CHURCH CHAT #16

 

MY UNDERSTANDING OF THE PHENOMENON OF FAITH HEALING

      

They begged Jesus that they might touch only the tassel on 

his cloak; and as many as touched it were healed.

Mark 6:53-56

It seems to me that I have tried to explain my belief about the faith healings of Jesus multiple times. It started with an old book from years ago. There are a few such old books still on my shelf, but I cannot get rid of this book, no matter what! It was the source of a great breakthrough in my understanding. I am talking about a book by Fr. Louis Evely that has his insight on the faith healing of Jesus.

Father Evely makes the case that the phenomenon known as a “healing miracle” is simply an abnormal acceleration of natural healing processes that are triggered by faith. A “miracle” he says, does not occur from the outside in, but from the inside out. Christ did not tell those he cured, “My power has cured you.” Instead, he said, “Your faith has cured you.”  In the previous chapter, we read about the cure of a woman with great faith, but earlier in this chapter, Mark reports that “Jesus could work no miracle there because of people’s lack of faith.”  Today, we read that people were begging to brought to the marketplaces so that they might touch the tassel of Jesus’ cloak, and as many as touched it were healed. It was not, of course, a holy tassel that caused the cures in the gospel today, it was people’s faith that triggered their cures! Their faith triggered an acceleration of natural healing processes.

What about the miracles that have been recorded at places like Lourdes? Well, there have been miracles at every shrine of every religion, and most of these have been miracles of healing. Father Evely notes that the sole characteristic of a miraculous cure is the extraordinary acceleration of the natural healing process. That which cannot be healed by a natural process is not susceptible to a miraculous cure; an amputated leg or arm, he noted for example, has never been re-grown miraculously – not even a finger. So, it seems that such acceleration of the natural processes of healing can be triggered by faith. It’s not the sacred stone, the holy relic, the water from a mysterious water source or even the tassel of a Jesus’ cloak that causes the healing, but the intensity of faith of those who believe that triggers their extraordinarily rapid healing processes.

I believe in the possibility of faith healing us physically. When I was in the Home Missions, I anointed an old German man who had a deep, but simple faith. He had an ulcer on his hand that had not healed for years. He wanted it to be anointed, believing that God could heal it for him. I accommodated him without much hope on my part, but guess what? He came back a few weeks later and, sure enough, his hand ulcer was completely gone!

Even doctors will tell you that people have mysteriously gotten well when they are able to believe that getting well is possible, while they have mysteriously lost patients who gave up on their treatment.

How does healing work? How do these healers effect their cures? In a nutshell, their cures are due to the belief of the sick person that releases the healing power already resident in the subconscious mind. We know this from watching a wound heal itself without effort on our part. The belief of the sick person, encouraged by the “healer,” triggers an abnormal acceleration of a natural, God-given, healing power we all carry within us. The healer elicits belief from the sick person. That belief triggers healing power. Health is the result. This healing power was given to us when God created us. In that sense, God is certainly the source of all healing.

Faith is more powerful than we realize! It can trigger healing of the body, healing of the mind and healing of the spirit! We often say, "I will believe it when I see it!" Actually, it is the other way around. "Believe it and then you will see it! 

 

 

 

THE BEST LENTEN RESOLUTION EVER

FORGET GIVING UP CANDY AND OTHER FOOLISHNESS!

DO THIS INSTEAD! 

POPE LEO I

Served as Pope from September 29, 440 AD - November 10, 461 AD
"Pope Leo the Great"

 

The First Pope Leo Counseled This During Lent. 

“Now let godly minds boldly accustom themselves to forgive faults, to pass over insults, and to forget wrongs. Let all discords and enmities be laid aside, and let no one think to have a share in the Paschal feast (Easter) that has neglected to restore brotherly peace.”

DO YOURSELF A FAVOR!

You Have Forty Days!

Make Your List Now and Get Started Right Away!

THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE AND THE DUTY TO CHOOSE WISELY

 

If you choose you can keep the commandments. Before man are life and death, good and evil, whichever he chooses shall be given him.

Sirach 15:15-20

There are two great “temptation” stories in the Bible – the temptation of Adam in the garden and the temptation of Jesus in the desert. In the first temptation story, man loses and Satan wins. In the second temptation, Jesus wins and Satan loses. All other temptations in history have to do with these two stories of temptation.

What exactly is a “temptation?” It is a personal inner struggle with a choice that has at its base a desire to do something, especially something wrong or unwise. It is such a part of our everyday living that every time we say the Our Father, we pray that we will not be led into temptation.

I am reminded of today’s reading from the Book of Sirach in the Old Testament. “Before you are life and death, good and evil, whichever you choose shall be given you.” That is worth repeating! "Before us is life and death, good and evil, whichever we choose will be given to us!"

A lot is made these days of our "right to choose," but little is said about our responsibility to choose wisely, not to mention our responsibility to accept the consequences of our choices. Some people are like kids who go through life eating the filling out of the Oreos and then throwing the cookies away. They want freedom without the responsibility that goes with it! They want to choose, but they are not necessarily willing to accept the responsibility that goes with their choices.

 

We may have the right to eat French Fries and Chicken Nuggets three times a day, but we also have the responsibility to eat healthily.  If we only exercise our right to eat whatever we want, without accepting our responsibility to eat well, we will sooner or later have to accept the consequences of our choices. College students may have a right to skip class, but they also have a responsibility to go to class. If they only exercise their right to skip, they must be willing to accept the consequences of maybe flunking out of school.  If we only exercise our right to accept a credit card, without accepting our responsibility for paying for what we charge, we will sooner or later have to accept the painful consequences of our choices - ruining our credit for years to come!  Our culture is now filling up with people who keep trying to beat this basic truth!    

 

Young friends here today, I have something to say to you. One of the benefits of being a young adult is finally being able to enjoy the freedom to make your own choices.  One of the upsides of the freedom to choose is the ability to build your own life the way you want it through a series of personal choices. One of the downsides of the freedom to choose is the freedom to ruin your own life through a series of poorly-thought-out choices. The freedom to choose, combined with the ability to choose wisely, is the ideal. Yet there are many who cannot handle their freedom well and end up losing it. Choosing what feels good at the moment, without the personal discipline to choose what would actually be good over the long haul, is a recipe for disaster.  Hearing about people ruining their lives has actually become a favorite American entertainment. Many think it is funny to watch stupid people on trash TV tell the world how they have ruined their lives and the lives of those who have been associated with them.    

 

Every day people like Judge Judy and Maury Povich make big bucks featuring people who have ruined their lives and the lives of those around them because of the poor choices they have made. They have the "freedom to choose" but choose poorly. They have the "freedom to choose" but they don't have the ability to discern what is of value.  Illegitimate children, ruined marriages, sexually transmitted diseases, financial ruin, family disintegration, squandered opportunities for a good education and loss of reputation are only a few of the consequences of making choices without the ability to choose wisely.

 

To be able to "discern what is of value," we must develop self-mastery. By “self-mastery,” I mean we have to be able to name and then "stand up to" our addictions, our cowardice and our laziness in order to create the life we want to have! We must be able to "handle" ourselves and our cravings - for a higher purpose and for our long-term good. We must be able to continually clarify what we really want out of life, constantly focusing our energies to reach for what we want and consistently dealing in truth rather than self-deception.

 

People with self-mastery approach their lives like artists approaching the task of producing a work of art. People with self-mastery know how to discern what is of value and use what they have discerned to live on purpose!  The spiritual disciplines of both East and West speak often of the practice self-mastery.  I published a book eight years ago on this very subject. It is an autobiography mapping the choices I have made since age six and how those choices made me what I am today – for good or for bad! It is called BETWEEN COURAGE AND COWARDICE: Choosing to Do Hard Things for Your Own Good.

 

One of the sad things about our culture, in which freedom of choice is so highly honored, is the growing tendency to deflect responsibility for our choices after we make them.  If our culture is to survive, the freedom to choose must be combined with personal responsibility. To demand the freedom to make our own choices and then throw the blame on others when those choices backfire is the height of cowardice and irresponsibility - and yet it is so popular in our culture. Freedom without responsibility is wreaking havoc all around us.

 

When enough of us have the ability to discern what is of value and when enough of us have the self-mastery to choose what is of value, our marriages will improve, our families will improve, our neighborhoods will improve, the economy will improve, our churches will improve, nations will improve and the world will improve. These problems can only be fixed one person at a time. In reality, no one can save us from us, but us!  As I like to say, “There is no rescue party out looking for us!”          

 

Discipline is about choosing “delayed gratification” or “good things coming to those who wait” or “the ability to resist the temptation of an immediate reward in favor of a larger prize in the future.” Numerous studies have shown that the ability to delay gratification is one of the biggest indicators of success through life – be it your ability to manage your resources, choose the right spouse, maintain your weight, becoming skilled at a sport or launching a career. Those who can resist temptation in pursuit of long-term goals are blessed with an enormous advantage over the rest of the herd. In other words, too much comfort is a bad thing – long term. Yes, lack of self-mastery has a direct impact on the quality of multiple areas of people’s lives. Those who cannot establish mastery over their appetites and impulses will no doubt see many aspects of their lives quickly unravel. The ability to subordinate a lower impulse to a higher value is the essence of a satisfying life. Leonardo da Vinci was right when he said, “One can have no smaller or greater mastery than mastery of oneself.”

 

The ability to discern what is of value and self-mastery in the face of severe temptation is at the heart of Jesus’ desert experience. To do his Father’s will, not his own, Jesus had to be able to see the difference between what “looked good” and what was “actually good.” Once he was able to discern what the will of his Father was, he needed to have the self-mastery to follow it, no matter how tempting it was to do otherwise!