Jesus healing

On Wednesday we have a bible study for some new Christians in our church, this particular week for different reasons we only had one lady show up, and so rather than do the formal study we asked if there was anything she would like to know about. She said that she wanted to know more about the story from the kid’s talk on Sunday which was on the theme ‘i want more’. We discussed the passage about the woman who came to Jesus persisting he listen to her. From there we talked of her family and how God had been moving in their lives and she told us of her brother-in-law’s sister who was staying with them at the moment. This lady has been bedridden. She has so much pain in her back she even eats lying down. She had tried everything from doctors to witch doctors and other healing methods, but she hadn’t encountered Jesus. So we shared the story from Acts 19 where Paul prayed over some handkerchiefs and aprons and the people got healed.

We asked her if she wanted us to do this for this lady, she was keen but had nothing of hers with her. so, we prayed over a tissue and believed that as our friend took it home the lady would be healed.

And she was… Our wonderful Jesus, showed up.

She is now sitting up and eating, and the pain is gone! Others in the family wanted to touch the tissue to get a touch, but we know there’s nothing special about a tissue… it’s the power of Jesus, alive and real today, working through his people, who are asking and open to his touch. And then that faith being transferred to others because they see a powerful God at work, who is intimately involved with our everyday lives and struggles.

Another bus story

Ben (my husband), has done quite a bit of study on building inter-cultural relations and one of the things he has shared with me that has stuck with me:  that they (not quite sure who they is, but let’s just go with experts in the field) say that humour does not cross cultures. You cannot assume that something funny for you will be funny to another people group. Well I suppose that can be said to be true if any media stories are to be taken as truth, where ‘jokes’ have gone wrong when they go off shore, or when I take my Greek friends to see “the Castle” and they give me a strange look and then I go to a live ‘Wog Boys’  show and they are falling off their chairs laughing whilst I am merely falling asleep.

But I have seen humour cross the cultural barriers when there is friendship. Something happens as you become familiar with people and they let their guard down, and we become playful. Where am I going with all this? Well where I inevitably go, if you talk to me long enough… to the church bus run.

On Sunday, a guy from church (we’ll call him Joel) and I, go on one of the bus runs for our church. Now we more or less pick up the same people every week and have the same conversation every week. We pick up a lot of older ladies from hostels in town (where they are living so they can get to their renal dialysis appointments 3 times a week). Twice a week we have the pleasure of picking up these ladies who most are walker or wheelchair bound and take them to church activities. Every week, they ask where Ben is, and I tell them, he’s waiting for them at church. They then ask where Maku (my youngest boy) is, and I tell them he’s at church waiting for them. And every week it’s the same, except for our random weeks, which I love. Like this Sunday.

Yesterday, we needed to drop off a gentleman on a different side of town than we usually go with our run, and we decided to take him first as the ladies usually like to go for a drive. So we began to travel slightly north, and they begin to say, where you taking us? Darwin? I say yes, and so begins the banter, in which most of them get involved, even the grumpy man at the back who said we were taking too long to get him home for his lunch. They say “the driver man (Joel) can catch us some fish… with a spear. And the man at the back can get us some kangaroo, which he says we can eat raw…” and so it continues…. it was as if the event was really taking place and we were all to be involved including the driver man hitting a goanna which we could cook up.

Now to you reading this,  you may say where is the humour in this… Maybe it’s not hysterics, but it is playful, banter, imagination, fun… crossing all sorts of boundaries, cultural, age, gender and it worked. There was not one of us on that bus that wasn’t smiling and enjoying the story… It was a wonderful experience of humour crossing boundaries where it ‘should’ not apparently. I love being a part of these times. Stories that are really ‘you had to be there’ sort of stories, but one’s that convince me of this: that love is what crosses all boundaries that are in our way. And where there is true love (that only God can give) for the people you come into contact with, no matter how hard and daunting it can sometimes be, good things happen and people’s barriers begin to come down… and true friendship begins and deepens.

Some of the people we pick up on the bus

Jesus moments

There are days when all flows just how planned and you feel extremely satisfied with life and all that it is…. and then there’s the rest of the days. The plodding days, the downright awful days, the freak me out days, the overtired, overworked, over people days… and it is in those days that one would like to retreat into hibernation, or drive off in to the sunset, or consume a whole tub of chocolate ice cream and then feel guilty about that and consume a mega block of Cadbury chocolate to overcome the guilt… of course I’ve only heard about those days, I’ve never done that ;-).

Jesus had those days (though I’m pretty sure he didn’t eat the chocolate). Ooo now before you super theology spirro gurus write me off as a heretic, I’ll give some Biblical evidence for my radical observations and explain where I’m going… When Jesus had ‘one of those days’, he withdrew to the solitary places. When his cousin John got beheaded, he withdrew to the solitary places to grieve Matthew 14:13 and it says in Luke 5:15 that Jesus often withdrew to the lonely places to pray. There is a time, and this is the one I am thinking on today, that Jesus says to his close disciples, “Come away, to a quiet place and get some rest” and so they sail to another area, but arriving there and about to rest and recoup, Jesus sees the crowds that had caught wind of where he was going, and he has compassion on them and began to teach them, and then went on to feed them all… over 5000 of them… It was supposedly his ‘down time’. His  ‘me and my friends time’ and yet when he saw the people he was overwhelmed with compassion for them because he saw they were like sheep without a shepherd… they needed care and guidance and sustenance which he had in his hand to provide.

I have felt in this place, where I have withdrawn to the solitary (well tried to :-)) places in need of some rest, and it will be in those times that someone will come or call, in need -physical, spiritual, relational and I have felt what I call a “Jesus moment” about to take place. His compassion (not my own), His sustenance, His power and His provision give me what I need, at that moment to fill the need of the other person.

Now before you all get concerned that I am saying that we should all give up our rest time, me time etc… that is not what I am saying. We need time to refill and spend time letting the Holy Spirit replenish our temple (our body). We also need to set boundaries with people and not always do everything for them…

What I am saying… is that there will be times when we think we can give no more, when our tank is depleted, when we are exhausted, when we are justified in our time out, but a person will come or call with a need, and Jesus will prompt us to say ‘yes’ to the compassion that He can give us for his wounded treasures, and be amazed at His grace flowing through us and extending to others. It is often in those times I have seen the greatest breakthroughs and miracles, because it is literally less of me and more of Him… purely a “Jesus moment”. He will give you rest, and He says He will empower you to run and not grow weary…