So let's say I want to write about healing - I could throw in the cliche Isaiah 53 verse or Psalm 103 and maybe a red-letter healing or two - but I don't know how that would help [this writing]. Now I need you to know that in no way am I trying to say that we can't look at scripture for the answer of healing - rather far from that because I think Biblical Interpretation is foundational and vital in understanding healing...

...Isaiah 53 says that by his stripes we are healed (with some just as profound surrounding verses). And Psalm 103 (yeah I know - I still added the cliche verses in - I just didn't want the above paragraph to lead anyone in a way of scripture less thinking, or that someone may think I take the Word of God lightly) tells us that surely our iniquities were taken up with him on the cross...but I still don't get it. I still don't get why thousands of my neighbours are infected with AIDS or Hep C, I still don't get why over 400 children die daily of preventable diseases. Our God is a God who heals - so why don't' we see it [more often].

I don't think it has much to do with faith at all, or at least how much people say it is. I think we need faith - but I think we give it [and ourselves] too much credit in the whole healing thing. I think rather then not having enough faith we simply don't pray enough. We don't ask God to heal enough. We don't fast enough and we don't lay on hands enough. Enough meaning we want to see people healed.

I was recently a substitute War College teacher and with less then 5 minutes to prepare I threw out the healing topic for discussion as I've been questioning it lately and was interested in what others thought. I think I've been questioning the whole healing thing lately because of my friend Leighanne. Let me segway a bit and talk about Leighanne.

She's been here since before we were. She's one of the most loveliest and loyal people I know. She's also a drug addict and has full blown AIDS. She has been told by doctors that she has until June to live. I can't imagine the DTES without Leighanne, nor re:cre8 or even The War College. Leighanne takes great care of us and consistently watches out for us. She calls The War College students her kids and brings us all tremendous joy [and sometimes sorrow - through no fault of her own, more the oppression upon her that we grieve]. She is in daily pain and is dying. It breaks my heart, yet I've (we've) never prayed for her to be healed. I have never called upon the LORD to deliver her of her iniquities. I have never fasted and prayed and laid on hands expecting the LORD to free her. So it can't even begin to be a faith thing - I'd argue that is is much more of an obedience thing. At the end of Mark Jesus commands us to lay hands on the sick [and they will recover]. It's like fasting - he doesn't ask us to nor suggest we should but requires it of us.

Is it like justice? That if you don't choose to stand up for the oppressed you are then on the side of the oppressor. So if you don't fast and pray for the sick...

Then we can get into a whole nother discussion about Spiritual Gifts, but i will leave it relatively short. Healing is a widely spoken about gift and maybe one of the more practical ones out there, yet we aren't claiming it. I think tongues is a bit more whacked out then healing - yet I know more people who are operating in tongues then I do healing. Not because I don't think people are gifted in healing - but because they don't know it. Best way to find out is try - pray for the sick. Lay hands on those suffering. Test it out. Let's see people healed.