Against All Odds
- Observations from the palms of God's healing hands
(A collection of blog posts)
“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut himup for afool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.” -CS Lewis
Dr. Kevin Conners
Fellowship in Integrative Cancer Therapy
Fellowship in Anti-Aging, Regenerative, and Functional Medicine
American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine
Preface
I’m not a healer; I claim no credit. I am not particularly intelligent; I am not overly gifted. I’m not special in any way except that God made me His child. I have been adopted, made an heir, not by my works, nor deeds, nor inner goodness, but solely by the choice of His Spirit.
There are many believers that never fully understand or define the mission that God ordained for them. Many just fail to recognize that ‘being a mom’ and similar roles are HUGE ministries that influence hundreds of lives for Him. Some know that they are called to preach, others to lead people to a saving knowledge of Christ; I know that, though God uses each of us in distinct ways and gifts us with unique talents He also anoints us all for different tasks in different seasons of our life.
For me, I know that God uses me despite of my imperfections to teach others of the importance of sanctification, i.e. how to stumble along in our walk with God, ever moving towards the ultimate prize. I firmly believe that this takes humbly surrendering ourselves to others who will lovingly hold us accountable to an ever deeper relationship. This “iron sharpens iron”
“I don’t just have a log in my eye, I’ve successfully
built a three story cabin with a porch,
a deck and a wooden hot tub. Where the heck
was the mature one who could have
stopped me when it was just a speck?”
Building each other up does not mean strengthening each other’s self-esteem. The church seems to have adopted the false gospel of ‘feel-goodism’ that the pseudo-psychological community has come to babble lately. The postmodern, mega-church’s utter defiance to the true Gospel’s message of carrying one’s cross, laying down one’s life, and complete surrender to the lordship of Jesus Christ is nothing short of heresy. God did NOT send His Son to give us a better self-image; He died so that we could be grafted into His image.
May this short collection of blog posts remind you that God desires to use all of His children; may it drive you to a deeper hunger for Him and remind you to surrender daily to His will. This is my prayer for you.
“Hey there! All who are thirsty, come to the water! Are you penniless? Come anyway—buy and eat!
Come, buy your drinks, buy wine and milk. Buy without money—everything’s free!
Why do you spend your money on junk food, your hard-earned cash on cotton candy?
Listen to me, listen well: Eat only the best, fill yourself with only the finest.
Pay attention, come close now, listen carefully to my life-giving, life-nourishing words.
I’m making a lasting covenant commitment with you,
the same that I made with David: sure, solid, enduring love.
I set him up as a witness to the nations, made him a prince and leader of the nations,
And now I’m doing it to you:
You’ll summon nations you’ve never heard of,
and nations who’ve never heard of you
will come running to you
Because of me, yourGod,
because The Holy of Israel has honored you.”
-Isaiah 55:1-5 (The Message)
Warning: This book is a LIVING BOOK – I am adding to this e-book on a regular, weekly basis.
Against All Odds
When Mayo Clinic has given up, the oncologist is out of chemotherapy recommendations, and the specialists have given just a few weeks or months, people begin to turn to other methods. Many of our patients come to us in this grave condition, struggling to figure out why all their trust in contemporary medicine has left them hopeless.
There is always hope; wherever there is faith, there is hope. Unfortunately, many of us seem to have abounding faith but place our faith in the wrong hands. We have faith in our doctors, our medications, our nutrition, our stamina, our intelligence, and our choices. Such faith is powerless; it is fleshly, temporal and dead. What we place our faith IN is what gives faith grip on hope.
I’m reminded of Jesus’ encounter with the centurion in Matthew 8:5-10:
“And when Jesus was entered into Capernaum, there came unto him a centurion, beseeching him,
6And saying, Lord, my servant lieth at home sick of the palsy, grievously tormented.
7And Jesus saith unto him, I will come and heal him.
8The centurion answered and said, Lord, I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof: but speak the word only, and my servant shall be healed.
9For I am a man under authority, having soldiers under me: and I say to this man, Go, and he goeth; and to another, Come, and he cometh; and to my servant, Do this, and he doeth it.
10When Jesus heard it, he marveled, and said to them that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not in Israel.”
The ‘great faith’ that was found in the centurion was complete trust and belief that God could do anything. The centurion still sought out Jesus and made his request known but it was in a spirit of humility under the knowledge of the holiness of God as evidenced by his comment, “I am not worthy that thou shouldest come under my roof…”
Do we understand authority as well as the centurion? God is sovereign and if healing is part of His sovereign will for my particular illness, then this encounter certainly gives us an understanding on how to approach God:
- God desires for us to seek Him, especially in our direst circumstances. Sometimes He allows us to go through dire circumstances to drive us to a dependence on Him never before experienced. Psalm 23 states, “though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…” because we are all going to experience grave, stressful, fearful, life-threatening times. Being a Christian does not excuse us from living in this fallen world and suffering the consequences of evil, but, “I will fear no evil, for You are with me…” it continues.
- The centurion left his home and his sick child to find Jesus in a repentant state of mind. He knew he was a sinner and there is no reference in the text that his comment, “I am not worthy…” was said anywhere but extremely public. He would have been hated by many of the Jews that were following Christ, begging Him for their personal needs, yet he was addressed by the Savior personally. Maybe it was because Jesus knew his heart but surely the passage tells us that the man “beseeched” Jesus. Do we beseech Him, repentant; acknowledge dependence, authority and power to the One and only God?
- Jesus has conquered fear, evil, sickness and death but it takes us putting faith in HIM to receive it. Many of the Jews to whom Jesus preached had placed their faith in religious accomplishments, their stature in the synagogue, or their knowledge of the law. It is the person of Jesus Christ, fully man yet fully God, His death, burial and resurrection that gives us hope. We might have new life, free of fear and torment, solely and wholly because of what He has already done. It is only faith in the living Christ that has any power over anything we may face in this world.
- Jesus said, “I will come and heal him.” We have to understand that Jesus didn’t heal everyone and He was under no obligation to heal this man’s son. We will all die physically, some from cancer, others from traffic accidents. Our ultimate promise is eternal, not temporal. But we serve a God who desires our best (rightly defined) and for us to be free from demon influences that cloud our thinking and hinder our witness. Someone commented on a previous newsletter I wrote on God’s sovereignty that God would never be the author of sickness in a person’s life and He only wants us healed. If that is true then either He isn’t all powerful or He was sleeping when Paul got his head cut off, the martyrs were horrifically killed and all other believers died natural deaths. To think that we can demand from God is really placing oneself equal to God – the original sin of Eden. The centurion, in full faith that Jesus was God, with authority to heal by a command of His will, laid out his plea for his sick son.
Never do I want a patient to put faith in me as a doctor, my methods or tools. Pray for me, yes, that God will use me, impart wisdom as to your care, but FAITH is reserved for the ONE who saves, against all odds, when our hope is gone.
Let Your Impermanence Motivate You
Maybe you have yet to experience it; possibly you retain the youthful veil of indestructability. Sooner or later we all realize the transitory nature of our existence here on earth. For some it comes with age; for others the gravity of illness. Death of a parent or loved one may often bring a person to consider their eternal possibilities and re-think their life plans.
The only thing permanent is change – at least on earth. We are but a vapor, Solomon wrote, a reed blowing in the wind. This fact has driven countless men mad, tumbling into despair. Friedrich Nietzsche the devote eighteenth century atheist penned, “Existence really is an imperfect tense that never becomes a present.” He later went insane and died alone in the Basel mental asylum in Germany.
Though Nietzsche grasped at philosophy to fill the holes of his enlightened impermanence, others hide behind worldly success, the accumulation of money and things, or the foolish attempt at perpetual youth. One need not look far to see that nearly every product advertisement appeals to our lusts that temporarily sooth the empty soul.
What are we to do? We can slip into depression as we contemplate our past; we can be strung with anxiety of our wavering future; or we can cling to pretenses that give hollow satisfaction.
Reality is opportunity for faith.
Without faith it is impossible to find true peace, impossible to justify current suffering, and impossible to please God. As we begin to loose our grip on temporal treasures and tighten our hold on eternal hope we encounter another choice in dealing with this transient life:
Knowledge and acceptance of our impermanence can motivate us into eternal purposes!
Knowledge and acceptance that this life is but a sliver of forever is a blessing; our eyes are opened to a realism that only maturity can reveal. We have been given the gift to reassess our priorities, reformat our goals and align with the Creator’s specific, intimate, personal design. Finding God’s will is not difficult; it’s letting go of ours that becomes a life-long chore.
I find that God often uses pain as a crowbar to pry selfish ambitions and foolish pride from my hold. My useless struggle simply intensifies and often prolongs the suffering. The Apostle Matthew likens his life to a pot, an earthen vessel, able to be filled with numerous desires. We may choose to paint our pot with elaborate decorations, fill it with the finest wine and show it to be admired by all. It’s still a pot.
Filled with self, my pot attracts other self-filled pots. Regardless of what illusion I’ve created from exterior modifications, what is inside my pot will be evident to all. It spills onto others as I walk down the street; it splashes onto colleagues at work, family at home and strangers I bump in passing. Sooner or later, what is inside comes out. Call it character; but what fills my pot is either ME or God.
Oh that I may find joy to be filled with God’s Holy Spirit so that my pot could gush truth and grace, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control.
Our Cracks Reveal
Protect us through the suffering
Protect us through the pain
Protect us through the cloudy days
When all we see is rain
Teach us meanings, show us more
I know there is a reason for
Reveal the truth as You create
Of me You mold a different state
It hurts to have a chisel cold
Placed against my side to mold
With careful blows that chip away
My selfish dreams, my doubts this day
Your skillful hands of artistry
Gently show a form in me
Though often it may hurt I pray
You leave Your fingerprints to stay
Let suffering bring us closer still
To pour out self on cloudy days
Let pain remind us of Your will
Our cracks reveal Your Glorious Rays
Healing an Orphan Spirit
What does it mean to say that someone has an orphan spirit? First, we are talking about the person’s spirit, not a demonic spirit. A spiritual orphan is one who feels they are alone – either a strong, obvious feeling that may manifest in depression, eating disorders, anxiety, cutting, etc., or a subtle, insidious gnawing that shapes decisions that reinforce unworthiness.
Orphan-spirited individuals unconsciously believe that they do not have a safe and secure place in the Father's heart where He can affirm, protect, provide and express His love to them. They feel as if they do not belong. They can be full of fear, anxiety and insecurity, or just quietly reclusive.
Spiritual orphans have a difficulty receiving the love of the Father often stemming from past abuse, hurt, rejection and wounds by their earthly fathers or others in authority over them. Though they may know all about God’s love, even teaching others of His majesty, yet they themselves cannot receive the love of their heavenly Father. To the degree that they’ve been hurt and built the walls that seemingly protect their heart is the degree they cannot bring themselves to a place of being able to trust Him. Trust involves vulnerability; trust involves receiving. Spiritual orphans cannot trust nor receive until they attend to the unhealed issues and hidden cores of past pain. Trust involves opening your heart to others and spiritual orphans have closed their hearts because they are afraid of being hurt.
Instead of running to God, those with an orphaned spirit are continually running away from Him, remaining superficial and protected. If they are believers, they remain in the outer court of God's presence. They do not have the capability to enter into the Holy of Holies because they fear intimacy.
People with orphan spirits seem to hide behind an independence, which may cause them to hide or deny pain. They often control relationships with anger, passivity, isolation or various other means. They find comfort and identity in money (by possessing material things), addictions (to alcohol, drugs, food and other forms of immorality), position (looking for acceptance by obtaining the praise of man or striving to be seen by man), and power (by controlling their own lives).
Spiritual orphans focus more on God's acts than on His ways. They tend to keep themselves busy doing religious activity out of duty instead of relationship. In their limited understanding, love is not received, but earned. Their ungodly belief system tells them that they need to do more and more in order to be accepted by God and they often find themselves in oppressive, spiritually abusive churches that subtly use manipulation leaving many wounded in their path.
They are deceived into believing that they will never measure up to God's standard because they can never do enough to attain His love and acceptance.
I really believe that all of us DO and SHOULD experience a time of having an orphaned spirit. Let me explain. Without the Holy Spirit, we are all truly orphans. Christ died, rose and ascended to heaven for one purpose – to reunite us to our Father, breaking the chains of sin, works, and human effort. We were orphans prior to this and an unbeliever remains in such a state prior to regeneration. Jesus, speaking to His disciples, with eyes that see past all pretenses and viewing the emptiness of man’s heart, promises: