At The Right Time

Read Lk 13: 10-17

I love it when Jesus fights for the little guy.

In this story found in Luke 13, we have another healing that Jesus performs on the Sabbath Day. This time it is a woman, crippled for eighteen years “by a spirit”. This spirit had so crippled her she couldn’t stand straight. Imagine for 18 years all this woman saw was the dust at her feet as she trudged from place to place. We see no friends here to help her. It seems there are none that care for her.

Yet there is one place she seems faithful to go, and that is to the synagogue. Despite her infirmity and the pain and suffering that go along with it, the woman attends her synagogue. You can probably imagine why, for she still has one Friend, One whom she still seeks week after week after week. Maybe for 18 years, she has lived with this crooked spine, still hoping, even praying that her God would heal her. I would say it is a greater test of faith to endure hardship as she did and still trust in God. And to not receive that miracle, than to pray and immediately be healed. I would say she did not make her infirmity a reason for leaving God behind, despite the lack of healing. She still trusted, as Job once wrote, “though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”

It is one thing to come into an illness and to pray for healing, and receive it. We praise the Lord for His work and move with life. It is quite another to have such an illness, pray for healing, and never receive it. And still, despite this, to trust in God. Does your faith in God rest in the quiet trust that whatever is, is of God? That God knows what is best? And will do for you in His time? Would your faith endure for 18, 30 or even 50 years?

During Jesus’ life and ministry, many throngs of people came to Him for healing, pressing up to Him even to touch His garments. They were desperate to be free from their diseases. Jesus healed them. Yet this woman makes no effort to touch Jesus. She does not call attention to herself, and doesn’t seek healing. It is Jesus who sees her, notices her, and calls her forward saying, “Woman, you are set free from your infirmity.” The woman’s back, once crooked and useless, was now straight. Once she was weak and disabled, but now she was strong, and this back made her taller than she’d ever known. Where once she was a woman ignored and overlooked, now she would be seen. The only words we hear her say is that she “praised God!” She knew who had healed her. He was the One she had been faithful to, when all others looked the other way. God saw her. He had been faithful to her, over the eighteen long years she had suffered and prayed, He had seen her, and for this moment, this moment when His Son visited this synagogue, she was prepared. She spoke perhaps more than she knew, but she knew the only power that mattered was the One come from God.

Jesus makes clear for us the struggles she faced. In verse 16, this woman was bound by Satan. But this woman, He says, was a daughter of Abraham, not just because she was a Jewess, but like her father Abraham, she too was faithful. Just as Abraham had been tested in his faith, so was she. She had received the sorest test, and had passed. Her waiting, her praying, and her willingness to endure this brokenness, despite the obstacles it presented to her life, her dreams and her future, was rewarded and commended. She had been prepared for this moment. She could have been set free on any day, but this healing on the Sabbath Day exemplified her faithfulness to her Lord and God.

Where you are today, you too may be praying for healing. Maybe you too have suffered for 18 years, as this woman did. There is hope yet. God knows your struggle. And God will act in His time. It will be the right time.

Heavenly Father, we come to you today to pray for Your healing. It may not be today, nor what we expect. It may not be this week, or at a time we think is right. So Father we also pray for trust that it will come at the right time, the best time. And may our lips and our hearts glorify You all the same. In Your Son’s name we pray, Amen.