What Does it Take to Save a Life?
It was the coldest day yet this winter. As I headed to an emergency call in my veterinary truck, I glanced at the thermometer and it said -8 degrees Fahrenheit. My first call was a calving; a cow with a twisted uterus that could not deliver her calf. Upon arrival, we rolled the cow and delivered a live bull calf. Everything went perfectly –a textbook calving. I proceeded with my scheduled work that morning and then stopped at my parents’ house for a late lunch.
As I was sitting down to eat, Dad mentioned that he had a lamb in the bathroom. Dad’s flock is in the middle of lambing and a three-day old lamb had gotten cold, so he had brought it into the house to warm up. As soon as I saw the lamb, I knew it was in real trouble- diarrhea, body temp of only 83 degrees F (102 is normal) and in hypothermic (and likely septic) shock. My wife (who also is a veterinarian) was with me, and we both worked quickly to get intravenous fluids into the lamb, warm it up in a hot water bath, and get it into a warming box. The lamb perked up and even stood with assistance. We took the lamb home to treat it throughout the night, but despite powerful antibiotics, electrolytes, and our care, the lamb didn’t make the morning. We were not surprised, but still a bit disappointed. Throughout the years I have seen both disappointments and amazing recoveries in sickly neonatal lambs and calves, and I am often surprised by which patients recover.
As we were working to treat the little lamb though, I couldn’t help but think how effortlessly Jesus healed the sick and dying while he was on earth. Instead of struggling to get a needle into a tiny, poorly perfused vein, and then waiting for fluids to take effect, he just touched the sick and they were instantly better! Jesus didn’t wonder if his treatments were going to work, he confidently knew that the individual would be healed the moment he commanded them to be healed because Jesus was and is Sovereign God! (Colossians 1:15-20) Jesus did not have to see or touch his patients for them to be healed. In fact, his patients did not even have to be alive to be healed! Lazarus was dead and decaying in the tomb for four days when Jesus simply called out to him “Lazarus, come out,” and Lazarus walked out of the tomb alive and completely healed! (John 11:38-44)
As amazing as the stories of Jesus’s miraculous healings are, healing the sick was not Christ’s primary purpose during his time on earth. In fact, the main purpose of his miracles was to show the crowds that He was the Messiah, the promised savior who had been foretold by the prophets and the one in whom the people needed to put their trust.
So what did he save the people from? It wasn’t physical sickness, Lazarus eventually died again. Jesus came to save people from the spiritual sickness of sin and from the eternal consequence of punishment in hell! The Bible says in Romans “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (3:23) and that “the wages of sin is death.” (6:23) We are all born dead to God, with rebellious and disobedient (sinful) hearts that are primarily consumed with getting our own way instead of giving the Lord the honor and worship he is due. Amazingly, God still loves us and sent his son the Lord Jesus to earth to reconcile people to Himself.
As effortlessly as Jesus healed the physically sick though, it was a different story when it came to saving people from our sin sickness. As a Holy God, the Lord cannot just excuse sin, so the punishment for every single sin must be paid, and every one of us are helpless to pay our own sin debt. So God, the great healer, sent His Son. The Lord Jesus Christ stepped into our world and served our death sentence for us by dying in our place! (Romans 3:22-26) The Good News is that Jesus was more powerful than death! He rose again and now everyone who asks for Jesus’s forgiveness and follows him can know God and live with him forever!
Are you hurting today? Is your health declining? Are your relationships disintegrating? Is your heart broken? Is your life full of regrets? Do you feel like God is a million miles away? Have you lost hope? Are you in need of a supernatural healer? Then take heart, Jesus broke the power of sin and death, and he the great healer rose from the dead and is alive and working in our world today! Jesus loves you more than you can imagine! Please, if you are hurting or know someone who is, contact us at Grace Baptist today!
What does it take to save a life? The Lord Jesus Christ! Do you know Jesus? If not, we would love to introduce you to him!