People like to pick at scabs.

They like to keep old wounds open. They are afraid to let them heal. They are afraid of what is on the other side. They are afraid of what they might lose if that wound is taken away from them.

Unhealed wounds and unresolved grief are convenient scapegoats. They give a person a good excuse for continuing in mediocrity. “You wouldn’t kick a man when he is down,” they mutter plaintively while displaying the festering sores that pock their tattered coats of skin.

True prayer invites healing.

Healing is the restoration to wholeness, wholesomeness, holiness. Healing is the consecration of the abomination of desecration. True prayer is living righteously, that is, according to God’s laws and according to God’s will.

People like to pick at scabs because they feel the sting of the fresh air again. It makes them feel alive. They would rather feel the pain of victimhood than face the darkness of the unknown that healing represents.

Healing requires responsibility.

Most people crave the privileges of righteousness, but few are willing to assume responsibility for it. Righteousness in a fallen world requires a constant state of forgiveness, mercy, and grace. It is a pearl of great price given to all who cultivate an untroubled heart.

Healing to a state of fulfillment is at hand. Healing is not available in some distant heaven, after death. Waiting for fulfillment to come after death prolongs suffering and denies God the privilege of enjoying His creation, of resting.

Let healing come now.

Letting is not passive. Letting is an active state of abiding in the shadow of the Almighty even while walking in the valley of death. When an individual says “I’m putting this in God’s hands and letting it work out,” while continuing to resent, refusing to forgive, and delaying repentance is not letting, he is denying, betraying, and following afar off. Letting is discipleship. Letting reveals the evidence of the presence of the One who dwells.

People like to pick at scabs because they are reluctant to come under control of the Kingdom of God and His righteousness. They are afraid of what the world might do to them if they overcome. They would rather test God’s patience through needless, self-inflicted suffering than face the ire of the adversary.

Healing invokes loyalty.

All injury and pain come from breaking God’s Law, from being at odds with truth. God has no desire for man or any aspect of His creation to suffer or hurt. God does not impose pain, suffering or misery; man produces it. Breaking the law has consequences, always. Two basic violations have created all of the misery on earth through the ages: 1) not loving God with all and 2) not loving one’s neighbor as oneself.

Healing requires obedience and agreement.

Obedience is a prerequisite to agreement. Each must learn to obey truth before he may enjoy the privileges of agreement with love. Obedience does not restrain life, it liberates life. Agreement reconnects heaven and earth. Life without heaven is not living, it is surviving. It is a hunger game.

Agreement is revealed in worship. Agreement, as such, is fundamentally a matter of orientation. Each man must choose between worshipping Love, Truth, and Life or Hate, Lies, and Death. The former restores vision. Where there is vision, the people flourish. The latter constrains to blindness, ignorance, and arrogance.

Man cannot arrogate God’s healing power to himself. Healing is freely given by God if it is freely received and shared in turn.

Healing cannot be kept to oneself.

There are many reasons to stop picking scabs, to letting a complete cycle of healing occur.

These are but a few.

I pray that you will stop picking at your scabs and heal…not tomorrow, not in the afterlife, but now. Your fulfillment, but more importantly God’s fulfillment, depends upon it.

Let perfect love cast out all fear, today, tomorrow, and for the rest of your days on earth.

Photo credit: Matthew Henry on Unsplash.