Healing

Click to read Mark 1:21-45

Mark begins his Gospel, which means Good News, by telling us that the heavens are ripped open, Jesus is tempted in the wilderness and John the Baptizer is arrested. Really? That is suppose to be good news? Yet, as Don Juel points out, when the Heavens are ripped open is because God is on the loose in the world.
After calling Simon, Andrew, James and John to follow him, Jesus begins to heal people. Healing and the church have a strange history. To be sure some of the first hospitals were founded and run by churches, priests were some of the first physicians, but there is also that pesky Exorcist film as well as televangelists claiming to heal people instantly on stage that has driven a wedge of skepticism in people's minds when it comes to religion and healing.
I recently toured a new hospital opening in the city where I live in. I had never seen a surgical room before, but as I glanced in there were computers and pinpoint precision lasers and lots of other cool things that I did not have the foggiest idea what it was used for. The tour guide made sure to point out how state of the art things were and how seriously this hospital would take healing people.
Don't get me wrong, I am glad for the marvels of modern medicine. But I also have bumped up against its limits. I have sat with families who cannot believe the doctor cannot do anything more to cure them. I have seen families ready to say 'goodbye' to loved ones, only to have doctors unable/unwilling to stop. Even with all the best equipment in the world, we know that our bodies are mortal and finite.
And while I don't want to return to a time of pastors as doctors (I am pretty squeamish around blood), I do think there is a key difference between healing and wholeness that we do not talk about. I may feel physically fine, but emotionally be a wreak. I may be happy as can be, but the only thing that seems to soothe my soul is an addiction to alcohol or shopping.
Today we divide our bodies up to specialists. We go to someone who knows all about the heart, to another person who knows all about the pain in our foot, to someone else who helps us work through our emotions and then off to church. Part of the gospel claim is that we are more than the sum of our parts. We are whole-ly (holy) created in the image of God.
The healing narratives tell us of Jesus talking with the person living with illness or seeing people as whole people even with the illness. I pray as people of faith we would see ourselves as whole people, see the connections within us, from our tiny pinkie toe to the hair on the top of our head - no matter how much hair might be up there. I think there is healing in seeing ourselves as whole people, and encouraging others to see us that way too.

May traces of God's grace be found as you look in the mirror and into the eyes of those you bump up against this week.

Blessings