The pastor was preaching about hope and healing, and how we should never stop praying for healing, or hoping that God will answer in full. It wasn't like I had never heard that message before. All of Christianity is based on hope, isn't it? Maybe God was sick of my stubbornness or maybe I was just more willing to hear the truth, I don't know; all I know is that God took that particular sermon and smacked me with it.
I realized that I had come to an awful place of acceptance in my life. Not the kind of acceptance that a terminally ill person finds in the last few moments of their lives, but the kind of acceptance that says, "OK, this is just my lot in life. Forever. Amen." I not only accepted that my husband was chronically ill, and that I had a mental illness and diabetes, but that it was permanent. That's just... the way it is. Get used to it. That's life.
I wasn't bitter or angry about any of those things, really. I didn't blame God or wonder whether or not I was being punished. I had just accepted it. It was as much a normal part of my life as, say, running the dishwasher every afternoon. I took my pills and injected my insulin and that was that. In fact, I used to get angry at people who said they were praying for our healing. What was up with that?!? Didn't they know I had already prayed, like, at least 10 times? And when someone professed healing from depression in Jesus' name, that really set me off, too. My response was to always fold my arms and mutter, "Then you never had REAL depression."
You could say that my God was a God of maintenance, not transformation. Yes, God works through doctors and medications, but God also works through... God. He doesn't NEED a pill. He can command the waters to be still, and they will obey. Pill or no pill! The more comfortable I was with my life, the less power I attributed to Him. God heals people through medicine, but God still heals people outright, with nothing but His own sheer will.
I had been dismissing the omnipotence, power, and mystery of God. I had also all but abandoned any real communication with Him about the issues my husband and I face daily.
I could go on about how Jesus' birth was a gift to all mankind, but that has been done before. I know a lot more about how Jesus has been a gift to me. He has given me the fresh gift of hope, and wide-eyed wonderment at all that He is capable of. Many years ago, when I was a baby Christian who didn't know how to pray, a friend of mine told me to pull out a chair and pretend Jesus was sitting in it. That works fine if you're a teenager, but it gets stuffy when you grow up. Jesus is as close as a brother, and yet I don't understand Him completely, nor do I want to. I want a Savior who has more power than I do, and more knowledge than all of us combined. Buddy Jesus is great, as long as I don't forget about Sunday School Jesus - big, mighty, awe-inspiring.
That's the Jesus who was born to a virgin, healed the sick, saved the world, rose from the dead, ascended into Heaven, and allows the Holy Spirit to dwell in the hearts of everyone who calls Him "Lord." And that's the Jesus who changes my perspective, perfects my imperfect heart, and gives me hope that with the slightest touch of His hand, or a whisper of His voice, I can be healed.
Pill, or no pill.
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