It Starts Small

When we read the account of Job, we know that four of his friends came to preach over him about why he was in the state he was in. Job and his friends judged his sickness as God was angry with him. The last, Elihu, was telling Job, sometimes God will afflict the body for our goodness. God’s affliction is good to the soul. 

Pain is the fruit of sin. But by the grace of God, the pain of the body is often good to the soul. When afflictions have done their work, they are removed. A ransom is found. Elihu calls Jesus the Messenger and the Ransom. Job calls Jesus his Redeemer because He is the Purchaser and the Price, the Priest and the sacrifice. 

The value of a soul was so high, nothing could redeem them and so great was the hurt done by sin, that nothing less would atone for it, than the blood of the Son of God, who gave His life a ransom for many. When our afflictions are done and removed, a blessed change follows. Recovery from sickness is God’s mercy, when it proceeds from remission of sin. 

All that truly repent shall find mercy with God. The work of darkness and evil are unfruitful works and the gain of sin will come far short of the damage done. 

We have the complete book of Job and know why he was suffering. Sometimes the affliction to our mind and body is because of the sin in our lives. He is grabbing our attention and saying hey you, return to me. 

I have received two great healings in my lifetime. The first was healing of my cancer. I thought God began to move in my life four years ago, but I believe it goes further back. I had just received the bad news that my cancer was not responding to the treatments as they had hoped. A few months later, alone and quiet in my room, I began to realize that there was a good chance that in a few years I would be dead. I was staring down the future that I may never see my oldest graduate from college. My husband and I would never grow old together. I was looking at death. 

I prayed that night and confessed to God I was a terrible Christian. My life was not living for Him but for me. I did not want to be me, but I did not know how to not be me. I prayed I did not deserve to ask Him for more time and would He allow me a quiet and peaceful death so my family would not have to endure what I had to in my mother’s passing. I prayed for His forgiveness for having taken the life He had given me and squandered it for my selfish gain. Just let me die with dignity. 

God I believe saw my heart. He could always see in the depths of it. I desired change. I did not want this life that I had to be what it was. I could not see it then, that there was possibility for Him to reach down and heal me. I did not believe I was ever worthy to live on. SO as the weeks passed, and the years, I carried this guilt. God saved me, but why? 

Because He was waiting to do do another great healing in my life. Because I was healed from cancer and delivered from death I carried shame. I carried guilt. It ate away at me. Evil continued to drag and pull me further and further in to a mental put of sickness in my mind. Constantly, everyday I reminded myself God healed you and look at what you are doing with your life. I was reminded by a spoken evil that I was still this nothing. It led me to drinking to get the noise to shut off. I needed to just be numbed and not think or feel. 

Four years ago (about then, not exact) I found myself asking for help with the drinking. It was through therapy, I discovered my childhood trauma and had to come face to face with it. There was a problem, tho. I could not still come to terms with the current relationship I was in. I could not be honest about what was truly going on in my family and marriage. 

So two years later, it all burned to the ground. It had cycled this way, just about every two years, over 23 years, but this time was different. A nuclear bomb had gone off and there were no more pieces for me to try to duct tape back together. I was done with life. I was done living. Why on earth would God heal me to just be where I was. What on earth was His purpose in all this. 

And so… began the greatest journey of my life. It started with a confession on the side of I-80 and a change of clothes. It start with accepting everything I knew about God was a complete lie and everything I knew about me and the world around me was a complete lie. Over the course of a year, God healed my heart, which healed my broken and twisted mind. 

My pain and suffering was brought on by my own sin. I own my sin. I caused my body harm, my mind was a train wreck and my spirit was dead. It was only through repentance I was healed. Many hate the idea that sin brings us physical or emotional affliction. But what if it is God trying to get our attention? What if He allows sin to destroy us to a level of physical and emotional affliction because of His mercy to heal us? God would never be so cruel as to make us sick, but what if our sickness is our own, and God’s mercy is the healing we need?

Ponder: What afflictions are you suffering today? God is the God of possible and His healing is complete and wholesome. Take time today to pray. Is there a confession to be made?