Would you take that decision away from our sovereign God as the so-called faith healer I quoted at the beginning of this chapter would? Would you dictate to Him the kind of box He should use to store His treasure? Would you complain if the box had a few holes in it to better let people see the dazzling wealth inside?
In my last book I wrote about Cindy, a young woman with cerebral palsy who happened to be the last person to participate in a talent night at one of our Joni and Friends family retreats. Cindy’s mother pushed her daughter, in her wheelchair, out onto the platform. Cindy, she told us, had been working hard all week on her song, “Amazing Grace.”
Several of us looked at each other. We all loved Cindy, but how was this going to work? Because of her disability, Cindy couldn’t speak.
Then her mother walked off stage and left Cindy alone. The young woman laboriously stretched out her twisted fingers and pushed a button on her communication device attached to her chair. And out came the monotone computerized voice: Amazing grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a wretch like me.…
As the robotic voice continued the hymn, Cindy turned her head to face us, the audience, and with enormous effort, mouthed all the words as best she could. What’s more, her smile lit up the entire place.
It was a performance that any opera star or recording artist would envy. To be honest, I had never seen anything to equal it—from that day to this. “Amazing Grace” is not a new song, but that night, it was sung in an entirely new way. Although Cindy was unable to sing the words with her vocal chords, something happened as she leaned hard on Jesus and mouthed those words.
I can’t explain how, but somehow it rose up in that auditorium as a ringing hymn of praise to God. It was though Cindy’s song was backed by an eighty-piece orchestra. I can imagine the angels, filled with wonder, leaning over the edge of heaven to catch every word.
My friend, that’s what I’m talking about.
God revealed Himself in a mighty way, gaining great glory through Cindy’s song in front of that audience—and all the unseen hosts of heaven. No one else on earth could have done that in just the way Cindy did. Because of her profound weakness, the treasure of Jesus’ life shown through in a way that not even the most technically correct performance on American Idol could have come close to matching.
Would you tell Cindy that she was “out of the will of God” because of her disability? That her performance was somehow inadequate? I would be careful about ever letting words like that out of my mouth. I have a strong feeling that God took that performance very seriously.
As Henry Frost wrote:
Christ has many things to think of in planning for a saint; He must have in mind what is best for the individual; what is the greatest profit in respect to His testimony; what is required in his relationship to many other saints; and what is to make most for God’s present and eternal glory; and He will hold resolutely, in answering prayer, to that course which will combine in bringing the largest and most enduring good to pass.14
One more illustration comes to mind. I think of a little Down syndrome boy named Isaiah Nicklas. Barely a toddler, he has sparkling eyes and a shock of red hair.
And Isaiah has a powerful ministry.
How could that be, you ask? How could this child have an actual ministry for Jesus? I’ll let his older sister, Mary, share exactly what her little brother’s ministry is all about. Mary and Isaiah are covenant children; their parents covered them in prayer long before they were ever born. Those children are part of “the household of faith” in the Nicklas family, and from the very beginning, their parents have encouraged them to explore the ministry that God has blessed them with.
Mary was the one who told me—as she was feeding little Isaiah at the table, spooning the food his way—“All of us in our family have a ministry. Just look at Isaiah!”
At that point Isaiah turned and gave me the biggest, happiest grin. At the same time, his eyes sparkled and his cheeks got just like two little apples.
I really don’t know how to describe what I saw that day. “Come on, Joni,” someone might say. “It was a toddler’s smile.” I’m just here to tell you there was something that set that smile apart. It was transcendent. It glowed. And it gave me so much joy to see him.
“See what I mean?” Mary said. “Isaiah has his own ministry, too. It’s his smile!” She was right. The little boy’s face beamed with happiness beyond this world. If you ever wanted to see pure joy right out of the heavenly tap, it was there in Isaiah’s countenance.
Let’s go back to our verse in 2 Corinthians 4:6: “For God, who said, ‘Let light shine out of darkness,’ made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.” Even a little child with Down syndrome can have the light of Christ. I might even say especially a little child with Down syndrome.
It’s all about the glory of God, isn’t it? That’s what Henry Frost said:
Let us then not say God cannot heal and will not do so. Let us rather say God can heal and will do so if it is for His glory.
… The saint is to remember … that God is the judge as to whether or not He will display Himself and His power by a miraculous act, and also when, where, how, and with whom this will be done; and he is to keep constantly in mind that God is just as faithful and loving when He does not so display Himself as when He does.15
Amen!
4. As with other crucial issues, Satan will seek to push us into nonbiblical extremes on this issue of miraculous healing.
Henry Frost wisely wrote: “It is my impression that often those persons who have considered the subject of miraculous healing have been extremists, opposing it in toto or else endorsing it in toto, when neither the one nor the other is justifiable.”16
Extremists! How our adversary loves it when people who claim to speak for God stake out unyielding, brick-hard positions on issues where Scripture allows for more than one viewpoint or interpretation.
Frost went on to say:
Satan, in seeking to destroy the peace and usefulness of the children of God, has many methods of attack, and none is more effective than when he attempts to lead them in to unbalanced and extravagant positions.… Any doctrine may easily be distorted; but here is one which … may readily be thrown into large disproportion by one who holds it and enjoys its benefits. And this, it seems to me, many persons have done and are doing, and with serious consequences.17
To me, there is one thing that seems to be a common element in those who take extreme positions on divine healing.
A lack of humility.
On the one hand you have people telling God what He must do, and on the other hand you have people telling God what He can’t do. I wouldn’t want to be in either position. Who am I, that common earthenware jar we talked about, to dictate terms to the master potter and tell Him that He has to heal me right now? Who am I to tell God what He can or can’t do in today’s world?
Bottom line: He can do as He likes. He is God. As He declares in the book of Isaiah, “My purpose will stand, and I will do all that I please” (46:10). As Job asserts, “He stands alone, and who can oppose him? He does whatever he pleases” (23:13).
I prefer the approach of the leper who came to Jesus, knelt down in the dirt, and said, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.” The gospel writer tells us that Jesus reached out His hand and touched the man, and said, “I am willing.… Be clean!”18
Sometimes He is willing to heal immediately—and He will perform a miracle that modern medicine can’t begin to explain. I remember so well a personal friend of mine, a mature Christian woman who suffered from a severe bone marrow disease. Every known medical procedure having failed, the doctors gave her a short time to live. But she and others prayed, and when she returned to the doctor for examination, he dropped his jaw in amazement. The man was not a believer
in Christ, but after taking repeated blood tests over a period of time he told my friend, “There is no natural or medical explanation I can give. Your situation was beyond hope. All I can say is that this is a miracle.”19 And it was no temporary situation. After fifteen years, the woman was still going strong.
At other times, however—and for reasons we can’t always fathom—He is not willing to heal a particular illness, reverse the course of a disease, or cancel a particular disability. As with the apostle Paul, who had his request for healing denied, the Lord Jesus will give an extra measure of His presence and grace instead.
That’s why I have so appreciated the words of Henry Frost through the years. While he firmly believed in the compassion of Christ and in His power to heal and perform miracles among us, his beliefs were always balanced and tempered by a heart of submission to the mysteries of God’s sovereign will and purposes.
When I get to heaven, Henry and I are going to sit by some bright, crystal stream in a field of wildflowers and have a long talk. For now, however, I will leave the final word in this chapter to him.
We need to have confidence in the power of God in respect to our mortal frames, being assured that He is greater than we think. Let us lay it to heart that Christ is still a miracle-worker, with as much power as when He went about on earth healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease (Matt. 4:23).
As long as we give Him the ultimate right of choice, and are as submissive and thankful to Him when He says no as when He says yes, we may freely urge our physical claims upon Him, and this with much expectation. There are many saints who are not well and many others who are not strong, simply because they have never asked God to be their physical sufficiency.20
Four
What Benefit Is There to My Pain?
Love is something more stern and splendid than mere kindness.
—C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain
My friends who love to hike in the wilderness (and I would be right there with them if I could) tell me that the best trails are ones that “open up” now and then, giving them a wide-angle perspective on where they have been and where they are in relation to their goal.
In other words, it’s great to stop at vistas. If you can find a vantage point in life where the horizon fills your vision and you can gain a bit of perspective, you’re in a very good place.
A flat rock at a high overlook, warmed by the sun, is a first-rate place for a slightly smunched peanut butter and jam sandwich out of the backpack—or maybe just a swig of cool water.
Some trails wind endlessly through the forest, never emerging from the sheltering canopy of tree boughs. They’re nice, too, of course. I can remember walking such wooded trails in Maryland in my early days—especially savoring the autumn afternoons, with the wine-sweet smell of fallen leaves and the crunch of that red and golden carpet under my feet. (The memories are faint, but still there!)
But after a few hours of walking, you begin to want to see some sky. You crave a viewpoint—maybe on a little hill or high rock—where you can cast your eyes back on the winding path behind you, taking a little well-earned satisfaction in your progress.
I think the author of Psalm 119 had found one of those places in his life where he could pause, catch his breath, and take that long view behind him before squaring his shoulders, tightening the straps on his pack, and setting out on the trail once again.
His words remind me again—on a day when I need reminding—that even though pain and suffering may be our experience during our brief earthly passage, our Lord knows how to turn even such disappointments and hardships toward our favor and help. I’d like to capture several of those benefits in the next few pages—and give thanks for them.
Benefit No. 1: Suffering Can Turn Us from a Dangerous Direction
Looking back over his life (if not his hiking trail), the psalmist scribbled these words in his journal:
Before I was afflicted I went astray,
but now I obey your word.
(Ps. 119:67)
“Well,” you may say, “I’ve heard that before. That’s really nothing new.”
But think about it: For this man at this particular place in his life, it was something new. And the thought stopped him in his tracks. It had suddenly dawned on him that the trouble in his life—sorrowful, upsetting, annoying, pressure-packed, or painful as it may have been at the time—had been good for him, and had been specifically allowed by God to benefit him.
Say what you will, my friend, but that is a profound realization for anyone.
No, he wasn’t saying that the trouble itself had been good. Far from it! But looking back, he could (now) honestly admit that it had produced a good effect.
It had turned him … and he’d needed turning.
He had been heading one direction, then—wham!—he was flattened by this whatever-it-was event in his life.
He frankly acknowledged that before this “affliction” came—an injury, an illness, a financial reversal, a broken love affair, who knows?—he was heading down an unwise, unhealthy path. In the back of his mind, in his heart of hearts, he might have known it was wrong. And yet he couldn’t—or wouldn’t—turn back. The path he had felt so determined to follow might have taken him into a foolish marriage, a careless business deal, alcoholism, pornography, estrangement from his children, criminal activities, or maybe just into a proud, careless lifestyle that pushed God to the far margins.
Then the affliction came. The bad thing that became a good thing.
The wound. The disappointment. The setback. The pink slip. The rejection. The heartache. The divorce. The failure. The doctor’s report.
That intruder in his life—whatever it was—took hold of both his shoulders and wrenched him a little (or a lot), dragging him back on course. And now, many happy miles down the right road, he was looking back and saying to himself, “You know that was a very hard thing, but thank God for it! Lord, You are good and do good. I’m so thankful. If I had kept heading in that direction—if I had insisted on going my own way—who knows what would have happened?”
It didn’t mean that his troubles all went away. No, the implication in the following verses is that at least some circumstances in his life continued to bring a great deal of pain to his heart. But even as he reflects on these things, the strong assurance once again wells up in his heart:
It was good for me to be afflicted
so that I might learn your decrees.
(v. 71)
Benefit No. 2: Suffering Reminds Us Where Our True Strength Lies
The scenario I just described is so God. That whole way of looking at life runs precisely counter to the way most people naturally think or respond.
One of the reasons I know the Bible is true is by the way its wisdom runs consistently cross-grain to common human assumptions. God’s Word never, ever tags along behind human thinking and philosophies, never tries to stay in style, never seeks to accommodate itself or somehow make itself “relevant.”
No, God’s truth simply is, like a towering mountain, majestic and serene, dominating the horizon, utterly unmoved by wind or weather or the fickle judgments of the so-called opinion makers in our world.
Take the biblical teaching on human strength.
In the pages of Scripture, authentic strength—of the sort that wins battles, overcomes impossible odds, and takes on overwhelming opposition—walks hand in hand with weakness.
Now, that’s anything but a popular notion. It’s definitely not Hollywood. And yet it is true ten thousand times over. Those in Scripture who take pride in their own might or prowess or superior resources fail and fail again. But those who acknowledge their weakness and their need, those who cry out to God in their heartbreak and frustration and utter inability, those whose need for Christ isn’t partial, but total, find vast amounts of strength beyond their
own.
One of the last words recorded in red in the New Testament, prior to the book of Revelation, are the words of Jesus to the apostle Paul, when He said: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (2 Cor. 12:9).
The word perfect springs from the same Greek term that Jesus used when He cried out from the cross with His last breath, “It is finished!”
Tetélestai! Accomplished. Done. Fulfilled. Paid in full.
To Paul, in his weakness and distress, Jesus said, “Teleítai! My power is accomplished or brought to completion in your weakness or frailty.”
Ah, but here’s the rub. To access that incomparable resurrection power, you and I must first be thoroughly convinced of our own utter bankruptcy and turn to Him with all our hearts. As C. S. Lewis wrote on one occasion, we must “fall into Jesus.”
You would think that this simple truth would be a no-brainer for a person like me, in a wheelchair. But it hasn’t always been so.
I can’t recall how far back it was—maybe when I was at the University of Maryland in the late sixties or early seventies—but I was really big on “being independent” in those early days of my paralysis. I remember wheeling around that huge campus, my face a mask of determination, firmly resolved to “make my own way.”
Absurd? Yes. In denial? Probably. Bound to fail? Of course.
Nevertheless, I’d made up my mind that there would be no special considerations or help for me in my classes, and that I would feed myself in the cafeteria using a special spoon inserted into my arm splint. I didn’t want to be “treated any differently,” although quite obviously my needs and challenges were vastly different from 99 percent of my fellow students.
The truth is, I didn’t want anyone to see me as “weak” or “needy.”
As a consequence of this mind-set, there was one particular Scripture verse I never wanted anyone to quote in my presence. It was 1 Corinthians 12:23, where Paul says to treat the weaker parts of the body with special honor. I looked at that verse as nothing more than a pity-the-poor-unfortunate perspective on people like me in wheelchairs. Treated with special honor? No, sir. Not me. I was young and strong. I was on my own. I wasn’t weak. I could handle it. Get the picture?
A Place of Healing Page 7