Those of you who know me know that my expectations are always high. My expectations of God to move that is. I left on this journey called the World Race one month ago with an expectation that God would heal people right before my eyes as I was empowered by the Holy Spirit and prayed for them. I’ve been praying for the sick everywhere I go. Yes, in the past I’ve seen people healed miraculously through prayer, but this year I expected that every single person I prayed for would be healed in that moment.
I’m currently reading this book called, “Healing” by Francis MacNutt and just in reading the preface I fell in love with this woman named Jo Kimmel’s comment, “Why should healing be extraordinary?” What, I thought! It is extraordinary that our God would heal people. But, then I kept reading and Francis explained that “she plainly considered healing an ORDINARY part of the Christian life. I agree with this, but it still is not ordinary for me to see healing.
If healing is ordinary then why were these men and women in Guatemala and Mexico not healed miraculously? I was struggling internally with this because I knew that God spoke to me before the race very clearly saying that I would lay hands on the sick and heal them. And, I definitely believe and have faith that this is true. Like I said, my expectations of God are always high. Through this discussion in my head I decided that I would just continue to pray for every sick person I saw and believe in miraculous healing and come with the same expectation even though I had not yet seen it here on the World Race.
I didn’t realize that I needed encouragement in this until Seth Barnes Jr. who just recently finished the WR came and shared with our squad. He began by saying how he prayed for this woman 5 times and even brought the pastor to pray for the woman the next day believing in faith that God would heal this frail woman miraculously. Prior to the race he too had people prophesy over him that he would heal the sick as in Isaiah 61. He did understand why he did not see this woman healed and their team even began to see a pattern of death. What was going on? Why was this happening and why had they not seen miracles? Then a wise man spoke to this question and told him that true FAITH is not seeing a person healed, but still praying for the 99th person with the same expectation even though you have not seen even one of them healed.
I love that word of encouragement and I even had tears in my eyes as I so desperately needed to hear those exact words. I know I have not yet seen healing on the WR, but I can see how by not yet seeing God is answering my continued prayer that God would increase my faith in Him. SO, PLEASE JOIN ME IN PRAYING FOR HEALING FOR THE SICK AND EXPECT GOD TO SHOW UP. Cause it is not something extraordinary, but an ordinary thing.
