Healing?????

‘I believe your my healer’.
‘with the following instructions, ....heal the sick, raise the dead, clense those who have leprosy, drive out demons...’

Do you ever get a little fed up, maybe you haven’t seen any healing, maybe no miraculous signs or wonders have gone down in a while and your just desperate for something. Maybe your losing faith? Maybe your not sure if it can really happen?

Just consider this...
Its a cloudy afternoon, 5 transit folk take a break from clearing the community garden on one of the toughest estates in the north. Carmella, a lady of around 80 years old who is just getting ready to go in for a hip swap operation, hands out a few cups of tea and simply asks a little about what transit is all about. We recount the tail, its basic to say the least, bit of this, rhythms of that, helping where we can, just trying to be image bearers of Christ in the world. With a look across her face that exudes dumbfounded hope she utters a few words that shake my thinking “that’s healing that is, that’s healing that is to hear you say that” (in a wonderful Italian/Yorkshire blended accent) That’s healing, I stop to consider for a moment of two. Just think, as we struggle and strive to do as best we can in advancing the kingdom, in prayer and action could that in its self be healing? Granted no one has been cured of cancer of freed from HIV, but an old lady who’s faith had taken a jump forward through some practical help. A boy who really needs some help with writing lyrics for a party on Saturday night and on a deeper level is searching for someone to restore a sense of trust in his life. Some sound advice to a guy about to face a tuff sentence, could these simple acts, in God’s hands be bringing about healing. Is a broken heart, a lost sense of trust, heightened pride and self dependence be the very things that need to be healed in the lives of the people around us. And greater still what if a whole community has lived and been founded on disappointment, failure, let down and depression. Could the simple act of serving free tea and cakes as a sign of acceptance love and hope be bringing about a change in the atmosphere and in doing so be bringing about healing (on one level)

I don’t really know, I’m just working it out, but the prophetic words of an Italian, Yorkshireean pensioner gave me another of life’s proverbial slaps in the face and then I’m left bemused by a God, a God of healing, in every sense of the word.

So where do we go from here???