Searching for a Miracle

Why doesn’t faith always heal?

October 22, 2012 By 1 Comment

by Carol Howard Merritt

Gospel Reading: Mark 10:46-52

For Sunday, October 28, 2012: Year B—Ordinary 30

My father and I entered a huge concrete block building, crowded with people. My dad didn’t use a cane but he needed to, so he held the back of my neck. I was about nine-years-old and just the right size to be a human crutch. I walked slowly, with the weight of him leaning on me.

My father had a neurological condition that grew worse over time. He had no control over his lower body and moved his feet by swinging his arms and chest. Eventually he acquiesced to a cane, a walker, and a wheelchair. He fought each digression with a hearty denial. But his body never cooperated with his strong will. [Read more...]

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If This is a Pep Talk, I Give It an “F”

What about all the people who are fervently prayed for and never healed?

September 24, 2012 By 6 Comments

by Danielle Shroyer

Epistle Reading:  James 5:13-20

For Sunday, Sept. 30, 2012: Year B—Ordinary 26

I don’t have any concrete evidence on this, but I think this passage may be in the running to win a “Most Negative Spiritual Baggage” award. I can personally count a rather alarming number of conversations I’ve had with faithful people who have felt that they’ve prayed their hearts out over people they’ve loved only to see them not be healed. I’ve also seen my fair share of really terrible theological conclusions and manipulations that are pinned on a few of these verses. [Read more...]

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Sense My Body

June 24, 2012 By 2 Comments

“Reach out and touch—faith!”

by Clint Schnekloth

Gospel Reading:  Mark 5:21-43

For Sunday, July 1, 2012: Year B – Ordinary 13

There is a lot of touching going on here, a lot of sheer physicality.

Jairus falls at Jesus’ feet. He begs Jesus to place his hands on his daughter. The people are swarming (Mark 5:24; CEB). A woman is menstruating. A woman is touching a man’s clothes in public; a woman who can sense things in her own body. Jesus can tell when power goes out of him. A crowd is pressing against Jesus (Mark 5:31; CEB). The woman falls down in front of Jesus.

Compare this to a recent complaint I heard from a pastor attending a synodical event, who was offended that all the worshippers were invited to pat each other’s heads. Or compare it to my own discomfort with dispensing hugs at church unless I am hugged first.

What disembodied souls we are becoming.

Touching Bodies

There is simply something about touching and healing, and there is no getting around the touching and feeling and healing here in Mark. It’s a sweaty, swarming crowd, and in the middle of this teaming crowd there are people bleeding, and others willing to fall in the dust or the muck at the feet of one man in that crowd.

[Read more...]

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Buying Access to God’s Healing

February 6, 2012 By 5 Comments

Why does this business of healing have to be a business?

by Michael Danner

Old Testament Reading: 2 Kings 5:1-14

For Sunday, Feb. 12, 2012; Year B—Epiphany 6

When I read, or hear, a healing story, I tend to take the perspective of those who have not experienced healing. Don’t get me wrong, I can celebrate your healing with you in all faith, sincerity and joy! What I can’t do is stop thinking about what it means to those who haven’t been healed.

Here and Now

My questioning disposition not only pertains to supernatural healings, but also the healing that comes through traditional medicine.

When I celebrate your successful open heart surgery with you, and ponder the cost of such miraculous interventions, I can’t help but think of those without access to basic health care who die of preventable diseases. I find it troubling that we can’t do better. I wonder why money, power, privilege and politics have to play such a big part in healing!

Then and There

Imagine my surprise when I read, again, the story of Naaman. Yes, it’s a story of healing. But then, as now, it’s also a story of money, politics, power and privilege.

[Read more...]

Filed Under: 2 Kings, Featured, Old Testament, YearB Tagged With: , , , , ,

Sweet Jesus, What have you Done?

February 6, 2012 By 6 Comments

Why did Jesus have to set our healing hopes so high?

by Michael Danner

Gospel Reading: Mark 1:40 – 45

For Sunday, Feb. 12, 2012; Year B—Epiphany 6

As a pastor, there is nothing more frustrating than Jesus, doing something or saying something, that offers people hope of healing.

I know, that doesn’t sound like a very pastoral thing to say, but often times that is how I feel. Where I feel this the most is Jesus’ encounter with a leper in Mark 1:40 – 45. It’s a simple, beautiful, story, as long as you don’t think about it too much.

Enter the Nameless Leper

There is a man with leprosy − a disease which is physically and socially debilitating. He sees Jesus and he kneels before him. Begging him, he says, “If you choose, you can make me clean.”

This leper represents me and every other leper I’ve ever met. By leper, I don’t mean people with actual leprosy. I mean everyone who is need of healing of any kind (which is pretty much all of us); everyone who is cut off from friends and family (which is most of us); everyone who sits outside of the community, apart from the life-giving sustenance that community provides (which is too many of us); and, everyone who, in the midst of their struggles, still has faith in Jesus (which is a growing minority of us).

[Read more...]

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Jesus the Exorcist II

January 29, 2012 By 6 Comments

Is healing one of the promises of the kingdom?

by Jodi-Renee Adams

Gospel Reading: Mark 1:29-39

For Sunday, Feb. 5, Year B − Epiphany 5

Jesus starts his ministry with a bang by healing a dying woman and starts an ongoing trend of redefining Sabbath rest.

It only takes a few hours for the villagers catch word of this new teacher and his supernatural authority, and as soon as the sun sets on the Sabbath day, every crazy, ill, or demon possessed person shows up at his door hoping for his touch.

After a typical long night of casting out demons, Jesus tells his disciples that they need to move on; this is why he came and other towns need this preaching, making one wonder what Jesus had in mind when he went out to “preach.”

To preach? Surely not in our limited use or sense of the word.

Frank Perretti Theology?

Demons wig me out. I’ve spent the last few years trying to avoid having to form a theology, philosophy, or even an opinion of demons. I’ve tried even harder to avoid being one of “those” evangelicals who prays that Satan would keep his grimy mitts off of the sound system or out of the weather during the youth group ski trip.

Reading the first chapter of Mark, there’s no way to get around this demon thing, no way to wrap it up tidily especially since the Jews

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We Are Not Alone.

June 27, 2011 By 1 Comment

The insidious nature of sin and brokenness in communities of faith.

by Bruce Reyes-Chow

 Epistle Reading:  Romans 7:15-25

For Sunday, July 3, 2011: Year A – Ordinary 14

Oh boy, proof that some people just can’t help being bad.  Better yet, now we each have an excuse for messing up when we should know better.  “Hallelujah, the Devil DID make me do it!”

Not so fast there, Skippy. 

Contrary to what most of us would see on a first read, many scholars believe that Paul was not addressing individuals, but the larger human condition. Yes, he uses individualist language, but  Paul is challenging us to take the bigger and wider view of sin—in this case, the proclivity for communities to sin even when we may know better. 

 Gathered to Mess Up

The reality is that faithful people with good intentions gathered together to mess up.  We sin, sometimes intentionally, but more often without even realizing it.  When we look at issues facing the United States today such as the incarceration rate of African American males, the growing disparity between socio-economic classes and the disproportionate amount of money that we spend on military, there is not doubt in my mind that we as a gathered group of people, who mean well, have made bad choices for generations.

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The Untouchables

October 4, 2010 By 6 Comments

Why does Jesus keep his distance from the lepers and heal them as they’re walking away?

By Tony Jones

Gospel Reading: Luke 17: 11-19

For Sunday, October 10, 2010 – Year C, Ordinary 28

From a ways off, the team o’ lepers shout to Jesus, asking for his help. We’d like to think that Jesus would call lepers over to him, that he’d touch them (or allow them to touch him), like he does with the Hemorrhaging Woman, the Blind Beggar, and the Poor and Lame all around him.

A ‘High-Touch’ Savior?

We like to think of Jesus with kids in his lap and lost sheep over his shoulders. He’s a hugger, just like your pastor in the narthex on Sunday morning. Seriously, how many times have we heard that people today lack human contact, that they need more touch. And we’d like to think that Jesus — and, by extension, followers of Jesus — would provide that to a [insert Christian euphemism here] lost and hurting world.

Lepers! That’s the perfect biblical metaphor for touching the untouchables. Mother Theresa did it all the time, shocking visitors to Calcutta by providing loving touch to lepers without any fear of contracting the horrific disease herself.

But Jesus doesn’t call the 10 Lepers over to himself. He doesn’t walk over to them. Instead, he keeps his distance and tells them to go see the priests. As they’re walking away, they are healed of their leprosy (presumably by Jesus, though the text doesn’t say that exactly).

[Read more...]

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