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What do you want me to do for you?

 When I was serving Ipswich, SD, I was called to the hospital as one of our members was in a serious way. The doctors discovered that she had blockages in both her arteries going to her head and a blockage of her main artery going to her left arm. It was require three separate surgeries, each one was pretty risky. They did one each on Saturday, Sunday, and the left arm on Monday. I was called on Wednesday because the doctors said though she survived the surgeries, her lungs were damaged. She would not be able to live without being on the ventilator and the family decided to take her off and she would then die. I arrived and their two adult kids were there and the husband. We talked for a while and I brought my worship book and we did a prayer service called, "prayers for a time of dying." "She is not going to die," the husband said. "I am going to bow my head and pray to God, because you don't know how strong she is and she is going to come back to me." I didn't argue with him, but reiterated what the doctors said and then said it was in God's hands now. I was with the family for a couple hours and she was still hanging in there after the ventilator was stopped. The next day was Thanksgiving. I asked the family if I could leave, because my dad passed away in May and Kileen and I were going to Fargo to be with my family. They said they were ok and they would call when she passed. Thanksgiving day I didn't hear anything,  Friday I received a phone call that she was hanging in there. Sunday after worship, I went to the hospital. I went to the ICU and that said she was moved to a regular room. I walked into the room and there she was sitting up and holding a cup of coffee with her left arm that was blocked for at least 3 to 4 days. They both had to move into a nursing home afterwards and she outlived him by about 6 months when their time finally came.

It is interesting that Jesus asks James and John AND Bartimaeus the exact same question. "What do you want me to do for you?" James and John want glory and prestige, Bartimaeus wants to see. Bartimaeus was a blind man who believed that Jesus would be able to help him, as there were numerous stories spreading all over about who he was and what he could do. Bartimaeus shouted for help, was told to be quiet and shouted all the more. He got Jesus' attention and answered Jesus' question with, "Teacher, Rabbi, I want to see." "Go, your faith has healed you," replies Jesus and Bartimaeus gets up and follows Jesus. 

I do imagine that everyone has at least one story where someone defied the odds or there was a miraculous healing that doctors couldn't explain in a pretty spectacular way. I also imagine that everyone has prayed for health and well-being for themselves, for a family member or a loved one, and what we prayed for didn't happen. After my dad's third or fourth heart attack, my family was gathered around the hospital bed, and the chaplain was a UCC minister and she prayed that he might recover so he can continue to serve and robbed us of some comfort and peace. He only had ten percent heart function and was ineligible for a heart transplant. He lasted a couple of hours after we took him about life support, long enough for us to say our goodbyes. 

I suspect that the reason that Jesus and the disciples had such a high rate of success was because they lived this life, 24/7/365 to put it another way. But we know that in the Gospel of Mark, there was, at least, one time when Jesus couldn't do much healing because the community was unwilling to accept that it could be done. There was another blind person where Jesus had to lay hands on him twice because the first time didn't fully heal him. We have our prayer list and lift up people in prayer on Sunday mornings, however, we haven't practiced or studied this too much. Some of us explore health with practices such as Spring Forrest Qigong, yoga, tai chi, and reiki. I am inviting us to make healing prayer a practice of this church. We have done anointing about 4 times a years once we could touch each other, and I want to increase that. In following the Spirit, opening ourselves up to God's healing love and learning how to let it flow through us, we could become a church of healing. It may be that our gifts are more for justice and peace as we have a long tradition of that. But we won't know until we try. Let us seek to become a church of healing, during worship and in meaningful ways through the rest of the week. After Easter, we will work on starting a regular gathering to explore healing. May it be so. Amen.

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