The God Who Heals

"...for I am the Lord who heals you.”

Exodus 15:26b

Maybe Healing Is Growing In Understanding What Jesus Did At The Cross

One September evening in 2019 I was giving my daughter a bath when I suddenly felt like I was going to vomit. I glanced at my husband and said, "I think I'm going to be sick." To which he immediately replied, "You're pregnant."  He was right, I was pregnant. It was with twins.

I recall crying in bed after I found out it was twins because I wasn't sure how I was going to survive the pregnancy. I felt like I barely got through my singleton pregnancy! 

My husband looked at me that evening, really looked at me and said, "Babe, no matter how much it costs, we'll fix it.  Don't even worry about it, we'll fix it."  A massive part of me healed that night, I just didn't realize it until much later. 

The first part of my twin pregnancy was extremely rough. I was so sick I couldn't keep down any food or water, and I lost so much weight it made my doctor nervous. She prescribed me some medication so I could keep down some food and liquids. It helped some.

The last 2 months of my pregnancy were even more excruciating. I could feel my body shredding apart as my belly stretched to accommodate two babies.  I was in agony. It was during those evenings, while my body shredded apart, that I began to have visions of Jesus. 

I had visions of His body being whipped until He was so marred no one recognized Him. I had visions of His back completely torn apart exposing His bones, and the cross being laid on it, putting splinters into His muscles. I had visions of His skull being pounded as a crown of thorns pierced through His flesh and into His bones. I had visions of His eyes as He looked at me and saw me, and He spoke gently saying, "I did this for you." I began to know and to understand the depths of His love for me, that I was forgiven of every wrong, healed of every hurt, loved in my very depths. 

Night after night I would cry in agony, and night after night He would come to me with visions of what He went through for me. 

I began to understand the real weight of love and the Father's love for His creation, that He would send out His own arm, and then injure it for our salvation. (Isaiah 63:5) But He didn't just buy our salvation. He bought our freedom, our healing, our provision, our sanctification, our holiness. He bought it all. He paid it all. (Isiah 53:5)

I began to understand His love for us and what He went through to buy us back, because I was going through the smallest measure of pain to bring two little babies into this world. He was beaten so that we could know Him. I was shredded apart so I could hold my children. The cost of love is great and I began to understand why He paid it, and just how great was His love for me.

My friend, He loves you dearly. Perhaps your healing will come through the deep understanding of what His love for you cost Him. If we don't truly understand the cost, how can we even begin to appreciate the price tag on our lives? It was through my deep pain that I began to know, I am worth His life. And so are you.

He never sends suffering, for we know that death and destruction comes through the work and hands of the devil. We know we will have pain and suffering because we live in this fallen world. However, sometimes it is after we have suffered a little while that we begin to understand in great measure just how much He went through to buy our souls back from the gates of hell. Sometimes it takes suffering to know the heart of our Savior.

Don't blame the Lord for going through pain! Instead, lean into Him, cry out to Him. and let Him bind you up with His tender loving arms and teach you more about Himself. He so wants to teach you in greater measure about His desire to see you healed and whole.

Maybe Healing Looks Like Surgery

When I was 11 or 12 I was at a friend's house and we were playing in this little creek that wound its way around her home. We had been splashing in it for awhile when I suddenly felt something sharp slice through the bottom of my foot. I pulled my foot out of the creek and blood gushed out of the cut. The fear that tore through my heart at getting hurt wasn't because of the pain of the cut, but because of the emotional trauma that I knew awaited me at home.

At home I was given a lecture about getting hurt, but I was also distinctly aware of how upset they were that my injury might cost them money. I went to bed that night and real fear gripped around my heart, causing me to become afraid of money, of the cost of medical procedures, and trauma began to set in.

The next day my foot wasn't any better, in fact it was getting significantly worse. Part-way through the afternoon I noticed a red line was marching up my ankle. I didn't know much about medical things, but I was pretty sure that wasn't good.

I showed my mom and she got very concerned and went in to tell my dad she had to take me to the doctor, there was no other option. It was either that or I could lose my life. 

I recall there was some rather nasty things said, a lot of swear words mixed in with money complaints and doctor this-and-that.  (I'm sparing you what was really said, but I think you get the gist) But this is what happened while I stood in my dad's office listening to my mom plead that this visit was important - I learned my life was barely worth the cost of the urgent care bill. The seeds of worthlessness began to be sown deep within my heart, and I hung my head in shame that I had been so stupid as to step on something sharp in a creek. This was one of many memories that I have where I learned that if I costed anything extra, or anything at all, that I was a burdensome child. For a long time I wished I had never been born. 

But did you catch what I said? It was a learned way of thinking, and the Lord taught me that all things learned can be unlearned and rewired according to His Word and His truth. I was in my early 20's when He began to deal with this area of learned thought-process, as He tenderly taught me that there was no expense spared on His part to redeem me and heal me.

To wrap up that story so that you aren't left hanging, I went to the doctor that evening and he looked at that red line going up my leg and knew he had to completely clean out the infection. I was sitting on his exam table when he put both of his thumbs on either side of the deep cut that was beginning to sew itself back together, and then he split it open and blood gushed out, again. That's the last part I remember as I passed out from shock.

Later they numbed me up and cleaned the whole thing out, I ended up being fine. Everything healed up great, and all I have left of that day is a scar on the bottom of my foot. Except I didn't realize there were a lot more scars forming on my heart, and I added a new one: fear of doctors who split open wounds on their exam table. I couldn't see the part where he helped heal me and clean out the infection, because the extensive fear in my heart already ran deep, and only kept going deeper.

But this is a story about how the Lord uses surgery and incredible doctors to heal us.

When Mikael said to me, "It doesn't matter how much it costs, we'll fix it," a part of my heart began to heal from the trauma I had incurred as a child. Those words were like a balm to my heart and sweet waters to my soul after years of hearing bitter and angry cursing. My life mattered to someone, and the cost wasn't important. 

I began to see how the Lord had divinely orchestrated certain events to cause an outcome only He knew about. I began to see how He had planned a twin pregnancy so that I could later receive Mikael's words and be healed from so many memories of having costed too much money. My eyes were opened to the unique ways in which He works, and how He brings about a wonderful plan to heal His beautiful children from lingering hurts and years of sadness. His hands work within us in very intricate ways. 

I wish every one of our scars only needed a few words or a sudden touch in order to be healed, but the truth is that the Lord often splits open our wounds with His thumbs, and then cleans out the infected area like a surgeon with his scalpel. Most often we are injured in the very place we need healing, because unless we know where the infection is how can He begin to clean it out? The cleaning usually begins when we cry out to Him to heal the area of our pain, and He never goes to work without our cooperation and permission.

It was almost 2 years exactly from the day my husband said that to the day I had surgery to bring my ab muscles back together. (Otherwise known as a tummy tuck) About 6 months after I gave birth to our twins I began physical therapy to try to bring the muscles back together. I was in therapy for the better part of a year when I asked her if there was any hope of healing without surgery- she gave me a look that spoke volumes, and I knew what the answer was.  I had known for a long time, because the Lord had already been leading me in that direction. I was just too afraid of actually walking in it.

While Mikael's words soothed my heart, they didn't take away the fear I had of seeing a doctor and going under the knife. Throughout my childhood, the door was left wide open to the spirit of fear to come and go as he pleased, and he had wound himself around my life and imbedded roots deep within my heart. I knew part of digging up those roots meant facing the very fear I was afraid of, and the Lord often has us doing that by going into the very battle we wish to run from. In my case, it meant putting my life into the hands of a surgeon I didn't know. But ultimately the Lord was asking me to trust that He would see me through and wake me up on the other side. 

I found an incredible surgeon and had a great consultation. We decided to go ahead with it. At this point my abs were so far separated that you could fit your entire fist in my stomach and feel the organs. We would go for a 2-mile walk and I would have severe pelvic and back pain for days following. I couldn't work out without debilitating pain. Just eating made my stomach hurt. It was time to get over the fear and do the thing God was asking.

The day I booked my surgery a storm blew through and left an unbelievable rainbow hanging in the sky. This was exactly the way in which the Lord was leading me, and it was Him promising me everything was going to work out well. At the time I just wished it could have been a different way, but that's not how God works.

Surgery ended up being a breeze, and recovery was pretty easy (if you compare it to a C-section!) I let my body heal and slowly got back into working out. It was 6-8 months after surgery that I realized I was able to do any workout I wanted without the consequence of pain except for a little muscle soreness.  I was back. I was completely healed and then some. And I no longer feared surgery, or doctors, or the pain that it takes to be healed. I had learned to truly put my hands in the One who made me, and to trust that He will see me through every challenge, be with me as I face every giant. 

While I know the Lord could have just waved His hand over my belly and brought the abs back together, what He taught is that sometimes He's after something so much greater than the healing of the thing we're crying out for. He's after total wellness, complete wholeness.   

It was through this that I saw the demon of fear fall as his head was severed in my presence.  My fear of doctors crumbled into a heap at my feet and I realized that perfect love, the love of a Father, casts out every fear as we walk with Him down the path He's carefully laid for us.

And, if I had never gotten pregnant with twins, I would never have heard my husband say the words that healed so many scars that crisscrossed my heart from childhood.

Sometimes the Lord asks us to walk down a path we don't want to, because we're afraid of putting our life into the hands of a doctor. But what we're really saying is, "Lord I don't trust You and that You will see me through."  And it's this lack of trust, the fear and the doubt, that He's looking to eradicate from our lives so that we can move boldly forward knowing that He is the ultimate healer, and we can trust Him however He's leading. 

Jesus Himself chose Luke, a doctor, to be his disciple. That must mean that if we allow the Spirit to lead us into find the right one, that we can trust they have been given hands that heal and a gift from the Lord.

Sometimes healing comes through surgery. 

***Disclaimer: this is not a word for everyone. I have heard of people receiving dreams from the Lord to avoid surgery! Whatever we do, we must be actively praying and seeking His will and guidance for our life. We can know that if we do that, He won't steer us wrong but will lead us perfectly according to His plan for our lives.

Maybe Healing Looks Like Choosing Jesus To Be Our Savior

At this point in my story you can see that I grew up in an emotionally (sometimes physically) traumatic home. I would actually go so far as to say that I was living in a constant state of fear and anxiety, and just trying to survive it somehow.

Living in a heightened state of fear allows the spirit of fear access to your heart, but it also often brings with it the spirit of anxiety that imbeds itself in our bodies. This spirit of anxiety raises all kinds of hell if we surrender to it instead of actively choosing to go to war against it and surrender to Jesus instead. I would know, for I have seen this giant fall in Jesus name.

I have an entire article on my baptism of the Holy Spirit, you can read it here, but that's actually where my awareness of this giant began. 

I surrendered my life to Christ following college and when I did that, the Lord deliberately kept me in a place of isolation for another 5 months. At the time I believed He wasn't answering my prayers- now I am so unbelievably grateful that He knew what I needed, and what my heart and soul would later desire.

He kept me isolated in a job that I hated, in a town where I knew no one, and I had 5 months to study scripture alone with Him. Because I just had Him, I learned in this 5 months to see the Holy Spirit as a teacher, and He became my ultimate Authority on His word. 

I started in Acts and it didn't take long before the Spirit began to instill in me a desire to speak in tongues, except that I had a very strong fear and had been taught that the devil is in this gift. My word! Can you imagine teaching that a gift straight from the Lord Himself is a place that the devil has access to??? 

It was during these few months that the Holy Spirit began His teaching with me in what to believe, how to believe, and that if it's written in His Holy Bible and I have a problem with it, then the problem lies with me and not with Him. I began to learn how to take my problems with His Word to Him, and to pray that He would align my thoughts correctly, reorder my beliefs, and help me deal with the fear and the doubts. There isn't enough praise in the world that I have for what He taught me in those months, and I can't thank Him enough for "leaving me stranded!"

I began praying for the gift of tongues. Actually, let's be honest, I began to tell Him everything I knew to be wrong with tongues and that everything I was taught about it was correct. He was the one who was wrong. Even now I am humbled by how much He loved me through those years, despite my attitude!

It was sometime after a year of telling the Lord everything wrong with tongues that my heart began to change and I began to want this gift and to ask for it. I still had my doubts, I was still acting like a Thomas every time I prayed about it, but the fear I had had was beginning to dissipate and be replaced with curiosity and longing. 

It was another 6 months or so of talking about it with the Lord that my heart changed and I began to ache for Him to bestow this gift to me. Many years later I learned this is actually biblical as Paul says, "Pursue love, and desire spiritual gifts" in 1 Corinthians 14. The word desire is the Greek word zēloō, which means to covet earnestly, desire, move with envy, be jealous over, be zealous. Paul says to move with envy over God giving us His spiritual gifts!  What does that mean? For one, I was taught that if God didn't give it, then it wasn't meant for us. But Paul is saying we ought to burn passionately for these wonderful gifts from heaven and to beg the Lord for them!

That's what I began to do, to beg for it. I was on my knees crying out, quite literally envious of anyone else who had this gift. I needed it.

And one quiet morning I was hit with a lightening bolt from heaven, baptized in the Spirit, and able to speak in tongues. It took some time to learn it and walk in it, but I now had the gift and started to learn how to steward it.

As I began to bumble in this new gifting and call on my life, learning to speak this language like a child learns to talk, the devil suddenly took interest in me and began to hurl attacks my way. I got into a car accident that left me reeling and injured. A few months after that I was driving home from Duluth (living in Minnesota at the time) and the wheels of the semi-truck in front of me exploded. I watched as tire bits flew all around me and the only thing I experienced was a tiny piece of rubber hit the windshield. But it was enough. 

I couldn't see how the angels flew around my car preventing the tires from blowing through the roof. I couldn't see how God protected my life. I saw the tiniest dent in my windshield. And I began to feel like the my insides were screaming and my ears were buzzing every time I got into my car. I was now having full-blown panic attacks, and I felt so out of control.

I realized I needed to drive in order to get to work, but I could barely get in my car without feeling like Satan himself had a vice grip around my heart.  The fear was overwhelming, and the anxiety caused my heart to race and my thoughts to scatter. There was no "thinking logically" to get out of this mess, I had to find a solution.

I recall thinking that maybe I needed medication to get through, and the Holy Spirit about sounded a gong of alarm through my brain when I had that thought. I turned to Him and said, "how am I going to survive?  I can barely drive!" And the Lord was very clear with me: if I chose medication I was not choosing Him. Who would I choose? 

I began to realize that choosing to go on an anti-anxiety med would be deliberately not choosing God, but also that the Lord called it a who and not a what. Perhaps I will share more on that subject at a later date.

For the purpose of this story though, I will tell you I chose the Lord and not a drug to help me get through. Would it have been easier to go on meds? Oh yeah, for sure. Would I have regretted it? 100% 

I knew I had to survive getting in my car every day somehow, so I did the only thing I could think of to get by. I began to put sermons on every day in my car while I drove to and from work. Instead of listening to my racing heart and scattered thoughts, I struggled to focus on what the pastor was saying about the Word. 

Day after day I filled my car with sermons, and little by little I got better. I won't tell you this was an easy fight, it was not. I won't tell you that this giant only took a few stones and a day to fall, he did not. Truthfully, this was a fight I was in for 3 years. But at the time I couldn't see with clarity that I had had 18 years of fear and trembling being sown into my heart, and that the Lord undid in 3 what my family did over 18. I couldn't see how God cut down the time and not only redeemed the anxiety I had from 18 years of childhood, but also healed me of being anxious as an adult. It wasn't until a few years after being healed of it that I saw clearly how He had worked that whole time.

So why didn't the Lord protect me from the car accidents? I think this is something we can get hung up on as Christians, that if the Lord didn't protect us then perhaps He wanted it to happen. I don't believe He ever wants these things to happen to His beloved children, but on occasion allows the devil's attacks to make it through so that we can see where we are vulnerable and weak. Because if we don't know where we're hurting, how can He come in and offer healing?

The car accidents only brought my anxiety to the forefront, but it was already well established in the background. God wanted it front and center so that together we would deal with it and overcome it. Together we watched that giant fall, and I walked deeper into relationship with Jesus and into greater freedom. Chains were broken and demons fled as I put on sermons, continually looked to Him to get me through.

While the Lord was after removing anxiety from my heart and life, and having the demon of anxiety's head cut off in my presence, He was also interested in stretching my muscles of faith and having them grow. His Word says that "So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of God." (Romans 10:17)  And because I couldn't drive without distracting myself, I (unknowingly at the time) was hearing and hearing and hearing, and my faith was growing greater and greater. As faith grew and sprung forth it began to choke out the spirit of fear and replace it. 

We all have choices to make in this life. We can choose Jesus to save us, and then do whatever it takes in following Him to get us through each day, or we can choose something else to save us. God was very clear with me that if I chose anti-anxiety meds I was actively choosing them to save me, and not Him.  I didn't want that. I wanted Him. 

It was about 3 years or so following the first sermon I listened to in my car that I no longer experienced any anxiety while driving. It was probably around 2-3 years after that it suddenly dawned on me that I couldn't remember the last time I had felt anxious...about anything. In the place I am living in today, I almost never feel the grip of fear or anxiety. Ever. If I do it's so rare, and when it happens I either put on worship music or go back to what the Holy Spirit taught me and listen to a sermon. 

One time in the last few years I felt that anxiety well up and I was like, "Lord!  Help!" And all I heard back was, "Trust your training."  Oh yeah, that's right, I have been well-trained by the perfect Faith Trainer. I don't need to be anxious or fearful, for I have a God who loves me so perfectly that it casts out every fear, every anxious thought. 

Perhaps you haven't experienced the healing you so desire to experience because you're running to everything or anyone to save you, except for the only One who actually does save.

Maybe Your Healing Will Come From Partaking in Remembrance of Him

Shortly after Mikael and I were married I began to get UTI's, every single month. This went on for over a year, and I knew I was under attack (yet again).  The devil was assaulting our marriage, but also my body, and I wasn't here for it.

I wasn't sure what to do to end the onslaught, and month after month of antibiotics were wreaking havoc on other parts of my body. In what I would call desperation, I turned to communion to heal me.

I began to partake of the Lord's supper every day, sometimes twice a day, hoping (without truly believing if I'm being honest) that God would heal me. I confessed every day while I ate the bread that by His stripes I was healed, and declared that because of His shed blood I was forgiven. Sometimes I could barely choke out the words because while my head wanted to believe it would happen, my heart struggled to have hope.

This time it only took a few months before I saw Him heal me. Three to six months after I began taking communion I stopped getting urinary infections, and then they just vanished like they had never even happened. 

In the years following I've only ever had 1. I went from getting them every month to only once in the last 7 years. 

Now partaking of communion is my first response to a health issue or pain - because I know what He did for me. I know (in small part) the incredible price He paid for my healing, and I want to honor Him by eating the bread and drinking the cup in remembrance of His broken body.

One of my favorite things I have ever read about communion from an author I deeply respect is this:

"Once when I was taking communion alone, the Lord granted me an amazing experience. After I had eaten the piece of matzah and was meditating on the cup of His suffering, I sensed His presence with me in the room. I could see with the eyes of my heart that the Lord was also holding a cup in His hand, and that He wanted to drink it with me. 

I held out my cup of grape juice to Him. Just before drinking His cup, the Lord held it out toward me, and He spoke a traditional Jewish blessing: "L'chaim!"  For those who have seen Fiddler on the Roof, you will remember that when drinking a toast to the bride and groom at a Jewish wedding, we declare, "L'chaim!" This means, "To life!" I noticed that the Lord had a bittersweet smile on His face as He pronounced this toast. The Lord was drinking the remembrance of His suffering, and I was drinking nothing but life.

I answered Him, "L'chaim bi'shua," which means, "to life in Yeshua." Before drinking, I added, "It's death to You, but it's life to me."

I sensed that the Lord didn't want me to watch Him as He drank the bitter cup and as He remembered the bitterness that it represented. I closed my eyes, and we drank it together. The Lord's word for His children as they take communion is "What was the cup of bitterness and death to Me is the cup of life to you."

The value of Yeshua's blood is beyond our ability to imagine, but we trust in it even if we cannot fully understand it. This was an incredibly sacred and special moment to me, and I will never forget it."

-Jill Shannon, A Prophetic Calendar: The Feasts of Israel

I have been teaching my children this incredible truth about communion and the price the Lord paid for us to have life. Jill's story brings to my mind the verse, "I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly." (John 10:10b)

I have made a habit of partaking of His body, bringing to my mind often of what He did to purchase my healing, your healing. Whenever we lift the cup and the bread to our lips may we remember, "it's death to You, but it's life to me."

Maybe Healing Will Come When We Cease From Fighting, And Rest

Some battles are won through fighting, and some battles are won through resting. 

It's been my practice for many months now to take communion when myself or someone in our home is sick, and then simply hand it to Jesus and rest in what He did. If I have an unexplained pain or headache, I will enjoy communion and then say at the end, "it's in your hands Jesus, I trust You to take care of me." And He does.

I can't tell you the number of times that He has healed me by just resting in what He did and trusting Him to be my ultimate Healer and Physician. The end of Isaiah 53:5 states: "And by His stripes we are healed."  The word healed is the Hebrew word rapha, which means to mend by stitching, to cure, to heal thoroughly, a physician, repair and make whole. I'm not sure how you read it, but by my standards that's a rather all-encompassing word that means He is a Physician who heals everything!

Recently we had a guest speaker at our church and he gave an incredible testimony of how the Lord healed him. Bishop E.W Jackson had a tumor that spread aggressively in his chest and throughout his ribs. It came to the point that if he wanted to live, the surgeon would need to remove all of his ribs on one side. Bishop Jackson's surgeon said "it's either this operation with fiber glass and grafted skin to create ribs, or the cancer will kill you." He went home and prayed about it and the Lord said to him, "I'm going to heal you." 

(Here is an example of how surgery is not the answer!)

Some time later Bishop Jackson went back to the doctor and he told him, "it's gone!" And his doctor (not believing him) gave him an MRI and looked at it and he said, "there's a little line like somebody went in and took it out."  And Bishop Jackson said, "somebody did."

Not just somebody or anybody, the Physician of the universe. 

(Click to watch the entire sermon)

Sometimes healing comes when we stop trying to bring it about and rest in what He did. I had to learn how to rest in Him, and it took some time of practicing it again and again before I was able to finally do it. It took a complete renewing of my mind to take communion, put it in His hands, and then really leave it there and not pick it back up. 

When Jesus said cast our cares He meant our thoughts. We carry our cares in our thoughts, letting our minds run us ragged instead of taking hold of what we're thinking and discarding the trash and keeping only those that are pure, holy, righteous and truthful. Resting in His finished work is a true learning process of casting every care and anxiety onto Him, and letting Him catch them all. All He gives in return for our trash heap when we hand it over is health and life. 

Meditate on His wonderful healing promises. Enjoy His communion and presence. Put all your worries and cares into His hands, and let your heart and mind simply rest.

Maybe Healing Will Come Through Taking Authority Over The Problem

Well, we're getting personal now. 

A year or so after the twins were born I had been learning how to take authority over problems in my life in Jesus's name. Just like faith is a muscle to be exercised, so too is authority a growing process. When you first start it might feel awkward and uncomfortable. If you asked me to go running with you I'd feel awkward and uncomfortable and in pain the entire time- and you would likely encourage me that if I just kept it up a little at a time, one day I would get to the point where I didn't feel my heart trying to explode in my chest and I would have a smooth, steady running pace. Speaking our authority works the same way.

My first real brush with speaking authority the Lord gave me victory, and I think He did that so I would power through the times when I didn't experience immediate wins. 

One Sunday I had an incredible power encounter during church. Later that day, riding my high, I was lying in bed when I suddenly knew something didn't feel right. I was in the middle of my period and I knew something was going really wrong. I went into the bathroom and I began hemorrhaging blood. This has never happened to me before, and hasn't happened since. No, it was a very targeted attack leveled against me from the demonic realm. 

As blood gushed from me I began to pray fervently in tongues, this probably went on for 10-15 minutes. After about 15 minutes of praying without ceasing the Holy Spirit gave me these words to speak and its as though they burst out of me, "In the name of Jesus and by the power of His blood, I command my body healed! No demon and no devil is allowed to touch me, because I am a beloved child of the The King!" I had barely finished speaking when the bleeding stopped. Completely.

And that was it, I was done with my period for the month. I know, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that I was healed that day by the power of Jesus Christ and His Holy Name. 

It's taken some time to get used to speaking my authority over the situations in our home, but the more I do it, the easier it gets. I have also noticed that the more I speak, the more I see the darkness flee and miracles happen. Sometimes it's just small things here and there, but it makes a big difference in our home life.

This evening as I was writing, my daughter called down from her room, "I'm scared!" As I was walking upstairs I said, "I cast out the spirit of fear and intimidation by the power and name of Jesus Christ. Jesus, because of the shedding of your blood, no demon may enter this place and terrorize my children! Your word says that perfect love casts out fear, in your Holy Name I cast out the spirit of fear and declare instead that my daughter has Your Spirit which is power, love and a sound mind!"

I got to her room and she just looked at me like, why are you here? I said to her, "is everything ok?"  She just smiled, gave me a kiss and laid down. 

Maybe healing will come when we learn to take authority over this world and speak as Jesus spoke.

"Assuredly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven,

and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven."

Matthew 18:18

Maybe Healing Will Come When We Surrender To His Timing & Leading

Sometimes we just have to let go of what we think is best for our lives and trust that He knows better than us.

We can have the best doctor, the best plan, be resting and taking authority, trusting and believing, and it's simply not His time for it. We can pray and fast and be in the Word, meditate and fill our minds with scripture, but the Lord says, "Not yet."

Whenever this happens I ask Him, "What would you have me do in this season while I wait?" And He always gives me an answer as to what He would like me to focus on during that particular season of waiting. 

In John 9 we find the story of the blind man. "Now as Jesus passed by, He saw a man who was blind from birth. And His disciples asked Him, saying, “Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?” Jesus answered, “Neither this man nor his parents sinned, but that the works of God should be revealed in him."

It's tempting to believe that our healing isn't happening because of some sort of sin in our life, because of something in our past, because of the faults of our parents. And while there are cases of being injured or diseased because of certain sins we commit, there are also circumstances and stories like this one: that the works of God should be revealed in us.

Maybe this blind man believed it was some sort of sin that caused him to be blind. Perhaps he prayed, and begged, and pleaded to the Lord to heal him.  Or maybe he just accepted it and lived like that. One thing is for certain from this text though, he was never healed before his appointed time because Jesus Himself planned on visiting him and making him a living, breathing testimony of His glory.

Maybe your healing has an appointed time, hand-picked just for you, that your life and miracle would become a walking testimony of the goodness of God.

After Jesus made clay with His spit and rubbed it in on the blind man's eyes, he told him to, "Go, wash in the pool of Siloam" (which is translated, Sent).

This Hebrew word Siloam has incredible etymology. It's derived from verb שלח (shalah) which means to send; to send whatever from messengers to arrows. It can also be used to describe a plant's offshoots or branches. 

When Jesus sent the blind man to the pool and he came back seeing, He was literally "shooting out a message to the world that He heals the blind." This man became a walking messenger of the miracles of Jesus. He was sent out to prove Jesus is the Savior. 

Perhaps your healing will come about in the right time so that when it does, you will know only Jesus could do what He did, and all you will be able to say is, "Jesus did it! My body was dead but He raised it. I have no one to praise but Him." You will be sent out to declare His hands heal and His voice created your miracle.

I think it's interesting that the blind man washed in the pool of Siloam and that the verb shalah can also be used to describe a plant's offshoots or branches. It's a beautiful tie to the idea that He is the vine, we are the branches. When we continually wash in the pool of Siloam, we are choosing to live tied to the vine, and we come away seeing. The scales fall of our eyes and we see His glory and splendor and wonder and might. We see our Savior, and that His arm is outstretched ready to save us from everything that ails us.

When we get to this place, where we're living content in our walk with Him, we can really trust that He knows what's best and will bring it about in just the right time.

Often in our walk with the Lord we are given the idea of the promise, a spoken word, a vision or a dream. We now know "what" we're waiting for, but He doesn't usually reveal the "how" or the exact "when". I have noticed the Lord almost never reveals the 'how' until it turns into 'now', but let's that remain a mystery as we trust and walk with Him. It's a major aspect of growing our faith.

He very often gives hints toward the 'when'. But even that is generally crypted unless He wants to give a very specific date. I have only been given a specific date once, and He did answer it exactly.

Most often He reveals a certain time-frame or time-line, and my job is to simply trust that He will be faithful to do what He said He would. If only the job was actually as simple as it sounds! But it very often requires a stretch of faith, a deep work of heart-surrender, and a complete overhaul of our mind as we learn to trust that He will show up as God. 

I have yet to see God fail in His promises to me. I trust that He will do as He said He would, whenever He would like to do it.

My Final Thoughts

I hope you come away from this article knowing that the Lord desires to heal you and to see you healed and whole.

I have so many stories of the unbelievable ways God has healed me, I can't even remember them all because it happens with such frequency now. The more I grow in my understanding of Him as my Healer, the more I see Him show up and show off as my wonderful Physician. 

In Becky Dvorak's book The Waves of Healing Glory she writes, "There comes a point in each of our lives when we all have to call upon the name of the Lord for ourselves and trust in His healing grace for our own bodies."  This is the point in which many of us are at - will we call on His name to heal us? Will we trust in what He did to save us? Can we accept that His grace is enough for our weaknesses?

My dear friend, you are so precious to Him. It doesn't matter what you were told, how you grew up, or even what you did yesterday. Your life is so deeply precious that when He was whipped and beaten, the Psalmist seeing what was to come wrote this of Jesus:

"I can count all My bones.
They look and stare at Me."

How can you count all your bones unless they are exposed? It brings me to my knees to think of my Yeshua so badly beaten that every bone was exposed to the light of day, and it's with this fear and trepidation that I can confidently declare that it is by His stripes that I am healed. I can come to the table and know what He purchased for my freedom, for my health, for my life.

When the days of weakness come, and the pains in your body are overwhelming, may this be the anthem and song that you declare: "it's death to You, but it's life to me."

L'chaim bi'shua,

Jessica