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It’s time for another post in the Names of God series. We have done a little study on the names Elohim, El Elyon, El Roi, El Shaddai, El Olam, Adonia, Jehovah, and Jehovah-jireh. And now we move onto a new name… Jehovah-rapha.
We are introduced to this name of God and discover its meaning in the book Exodus. To set our context the children of Israel have just been set free from Pharoah’s hold by the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob… and the God of Moses. We are introduced to this name, this attribute of God right after they have crossed the Red Sea.
Here God let the children of Israel know that “for I, the LORD, am your healer” or for I am Jehovah-rapha. He wanted them, and us, to know that He is the God who heals.
Now lets go back a little further and look at our context a little more.
Here in this passage we discover that God himself was leading them. He led them in the day and He led them in the night. Never at any time did He remove the pillar of His leadership. If that is true then what also must be true?
Do you think that God just led the thirsty children of Israel to a spring that He thought would be good for drinking and then got there and was shocked that it was bitter and had to figure out what to do next to appease a bunch of grumbling and complaining kids?
Nope. God is God. Remember?
Therefore, He had to have led them to these bitter waters on purpose for a purpose.
He had a lesson to teach them. It was test time.
This is true with us as well. Sometimes God leads us to bitter waters. We may not like it, but it is true. But if we will submit to His will and trust Him in surrendered obedience, He will indeed make those bitter waters sweet.
Our God is Jehovah-rapha.
He is Healer.
Our God heals.
He heals our land.
He heals our sin.
He heals our broken heart.
He heals our diseases.
As we look at God’s introduction to this name Jehovah-rapha we must take note of the instructions that came before He shared this name. We must remember the “if“
There was a prerequisite for experiencing God as Jehovah-rapha… and was obedience and submission to Him. That obedience includes confession of disobedience and repentance when God makes it known to us.
Many times before God will heal us we need to first take care of our sin. Sometimes that sin is simply to obey Him in His simple request to trust Him. Jesus commanded us not to worry. He beckons us to cast our burdens on Him. When we choose not to… we have stress. It is a proven medical fact that stress kills. Stress leads to depression. It leads to obesity. It leads to blood-pressure issues. It leads to countless other ailments. God would heal us of all these if we would trust Him with our problems and our anxieties and our regrets and our fears and our failures. If we would simply obey Him and surrender our will to His will.
God commands us to share our problems, our sin, with others. Holding onto unconfessed sins and unforgiveness can make us sick. Holding onto our struggles because we fear the shame of them being exposed can easily lead to death. God tells us to find someone, a fellow believer, to share these things with. we must expose the things hiding in the dark so that the Light of Christ can shine on them. A germ likes to grow in the dark, so does mold, all things that kill, steal, and destroy like the darkness. They like to hide. Let us bring them to the Light.
However, not all sickness is due to a personal sin. Jesus makes that very clear in His Word.
I must share that the day that I shared about this beautiful name of God in our co-op chapel time I was sick. I mean flat-out could lose my pop-tart any minute sick. However the Lord sustained me through the chapel time and through my zoology class and through one daughter’s piano lessons and another daughter’s violin lessons and I didn’t lose my pop-tart until safe at home in the sanctuary of my own bathroom. So I am thankful that as I studied this name of God I was able to rest in the truth that not all sickness is due to personal sin… but in all honesty Psalm 139:23-24 is where I began my evaluation when I realized sickness had hit me.
If it was an attempt to get my attention to fix a division between me and my God then I wanted to seek that out. I want to know every wicked way that there is within me so that I can confess it before my God and lay it at the foot of my Saviors cross. I want to live a life of repentance not a life of regrets.
When God brings me to bitter waters and I am thirsty… I pray that instead of grumbling and complaining I will look at those bitter waters and ask my God what He is wanting to teach me. What lesson do I need to learn? How, my God, will you make these bitter waters sweet? I pray that I will look for the tree… and always remember that my God is Jehovah-rapha, my God is Healer.
>I am sitting here in the surgery waiting room as my sister is back in surgery having the steel plate removed from her leg and as many screws from her knee that the doctor can safely remove. I spent a lot of time here a little over a year ago. On the way here I was listening to Way-FM and they were doing a listener call in to the question “What was the worst day of your life? How did God get you through it? Did good end up coming from it?”
As I answered the question to myself on this drive to the hospital… my mind went to this first trip that I made to this hospital to get to my sister. I have had more “worst days” that God has seen me through, but today my mind took me to this one.
This was the worst day because it was the first time that I was faced with asking God whether or not I could ask for a loved one’s life to be spared. Every other time before, I just simply selfishly asked for the life to be spared…
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>Revive us O Lord…
Wake us up from our slumber.
Let us not be content in our comfort.
Nor be consumed with the pleasures of this world.
Let us spend less on entertainment and more on eternal attainment.
Let us see past our own noses into the depth of the eyes of others… Let us be willing to step into their hurts and see past their defences and introduce them to Jehovah-rapha, the LORD our Healer… Let us be willing to stop and listen… Let us be purposeful to smile through even our own pain and bad days and not take our own frustrations out on others…
Let us, O LORD, be instruments of Your grace.
Revive us O Lord.
Teach us in Your ways.
Let us not continue to wander in our wilderness…
Nor grumble and complain.
Let us be renewed in our commitments and focused on Your face.
Let us see past our own selfish desires and submit our hearts unto Your lead… Let us be willing to die to ourselves and take up our own cross.
Let us follow You alone and not the ideas and philosophies and traditions of man… Let us be reminded of our blessing of the forgiveness of our sin and let us be willing to forgive as we have been forgiven…
Let us, O LORD, be instruments of Your grace
Revive us O Lord…
Let us, O LORD, be instruments of Your grace
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>It is 7:40pm and I have been successful in my fast today as in the not caving part… However, I still ponder the point of the fast… and why God has called me to it.
I am at the point now where I am having to fight little irritations that normally would not bother me. In all honesty I know I am far from starving. But at the same time I know that I could easily open the refrigerator door and consume every leftover that I know is in there.
So it seems that what God is teaching me is self-control and patience. Sometimes and opportunity is right there, easy and ready for the taking. But maybe I shouldn’t dive into old leftovers when quite possibly my God has something new and fresh for me if I will just be patient and wait on Him. Maybe what God is teaching me with this fast is the crucifixion of my flesh. Maybe He is simply strengthening me in my prayer to be kind and to love and to respond with grace. I still am not sure if the fast is over… or if it continues into tomorrow… my God will let me know.
I still am searching and seeking His face as I wait on answers to questions that have entered my head and heart during this day of fasting. Questions that pertain to future opportunities and directions of ministry. Life is about to kick back into full gear and the full gear comes with new studies, new speaking engagements, and new ministry opportunities. It comes with decisions regarding our home and family. I must trust God to open doors and close them and not barge through demanding my way… when it might not be His plan at all.
I have stopped to write this post and my girls have interrupted me at least three times each… once to describe the jelly on their sandwhich, once to ask me if I knew that their pj’s were fireproof, once to ask if I would play a game, and etc… so I am saying goodnight to the blog and am heading into the living room to participate in a hardcore game of Phase 10 played our way before I send my youngens off to bed and then pour my eyes over and over the wisdom of the Word of my God.
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>Okay so it’s after midnight and I have been searching my blog posts for a post I am pretty sure I did on the subject of fasting while studying Isaiah… although that could be one that was a draft then deleted or something I posted somewhere else or could be something I wrote in a journal with actual pen and paper…
The reason I was searching for it was to back up my reasons for this post and also to see where I was in my thought process concerning fasting when I wrote it. I feel the Lord has called me to a fast. However I do not have a set reason… other than the desire to be completely and totally in His will and walking in it with full confidence. There are several areas in my life where I go “well I don’t know… maybe this… or maybe that…” There are some areas that I need solid assurance not wishy washy maybes… because I know my God is a solid Rock… He is not wishy or washy… and He has a plan… I need to be still and see if He is willing to give me the heads up on what that plan might be.
However when I even think “fast” my stomach starts growling and my head starts hurting… and the excuses begin and the compromises come. So this is my accountability. I usually try a secret fast. The don’t-let-the-right-hand-know-what-the-left-hand-is-doing fast, but for me it makes it too easy to compromise and take a big ole bite of whatever.
Here’s the thing.
I will be teaching on love from 1 Corinthians 13 this coming Sunday morning as I finish up a study on spiritual gifts and then I will be leading an adult small group study from the book of Job beginning the next Sunday.
This Sunday, after my small group, I will immediately go to teach our children at church on Bible prophecy through the book of Revelation.
On Monday I will be back to teaching during our homeschool co-op chapel time on the names of God and I also teach a Zoology class.
I also am involved in a prayer wall ministry and will be speaking at a ladies retreat in March.
Then of course their is my writing.
And being a wife to my wonderful husband.
And motherhood and homeschooling my girls.
And all the other stuff in between…
So many times people ask me how I have the time for all that I do… and I immediately begin to try to make excuses and justify and defend and basicly apologize for my service… I have no clue why I do that.
The simple truth is that as long as I am doing what He alone has called me to do, my God, the Author and Finisher, the I AM, the Beginning and the End, the One not bound by time, space, or matter, He always manages to make enough time for me to accomplish whatever He has called me to do. It’s all Him. And I have no clue how He does it… He just does.
So my fast…
My fast is to make sure that I am serving on His time, in His time, for His time, with His time, so that I always have time. In His strength not my own. Not my will but His will be done. No wishy-washy maybe but only a sold rock of assurance. I like my face set like flint, fully focused on the prize of my Christ. Obeying His Word, His Way, His will.
F aith
A mplifies
S urrendered
T ime
Accountability: to help me keep my mouth closed and my heart open
It’s 1am now…
I’ll let you know how well this fast goes.
Hopefully I will not be defeated with breakfast…