, but for someone to be told that nothing will be done for their condition seems like a slap in the face after they have exposed their vulnerability. No one ever wants to hear anyone say, “you just have to let it pass”.

In our Christian life, we have the same thing. God sends us “cures” when he cause our problems go away. He moves a mountain for us, answers our prayer, provides for a desperate need from a mysterious sources, or he heals our literal and figurative wounds. Those are the ones we like. We love it when God give us the desires of our heart, and when he is quick to answer, give direction, or eliminate a problem. We love it when God cures our “illnesses”.

Sometimes, however, we see the other side of His providence, and we don’t find it very appealing. We said we liked it when God’s answer comes in a swift stroke of power on our behalf. But, when God’s prescription is for us to simply heal – we don’t like it. Sometimes God allows us to go through some very painful struggles in our lives -a lot of pain, discomfort, anguish, and heartache, only for Him to seemingly say, “suck it up, I’m not doing anything this time”. As our vulnerability is exposed, and we ask God to take them away and He says nothing, we feel somehow betrayed. Or we feel neglected when we plead with him to cure us of this disease, trial, tribulation, struggle and he gives you a resounding, “No”.

In 2 Corinthians chapter 12, we see this very exact thing happen. Paul talks candidly about an ailment of some sort that he vaguely describes as a “thorn in the flesh”. Paul said that three times he tried to plead with God. He didn’t just ask the Lord – he pleaded with Him. In the end, nothing happened. No cure was sent. No relief was granted. Not even a hope of any future remedy from this troubling issue was provided. God did nothing and said nothing, except for an almost impersonal, “my grace is sufficient for you”. How many of us would react just like those suffering patients in the doctor’s office? How many would like to say to God, “you’ve got to be kidding… you told me to pray and call on you for help, and now you are going to leave me worse of than before?”. That’s almost natural for us to react that way. I was amazed at Paul’s reaction (or non-reaction) as he never got bitter, angry, or even disheartened. He took God’s prescription of healing and went along his way, working just as hard and just as dedicated to this God who has seemingly rejected his cry for help. Job responded to his wife in her frustrated advice for him to curse God and die this way: he said, “shall we only receive good from God and not trouble?”.

What’s our response in this? Do we get bitter or do we accept? Do we lash out or do we rest in the grace that is laid out available for us? God will often allow us to go though a terrible trial or painful struggle only to tell us that he won’t be doing anything for us this time. God is not abusive. Nor does he leave us empty-handed and vulnerable. He gives us comfort as he gave Paul comfort. That though this struggle won’t have any designed exit plans, there is still enough strength, grace, and peace to be able to go through it. There are things, as determined by the mind of the Almighty, that we must uniquely go through for His good and awesome purpose, though it is inconceivably horrific. He knows, as those doctors know, that a cure is not always the best thing. Sometimes our unique circumstances simply call for healing.


God Bless

March M Villareal
[email protected]
www.manswicked.com

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