April 15: “Do You Want to Be Healed?”
♫ Music:
Day 50 - Wednesday, April 15
Hymn of Supplication: As You raised up the paralytic of old, also raise up my soul by Your divine guidance, that I may be healed in mind, soul and body as I cry out, "Glory to Your Resurrection Power O Compassionate Christ."
Scripture: John 5: 2-15, John 14:12
Now there is in Jerusalem by the sheep gate a pool, which is called in Hebrew Bethesda, having five porticoes. In these lay a multitude of those who were sick, blind, lame, and withered, waiting for the moving of the waters; for an angel of the Lord went down at certain seasons into the pool and stirred up the water; whoever then first, after the stirring up of the water, stepped in was made well from whatever disease with which he was afflicted.] A man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had already been a long time in that condition, He said to him, “Do you wish to get well?” The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I am coming, another steps down before me.” Jesus said to him, “Get up, pick up your pallet and walk.” Immediately the man became well, and picked up his pallet and began to walk.
Now it was the Sabbath on that day. So the Jews were saying to the man who was cured, “It is the Sabbath, and it is not permissible for you to carry your pallet.” But he answered them, “He who made me well was the one who said to me, ‘Pick up your pallet and walk.’” They asked him, “Who is the man who said to you, ‘Pick up your pallet and walk’?” But the man who was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had slipped away while there was a crowd in that place. Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, “Behold, you have become well; do not sin anymore, so that nothing worse happens to you.” The man went away, and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.
Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father.
Poetry:
To Be Held
by Linda Hogan
To be held
by the light
was what I wanted,
to be a tree drinking the rain,
no longer parched in this hot land.
To be roots in a tunnel growing
but also to be sheltering the inborn leaves
and the green slide of mineral
down the immense distances
into infinite comfort
and the land here, only clay,
still contains and consumes
the thirsty need
the way a tree always shelters the unborn life
waiting for the healing
after the storm
which has been our life.
“DO YOU WANT TO BE HEALED?”
“Do you want to be healed?” was the question that Jesus asked an invalid man near the Sheep Gate in Jerusalem. After thirty-eight years of living in infirmity, his answer should have been a resounding “YES!” Instead, the invalid man answered, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the [Bethesda] pool” that purportedly allowed for healing. Knowing that he could not facilitate his own healing, the invalid man had looked to the compassion of bystanders, only to be met with thirty-eight years of disappointment. The invalid man, perhaps like us, thought that healing came from our own abilities to hoist ourselves up and tap into the right resources; or, if that failed, to seek it in others. Jesus breaks those false assumptions and, in a single sentence, heals this infirm man in both body and spirit.
God certainly uses people and things to heal. There is no doubt about that. Physicians, nurses, and all healthcare professionals, especially in the midst of this pandemic, have been agents of incredible care and healing. Still, God is the only One who heals. The same medication, the same skill set, the same hospital, and, yet, the results can be drastically different. God alone heals and God alone is sovereign over life and death.
Healing sometimes comes in this life. But for those who profess to follow Jesus, healing always comes, even if it is in the afterlife. This does not mean, however, that Jesus disregards our current illnesses and sufferings. Jesus cares for our physical well-being. The Scriptures show repeatedly that Jesus spent an untold amount of time healing people of many diseases (e.g. Mark 1:34 and Luke 7:21). But there is no doubt that Jesus’ main aim in His incarnation was to cure us of our spiritual disease of sin. More lethal than the coronavirus (or cancer or any other illness), sin invades our soul and brings an eternal death. The Good News, however, is that there is a cure! This Easter we look to none other than the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (John 1:29).
As poignantly written in the song “After,” “deaf, dumb, blind, and lame … beggars, cheaters, liars, and thieves … elite and the ordinary” are all called to “come” to the Healer. And no one is excluded from this invitation. There might be long lines at the grocery store or at the doctor’s office, but our access to Jesus is immediate. Let us turn to him again and again, knowing that He alone heals, cleanses, and provides all that we need in this life and the next.
Prayer:
Loving Father,
Thank You for sending Your Son to cure us of our eternal sickness. And thank You, Jesus, for being Healer, both over our bodies and souls. We ask for healing and mercy upon our world, the world you so love and the world for which You died. We look to none other than You this Easter and always to be our resurrection and life.
In Jesus’ name,
Amen.
Dr. Susan Lim
Associate Professor of History
Biola University
For more information about the artwork, music, poetry, and devotional writer selected for this day, we have provided resources under the “About” tab located next to the “Devotional” tab
About the Art:
Gethsemani Abbey Walking Sticks
Keith Barker
Image size 9.875" x 9.875"
Numbered print of photo
From the exhibition Sacred Spaces in Central Kentucky
The Trappist life is separate from the turmoil of the world “…in order that our monasteries may be sanctuaries of silence filled with the fragrance of prayer.” “Is it any wonder that Trappist monasteries are places full of peace and contentment and joy? These men, who have none of the pleasures of the world, have all happiness that the world is unable to find…When they raise their eyes to the hills or to the sky, they see a beauty which other people do not know how to find.”
“It all adds up to one thing: peace, silence, solitude. The world and its noise are out of sight and far away. Forest and field, sun and wind and sky, earth and water, all speak the same silent language, reminding the monk that he is here to develop like the things that grow all around him: he is planted in the garden of the Lord, plantatus in domo Domini, and his existence has now one meaning only: to reach out for the light of truth and the waters of grace, to sink its roots into God and raise his branches into God’s good air and breathe heaven and absorb its wonderful rays.”(Excerpted from Sacred Spaces exhibit statement by Dr. Linda Stratford. Quotes by Thomas Merton, The Waters of Siloe).
About the Artist:
Keith A. Barker’s photographic work centers around people, places and objects that relay a sense of history and time’s passage. Currently Professor and Art Department Chair at Asbury University, Barker has taught Photography and Graphic Design since 2000. He received a Bachelor of Arts in Studio Art from Asbury College (1991) and a Master of Fine Arts in Photography from Savannah College of Art and Design (2000). Barker enjoys splitting wood, and playing outdoors with his family where they live in central Kentucky.
www.kbarkerphoto.com
About the Music:
“After” from the album Pull the Stars
The Lyrics:
The deaf, dumb, blind, and lame - come, come, come.
Hear the call to all the same - come, come, come.
Oh... Beggars cheaters, liars, and thieves - come, come, come.
Elite and the ordinary - come, come, come.
Oh... The deaf, dumb, blind, and lame - come, come, come.
Take heart, you have a new name - come, come, come
Composer/Performer/Lyricist:
Jess Ray is a singer/songwriter and producer from North Carolina. In May 2015 Jess released Sentimental Creatures, a full-length record which features her on everything from guitar to the trumpet. Sentimental Creatures is an enchanting blend of Indie pop vibes and lyric-driven sensibility, a new brand of music she’s affectionately dubbed “friendly folk.” Intensely spiritual yet deeply real, her songs soar with joy and hope without ignoring the reality of our human struggle. In 2018, Jess headed back to the studio to record her sophomore album, PARALLELS + MERIDIANS, which feels like new territory for the artist, whose writing has ventured much further into the relationships between people. It’s this connection, to one another as well as our connection to God, that dominates the landscape of her newest album.
https://www.jessraymusic.com/
About the Poet:
Linda Hogan (b. 1947) is an American novelist, essayist, poet, storyteller, academic, playwright, environmentalist and short story writer. She is currently the Chickasaw Nation's Writer in Residence. Hogan earned an undergraduate degree from the University of Colorado-Colorado Springs and an MA in English and creative writing from the University of Colorado-Boulder. Intimately connected to her political and spiritual concerns, Hogan’s poetry deals with issues such as the environment and eco-feminism, the relocation of Native Americans, and historical narratives. Hogan’s collections of prose also reflect her interests in the environment and Native American culture. She is a recipient of grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation for her fiction. Hogan’s awards include a Lannan Literary Award, the Mountains and Plains Booksellers Spirit of the West Literary Achievement Award, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers Circle of the Americas. Active as an educator and speaker, Hogan has taught at the University of Colorado and at the Indigenous Education Institute.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/linda-hogan
http://www.lindahoganwriter.com/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linda_Hogan
About the Devotion Writer:
Dr. Susan Lim
Associate Professor of History
Biola University
Susan Lim is an associate professor in the Department of History & Political Science at Biola University. She received her bachelor’s degree in history at the University of California, Berkeley and later earned her master’s and doctoral degree in history at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her current research examines religious dissent in colonial New London, and she is starting on a second project tracing America's spiritual past. She resides in Irvine with her husband, two children, and two puppies.