Jehovah Rophe.

— Isaiah 53:4-5

 

As I write this, the most important man in my life is sleeping. He’s weak, he’s exhausted, he’s plagued by weakness uncharacteristic to the arms I remember swinging me through the air at four. He’s hooked up to more machines than I understand functions for, filled with more medications than I understand ailments for, and attacked by more pain than I understand responses for.

 

My hero, the one who chased away monsters from the closet on stormy nights.

 

My confidant, who was never too intimidating to tell every secret (even that the lions in my snowglobe were alive).

                           

My fearless leader, who was never too afraid to get up in the middle of the night to make sure the “bump”  was just the cats in the garage.

 

My role model, who time after time ate humble pie for the sake of the man he calls Savior.

 

My pick-me-up, who never tired of hiding behind the door in his room to wrestle us to the ground, tickling all the way to the floor.

 

My inspiration, who taught me how to love the art of expression through words and music by the love songs he wrote to mama and Jesus.

 

My Sharer, who always, always asked me if I wanted to eat anything from his plate, from whence I derived my love of hot sauce and spicy chips.

 

My teacher, who always addressed every single problem in my life, both spoken and withheld, to the feet of Christ.

 

My personal comedian, who always drew the most hilarious cartoons on each and every birthday card.

 

My daddy, who in every season of life, regardless of my rebellion or sin, never, ever stopped loving me.

 

 

 

To watch him stripped – bit by bit, day by day, moment by moment – of the very strength that made my dad able to beat up all other dads, has been numbing. Much like peeling off skin, it stings and burns, and the only way to make it stop is to press down as hard as you can.

 

I have claimed that faith is enough, that Jesus is enough, that healing will come. I have believed, nothing wavering. The night before we found out about the severity of his condition, God cemented my faith. I knew that no matter what was found, God would heal. The wounds of Jesus would drip healing, cleansing blood upon every infection and tumor until Satan’s defenses had to flee. I have believed.

 

In fact, I knew that just saying I believed was not enough. I had to act upon my faith. Dropping out of this mission was never an option, simply because God called me to it so distinctly that backing down would be blasphemous disobedience. I was accepted a week before the diagnosis came, but I knew that it was Satan’s attempt to keep me here out of love for my daddy and family.

 

Even though the initial diagnosis was bleak, I never wavered. I believed that even if tumors, growths, infections were found in every square inch of his body, Satan still didn’t have a chance.

 

What gave me such astounding faith? My dads.

 

One, my Heavenly Father, who will give supernatural, earth-shattering faith to any of those who hunger and thirst enough to obsess and cry out for one mustard seed of the real stuff.

 

Secondly, my daddy, who in every unbelievable circumstance, ran headlong and unafraid after the feet of Jesus. Feet that led him into a Colombian stadium, filled with guerilla assassins whose only order was to shoot and kill the American preacher who had come to heal the sick; Feet that led him to open a department store in one of the most economically depressed counties in America, not out of personal gain, but simply because it was that to which He was led; Feet that led from one of the biggest churches in Arkansas to a tiny, thirty member church in the Mississippi Delta; Feet that led to a woman’s uneven ones, who by faith and the Holy Spirit, saw them grow three inches in his own hand; Feet that led to the possessed then, with power and security in Jesus’ name, saw them cast out;

 

Feet that led him to, after being diagnosed with an incurable brain anuerism, call on the prayer warriors around him and speak his healing which doctors in Union county can’t explain to this day;

 

Feet that led him through a devestating car crash and into a helicopter over Memphis, leading him to rip the breathing tube from his throat and call out the name, “Jesus”, resulting in the healing of broken bones, punctured lungs, and internal bleeding which doctors in Shelby county can’t explain to this day;

 

Feet that led the feet a little girl watched every day of her life.

 

Some may ask how I have this faith. But the question is,

 

How could I not have this faith?

 

As I’ve watched my father delivered from death time after time, as I’ve watched Christmas money arrive the icy Eve before on more than one occassion, as I’ve seen impossible circumstances turn in favor of the Man with Faith year after year after year after year, how can I not believe that He will also now see us through?

 

So, as my father sleeps beneath the blips and beeps and whirrs of machines that make his slumber sound, I know that Jesus Christ is singing over him with healing, remembering every storm that was broken apart by the sound of Mark Morgan shouting at the top of his lungs, praising God in the valley of the shadow of death, in the throws of the angry sea, in the presence of a thousand enemies, and in a body full of cancer.

 

How can I not abandon all that I own, all that I have, all that I know, and run headlong into the footsteps that my father has followed without swerve or stall? How can I imagine that any obligation, any call, any love could possibly be greater than this?

 

And how can I truly honor my daddy? His heart’s second greatest desire would be for me to stay, talking him through months of recuperation or celebrating with him at the instantaneous, all-miraculous healing, whichever comes first.

 

But as a newborn baby held high above his head, consecrated first to Jesus before I was even named, I find his heart’s greatest desire: To be found in Jesus Christ, following Him every single day of my life.

 

To further the Kingdom of God is of greater importance to my father than to be beside him during the most difficult valley of his life. That God will bring total and complete healing to my father is of no question to either of us, but having endured physical anguish without my family for an entire summer taught me that pain without family is the greatest pain on this side of heaven.

 

So when you look at Shannon Morgan, don’t think, “Look at that faith! Look at this immensely difficult situation she is leaving and all the faith she has!”  Rather, think, “That a father can let his daughter go in his greatest valley, all for the love and glory of Jesus… Can such a thing even be contained in a word?”

 

My faith is a gift from my father, who through sweat, blood, and tears, impossible financial situations, sicknesses, deaths, losses, and the day to day mundane, laid a foundation of power, anointing, and healing in which I will never cease to walk. Neither my mother, brothers, or sisters. For, thirty years ago on the road to Hamburg, Arkansas, my father truly meant with every fiber, just as Joshua, that “As for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.”

 

 

 So, as my father goes in for his important surgery first thing in the morning, I claim the name, “Jehovah Rophe“ tonight, before scalpels are used or incissions are made. I do this to claim the authority and power of the name, “The Lord Heals”. That if we ask anything in His name, He will do it. That if we keep His commandments, love His words, cling to His promises, and proclaim our faith before the eye of the storm, we will never be ashamed.

 

For all to see, in accordance with the prophecies spoken by my brothers and sisters in Christ over this situation, I claim that tomorrow’s surgery will be not of men, but of God. That the Holy Spirit will fill them and they will know exactly what to do. That as we wait and trust in the God of all creations, healing will come with the dawn.