Wednesday 2 May 2012

Prayers for cure

He came to the JSK centre yesterday.

He had come a long way.  From across the country by train.  From Dehra Dun - at the foothills of the Himalaya.

Lets call him Mithun.  Mithun is from the Dehra Dun area.  Some years ago he found out that he was HIV positive.  He started on the treatment for his treatment at the government ART centre.

Then he joined a local church in Dehra Dun.  This church prayed for him and declared him healed of HIV.  Mithun was so grateful for this and stopped his medication and went back to live in his village.

But then Mithun become sick again.

He came back to the church.  They told him that he should go to Jeevan Sahara Kendra - that all we would make him better here.

Yesterday he arrived unannounced.  He wants to be cured.  When Sheba explained to him that we did not have a sure-shot cure here he was very disappointed.

Mithun is coming at a bad time for us - we seem to have very little success at the moment.  The three people that we are looking after as in-patients are just not getting better.  One of them has been with us for a month now and has lost all her bodily controls.  Another man keeps having a spiking fever.  A third lady keeps vomitting.  Its hard when you want to heal and the people we are serving are not improving.

Here is the crux of the matter:  Mithun can't see why he is not cured of HIV.  After all, he has prayed to Jesus who healed everyone who met him.  We also pray to Jesus - who brought back a man from the grave after 4 days of being buried.  Why are we not able to heal him?

Why indeed?  When the largest number of people with HIV live in Sub-Saharan Africa - arguably the most Jesus-following place on the the planet.  When millions of prayers for healing go up every day. Why do we see so few people healed?

At Jeevan Sahara we have seen people come back from the brink of death.  From being in a semi-comatose condition to being able to live a normal life.  But we have yet to see a person who has been rid of all his HIV.   The one person who came and told me he had - did not have any medical tests to prove it - and asked me for a donation pretty soon after we had become acquainted.

I believe that God has the power to rid a body of every single virus.  But for some reason this is a prayer that He chooses not to answer in the way that we wish at this point.  The Bible tells us that when Christ returns there will be a day when no disease, sorrow, tears will remain - and that God Himself will wipe every tear from our eyes.

And so we come to the present.  We have lots and lots of unanswered questions.  As a family we are reading through the book of Job.  42 chapters - largely dominated by a scab-infested man searching for answers for his sufferings - and increasingly strong accusations from his 'friends'.  One of the take-home messages is that we do not have easy answers for everything.  The writer of Job - some 6000 years prior to us - struggles with some of the same issues that we go through today.  But is also able to say through his pain that he knows that his redeemer lives - and that he will see him one day - with his own body, his own eyes.

In the meantime we hope, love and pray.  We are committed to telling the truth.  As soon as we have a fool-proof cure, as soon as we see the kind of healing take place through prayer that we wish and hope for - we will shout it from the mountain-tops.  Till then - we continue to serve - one person at a time.

The story with Mithun is not over.  

2 comments:

  1. I wish that for every Mithun there would be a friend committed to honest loving and caring; a friend willing to say, " I don't know why this prayer isn't being answered",but I will love you and be with you throught this journey, whatever the outcome. Thank you, Andi & Sheba, for your faithfulness. May the 'God of all comfort' be YOUR encouragement.

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  2. Thanks Yvonne,

    We were hoping Mithun would come back today. He didn't and we don't know where he went. He told our nurse that he did not want to take medicine and that God was going to heal him.

    At the same time one of the 3 who we are looking after has improved suddenly. His high spiking fever (for the last week) suddenly stopped last night. Today he demanded to be sent home! God continues to show His mercies to us.

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