The prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise them up. Our Lord Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, today, and forever, has not withdrawn His healing hand, nor has the virtue gone out from Him. When once the woman touched but the hem of His garment, immediately her issue of blood was stanched. Think you not that He who knows the very number of the hairs of your head regards also the channels through which your lifeblood flows? The Tree of Life bears leaves for the healing of the nations, and those leaves, applied by the Spirit, can calm the troubled current of your veins as surely as they can cure the malady of sin. The body, that poor tent in which the soul sojourns, is subject to a thousand ills, yet He who made it can repair it, He who redeemed the whole man will not leave the bodily frame without His tender care. Cast your care upon Him, for He cares for you.
But remember this also, that your real sickness goes deeper than the surging of the blood. The root of all our woe lies in the estrangement of the heart from God, and that is healed only by the blood of Jesus Christ His Son, which cleanses us from all sin. The same hand that brings pardon brings healing, as when our Lord said to the sick of the palsy, Son, be of good cheer; your sins are forgiven you, and then rose up the man as one made whole. Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and trust that the blood which has spoken peace to your conscience can speak health to your body. Underneath the visible disorder there may be a deeper unrest which only the Great Physician, who reads the heart, can fully know and cure. Make a confidant of Jesus; tell Him your trouble as a child tells a father, for He took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses. The one plant of renown yields leaves that affect the very lifeblood and change the nature, bringing peace where agitation reigned within.
That precious blood of the Paschal Lamb, when seen upon the doorposts, caused the destroying angel to pass over. And shall not the same blood, applied now by faith, speak better things than that of Abel? The blood of Abel cried from the ground for vengeance, but the blood of Jesus speaks to God for mercy, for peace, for restoration. It is not your estimate of that blood, nor your feelings about your condition, that avails, but the blood itself. When God sees the blood, He passes over. When the soul is sheltered by that eternal propitiation, the whole man, body and spirit, is under the divine guardianship. Fear not, then, that the Lord would heal your body and leave your soul unsaved. O you who petition for stable health, ask to be forgiven first and to know that your sins are forgiven you, and healing often comes from the pardoning hand. The Savior took Peter’s wife’s mother by the hand, lifted her up, and the fever fled, and immediately she arose and ministered to them. A touch from Him, a real contact of faith with the living and ascended Lord, carries with it no less efficacy now.
Be not anxious, saying, What shall we eat, or what shall we drink, or with what medicine shall we be restored? The life is more than meat, and the body than raiment. To seek after comfort as well as existence is natural, and the Spirit helps our infirmities as we groan within ourselves. Look for that bright day promised when the Sun of Righteousness shall arise with healing in His wings, when no inhabitant shall say, I am sick, for the people who dwell there shall be forgiven their iniquity. That is for the glory life in its fullness, but the down payment of it is given to faith even now. Wait upon the Lord with attentive hearing of His Word, for faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God. The healing power is often conspicuously present where Christ is being taught. Let the teaching of Jesus drop as the rain, and His speech distil as the dew, and you shall find that He links the cure with the Word.
If He grants you immediately to feel the ebbing of the tide of distress, praise Him with a grateful heart, and let your service to Him begin afresh. If He wills that the affliction should tarry yet a little while, know that His grace is sufficient for you, and His strength is made perfect in weakness. The abiding power of the healing leaves keeps the soul in perpetual health, even when the body groans, and that power shall keep you, world without end, until the night is gone and the gloomy morning brightens into eternal noon. We are on our way, believer, to eternal health, where the inhabitant shall no more say, I am sick. Until then, trust the Great Physician, who has the keys of death and of Hades, and rest in His blessed will, knowing that all things work together for good to them that love God.
Let the peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your heart and mind through Christ Jesus. God grant that the healing influences of the Tree of Life may fall abundantly upon you, till you walk in newness of strength. Amen.