Today is the Synaxis of the Holy Unmercenary Healers or, as they are called in some traditions of the Church—“Physicians without silver”, which still has a resonance in our day. As Americans, we spend hundreds of billions of dollars treating our illnesses and diseases each year and hundreds of billions on prescription drugs that treat the symptoms, but do not offer a cure. We remember this day these Holy Physicians through whom God healed His people: Panteleimon, Cyril and John, Cosmas and Damian, and the others, who sacrificed themselves for the physical and spiritual healing of others.
The healings that Christ performed in the Gospels, and through those lovers of Christ with the gift of healing, are complete. Christ God, the Logos (Word) of God, Who spoke creation into being, sustains us all. He gives us the tools in His Church to find healing for our souls and eternal life with Him. Sometimes, He administers physical healing alongside spiritual healing.
But why does God choose to heal some and not others? Why does He permit some to suffer terrible diseases while others enjoy health? Why do the righteous suffer affliction while it often seems the godless don’t? These are some of the common questions we’ve all heard. It’s another version of the age-old question of, “Why does God permit bad things to happen to good people?”
We think of Job, who lost almost everything dear to him, including his children, and then lost even his own health. His wife then advised him to “curse God and die” (Job 2:9). To some, this may seem like the logical response to such terrible pain and suffering.
The fact is, for many, it’s easier to put their trust in medical science than in God, it’s easier to put their trust in the doctors, in that which is tangible, material, than in God, which demands faith and surrendering to God’s will. It’s easier to take a prescription than to prepare yourself spiritually for anointing in faith; it’s easier to rely on medical science, as our culture does, than to be among the few who still believe in miracles and the spiritual healing of a sin-sick soul. Medical science can treat the symptoms of spiritual malaise and its physiological manifestations on our bodies, but only God can truly heal us of our spiritual and sin-caused afflictions.
Think about it, when one is depressed or stressed, our culture says: “get a prescription!” But medication can often only mask an underlying problem that ultimately only Christ’s healing of our souls and a renewal of our identity in Christ can bring. The Church recognizes that true healing ultimately involves not only the body, but also always involves the soul.
If one is physically fit but neglects the soul, what have they gained? In fact, Christ God asks this very question of us, “For what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world, and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? (Matt. 16:26). In other words, our physical bodies and our temporal pursuits will wear out, some sooner, some later, but they will in the words of the prophet Isaiah, “vanish away like smoke, The earth will grow old like a garment, And those who dwell in it will die in like manner; But My salvation will be forever, And My righteousness will not fail” (Isaiah 51:6).
Our Old Testament readings at Great Vespers for this Sunday give us some insights into answers to these questions as well, reminding us of what God has declared: “I, even I, am the Lord, And besides Me there is no savior. Indeed before the day was, I am He; And there is no one who can deliver out of My hand; I work, and who will reverse it?” (Is 43:11,13).
This gives us confidence because we’re all in need of continued spiritual healing and growth in Christ: we believe as Orthodox that this life is given us that we may find healing in Christ through our participation in the sacramental life and our journey of deification that unites us more and more with the Holy Trinity. Christ alone is our Savior. There is no medication, no science, that can save us. God receives us as we are—broken, sick, diseased, dying, and He gives us a future and a hope with Him that is eternal. It’s Christ we avail ourselves of first and foremost when sickness and disease of mind, body, or spirit assail us because He’s Life, He’s Reality, He’s the One who gives us identity, hope, peace and purpose in our lives.
The truth is that while God can work through medical science, unless we are healing in soul, all physical healing is meaningless. Medical science can fail us, our bodies can and will fail us, but a soul that is humble, that is open to God’s healing and growth in holiness and righteousness, in communion with God, a person striving to place Him first in life, to repent, to pray daily and even moment by moment, will grow stronger in spirit, even if his or her body wears out like a garment. God and His love never fails us. He’s always bent on healing and saving us as He imparts to us true life, purpose, and joy in that journey further up and further in His Kingdom.
New beginnings are always possible with God: He is the God of redemption, the God of those who want to be redeemed. He is the Savior of those who recognize their need for God, who put their trust in Him and “not in princes and sons of men,” as we sing at Vespers from Psalm 1. He is the Great Physician of our souls and bodies. This is the truth that the Holy Unmercenaries proclaim to us today through the example of their lives.
So yes, God can bring us physical healing, but that healing remains a mystery. God sometimes allows us to suffer with various afflictions. Remember St. Paul’s “thorn in the flesh.” He besought the Lord three times to take it from him and what was God’s response to His beloved St. Paul? “My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness.” As St. Paul admits, he was allowed to suffer this affliction that he might stay humble, that he might continue on his upward path of Christ and not be “exalted above measure.” While a mystery, we know that God alone sees all ends and His will for us is firm: to find our rest in Him.
Such crosses can be our patient teachers, if we’re willing to bring Christ into the midst of our physical limitations and afflictions of body and soul. This means, we avail ourselves of anointing, regular confession, reception of the Eucharist, and, daily prayer and repentance, a life spent day by day and moment by moment with God the Holy Trinity in mind and heart. Then, by God’s grace, we find step by step healing for the sin-sickness of our souls even as our bodies may continue to demonstrate their mortality.
Suffering is not the enemy. Suffering, like death itself, is transfigured in Christ, by Christ. Suffering is an identification with Him. Truly, what God says to St. Paul is also true for us: “My grace is sufficient for you, for my strength is made perfect in weakness.” In our weakness of body and/or soul, if we call out to God as our Savior, beseeching Him to save us, to have mercy on us; we can strengthen our souls and find healing and salvation from Christ even as we learn to entrust ourselves to Him and prioritize our communion with Him, our life with Him, over everything else. He truly is “the One thing needful.” (Luke 10:42).
God assures us that “the souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment will ever touch them…” that, “Those who trust in him will understand truth, and the faithful will abide with him in love, because grace and mercy are upon his elect, and he watches over his holy ones” (Wisdom, 3:1,9). May the Holy Unmercenary Saints, the holy Physicians without silver, intercede for us before the merciful Lord for the healing of our souls!
Fr. Robert Miclean
Holy Archangels Orthodox Church
Sunday, November 2, 2014
Epistles: I Cor. 12:27-13:8; Gal. 2:16-20
Gospels: Matt. 10:1, 5-8; Luke 8:26-39
