Last Sunday something happened in our marriage that has not happened before in our nearly 36 years together – both Brenda and I stayed home from church because of illness. We have Covid for a second time with many of its symptoms. I won’t speak for Brenda, but the illness is more irritation than misery.
To dull the pain of a sore throat, I’ve chowed down popsicles like a posse of 9-year-old cousins raiding grandma’s freezer. At 3:30 Sunday morning, while relishing the healing powers of grape on a stick (grape because Brenda didn’t buy banana), my mind cleared to think of those who suffer day after day.
The Lord has blessed me with good health, really good health. My back doesn’t hurt. I don’t wear bifocals. No nutritionist says, “Have you tried the Dr. Mike Diet?” yet I don’t have diabetes. The only reason I have orthopedic issues is because I still choose to play a young man’s game, and my knees raise objections. I take no medications to lower my blood pressure or to treat congestive heart failure. I can still enjoy a sack of Sliders® without the White Castle rumbly tumblies.
The upside of good health is I do what I want when I want for as long as I want with few restrictions. The downside of good health is blindness to those who suffer with chronic pain and a callousness toward those who will not suck it up and keep going. The latter looks nothing like our Lord Jesus and the call to Christian living.
People with infirmities were not an intrusion to our Lord; instead, he devoted a large block of time in a day to the healing of people, “the report went around concerning Him all the more; and great multitudes came together to hear, and to be healed by Him of their infirmities” (Luke 5:15). The healing from diseases points to the Great Physician’s greater work, the healing of our souls. The one who said, “Take up your bed and walk” first said, “Your sins are forgiven” (Luke 5:24).
When a mom spends a restless night with a child suffering from an ear infection, doing all she can to relieve the suffering of her little one, she looks like her Lord Jesus. When an elderly husband fulfills his vow “in sickness and in health” and cares for the needs of his debilitated wife, he looks like Jesus. When a son or daughter goes again to his childhood home because dad fell, they lift him off the ground with the same compassion that Jesus made the man stand on his own feet.
Our Christianity relieves us of our sin disease and frees us to feel the pains of the suffering and to ease their sufferings by whatever means the Lord gives us. To this we have been called. Jesus tells of future conversation with his disciples. “I was sick and you visited Me…when did we see You sick and come to You?... inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me” (Matthew 25:34-40).
Last Sunday morning when the time rolled around when Brenda and I would normally leave our house to head to the church building, a sense of deep sorrow overcame me. I wasn’t going to church today because my illness prevented me from going. I didn’t want to be in my house. I wanted to be with God’s people, and I wanted to worship the Lord. But that wasn’t happening. My singular experience is the reality for more than a few of God’s people. How can I help them? How can the church help them?
A prayer: O Lord, forgive my callousness toward those who are sick. O Lord, forgive my thoughtlessness of your gift of good health. O Lord, make me see the hurting of people and to serve you joyfully by easing their hardships. O Lord, prompt me to use my good health not for my own enjoyment but for the aid of those without. O Lord, grant that our church looks like you as we ease the sufferings of those in our assembly.
As always, thanks for reading, and I welcome your feedback and any suggestions you might have for an upcoming Lunchtime Musing.