HEALING at the TOP

SUPPORTING Reaching, Rescuing, Restoring For PASTORS and LEADERS

Luke 4:23 (K J V): And he said unto them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself: whatsoever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thy country.

This series “The Shepherd’s cup” is:

• To primarily underscore the backdrop of pain and suffering many pastors are confronting in private, yet hoping to find a place
• For unanswered questions and support as we drink from the same cup.
• To embrace one another as we release and minister to one another.
• To find our source of strength when seemingly all strength has been taken… leaving us alone in the battle.

Part One

What’s the meaning of the phrase ‘Physician heal thyself’’ ?

It means to attend to one’s own faults, in preference to pointing out the faults of others.

The phrase alludes to the readiness and ability of physicians to heal sickness in others while sometimes not being able or willing to heal themselves. This suggests something of ‘the cobbler always wears the worst shoes’, that is, cobblers are too poor and busy to attend to their own footwear.  What about the reason you don’t go to a hairdresser whose hair is ragged and un-groomed and does not maintain their own hair in a well groomed style! It also suggests that physicians, while often being able to help the sick, cannot always do so and, when sick themselves, are no better placed.  That being said, as preachers we can give it out but many times we may be the worst model of pain management, discouragement and disappointment, -but why?

Physician heal thyself creates the idea of self-help and self-healing, thus we have the paradox of a “wounded healer.”

We’ve been trained in Member care, Shepherd care, and whatever name you mediate spiritual guidance and healing …yet many pastors and leaders are unwilling to take the time to apply the balm to themselves.  Preach it but won’t practice it!  Demand it but won’t live it!  Are you finding yourself releasing your pain and hurt across the pulpit from where you are supposed to be feeding the sheep…?

Can the power of the Word of God you profess in your professional life (ministry), work in your personal life?

The Wounded Healer

Recently, I had the experience of needing emergency surgery.  With no warnings or dream, vision or prophetic utterance, but instantly there I was undergoing several hours of surgery.  Because of the wonder of anesthesiology, I felt no pain.  But oh my… the next several weeks gave way to the reality of pain and suffering!  A traumatic experience indeed!  On many occasions I had laid hands on the sick, prayed for them and they confessed healing or release from the agony and   torment of the devil!   In the hospital, professionally trained nurses took great care of my healing process. Daily they shifted and helped me with personal hygiene, cleaning the wound, etc.  As professional as they were, there was no less PAIN!  The day came when I was instructed how to clean my own wound and change the bandage… It was time for the physician to heal himself!  I remember the smell of flesh part of  it dying off…part healing into new fresh tissue, cells, blood vessels, muscles and nerves.  It was a very delicate and nerve bearing process.  IT WAS SOMETHING I HAD TO DO…ALONE.  It was necessary to heal and regain the quality of life I had known and enjoyed.

But you say preacher, what was your spiritual wound?  Similar to many of yours…the wound of  un-success, the wound of loneliness, wound of betrayal, wound of unanswered prayers, wound of non support, wound of financial burden for ministry…you get the picture.  It was “the wounded healer” experience that helped me to understand why many of the Apostles, Bishops, Prophets, Evangelists, Pastors and Teachers I knew were still struggling after Sunday!  They could express boastfully from the microphone on the pulpit but were as a bird caught in a snare soon after!  It didn’t apply to them! 

There have been numerous occasions when I would get a late night or early morning calls from those considered more powerful and anointed pulpiters than I, but they like Nicodemus came at an unpopular hour to say, ‘I need to talk with you or I need you to pray with me…’  As I listened to their soul’s cry within the context of their life story, it always erupted from the disappointment and hurt of an unclose mother-daughter relationship or the un-acceptance of siblings or peers, or the abuse in an unadvised/unwise marriage early in life…  The “hurt button” had recently been  pushed again and closet memories fell out all over the place! Thus, the healer was wounded!

Some Background About the Proverb

(From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Physician, heal thyself (Greek: Ἰατρέ, θεράπευσον σεαυτόν—Iatre, therapeuson seauton), sometimes quoted in the Latin form Medice, cura te ipsum, is a proverb used in literary Classical texts from at least the 6th century BCE. The Greek dramatist Aeschylus refers to it in his Prometheus Bound, where the chorus comments to the suffering Prometheus, “like an unskilled doctor, fallen ill, you lose heart and cannot discover by which remedies to cure your own disease.”^[1]

The moral of the proverb in general, containing within itself also a criticism of hypocrisy, is to attend to one’s own defects before those in others.^[2]

The same proverb also appeared  in The Gospel According to Luke, a Christian disciple who was a physician himself.^[3] There he quoted Jesus as making a similar reference: “No doubt you will quote the proverb to me, ‘Physician, heal yourself!’ and say, ‘We have heard of all your doings at Capernaum; do the same here in your own home town’.”^[4] At least one commentator has pointed out the echo of similar skepticism in the taunts that Jesus would ultimately hear while hanging on the cross: “He saved others; himself he cannot save. If he be the King of Israel, let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe him”.^[5

This proverb, “Physician, heal thyself.” This, doubtless, was a common proverb at that time, as it is also amongst us at the present day: and it shall be my endeavour to shew,

It may be understood,

1. As a sarcastic reflection—

[This is the precise view in which it was understood by our blessed Lord. He had wrought many miracles at Capernaum: and now at Nazareth, where he had lived from his earliest years, the people hoped to see similar exertions of his almighty power: and, because he did not see fit to gratify their unreasonable expectations, they doubted the truth of the reports which they had heard concerning him. Hence “our Lord said to them, Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, ‘Physician, heal thyself.’ Whatsoever we have heard done in Capernaum, do also here in thine own country.” But they had no right to dictate to him thus. The report of what he had done in Capernaum was authenticated beyond all reasonable doubt; and the people of Nazareth ought to have believed in him. But, being offended at him on account of his low parentage and connexions, they could not endure to regard him as their promised Messiah: and it was to punish this unbelief, that our Lord withheld from them any further evidence at that time. This is the account given both by St. Matthew and St Luke [Note: ver. 22–24. with Matthew 13:54-58.]: and this shews the precise meaning of the proverb, as applied to him by his countrymen at that time. Its meaning was, ‘You profess yourself the Messiah; and, if you do not give us all the proofs of it which you have given to others, we will not receive you. We shall take it for granted that you are incompetent to the task; and that you decline all efforts for our conviction, because you are not able to impose on us, who know you, in the way that you have imposed on others, to whom you were not so well known.’ Thus was the proverb used by them as a sarcastic reflection; intimating, that he could not do in his own country what he pretended to have done at a distance from it.]

Sound familiar?  The most powerful preacher who ever lived was challenged with this paradox..the greatest healer…has not shown anything at home amongst his own.  But Jesus had good reason.  They wouldn’t believe the prophet of their own home.  “But Jesus said unto them, A prophet is not without honour, but in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house.” –Mk. 6:4

2. As a salutary admonition—

[Certainly, a person seeking to reform others should, so to speak, begin at home; and, if he do not, he will provoke others to retaliate with this advice, “Physician, heal thyself.” It is in this sense that the proverb is more generally used amongst ourselves. And in this sense it exactly accords with the instruction given by our Lord, in his Sermon on the Mount: “Why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, and perceivest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Either, how canst thou say to thy brother, Brother, let me pull out the mote that is in thine eye, when thou thyself beholdest not the beam that is in thine own eye? Thou hypocrite, cast out first the beam out of thine own eye; and then thou shalt see clearly to pull out the mote that is in thy brother’s eye [Note: Luke 6:41-42.].” In this view it is a salutary admonition, for which all must be prepared who would do good to others: and to cut off all just occasion for it must be the one labour of their lives.]

When we see our blessed Lord supposing it applied to himself, it will be desirable to ascertain,

 3. To whom it may with propriety be addressed—

You will bear in mind, that our Lord was supposed to possess and exercise such powers as it fully attested to his divine mission. These powers the people of Nazareth, therefore, called upon him to display amongst them: and on his compliance with these terms, they suspended their acceptance of him as their promised Messiah. Had he never given sufficient proof of his divine mission, they would have been justified in demanding more convincing evidence of it. But what he had done at Capernaum was abundantly sufficient to shew that God was with him of a truth; and therefore their demand was unreasonable, and the refusal of it was a just punishment for their incredulity.

___ Dear Lord, ___

Strengthen each pastor that finds his cup bitter and unbearable with pain.  May the Holy Spirit give each one Comfort

and may they find help through the One who knows best, Our Lord, whom you have permitted to taste the pain in the cup. 

In Jesus Name ~  Amen.

    Next in this series…

1. to be continued…applying the term Part II

2.  How do I identify the Character of the ‘wounded healer’…Lord is it I?

3.  The pain of preaching and preaching in pain