Ed and Patsy now live in Athens, Alabama and are members at the Pepper Road church. As administrator of this blog, he enjoys sharing thoughts about spiritual maters. Not only his thoughts but good articles from other authors. He is also thankful to have been able to preach the unsearchable riches of Christ for over sixty years.
I still go to the doctor who has been my primary physician for a good many years. He practices in the town where we lived prior to moving to our present address. There are many doctors closer to us that I could use. In face, people often ask, “Why do you drive so far to get back to him when you could be driving much more closely? One reason is that driving from my place to his office, though the miles are farther, takes very little more time than driving through the Birmingham traffic to get to medical centers of the area.
As I drove home today after my appointment, I got to thinking, “Just why do I go these extra miles?” “Is it really just about avoiding the hassle of the traffic?” I concluded “Not really? It is because I believe in this doctor – his knowledge of medicine and skill as a health provider.” Once again, simply put, I believe in this doctor. That means a lot and involves a lot.
About every time I go to him, he either gives me some advice or prescriptions. Often both. I have learned that if I want to get well or feel better then I have to follow his advice and take the medicine prescribed. I cannot conceive of believing in him and doing otherwise. It is part and parcel of believing in him as a doctor. It would be the worst kind of insult to say to him “I come to you because I believe that you are a great doctor – but you should know that I do not believe in your advice or those prescriptions that you write. You could say that I believe in you, the man, but not your plan.”
Spiritually, Jesus is the Great Physician. His specialty is sin. There is not a sin that He cannot and will not heal us of – if we will truly believe in Him. While on earth, He often healed folks of bodily infirmities to show the world that He was capable of healing sin-sick people of their sins. (Cf. Luke 5:24). Now at the right hand of God, he continues to heal believers of the sickness of sin. While there is no evidence that He continues to miraculously physically heal people as the Great Physician, there is evidence that He is providentially involved in physical healing – or else why would we be taught to pray for the sick? But, as noted earlier, His specialty is sin.
Just as it is in the case of my believing in my earthly physician, how can I really believe in Jesus the Great Physician and reject or ignore His orders and prescriptions? How is it that believing in an earthly physician involves following his orders and taking his prescriptions and believing in the Great Physician not involve following His orders and taking His “prescriptions?” If my earthly doctor were to tell me, “If you will just believe in me, I can and will help you”; I would not be so foolish as to think that he meant by that I did not have to follow his instructions nor take his prescribed medicine.
Notice Acts 1630 where the Philippian Jailor asked what he must do to be saved. In the next verse he was told to believe in the Lord. Then down in verse 34, it said that he was believing. In between where he was told to believe and where it is said that he was believing, he washed Paul’s and Silas’ stripes (indicating repentance) and was baptized. His believing on the Lord involved things that the Bible says elsewhere one needs to do to be saved from sin. So, most of the time when the Bible simply says one is to believe in the Lord it includes doing all that He prescribes for him to do in order to be saved or healed of sin.
One final observation. Does my saying that I was made well by following my earthly doctor’s prescribed routine take any credit away from the doctor? How could any thinking person think so? No. Rather it compliments him. Nor would I have the right to boast that I healed myself. Similarly my saying I follow the Great Physicians’ prescribed routine does not take any glory away from Him. Nor do I have the right to boast that I save himself.