Post by Pastor Tim – I laid in my parents arms, with blood streaming out of my eyes, ears and nose, and I wasn’t breathing.  My father held my lifeless body in his arms and prayed this simple prayer . . .

This is one of the most profound instances of healing in my life, and yet one in which doesn’t seem that unique at all.  Let me continue by telling you the rest of the story.

My three siblings and I had been piled into the car to visit my grandparents.  I was in the middle of the front seat, and was left there while my parents ran back into the house to grab something.  I was only two years old at the time, and not knowing any better, I fiddled with the gear shift and in so doing I fell out of the car.  My oldest brother jumped out of the back seat and stopped the car by applying the brakes, but the car’s tire had already rolled over my head.

When my parents found me, I was lifeless and not breathing.  My parents were fairly new Christians, and my father prayed this simple prayer, “Jesus, please heal my son.”  At that exact moment, I gasped for breath, and my parents rushed me to the hospital that was a little over 15 minutes away.

After the hospital’s examination, the doctor said there was absolutely nothing wrong and they wondered if there might be some rational explanation or even if my parents might be exaggerating.  It wasn’t until the next day that my head revealed the black and blue tire marks, and the doctors were convinced as to what really happened that day.

At the beginning of this post, I said that this instance of healing doesn’t seem that unique at all.  This is not to take away from what happened, but to point to the prayer that my father prayed.  There was no shouting, pleading, ritualistic dances or altar calls.  My father was a new Christian, and he prayed a simple prayer of faith for my healing.  He knew that God could heal and he prayed that God would do that for his son.  Although my father’s prayer doesn’t encompass all the aspects of James 5:13-16, it does resemble the same simplicity of healing that James expresses.

I wonder if we have somehow made healing more complex than it needs to be.  We rely too much on the person who is doing the healing and what methods they are using instead of relying on the God who actually does the healing.  Peter reminded the crowd of this after God used Peter and John to heal a crippled man.  Peter said, “Men of Israel, why does this surprise you?  Why do you stare at us as if by our own power or godliness we had made this man walk? (Acts 3:12)

I suppose that simplicity could now be turned into a magical formula for healing prayers though.  So the emphasis is not on the simplicity as much as the simplicity is birthed from a God who already has expressed his willingness to heal.  Pastor Foley said, “For the Christian, healing is always about simple trust in God and heartfelt petition rooted in the knowledge that God wants to heal.”