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CONSECRATION
Wake up, sleeper, rise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.
Jesus, I belong to you.
I lift up my heart to you.
I set my mind on you.
I fix my eyes on you.
I offer my body to you as a living sacrifice.
Jesus, we belong to you.
Praying in the name of the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.
THE WORD OF THE LORD
Matthew 8:1–4 NIV
When Jesus came down from the mountainside, large crowds followed him. A man with leprosy came and knelt before him and said, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.”
Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” Immediately he was cleansed of his leprosy. Then Jesus said to him, “See that you don’t tell anyone. But go, show yourself to the priest and offer the gift Moses commanded, as a testimony to them.”
CONSIDER THIS . . .
Braden had an issue with his ears his entire life. They felt full of fluid, and he couldn’t hear as well as he wanted to. He had asked God to heal his ears many times, but there was never a change. One Sunday morning, during an altar call, Braden came forward to respond to an invitation to receive healing prayer. His healing was instantaneous!
His ears opened, and something else began to happen. Shame that he had carried for so long was lifted off his heavy soul, and he experienced a new level of joy in his relationship with God.1
Leprosy, in the time of Jesus, was a pain-package deal. Not only did you have a horrible and irreparable skin disease, but you were also cast out into leper colonies where you all slowly died together as an object of fear and disgust in your community.
This created a shame wound of an incredible magnitude. Jesus knows that healing is never just about the body or relief from pain. Jesus knows that the heart is the hardest spiritual organ to heal and that sometimes to reach the heart you must start at another place.
This is why it is so important that we not get ahead of ourselves when we pray for healing. I have been praying for a person, many times, and though the person wanted me to pray for one thing, I sensed the Spirit in me guiding me to pray for something else.
We always eventually get to praying for the illness or the request. But sometimes the real need is related to a broken relationship with a sibling, a nagging sense of shame over something we’ve done, or a spirit of fear that has held us captive for far too long.
This is why it is so important to learn to let the Spirit guide us in prayer, rather than diving right in and praying straight from empathy or compassion. A listening spirit can go where the Master, living within us, is going. An attentive spirit can see what the Father is doing and join him.
Steve Seamands reminds us to never forget who is doing the healing when we ask, “May I pray for you?”:
Never forget, Jesus is the chief actor in ministry. We are called to participate in his ongoing ministry of healing, to join him in his ministry rather than asking him to help us carry out ours. He is the healer—not us. Our job is to follow the Healer.2
The man who had leprosy was, as the last verse says, a testimony. When God heals someone, the story spreads.
The more we pray for others, the higher the chances that someone will be healed! We can partner with Jesus in seeing people transformed from experiencing a test to becoming a testimony.
PRAYER
Lord Jesus, I believe that it is you doing the work of healing. I welcome your Spirit in me to give me fresh faith to pray for healing for others. I want to see people become testimonies. In the name of Jesus I pray, amen.
JOURNAL PROMPTS
How have you become a testimony of God’s faithfulness to those around you? Write down what you think people see about Jesus when they see you.
ACTIVATION
Do you know someone who seems to be carrying a lot of shame? Today, begin to pray for them, for God to make a way for that shame to be lifted. Then, be open to the part you might play in their healing.
SING
Today, we will sing “All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name” (hymn 279) from our Seedbed hymnal, Our Great Redeemer’s Praise.
NOTES
- This story can be read in its entirety in Come Holy Spirit: Stories of Ordinary People Partnering with an Extraordinary God (Vineyard Resources, 2019), 57–58.
- Stephen Seamands, Follow the Healer: Biblical and Theological Foundations for Healing Ministry (Zondervan Reflective and Seedbed Publishing, 2023), 5.
For the Awakening,
Dan Wilt is an author, communicator, pastor, and practitioner. With roots in the Vineyard stream of churches, Dan has served the development of followers of Jesus internationally and is part of the Seedbed Farm Team.
One Response
When you pray and your prayers aren’t answered in the time and manner that you want them to be, reject frustration and embrace inspiration. Keep praying, keep trusting, keep relying and depending on the risen Jesus. Let Him keep your heart and mind full of the fruit of His Spirit. Let faith be your evidence of the things you haven’t seen God yet do. Keep hope in God alive within you. Let the testing of your faith boldly testify to your steadfast trust in God and inspire others to rely on Him too.
What’s in Your Tank?
No matter what is
Your situation
Don’t fill your think tank
With frustration.
Fill it instead with
Inspiration.