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Take Up Your Suffering and Follow Jesus

Immediately the leprosy left him and he was cleansed. 

Jesus sent him out with a strong warning, “See that you do not tell this to anyone.”

Why?!  Why not tell anyone?!  Hey!  Knowing from experience, if that was me, I’d tell the world!

Facebook update status:  JESUS HEALED ME!

Text message to the world:  are you sick?  Look what he did for me!

News report:  Let me share my story:  Sick. Healed. Jesus. 

WHY NOT TELL?

This is not the only verse where Jesus heals someone and then warns them to keep it a secret. It used to really get to me. And then I lived. I learned. I suffered. I matured. Sat under some good teaching. Had cancer and realized, “This life is so fleeting.”

HE IS BIGGER!  He is more than the here and now!  He heals more than this physical body!  Like a father, he looked on them and had compassion, he healed them but in their excitement they could not see that he was healing more than their bodies. 

To my live news broadcast, Jesus would respond, “I told you not to tell anyone because you don’t get it!  I did not come to heal bodies. I did not come to be king and ruler of this earth. I still had a lot to show you. I would suffer. I would die. Not what you were expecting?  Huh?  But watch. I’m going to do something even bigger than that!  I want to heal your soul. Not just the now, the eternity.”

Jesus is not the quick fix. “Take up your cross and follow me.”  And that is when the masses say, “oh never mind” and walk away. 

Then he performs a miracle, he tells the woman that had suffered for so many years, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace and be freed from your suffering.”  

Do you think she never suffered again on this earth?  She did. She was a human living on this earth. It happens daily. But she got it. When Jesus healed her body, he healed her soul. That is what matters!  You know she saw every single day that her suffering  actually led her to Jesus!  If she had not suffered all those years, she would not have been determined to just touch the hem of his garment.

I want to suffer and let it lead me to Jesus, to the greatest healing of all!

I want to learn from my mistakes and change. I want to suffer and learn, get the big picture, not live for the now. I want to have eternal healing, not just of my body, but of my soul. I have decided to follow Jesus, I will take up my cross and follow him. 

16 thoughts on “Take Up Your Suffering and Follow Jesus”

  1. Amen! Such wise and lovely words. I too often wondered about those words, “tell no one” and the way Jesus would sometimes tell a parable for the crowd, but after go and explain it to the disciples privately. Some people have the ears to hear and some are all bedazzled by the miracle itself and miss the message, and still others need their faith in smaller bites. What I really love, there are some things meant just for us, personal gifts and blessings that really show that we matter to him as individuals. He’s a personal God, not just a God of ideology or mass teachings and He wants to know each of us personally.

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  5. Caroline! This is a beautiful witness of faith. A faith that cannot be broken, shaken perhaps, but not broken. Thank you for sharing such a profound reflection on what ‘true-healing’ can be…may it cause a movement-of-the-heart in all whom read this! Hugs & Blessings!

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  6. Dear Caroline, your life is beautiful and you’re beautiful from the inside out. May the Lord bless and comfort you with His healing hands through the valley that i hope (and will also pray) is escaped through physical healing, but you have a living reality of spiritual healing that this world of Christ rejecters cannot see, nor understand. Your words inspire me to want to try to live my own difficult life in such a way as you are doing in yours. I hope the Lord heals you. Praying has always been difficult for me, but i will pray for you. I’m so sorry that you have cancer. Why you and not someone like me? You have so very much to live for…a family that loves and needs you. Your cancer has made you closer with the Lord. How many, like me, are not close in that way like they should be? Bible knowledge should never be a substitute for a tender heart that knows the Holy Spirit in the most feeling way. Rather, Bible knowledge should be part of an overall relationship with the Lord. I know that, but don’t deal with difficulty well. I’m a very negative person. I think if we had to be in a bad way, either physically or mentally, i think the choice is clear. As long as the path headed through that strait gate and narrow way, that’s all that really matters in this life. If Christ is truly our sure foundation and we know we’re children of God who can say “abba Father”, there’s nothing that can take that salvation away from us, not even ourselves. I believe that and hope you get blessed with the healing power of Jesus (Yeshua). He is the way, the truth, and the life. Christ is the life, one way or another. We can have hope and solace in that. Christ is the King of an everlasting kingdom. This world is passing away before our very eyes as possessions and people pass away like dust in the wind everyday. So many celebrities i saw and knew on TV and in movies are gone now. But we’re much more than dust. I don’t mean to get into words and lose the heartfelt meaning in an attempt at eloquent writing. Lord, please heal Caroline. Your perfect will be done in her life. May God bless you, Caroline. I know God is right there in that invisible space we cannot see, but can know. You know Him and express that knowing in your heart through your words that encourage us. Your blog is a blessing. May God bless you, angel. Amen.

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    • The presence of the Lord is in your words, your written prayer. To know that your are praying for me is an unimaginable comfort. My battle is not of flesh and blood, it is spiritual. I have a personal relationship with the one who can heal my body in a single word, but he has already healed my soul. That is what I long to share. That is the only way my life has any meaning/if I share his grace. And that is the beauty of Jesus: Grace.

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