DAILY READING
REFLECTION
JESUS CHRIST HEALS YOU
by Katie Borden
At the end of every year I try to spend a bit of time taking stock of the past year—reflecting on what I’ve learned, honoring and grieving what I’ve lost, thanking God for what I’ve gained and how he’s grown me, noticing where I’ve sensed God working…
This year I spent a significant amount of that reflection time giving thanks to God for the healing in my soul that he worked in me through Christ’s resurrection power, and as Peter's words, "Jesus Christ heals you" rang in my ears, I thought I would share some of that journey with you as a testament to how Jesus does heal.
I carried very heavy things into 2022. I felt as though I were in my own “dark night of the soul,” and I was as powerless to do anything to get myself out of that darkness as our text shows Tabitha was to raise her own lifeless body. As the psalmist says, God lifted me out of the pit. Jesus Christ healed me. He has been so kind throughout the last year to lift my burdens and work a miracle in me.
Jesus Christ heals you.
Sometimes Jesus’ healing happens all at once, like it was for Aeneas and Tabitha (although I imagine the eight years of paralysis Aeneas experienced were no picnic), and sometimes healing is a slow, almost imperceptible work within us. Often, healing happens in community.
Dear Church, you were part of how Christ worked healing in my heart. There were Sundays when all I could do was show up to worship and sit—I was too tired to lift my head, I was too tired to sing. I was just too tired. Friends, you were the embodied Christ to me in those moments. You sang our songs over me, whether you knew it or not. You prayed the prayers that my soul was too tired to pray. You fed me the bread and wine, the very presence of Christ, to sustain me. Jesus healed me, and part of how he healed me was through you.
Jesus Christ heals you.
And he heals me, too. Those words Peter spoke to Aeneas are truth; they are a promise. The healing may not come in exactly the wrapping we are expecting, and it may not come exactly at our preferred time. But Jesus has promised, through his death and resurrection, that healing and restoration are ours, and one day we will be healed, whole, and complete.
As we turn the page of the calendar and look forward to a new year brimming with hope and expectation, cling to the sure and certain hope of Jesus’ work and newness of life in you, dear friends. He loves you so much.
PRAYER PRACTICE
Spend some time in prayer, asking the Holy Spirit to show you where Jesus Christ is healing you (even if it is as yet an incomplete healing). Thank him for his goodness. If others have been the hands and feet of Jesus to you, consider thanking them as well.

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