Do we want to be healed?
We have many opportunities to be healed in this life. Being healed is a great gift. And with great gifts, come great responsibilities as well. These are some things to consider when we ask God to heal us.
We read so many instances of this fact in the gospels. A great example is found in Matthew 8:1-4, a leper says to Jesus, “Lord if you wish, you can make me clean.” And Jesus tells him, “I will do do it. Be made clean… See that you tell no one, but go show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses presecribed, that will be proof for them.”
Could you imagine suffering from leprosy and immediately being made clean, and warned not to tell anyone about it? Leprosy is incurable. It’s a horrible disease to endure until death. He merely asked Jesus to cure him and he received the miraculous gift of healing, but he can’t tell anyone about it, except to show himself to a priest and offer the gift that Moses prescribed. That is his instruction; that is his penance.
You see, we all suffer from spiritual leprosy. When we seek the sacrament of reconciliation, we are asking for the healing of our spiritual disease. We too are assigned instruction, or penance, after our healing. It’s not a punishment, but a a holy act to replace our unholy acts. This holiness strengthens the Church here on earth, because we repent of the unholiness, and in its place, we enact works of holiness.
Jesus wants to heal us, we only have to ask… and be prepared to offer the gift that is prescribed by the priest. It’s such as small price for a gift so enormous.
Blessed Mary Mother of Dominic 