Struggle to Trust: In poor health
It stinks when we feel badly; it can seem the end of the world. When we are in pain, or when we have to focus more on our health than on all the other things that are more ... more of what we like, it can skew our view of God. Poor health can be such a focus of our lives that we lose trust in God. What we want is our health. Even Paul struggled with his health and wanting to be healed.
Grace is sufficient
Paul says that he prayed for his own healing and God’s response is recorded in 2 Corinthians 12:9, “My grace is all you need. My power is strongest when you are weak.” His grace is sufficient. His grace or his favor. Perhaps it is worth considering what that means in relation to other Bible figures. In the Old Testament, Noah was counted as having God’s grace (Gen 6:8). And indeed, we see great things that come from that favor. Noah was not perfect, but God’s favor brought about newness of life through Noah. In Exodus 33, Moses too is favored by God (verse 17 in particular, but also surrounding verses). Moses had such a remarkable relationship with God and also the favor of God worked in him to carry the Israelites out of slavery. God’s grace upon us, is no small thing. This favor is what God uses to do great things in and through us.
God comforts us
When we are in poor health, or our loved one is, we want relief, we want comfort. Joy will come in the morning, He has promised (Psalm 30:5/John 16:22). He has saved all of our tears in his bottle (Psalm 56:8) and so he must have held us in our weeping. God has compassion on us, according to the abundance of his steadfast love and does not willingly afflict or grieve us (Lam 3:31-32). He is with us in this affliction and has felt the pains of our body upon the cross (Is 53:4). He does understand and He cares; we are truly not alone in the suffering. He satisfies the longing soul and the hungry soul he fills with good things (Psalm 107.9). In our suffering, we can expect good things from Him.
Perhaps at this point you are still holding your breath, hoping that I will say that He will heal you. He will! But I cannot guarantee that he will do that today. Isn’t that really what we want when we suffer? We want immediate relief. We can only rest in the relief of the mental anguish by resting in Him. Abide in Him and he will turn our thoughts anew. In 2 Corinthians 5:17, we are told that he makes all things new. Today we can embrace that and ask for Him to make our thoughts new, to make our thoughts focus on him and not the pain or the worry or the sickness. This is the immediate comfort. The Holy Spirit is the Comforter who lives within us and never leaves us (John 14:26).
The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ together with the Comforter are the answers to our wavering trust in God when we or our loved ones are in poor health. He is El Shaddai, not merely sufficient but He is all we need, all powerful, all in all and we have found His favor.
