fighting the good fight of faith

The good fight of faith is a big battle to be in. I think I would have preferred choosing my own battle. I could pick a faith project then work at believing on it. Alas, however, these battles for my son's miracle and my health were kinda thrust on me. Fibromyalgia and non-verbal Autism! Aaargh. And annoyingly, I have had to build my boat (or my house) in a storm.

Not that I didn't have faith before all this came down 21 years ago. But heck I was just a sweet little kid with an untried faith. Aaargh.

Jesus, St Paul, the apostles, the prophets, the patriarchs...everyone in the Bible and everyone who wrote the Bible....always spoke about the fact that the life of faith is not easy but it works. They tell us that perseverance works....and we see how it works. They show us how holding forth the word of God, walking by what one knows about God's love rather than walking by what one sees, relying on the spiritual to conquer the physical, living by faith....well, these all work. But aaaargh!!!! persevereance is a trip.

I remember an African minister talking about how healing began in his church. He had been ministering for years. Every day, every sunday, he would pray for people...for years, this went on....and then one day he prayed for this little girl and immediately she was healed. He said the weird thing was that it was a day like any other, nothing special had happened before. But the power of persevereance itself is rewarded.

Well, I am pretty convinced that I have learned a lot aboutu healing during the past 21 years. Each day I move closer and closer and put something aside that was blocking the healing. I now know, for instance, that when we pray God immediately answers the prayer. Immediately. We aren't praying and begging God to give. Or else we shouldn't be. God gives immediately, but what he gives he gives in the spiritual realm. He gives healing virtue like a seed, hidden in the ground. Planted. Unseen by human eyes. And it is up to us to water the seed and the word with thanksgiving until we SEE the blade. And to keep watering even after we see...with faith that we will get the fruit -- one fruit, thirty fold, hundred fold. That is a big thing to realize. For me, anyway. Because so much of the battle with some folks is believing God actually "will do it." But when one realizes that by Jesus wounds one was ALREADY healed....well, as ST Paul says, we rest in the finished word of God. We enter into God's rest because the word of God is active, powerful and working.

So upshot...am fighting the good fight of faith...and trusting God's word is even now working within younger son and me. God's word is truth. The Bible says "Let God be true and every man a liar." The word says Jesus blood healed me then and is healing me now. Am praising God for having healed me, even though these PHYSICAL eyes still have not SEEN the promise. I know my redeemer lives. I have two friends who died from auto-immune systems. They trusted in doctors ONLY and they mocked me about trusting God so much. They are dead. I am still alive. I look on God's promises, on the power of Jesus' blood. Not on my symptoms.

Oh thee that heareth prayer, unto thee shall all flesh comes! I love the Lord because He has heard my prayer.