We're dealing with questions and trying to get some answers to the questions that people
have when it comes to Christianity.
Today, maybe you felt this one.
"If Jesus can heal, why doesn't he heal me all the time?"
Well first off, I would say it's easy for us to think that Jesus hasn't healed us.
If we only think of Jesus' healing as like your body is infested with cancer one week
and the next week the scan comes back clean, okay I suppose most of us haven't been healed
that way, though he does that from time to time.
But Jesus' healing goes beyond that, doesn't it?
There are many of you watching today who do feel pretty good, right?
Um, many who are watching have never experienced cancer.
Praise God for that.
Many of you can sleep well at night.
That's one I think we take for granted until you talk to someone who can't sleep well at night.
They'll explain to you what a blessing it is.
Many of us have had bones that are broken that have, what do we say, "healed", right?
Many of you had a cold or the flu earlier in the year and yet you're here today because
of the amazing way God makes our bodies with immune systems, think of it, without the immune
system a virus could sweep through your body like that and take you out.
Yes, Jesus heals us in so many ways.
It's kind of like we used to say to our little girls when they would get an owie and they'd
come up and want help and I'd say, "Pray to Jesus to make it better."
And they would look up real hopeful and they would say,
"Will he make it better?"
And the answer is yes so often.
So often Jesus does heal us.
But maybe you're watching today and you're struggling with sickness.
Maybe you're mourning the loss of someone.
Maybe they were taken out by COVID-19.
Maybe you have a lingering illness.
I want you to know today that Jesus does care about you physically.
Sometimes Jesus allows, God allows pain into our lives to break us down to our rawest need, right?
Pain has a way of turning us around back towards God.
Pain has a way of reminding us we're not home yet.
Pain keeps us from being satisfied with this life.
It keeps us looking for the only thing that does satisfy - Jesus.
Think of how blessed we are.
Not every life in this world has a moment of knowing God.
Not every path ends in him.
Yours does.
Pain causes us to cry out to the one who did live this same life through blurring, human tears.
Who cried out to his own Father, "Why?"
Who proved to you beyond a shadow of a doubt that he does care for you.
Pain causes us to seek out Jesus.
I want to share with you a touching story from the Bible, from the ministry of Jesus.
Jesus had just cast out a demon from a demon-possessed man at the synagog on the Sabbath and now
they all went back, or the disciples and Jesus went back to Peter's mother-in-law's house.
And this is what the account says.
It says
Can you imagine Peter going to the door and saying, "Hey Jesus you have visitors."
"Who is it?"
"The whole town."
You have to understand what was happening here.
You see it was the Sabbath Day and a Sabbath's walk meant that you could walk, on the Sabbath Day,
from your home to the synagog and back, that's it.
No deviation.
The Sabbath was that special day that God set apart for his people to have spiritual
and physical rest.
And so the religious leaders wanted to make sure that everybody kept that Sabbath.
And it was a big deal.
Even mandating how many steps you could take on that day.
So then everybody who went to synagog, they saw Jesus cast out a demon, but then they
had to walk back home.
And as they walked back home, every one of them was thinking,
"Could he?
Would he heal my dad?
Heal my mom?"
Or maybe the people were at home, too sick to go to the synagog, and their relatives
came back from synagog and they all thought, "Could he, would he help us?"
And so they thought, "Yeah let's go."
but "No, we can't.
It's the Sabbath.
We need to wait until the sun sets.
We need to wait until that new day begins."
But every one of them went home from the synagog that day and they were all thinking the same thing.
"When the sun sets, when evening comes, then, then."
And it's a touching scene.
The whole town, it says.
The whole town is standing in their entryways.
Looking out their doors, watching the sun get lower in the sky as dusk sets in.
All so that they could go to Jesus for help.
Pain does that.
The same is true with you, right?
You come to Sunday morning loaded down with a week's worth of
anxiety and worry and pain and guilt.
You look forward to going to see Jesus for help.
Every person in this account had all these specific problems for Jesus to help.
And the whole town was involved, apparently, in some way.
Either they were sick or they were bringing their sick.
And just picture it.
These streets, there were maybe 2,000 people at most, but these narrow, winding streets flooded
with people when the sun goes down all going to the place they saw Jesus go after he came
back from synagog.
Why?
So that he could help them.
And make no mistake, that's exactly what Jesus did.
He helped them.
He didn't get his Saturday afternoon, after preaching nap.
He had a long day and yet he helped them. Why?
Because he cared about their physical needs.
And friends, I need you to know that Jesus cares about your physical needs too.
And he does spare our lives, 99.9% of the time.
Even if you have a lingering illness, he hasn't forgotten about you.
Because we all know that there's gonna be that .1% of the time when Jesus doesn't heal us.
Not because he doesn't care, not because he's not able to, not because he doesn't love you.
But because he wants something for you so much greater than this life.
He wanted it so badly he suffered death on a cross to pay for your sins and then rose
from the dead to assure you of the place where no one will ever need to be healed again.