We are going through the book of Luke at church and a really interesting point was made in chapter 4 where Jesus had healed Peter’s mother-in-law, then ended up having people from all over town bring their sick to have Jesus heal.

I have heard this taught before, including one very impactful version by Paul Washer. He relates that he had seen something like this, when he was deep in Peru in a village that hadn’t had much contact with the outside. He had brought a doctor and the people were desperate to have the doctor look at their sick. So they pressed in and were demanding he see them. They didn’t want to let him go because many knew they might not have another chance at seeing their loved ones healed. He relates this to the desperation people had to see Jesus. They might have known that if they missed this opportunity, another wouldn’t come around.  

As a short aside, I had an experience that gave me a taste of this back when I visited India in 2017.

I had met an Indian minister and evangelist years prior, and had heard about the incredible miracles that were going on there. So I had wanted to go and see the work. In Feb 2017, I went with a team of individuals from our churches. We were brought up on stage on a Friday, and we were told each to be ready to share. This was a huge 3 day outreach, with probably 1500 people. We were told not to seal ourselves off from the local peoples, and the day before, I had a sense that I needed to walk around the perimeter of the compound and pray that God would put his protection over the place. While walking, people would come up to me and greet me and ask me for selfies with them, so I had been out among the people pretty regularly. But Sunday morning I was asked to get up and speak to the people. I did, and after that, when I got down and started to walk around again, all of the sudden I found myself surrounded by people that wanted me to pray for them. So I would pray for them. I had no idea what they wanted since I didn’t speak their language and they didn’t speak English. I just hoped the Holy Spirit was guiding me and prayed away as best I could. When I finished praying for a few, there was a crowd twice as big around me and they were clamoring for me to pray for each of them. This went on for about an hour, when one of the Indian pastors’ sons came and started to translate what they wanted. That went on for another 30 minutes. I was already missing lunch, and the boy told me: Pastor, just send them away or they will keep coming! I told him I wanted to keep praying, and I did…. for a while… but after a few hours and ever bigger crowds, I decided I’d better take a break.

But in those moments when people were pressing in and just wanting me to pray for them, I got a small taste of what Jesus must have felt.

Anyway….. It was mentioned yesterday that Jesus could have just stood back and did a bulk healing, and it would have been done. Why did he tire himself out by healing them one by one? Because that’s how Jesus deals with us. We are part of a huge family of believers among the much larger family of humanity. And it is sometimes easy to think- I know God cares for ‘humans’, but I’m not sure he knows much about me personally. But the fact is that Jesus knows each of us by name. He deals with us as individuals… he knows our names and who we are and where we struggle and what we need and our hopes and our weaknesses… he knows US as individual people. And even more amazingly, he loves us each as individuals and spends the time personally with us, so that we don’t feel like just a number in a crowd- only one faceless member of a larger group that he loves.

I’ve felt that personal love for as long as I’ve known the Lord, and yesterday I saw a glimpse more of Jesus’ heart to minister to each of us as individuals because that’s what love does.