HEALING ORDINARY AND EXTRAORDINARY.
By W. S. SADLER, M. D.
"Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogs, and preaching the Gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people." Matt. 9: 35. THIS scripture tells us that the Master healed "every sickness and every disease." While this was true of His miraculous working when here on earth, it is equally true to-day, for all those who truly recover when smitten by disease are healed of God. But we must make a difference between healing that is ordinary and that which is extraordinary,—that which is the natural process, and that effected by miraculous power. Not but that they are both effected by the same God; indeed they are both manifestations of the same divine and merciful power. The difference consists, not in the personality of the Healer, nor in the character of the healing, but rather in the elements of time and human co-operation. In one instance, God chooses to heal the sick by what we ordinarily term "a miracle,"—that is, independent of time and means, and without any apparent material co-operation on the part of human agents, or the ordinary remedial agencies of Nature. In the other case, it is the same God that heals, and the healing requires the same mighty power, but it is effected only after the lapse of time, during which human hands co-operate with the healing process in the application of those powerful and potent natural remedial agents which God has placed within our grasp. This ordinary healing differs also from the extraordinary and miraculous in the rate of its progress,11consuming oft-times weeks, or months, and in some instances even years. "Then asked they him, What Man is that which said unto thee, Take up thy bed and walk? And he that was healed wist not who it was; for Jesus had conveyed Himself away, a multitude being in that place." John 5: 12, 13. Here is an illustration of how God oft-times heals those who do not even recognize His divinity, much less seek Him as a healer. No doubt God is just as liberal with His healing as with His rain and sunshine, causing it to be bestowed like many other material blessings, upon both the just and the unjust. The fact that God chooses to heal the unworthy or cure the ungrateful, in no way belittles His work of healing, but rather exalts His love and mercy. Many a sufferer, cured of His disease, has honored the doctor or glorified some patent medicine, little dreaming that his recovery was due to the ministry of life by a merciful Father who loves His erring children in spite of their sin and all its train of physical sickness and suffering. "One of them smote the servant of the high priest, and cut off his right ear. And Jesus answered and said, Suffer ye thus far. And He touched his ear, and healed him." Luke 22: 50, 51. In this instance the Son of God worked a miracle to rectify the mistake of one of His followers. In rashness the disciple smote off the right ear of the high priest's servant, and in compassion His Master touched the wound and made it whole—another illustration of how liberal God is with His ministry of healing, willing even sometimes to help us over the results of our rash blunders and heal the consequences of gross carelessness.