(This is Day 13 of our series on Revelation, what it means and doesn’t mean.)
The thing the church needs most today is the ability to heal wounds and to warm the hearts of the faithful; it needs nearness, proximity.
“I see the church as a field hospital after battle.
“It is useless to ask a seriously injured person if he has high cholesterol and about the level of his blood sugars!
“You have to heal his wounds. Then we can talk about everything else.
“Heal the wounds, heal the wounds. … Start from the ground up.”
— Pope Francis
“Heal the wounds!”
Pope Francis washing and kissing the feet of refugees, including three Muslim men.
The notion in a misguided segment of Christian culture that the God of love and life will turn into a monstrous, punishing God is based on phony theology that isn’t biblical.
Consider that Jesus Christ, the great healer, sent his 12 followers out with the power to heal (see Luke 9:1-6 here).
Consider that Jesus then sent out 70 more followers with–guess what– the full power to heal (Luke 10:8-9 here).
The last chapter of Revelation speaks of the healing of nations:
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“Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city.
“On either side of the river is the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month; and the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations.
We all take hard knocks in life, which is to say we’re all “the walking wounded,” all in need of God’s healing power and the healing power of loving companionship with each other that a church provides–or should provide.
The takeaway for today is:
13. If your church isn’t about lifting people up with the healing power of God’s love, grace and tender mercies, you might want to find the kind of church that Pope Francis envisions–a healing, life-giving church that’s like “a field hospital” for people struggling with addiction, divorce, a death or illness, teenage rebellion or anything else that causes pain or injury.
Father, what a glorious message of hope. You have taken a Biblical Book which we usually view as judgmental and dour and found the “silver lining,” in a manner of speaking.
Thank you. BTW, I am happy that I am a communicant of just such a body of Christians – joyous and redeemed.