If someone we love is not healed, what happens to our faith?
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I have learned the heard way that sometimes we can pray and have all the faith we want but healing never comes at least not in our time frame or in the way we want it too. When Stephanies dad was at his absolute worst last month I begged and pleaded with God to heal him I even offered many times to take his illness upon myself, foolish I know but that is just how I am I cannot stand to see others suffering. Of course he didn't heal him like I wanted but he is doing better however in that time I became so angry at God because I was willing to go so far so that he and her family would not have to suffer anymore and yet it was like God was just sitting there but it took me to point where I was destroying myself and it became bad like really bad and so I tried to just trust God knew what he was doing.
I don't doubt my faith in him and what he is able to do weakened in the slightest in fact it was because of how much I believed in his power that I was so angry at him I think however my faith in how he would handle the situation did weaken. I have always been so limited in this in every aspect especially in what I can do for others and so knowing how a single prayer is far more than enough to make the impossible possible and my utter exhaustion of being so powerless and incapability of being able to help people not suffer took it's toll me. I knew how faith works and I knew how he does things in his timing and in his way not ours I had the knowledge of how this all works but when your faced with it yourself and when you are willing to go so far for others to not have to suffer and yet not a single thing seems to be done it's an entirely different thing than when you talk about it.
Even now the one gift I treasure more than anything else that I lack is the gift of healing not even just physical wounds or suffering but the inner ones too, I have suffered in this life physically mentally emotionally and spiritually and it is because of this I don't want anyone else to suffer like this if I can help it even if it's merely by a single prayer I want him to take way peoples pain and suffering.
I don't doubt my faith in him and what he is able to do weakened in the slightest in fact it was because of how much I believed in his power that I was so angry at him I think however my faith in how he would handle the situation did weaken. I have always been so limited in this in every aspect especially in what I can do for others and so knowing how a single prayer is far more than enough to make the impossible possible and my utter exhaustion of being so powerless and incapability of being able to help people not suffer took it's toll me. I knew how faith works and I knew how he does things in his timing and in his way not ours I had the knowledge of how this all works but when your faced with it yourself and when you are willing to go so far for others to not have to suffer and yet not a single thing seems to be done it's an entirely different thing than when you talk about it.
Even now the one gift I treasure more than anything else that I lack is the gift of healing not even just physical wounds or suffering but the inner ones too, I have suffered in this life physically mentally emotionally and spiritually and it is because of this I don't want anyone else to suffer like this if I can help it even if it's merely by a single prayer I want him to take way peoples pain and suffering.
It's just how God made me sweetie I am like that for everyone because that is how love is I often times will even weep for people I have no idea of I just am suddenly overwhelmed by this deep pouring of love and perhaps it makes sense that he would gift me in that manner to be able to have empathy for people like that as I am an emotional person after all.
I remember a couple years ago how i was in a free poetry site and even though I have never even had a child let alone lost one I was able to write a poem of the pain and utter sorrow of losing one, even when I talk about the subject here on cc which I have done several times I can feel the depth of that pain and sorrow that no one could ever imagine.
I mean it becomes so deep and so painful that i feel like crying out in anguish and tears feeling the depth of that pain and sorrow of losing a child echo in that shriek of anguish that cannot even be described in words the only word I can use to describe the level of such anguish is inhuman.
However in writing that poem lots of parents who lost children who read it messaged me personally of how my poem helped to ease their pain and how it was as if I had spoken their own hearts.
I remember a couple years ago how i was in a free poetry site and even though I have never even had a child let alone lost one I was able to write a poem of the pain and utter sorrow of losing one, even when I talk about the subject here on cc which I have done several times I can feel the depth of that pain and sorrow that no one could ever imagine.
I mean it becomes so deep and so painful that i feel like crying out in anguish and tears feeling the depth of that pain and sorrow of losing a child echo in that shriek of anguish that cannot even be described in words the only word I can use to describe the level of such anguish is inhuman.
However in writing that poem lots of parents who lost children who read it messaged me personally of how my poem helped to ease their pain and how it was as if I had spoken their own hearts.
D
If'n you two are to become you one, (married), some of this is stuff you want to tell, because God works it out together with both of you together.
Often I've kept stuff from John until after, only to find out he was at the same place I was but didn't want to burden me with it. Sometimes two crutches walking together in a hobbly kind of way, is exactly how God wanted that part to work out.
I used to get mad at John's wheelchair, because it was half an inch shorter than the sides of our trunk, so getting it in the trunk was a feat of engineering, and I don't have brain cell of engineering skills in my brain. That plus lifting over 15 pounds is something I can't do without pain the next day. (Don't know how much a wheelchair weighs, but picking it up folded and sideways had to be more than 15 pounds of strength. lol) I strongly suspect I was never mad at the wheelchair. I was mad at needing the wheelchair.
So, I'd get mad at the wheelchair. And I tried hiding it from John, which is a thing when he's in the car already. (The trunk isn't so muffled that the man in the car can't hear the woman putting stuff in the trunk muttering under her breath.
) He hobbled out of the car one time and caught my furious face. Then he joined in on getting mad at the wheelchair too.
Suddenly something weighing heavily on me, made us both laugh.
And the following week, he knew I wasn't mad at the wheelchair anymore.
(The damn walker, but not the wheelchair. lol)
You're in this together. If God knows, somewhere along the way, it's okay if she/he knows. Probably not a good time to bring it up when Steph was terrified. But geesh, she's happy to know now, so somewhere in between then and now would have been good.
AND, she's still scared, so it's good company to be scared together. There's stuff she can't tell her dad. Be her sounding board.
And, likewise, there is stuff you can't tell your family, (and family doesn't have to be biological), about what you're going through with Steph. Let her be your sounding board.
I had PTSD by the time John got home. So did John. We're still putting the pieces together by talking about what happened. But because we both talked, and talked often, the PTSD is history.
Often I've kept stuff from John until after, only to find out he was at the same place I was but didn't want to burden me with it. Sometimes two crutches walking together in a hobbly kind of way, is exactly how God wanted that part to work out.
I used to get mad at John's wheelchair, because it was half an inch shorter than the sides of our trunk, so getting it in the trunk was a feat of engineering, and I don't have brain cell of engineering skills in my brain. That plus lifting over 15 pounds is something I can't do without pain the next day. (Don't know how much a wheelchair weighs, but picking it up folded and sideways had to be more than 15 pounds of strength. lol) I strongly suspect I was never mad at the wheelchair. I was mad at needing the wheelchair.
So, I'd get mad at the wheelchair. And I tried hiding it from John, which is a thing when he's in the car already. (The trunk isn't so muffled that the man in the car can't hear the woman putting stuff in the trunk muttering under her breath.
) He hobbled out of the car one time and caught my furious face. Then he joined in on getting mad at the wheelchair too.Suddenly something weighing heavily on me, made us both laugh.
And the following week, he knew I wasn't mad at the wheelchair anymore.
(The damn walker, but not the wheelchair. lol)
You're in this together. If God knows, somewhere along the way, it's okay if she/he knows. Probably not a good time to bring it up when Steph was terrified. But geesh, she's happy to know now, so somewhere in between then and now would have been good.
AND, she's still scared, so it's good company to be scared together. There's stuff she can't tell her dad. Be her sounding board.
And, likewise, there is stuff you can't tell your family, (and family doesn't have to be biological), about what you're going through with Steph. Let her be your sounding board.
I had PTSD by the time John got home. So did John. We're still putting the pieces together by talking about what happened. But because we both talked, and talked often, the PTSD is history.
I strongly disagree with this post. I've given my reasons elsewhere in different threads and have talked about how damaging this idea can be to some who don't receive a healing despite trusting God very much. I think this is a despicable teaching. Pray for healing, yes, of course. But don't do damage to someone God has given an answer of no to by telling them the fault is theirs for not having enough trust. That's what Jobs friends did. They told him he was going through what he was because of his sin. (Anything that is not of trust is sin.) But it wasn't because of that that he experienced all that heartbreak and loss.
Well, I know that there is nowhere written that physical healing is promissed for an believer. But I know as Gods child I can come with every request to him. And I trust him that he is doing the right, even when I sometimes cant understand it. I do not Doubt that God is Loving me, when he is not answering my prayer in the way I want. He is my precious father!
You are giving a promise which God Never gave and you cant hold. Yes, our father heales sick people today, but not every Sickness and all of his sick Children. To promise this is giving a false Hope and is faith destructing.
What we can know as his children is, that he is not Leaving us alone! In no situation!
What we can know as his children is, that he is not Leaving us alone! In no situation!
If'n you two are to become you one, (married), some of this is stuff you want to tell, because God works it out together with both of you together.
Often I've kept stuff from John until after, only to find out he was at the same place I was but didn't want to burden me with it. Sometimes two crutches walking together in a hobbly kind of way, is exactly how God wanted that part to work out.
I used to get mad at John's wheelchair, because it was half an inch shorter than the sides of our trunk, so getting it in the trunk was a feat of engineering, and I don't have brain cell of engineering skills in my brain. That plus lifting over 15 pounds is something I can't do without pain the next day. (Don't know how much a wheelchair weighs, but picking it up folded and sideways had to be more than 15 pounds of strength. lol) I strongly suspect I was never mad at the wheelchair. I was mad at needing the wheelchair.
So, I'd get mad at the wheelchair. And I tried hiding it from John, which is a thing when he's in the car already. (The trunk isn't so muffled that the man in the car can't hear the woman putting stuff in the trunk muttering under her breath.) He hobbled out of the car one time and caught my furious face. Then he joined in on getting mad at the wheelchair too.
Suddenly something weighing heavily on me, made us both laugh.
And the following week, he knew I wasn't mad at the wheelchair anymore.
(The damn walker, but not the wheelchair. lol)
You're in this together. If God knows, somewhere along the way, it's okay if she/he knows. Probably not a good time to bring it up when Steph was terrified. But geesh, she's happy to know now, so somewhere in between then and now would have been good.
AND, she's still scared, so it's good company to be scared together. There's stuff she can't tell her dad. Be her sounding board.
And, likewise, there is stuff you can't tell your family, (and family doesn't have to be biological), about what you're going through with Steph. Let her be your sounding board.
I had PTSD by the time John got home. So did John. We're still putting the pieces together by talking about what happened. But because we both talked, and talked often, the PTSD is history.
Often I've kept stuff from John until after, only to find out he was at the same place I was but didn't want to burden me with it. Sometimes two crutches walking together in a hobbly kind of way, is exactly how God wanted that part to work out.
I used to get mad at John's wheelchair, because it was half an inch shorter than the sides of our trunk, so getting it in the trunk was a feat of engineering, and I don't have brain cell of engineering skills in my brain. That plus lifting over 15 pounds is something I can't do without pain the next day. (Don't know how much a wheelchair weighs, but picking it up folded and sideways had to be more than 15 pounds of strength. lol) I strongly suspect I was never mad at the wheelchair. I was mad at needing the wheelchair.
So, I'd get mad at the wheelchair. And I tried hiding it from John, which is a thing when he's in the car already. (The trunk isn't so muffled that the man in the car can't hear the woman putting stuff in the trunk muttering under her breath.
) He hobbled out of the car one time and caught my furious face. Then he joined in on getting mad at the wheelchair too.Suddenly something weighing heavily on me, made us both laugh.
And the following week, he knew I wasn't mad at the wheelchair anymore.
(The damn walker, but not the wheelchair. lol)
You're in this together. If God knows, somewhere along the way, it's okay if she/he knows. Probably not a good time to bring it up when Steph was terrified. But geesh, she's happy to know now, so somewhere in between then and now would have been good.
AND, she's still scared, so it's good company to be scared together. There's stuff she can't tell her dad. Be her sounding board.
And, likewise, there is stuff you can't tell your family, (and family doesn't have to be biological), about what you're going through with Steph. Let her be your sounding board.
I had PTSD by the time John got home. So did John. We're still putting the pieces together by talking about what happened. But because we both talked, and talked often, the PTSD is history.
Why should a non-healing affect our faith?
Yes, a healing is indeed a miracle.
However, eternal life in Christ Jesus, now that is a MIRACLE!
Now, before you write me off I come from a church that really does believe that God heals.
I myself have frequently prayed for people to be healed, both at home and on the mission field.
However, whatever happens is in the hands of God...
Nowhere in the Word of God is it said that healing is a guaranteed outcome of prayer!
Moreover we would preach that the healing of some affliction or disease was temporary, while the offer of eternal life in Christ Jesus meant eternal healing on any and every level!
It concerns me that a non-healing would challenge your faith in God!
Yes, a healing is indeed a miracle.
However, eternal life in Christ Jesus, now that is a MIRACLE!
Now, before you write me off I come from a church that really does believe that God heals.
I myself have frequently prayed for people to be healed, both at home and on the mission field.
However, whatever happens is in the hands of God...
Nowhere in the Word of God is it said that healing is a guaranteed outcome of prayer!
Moreover we would preach that the healing of some affliction or disease was temporary, while the offer of eternal life in Christ Jesus meant eternal healing on any and every level!
It concerns me that a non-healing would challenge your faith in God!
In the end, the only miracle that counts is God saving us. What happens in these frail bodies, only matters in terms of "Did it bring us closer to Jesus?"
I've been lucky in my life and haven't had to watch too many people die, that I loved. My father came to Christ 5 months before he died. He was not healed of congestive heart failure, but he was healed totally of sin failure. He is with Jesus now, and I rejoice that God gave me the opportunity to walk alongside him every day for 5 months, teaching him, encouraging him, comforting him and that I was able to answer his questions, and love him before he passed into the hands of our loving Saviour, Jesus Christ.
One of my sons became very sick as a child, with frequent pneumonias. I was Pentecostal at the time, and I honestly don't remember what I prayed for. I did take him to a good paediatrician, who diagnosed him with allergies. We got rid of the allergies, and suddenly, he was better. Eventually he outgrew the allergies, and has been perfectly healthy since then. So, did God heal him? Well, I think God has a hand in all healing, he is the one who gave us the blue print in our DNA for the body to fix itself. But a direct miracle? Probably not! But, I do thank God that my son did not die.
As for myself, I have suffered, and suffered and suffered. The last 30+ years have been agony, since I suffered a bad whiplash injury in a car accident, which triggered asthma, which triggered severe Rheumatoid Arthritis, fibromyalgia, Sjogren's Syndrome, hyperthyroidism, and maybe now Celiac's disease. You cannot imagine the pain of an RA flare. I had a major one in my right ankle on the weekend. I literally could not put weight on it. I had to put anti-inflammatory cream on it, wrap it in a tensor bandage, put it on a pillow and not move it. And I had to miss playing in our worship team, which is my time to praise God in the sanctuary.
So, was that flare, or that messed up reconstructive surgery, or any of the other pain something to weep about? Well, sometimes. But, God has a way of getting a hold of us. Back in the early 2000s, I turned away from God, I felt so hopeless. But God never left me. He kept calling me back, got me reading the Psalms and meeting all those very real people who suffered from all kinds of very real problems. And when my pity party was over, God called me to seminary and gave me a ministry of reconciliation to the hurting and broken.
We simply cannot demand miracles from God. Sometimes, coming back to God and trusting him in a new and better way, is a bigger miracle than turning off the RA gene. Some days, I wish I wasn't suffering, but most of the time, I am happy, and growing, always looking to hear what God is saying to me both in his Word, and through the illumination of the Holy Spirit.
For some reason, being sick is always seen as being the worst possible thing that can happen. But, it is not. I was a chaplain in long term care. I saw so much suffering. But, I also saw perseverance. I saw love and maturity in ways I can only pray God will develop in me. I met a man, who survived cancer, only to have a stroke, who spent his time memorizing the Bible, and sharing the gospel with the other residents. I saw a man who had been hit by a power line on his head, confined to a motorized wheelchair, tell our Bible study that horrible day was the day his life BEGAN! Why? Because he turned his life over to Christ.
How shallow the Word Faith movement is, to demand something God has never promised, in certain healing, but even more, to miss out on the depth and breadth of God's love, for a bit of loaves and bread. Or a drink of wine at the end of a wedding. Jesus performed those miracles to show who he was - the Messiah, the one promised who would save us from our sins.
That is the best promise always! Jesus who lived, died and was crucified, and whom we will meet face to face, one day soon!
PS. I have examined exegetically the false promises of the Word Faith movement with regards to healing. If you want me to repost, just ask. The fact is, the Bible NEVER promises that we will be healed on demand. All those verses - out of context, and twisted.
I've been lucky in my life and haven't had to watch too many people die, that I loved. My father came to Christ 5 months before he died. He was not healed of congestive heart failure, but he was healed totally of sin failure. He is with Jesus now, and I rejoice that God gave me the opportunity to walk alongside him every day for 5 months, teaching him, encouraging him, comforting him and that I was able to answer his questions, and love him before he passed into the hands of our loving Saviour, Jesus Christ.
One of my sons became very sick as a child, with frequent pneumonias. I was Pentecostal at the time, and I honestly don't remember what I prayed for. I did take him to a good paediatrician, who diagnosed him with allergies. We got rid of the allergies, and suddenly, he was better. Eventually he outgrew the allergies, and has been perfectly healthy since then. So, did God heal him? Well, I think God has a hand in all healing, he is the one who gave us the blue print in our DNA for the body to fix itself. But a direct miracle? Probably not! But, I do thank God that my son did not die.
As for myself, I have suffered, and suffered and suffered. The last 30+ years have been agony, since I suffered a bad whiplash injury in a car accident, which triggered asthma, which triggered severe Rheumatoid Arthritis, fibromyalgia, Sjogren's Syndrome, hyperthyroidism, and maybe now Celiac's disease. You cannot imagine the pain of an RA flare. I had a major one in my right ankle on the weekend. I literally could not put weight on it. I had to put anti-inflammatory cream on it, wrap it in a tensor bandage, put it on a pillow and not move it. And I had to miss playing in our worship team, which is my time to praise God in the sanctuary.
So, was that flare, or that messed up reconstructive surgery, or any of the other pain something to weep about? Well, sometimes. But, God has a way of getting a hold of us. Back in the early 2000s, I turned away from God, I felt so hopeless. But God never left me. He kept calling me back, got me reading the Psalms and meeting all those very real people who suffered from all kinds of very real problems. And when my pity party was over, God called me to seminary and gave me a ministry of reconciliation to the hurting and broken.
We simply cannot demand miracles from God. Sometimes, coming back to God and trusting him in a new and better way, is a bigger miracle than turning off the RA gene. Some days, I wish I wasn't suffering, but most of the time, I am happy, and growing, always looking to hear what God is saying to me both in his Word, and through the illumination of the Holy Spirit.
For some reason, being sick is always seen as being the worst possible thing that can happen. But, it is not. I was a chaplain in long term care. I saw so much suffering. But, I also saw perseverance. I saw love and maturity in ways I can only pray God will develop in me. I met a man, who survived cancer, only to have a stroke, who spent his time memorizing the Bible, and sharing the gospel with the other residents. I saw a man who had been hit by a power line on his head, confined to a motorized wheelchair, tell our Bible study that horrible day was the day his life BEGAN! Why? Because he turned his life over to Christ.
How shallow the Word Faith movement is, to demand something God has never promised, in certain healing, but even more, to miss out on the depth and breadth of God's love, for a bit of loaves and bread. Or a drink of wine at the end of a wedding. Jesus performed those miracles to show who he was - the Messiah, the one promised who would save us from our sins.
That is the best promise always! Jesus who lived, died and was crucified, and whom we will meet face to face, one day soon!
PS. I have examined exegetically the false promises of the Word Faith movement with regards to healing. If you want me to repost, just ask. The fact is, the Bible NEVER promises that we will be healed on demand. All those verses - out of context, and twisted.