Categories: uncategorized
Date: 20 May 2009 05:54:56
Christianity Today has this article about prayer studies. These are studies conducted in medical settings to test whether prayer helps healing or not. It's an interesting article which deals with the fact some significant studies have shown that patients recieving prayer can do worse. One of the conclusions the article comes to is that "God is not a vending machine God" and he doesn't just take on the role of the cosmic magician. What the article fails to address is why God might say "no" or "not yet" to healing.
I don't have any words of wisdom on any of this but what I do have is a whole lot of compassion and concern. I believe in a God who can and does heal....I've seen evidence of it in my life and the life of others, but I know that the healing doesn't always come in the form we expect or "need". Over the last few years I have become increasingly aware of Christians, particularly in the evangelical setting, who are being left hurt and disillusioned by the teachings of those who concentrate on the obvious miracles of healing which they have seen rather than the more messy side.
I am glad that something that has started to emerge more in recent years, with the increasing recognition and respect given to disabled people, are the stories of people continuing to live and walk with God when healing isn't given. What we don't tend to hear, though, are the stories which say, yeagh healing took place....but it wasn't the sort of miracle that you can use as a one minute example to inspire. To that end I want to share a little of my own story today. (I know most of you have heard it before....some even lived through it with me....but for various reasons I want to retell it).
If you met me 18 years ago you would have met a young woman about to press the button marked self-distruct....or that's the way I see it. In reality you would have met somebody who was beginning a struggle with mental health issues, which would dominate the next decade or so of her life. The way these health issues manifested themselves included some of those which are all too common amongst our young people today as this disturbing letter and reply in the Times highlights. In my late teens / early twenties I was a self-harmer with an eating disorder. During this time I prayed hard, and others prayed for me but God didn't wave a magic wand. What He did do was take me on a journey, with the help of a few health professionals and more importantly a supportive family, away from my own personal hell. I had to learn to find alternative strategies to use when I was struggling, and I had to learn to be able to live with and within myself. This didn't come overnight, but it did eventually come. Healing occurred, but it was a fragile healing.
Within a couple of years, when my marriage failed, I was back suffering from depression and fighting against the desire to press self-distruct. Again I prayed, and again I went back to the doctor. Rather than healing me at that point God allowed my life and health to plummet to new depths of dispair. Rather than finding myself healed I found myself totally without hope and dealing with the consequences of where that leads. At this point, again, I wish I could say the prayers of myself and more importantly others were magically answered by God. Um, no they weren't. I spent another 4 years or so on the happy pills periodically fighting against feelings of dispair. BUT God did heal me. God healed me by taking me on a journey of healing, rather than giving it immeadiately. God took me on a journey where the biggest break throughs came when I learnt two things (i) to forgive and (ii) to start taking the risk to live.
Now please don't hear me wrong. I am not one of those who says if we forgive God will unblock something and healing can dramatically occur. That wasn't my experience. I did not have a sudden experience where I forgave somebody and was healed. In my case I gradually forgave as I became aware of the bigger picture a particular source of pain had to be placed within. I realised that the outcome of my marriage was somewhat inevitable and that responsibility for the decisions taken often lie with more than one person. God took me on a healing journey of letting go.
At the same time as the letting go, as I say, God was taking me on a journey of daring to risk living. This aspect of healing involved me risking taking on new challenges, particularly the challenge of my PGCE. I moved forward by daring to say I don't want to live like this anymore I want to try and change my life...again not as an island but with the support of friends and family. Through this experience and aspect of my journeying God started, very slowly, to heal me more deeply and long lastingly. God started to help me to see new abilities and worth in myself .... something that had more of a healing effect than any drugs.
A decade on and I'm still on the journey of healing. Yes, it's over 7 years now since I came off the happy pills and a long time since I self-harmed, but I'm still on the journey. I'm still on the journey of learning that I am loveable and of worth. I'm still recieving healing from God for my lack of self-esteem. He's still using friends to support me and move me forward that work of healing. So am I healed...on one level yes, but on another level no. For me healing is an ongoing act which God is doing in my life. The things being healed now aren't so dramatic, but the healing does continue. In some ways we are all like hurt children who need healing from the bumps and bruises which the experiences of life give us. That's the ongoing healing which God gives us.