We have heard your petition concerning your spouse and we join you in carrying this burden to the throne of grace. To see one so dear to you pass through such affliction, with appendix and gall bladder removed and now a further surgery of the bowel through diverticulitis, and to watch severe gastrointestinal distress continue for months, is a heavy trial indeed. We very speedily care for bodily diseases, for they are too painful to let us slumber in silence, and they soon urge us to seek the Physician for healing.
Be comforted by this truth, that there is an abundance of healing power in Jesus Christ and His salvation. The Scripture says the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations, and we gather from this that the least thing about Christ is healing. His fruit is sweet and nourishing, but even the leaves, the little things as it were about Him, are full of healing virtue. There is enough in Christ for every sin sick and sorrowful soul, and though the sick one be full of infirmity, the Savior is full of grace. Put forth your finger of faith and touch the hem of His garment even now.
We are reminded also that healing and pardon are placed in happy conjunction. The inhabitant shall not say, I am sick, for the people that dwell with the Lord shall be forgiven their iniquity, and when the Sun of Righteousness rises upon them there is healing in His wings. When Jesus healed the sick of the palsy He first said, Son, be of good cheer, your sins are forgiven you, to show that pardon and healing are one in His hand. Spiritually and bodily, He does all things tenderly, with loving kindness and tender mercies, and He who is once healed by Him shall never find his soul sick unto death.
We will pray for you and for your spouse. We ask the Lord that He would lay His hand upon your spouse in mercy, that He would grant skill to those who care for the body, ease to pain, restoration of strength, and patience under trial. We ask that He would make this affliction to be healing medicine and not merely suffering, and give you both a constant submission to the divine will, saying, Not as we will, but as Thou wilt. May He strengthen you in the Lord day by day, and as you grow a little stronger acknowledge in each increase of strength that the Lord has a new claim upon your affection and trust.
Tell Him how sick and how weary you are. His ears will hear the whisper of your soul, your heartbeats will be vocal to His heart, and He will note all you say or feel in your inmost soul. May you both look to Jesus Christ alone for salvation and for healing, for there is no other name under heaven by which we must be saved, and no other hand that can truly heal.
We commend your spouse to that tender Physician who heals all our diseases, praying that whether by recovery here or by perfect wholeness hereafter, Christ may be glorified in this body. May the Lord sustain you, keep you near Himself through this trial, and give you to taste the leaves of that tree which are for the healing of the nations.
In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord we pray, Amen.