Doldrums

Having lived close to Jinja road, over the last ten years, my mind has become so attuned to the sound and sight of ambulances, it is as familiar as birds tweeting. (Gasps of shock and horror!) That was till last week. I caught an infection that made my ears very sensitive to sound and so all through the nights, like insy winsy mosquitoes, I could hear ambulances whizzing up and down Jinja road.

A defining moment is one where you begin a new normal, your life does not reset to default. You get new default settings.

I set about on a journey to discover why my friend, the one who sticks closer than a brother, Jesus was perpetually healing. Early in the morning, late in the evening, in the garden of Gethsemane. He was always healing all manner of diseases. Including leprosy. Lepers did not have a life, they found a new community of lepers and spent their days shouting, ‘unclean!’. No family get togethers. No date nights with the spouse. No sports days for the children. No milestones for the baby. No watsapp. No selfies. No plans. No budgets. No deadlines.

Sickness isolates a person. Pain and discomfort isolates you from ordinary pleasures, it distorts your sensory perceptions. Nothing tastes right or smells right, you don’t feel right, you don’t look right, in my case, I could not hear right! kwegamba, your normal is a far cry.

Sickness isolates you from family, from society. Where it was easy to initiate an interaction with someone, now you have to wait for people to visit and most times, the conversation is about the sickness. All other things you had in common are packed away, because you are sick.

In some cases, it will isolate you from God. You may blame yourself or just allow heap condemnation upon yourself for your cumulative recklessness. Or excessive carefulness. (hola! To my OCD pals)

Jesus healed so that we take our place as Children of God. So that we live. So that you are effective. So that you fulfill your purpose. The smaller part is taking away the sickness, His deeper concern is for love to be perfected in us, so we may be as He is. David the Psalmist describes it as, He restores my soul. In being our salvation, it includes healing. Peter the rock describes it as He himself bore our sins and by His stripes we were healed. In being our deliverer, he destroys the ravages of sickness. Paul emphatically states that nothing shall separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

The gospel, the Good News, is that healing is free. Blind Bartimaeus, the lady with an issue of blood, the paralysed man let down through the roof, the man by the pool of Siloam, Simon Peter’s mother in law, The High Priest’s servant. And multitudes of other witnesses will attest to this. Freely receive healing from our friend and Savior, Jesus Christ. The Lover of your soul.