Why Jesus?…

In his own words (part 13)

In looking for clues as to how one “lays his life down for his friends” like Jesus talked about in John 15:13, I remembered that brief summary of Jesus’ life in Acts 10:38, that he “went around doing good and healing all who were under the power of the devil, because God was with him.” 

Which makes you think, doesn’t it? Because if Jesus has now flung open the doors to his disciples being able to do what he did, then we can expect to find ourselves doing all sorts of good – including healing too – right?  

James certainly thinks so. He said, “pray for each other so that you may be healed,” James 5:16. And by healing he meant verse 20, “turning a sinner away from his error to save him from death and cover over a multitude of sins.”

I’m jolly appreciative to those who did that for me when I was in serious error and showing clear signs of coming under the power of the devil in my attitude and behaviour. And they must have prayed about it, because they got the courage and love to take me aside and talk to me about it. Not an easy thing to do, knowing what reaction they might get. But they laid aside what might happen to them – “laid down their lives” for my sake – and they did it. And I can vouch for the healing power it had on me, because they saved me at crucial times from making a horrible mess of my life. 

It’s what Jesus did for his disciples too, when the devil was trying to get at them. He told them frankly in Luke 22:31, that “Satan has asked to sift you all as wheat” – a reality worth noting, that the devil is always out to get us. “But,” Jesus told them in verse 32, “I’ve prayed for you that your faith may not fail.” It was laying his life down to pray for them that saved them from the devil messing their lives up too. 

So when asking if healing is included in the good we can do, it was in Jesus’ life, and in ours too, because in verse 32 Jesus also tells his disciples that “When you’ve been turned back (you’ve been healed), strengthen your brothers.” What’s been done for you, in other words, do the same for your chums, because as Jesus’ disciples we really have been given the power to heal each other…(continues Wednesday)