The Lord who Heals You

“…Who can heal you?” – Lamentations 2:13

The world is sick. It is full of sickness, disease, physical pain, economic hardships, violence, hunger, and death. On top of physical hardships and pain, deeper emotional sufferings like loneliness, aimlessness, despair, fear, anxiety, and depression pervade society. And yet, beneath both the physical and emotional sicknesses of this world lay an even deeper sickness – a spiritual sickness – sin. But the world has a healer.

After God saved the Israelites from Egyptian slavery and rescued them from Pharaoh’s army at the Red Sea, they started their trek to the Mountain of God and celebrated the greatness of God – their deliverer. Yet, shortly after crossing the Red Sea, the children of Israel in the Wilderness of Shur grew thirsty and could find no water (Exodus 15). They continued until they found water at Marah but the water there was too bitter to drink. Exhausted, frustrated, scared, and thirsty, they cried out to Moses, “What shall we drink?!” So, Moses took their complaints and cries to God. The LORD showed Moses what to do to make the waters drinkable. Moses cast a tree (as instructed by God) into the waters and the waters were restored. The LORD then spoke to the children of Israel through Moses:

If you diligently heed the voice of the Lord your GOD and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all of His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought to the Egyptians. For I am JEHOVAH – RAPHA, the LORD who Heals You.

“Rapha” in Hebrew means to heal or restore. In the Old Testament, it is generally a word used only to describe an action taken by God. God’s power healed the diseased (Gen. 20:17), restored the waters, turned salt water into fresh (2 Kings 2:22 & Ezekiel 47:8), healed the land (2 Chronicles 7:14), repaired pottery (Jer. 19:11), and restored the dying (2 Kings 20:5). But God’s healing wasn’t just ascribed to physical healing in the Old Testament. More often than these physical manifestations of God’s power, God’s healing power is associated with spiritual and emotional healings.

• God heals the broken hearted (Psalm 147:3 & Isaiah 61: 1- 2)
• God heals the troubled (Psalm 6:2)
• God heals our backsliding (Jeremiah 3:22)
• God heals the soul from sin (Psalm 41:4)

Like in the Old Testament, Jesus also demonstrates the multi-layered approach to healing. Jesus repeatedly engaged in acts of healing throughout His time on this earth. The Gospels are full of examples of Jesus healing the sick (Mark 1:34). Yet, Jesus Himself said it wasn’t the physical healing that He was sent to accomplish. Jesus announced Himself in Nazareth by reading from Isaiah 61 which reads “…He has sent me to heal the brokenhearted (Luke 4).” He would later go on to explain to the Pharisees who criticized him for eating with tax collectors and sinners, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick…I did not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance (Matthew 9 :12 – 13 & Luke 5:13) Both Jesus and the Apostle Paul (later in Acts 28) used Isaiah 6: 9 – 10 to describe God’s desire for sinful is that they turn their hearts back to God so “…so that I [God] should heal them.” Jesus came not just to help those physically on earth while He was here but to provide everlasting healing for sin. He came to heal us and not from physical sickness, pain, or even death but spiritual sickness. To provide us the elixir to spiritual death – His blood.

Ultimately, Isaiah 53 truly describes the depth of Jesus’ healing. “But He was wounded for our transgressions; he was crushed for our iniquities; upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his stripes, we are healed (Isaiah 53:5). Jesus healed us from our sin – our fatal spiritual sickness (1 Peter 2:24). Without God’s healing through the blood of Jesus’ sacrifice, we would surely die (John 8:24). But we serve a God did not want that for us. He didn’t want us doomed for all eternity. He wants to save us – to heal us from our sin.

But, back in the story of Exodus, when God healed the bitter waters for Israel, He told them His healing was contingent upon their obedience. “If you diligently heed the voice of the Lord your GOD and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all of His statues…” Like the Israelites, who wanted continued healing and protection from God:

• We must listen to God.
• We must do what He shows us is right.
• We must obey His commands
• We must keep all His laws.

We are not promised God’s healing if we do not meet our end of the agreement which is obeying God.

But once we obey God, we have access to all His healing powers – powers that can heal the body, the mind, and the soul. We have direct access to Jesus who called Himself the Physician of Sinners (Mark 2:17).

When the Jews on Pentecost heard Peter’s first sermon, they cried out “What shall we do?” Peter responded simply, “Repent and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins (Acts 2:37 – 38).

The Apostle Paul reminds us in Romans we are all sinners (Romans 3:23).

So, like He asked the paralytic at the Pool of Bethesda (John 5:1-15), Jesus asks you “Do you want to be healed?”

Only JEHOVAH – RAPHA, THE LORD WHO HEALS, can truly heal you.