The Lord Our Healer

A blind beggar was sitting beside the road. When he heard the noise of a crowd going past, he asked what was happening. They told him that Jesus the Nazarene was going by. So he began shouting, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!”

Luke 18:35-38

“That’s a very nice story,” a woman in my Bible study commented after our teacher had read the story of the blind beggar’s healing. “But what relevance does it have for us today? My pastor always taught that this kind of miracle happened only in Bible times.”

I knew from personal experience that God is still bringing healing and wholeness to his people, so I shared my story with her. Although it wasn’t anywhere near as dire a need as the blind man’s, when I was thirty-five, I had developed a severe inflammation in my ribs. I could barely move without pain (a problem when you have three active children to care for), and when I coughed, laughed, turned over in bed, or even took a deep breath, it felt like a knife sticking in my chest. The doctor said it would take weeks, perhaps months, to heal; in the meantime, there was nothing to do but take aspirin.

Nevertheless, my husband and I came to Jesus with this need, believing that prayer was inviting Jesus into our infirmities and concerns. So we asked the Lord to heal my painful ribs. A week or more went by. Then one Sunday our pastor stopped in the middle of his sermon and said he sensed the Lord wanted to heal someone. His description of inflamed ribs sounded just like what I’d been experiencing. When he offered to pray for that person, I quietly got out of my chair and went to the front. After his simple prayer of faith in Christ’s name, I took a few deep breaths and realized every bit of pain was gone—completely gone—and it never returned. God’s power had touched my point of need, and I praised him. So did my husband and all the others who attended that day.

Thank you, Lord our Healer, that you are willing and able to touch the smallest to the greatest of our physical, emotional, and spiritual needs.

Will we give Jesus access to our needs? That is the one great fundamental question in connection with prayer.

Ole Hallesby(1879–1961), Norwegian pastor and writer