{"id":4912,"date":"2014-01-08T00:05:41","date_gmt":"2014-01-08T08:05:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/?p=4912"},"modified":"2014-01-07T19:32:52","modified_gmt":"2014-01-08T03:32:52","slug":"why","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/2014\/01\/08\/why\/","title":{"rendered":"Why?"},"content":{"rendered":"

A man with leprosy came and knelt in front of Jesus, begging to be healed. \u201cIf you are willing, you can heal me and make me clean,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\tMoved with compassion, Jesus reached out and touched him. \u201cI am willing,\u201d he said. \u201cBe healed!\u201d Instantly the leprosy disappeared, and the man was healed. Then Jesus sent him on his way with a stern warning: \u201cDon\u2019t tell anyone about this. Instead, go to the priest and let him examine you. Take along the offering required in the law of Moses for those who have been healed of leprosy. This will be a public testimony that you have been cleansed.\u201d<\/p>\n

\tBut the man went and spread the word, proclaiming to everyone what had happened. As a result, large crowds soon surrounded Jesus, and he couldn\u2019t publicly enter a town anywhere. He had to stay out in the secluded places, but people from everywhere kept coming to him. (Mark 1:40\u201345)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\tThe question for Jesus was never \u201care you able,\u201d but rather it was always, \u201care you willing?\u201d In the case of this particular leper, Jesus was willing and so he healed the man. The question before us is the same as the question of this leper and the heart revealed by his question. The leper was concerned not just for his desperate need, but with the will of God. He understood that the world was a bigger place than just his desire for healing. He knew that God\u2019s will was more important than his own.<\/p>\n

\tThe suffering that happens in the world is not meaningless. God knows what is best for us and for the world as a whole. Whatever we face, it is all part of the grander scheme of things: God\u2019s overall creation, a work of enormous beauty which we can see but a tiny corner of. What value or point there may be to what we must endure may never be clear to us. But like the leper, we should be willing to accept whatever God\u2019s will might be, whether, as it was in the case of the leper, the fulfillment of our deepest longing, or whether it might be something else entirely. We do this because we trust that God is good and that he knows what is best. We can therefore safely choose to submit to God\u2019s will and trust him, whatever the short term outcome might be for us.<\/p>\n

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A man with leprosy came and knelt in front of Jesus, begging to be healed. \u201cIf you are willing, you can heal me and make me clean,\u201d he said. Moved with compassion, Jesus reached out and touched him. \u201cI am … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_s2mail":"yes"},"categories":[18,17,16],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4912"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4912"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4912\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4913,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4912\/revisions\/4913"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nettelhorst.com\/blog1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}