You have asked us to pray for your health, and we have done so, and we shall do so again. But I want you to know this: you are not merely a name on a list to be mentioned, nor a case to be diagnosed from a distance. You are a soul, precious in the sight of the Lord, and when you are unwell, He takes it personally. Did you ever notice how the Lord Jesus Christ went about healing? He did not stand at a distance and issue commands as a king from a throne might do. He went into the house where the fever raged. He walked among the mats and mattresses laid in the streets. He allowed Himself to be pressed upon by the crowd of sufferers, and He looked on each one with a gaze that was both pity and power. And what does the Scripture say? It says He took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses. Not simply that He removed them with a word, though He could and did. But He took them. He made them His own burden before He lifted them from ours. Your weakness has been upon His heart.
I do not know the precise nature of your illness. Perhaps it is a thing you have carried for years, a low-grade weariness that saps your strength and dims your hope. Perhaps it is a sudden blow, a great fever of body or of spirit that has laid you low. But this I know: the same Jesus who entered Peter’s little home and saw a woman burning with fever, the same Jesus before whom the sick were brought at even-tide until the streets looked like a crowded hospital, that Jesus is alive to-day, and His power to heal has not withered with the ages. The power of the Lord is still present to heal. And when you ask for prayer, you are not sending a letter to a distant God hoping it arrives. You are touching the hem of a garment that even now passes through the room where you sit.
Sometimes the Lord heals at once, and we leap up to serve Him. Sometimes He allows the illness to remain a while, but He comes and He sits with us in it. Did you notice how the sick man in the Gospel was brought to Jesus by his friends? They carried him, they broke through the roof to get him there. And what was the first word Christ spoke to him? “Son, be of good cheer; your sins are forgiven you.” That seems a strange thing to say to a paralyzed man, unless you understand that the deepest healing a soul can ever know is to be made right with God. I do not say that your sickness is a punishment for some particular trespass, away with such cruel notions! The saintliest believers I have known have often been the most afflicted in body. But I do say that in your trouble, Jesus would have you hear these two things together: “I am with you, and I have forgiven all your sins.” The Great Physician is also the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. Before He heals the body, He secures the soul.
So let your prayer request be more than a cry for relief. Let it be an open door to His presence. You have asked us to remember your health. We do. But we remember you before the throne of grace, and we would have you remember that you are carried there by One who ever liveth to make intercession for you. The tree of life stands on either side of the river, and its leaves are for the healing of the nations. That tree is Christ, accessible, abundant, bearing fruit every month of the year. Not for Adam alone was there a tree of life, hedged about and guarded after sin. No, for you, poor sick pilgrim, the way is open, and the leaves are plucked and pressed to your lips by the hand of Him who loves you.
You may be lying there, feeling very much alone, the hours long and the pain heavy. You may wonder if your prayer caught the ear of God. It did. The smallest sigh from a broken heart reaches the center of heaven. The Lord who counts the stars and calls them by name is not so busy with worlds that He overlooks a sparrow, or a bed-bound saint. He healeth the broken in heart, and bindeth up their wounds. That is His specialty. He does not overlook the body, but He begins at the heart, and then works outward. Trust Him for the whole.
Now to the Lord who is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us, I commend you. Into those pierced hands I place your sick frame and your weary spirit. May the peace of God which passeth all understanding keep your heart and mind through Christ Jesus. And may you soon rise from that bed with a song in your mouth, to serve Him with gladness all your days. Amen.