Christians are given to some very odd permutations on the subject of healing. It's true that Jesus healed everything from Peter's mother's fever, to the sky and the sea. The most common interpretation of this (outside of "higher criticism"--so it calls itself without a hint of irony!) is that Jesus did strings of miracles to show his authority ("even the winds and the sea obey Him--what kind of man IS this!!!"..."That you may know...) as well as God's will ("that none may perish") and core compassion, ultimately by THE Passion.
"He could not do many miracles...becdause of their unbelief" and I would have to add, becdause of their reversion or addictions to materialistic assumptions centered on, "What's in it for me?" or "How can I impress others with my god-imitation schtick?"
I have been witness to several incontrovertible miracles of healing, some of them very close to home. Being married to a spouse whose faith in God's power and mercy is indefatigable, definitely helps when my faith is at low ebb. But bringing these events to mind--I have a notebook that contains a few of them--is a help when I am on my own--such as this week when Flo visits our grandaughters and my parents. If you pray, pray for her safety and my parent's sanity!!
But I must say, the greatest miracle of healing is here and now...and continuous. Think of it--God has healed every disease or infection I have had in the past 62 years! I realize that I am overwhelmingly fortunate--and I do the work on it that I am able to do--and like my patients I have areas of vulnerability and inborn weaknesses that I have to deal with. But the vast majority of my continual healing is done without any conscious effort on my part, apart from the general will to live, the awareness of which does surface from time to time.
The other thing to consider is that approx. 60% of the illnesses I see are lifestyle related and entirely preventable. Obesity is the main thing right now (and I have never yet seen a case of Prader-Willi syndrome --see your Funk and Wagnall's for details--or ask "Ste. Google) and countless cases of "Syndrome X".
And we get angry and blame God or some abstract and imaginary force--such as "society--for those who are not aware of their Guardian Wormwood, we can easily blame some other invisible and intangible force that hinders us; or extracts from us our pound of flesh. (If only liposuction really worked, eh?)
When it comes down to it, The Bible has answers available for sickness in general, and for responsibility; and evil. Individual cases require us to ask for insight--not an unreasonable request! But mostly when people ask for answers, their questions are 99% rhetorical; because they simply will not accept what God has actually said. They want answers, all right; but only if we are willing to assume materialism from the get-go. The aim of these questions are simply to confirm their prejudices--all of which are unquestioningly borrowed from McWorld. I have yet to see an unbeliever come to God by asking inherently incoherent questions such as these psuedo-proofs--which once again commit ad nauseam the logicicians mistake of "category error."
Speaking of prejudices, I can reccomend again "Stuff White People Like", whose bow is irony and whose arrows are those of logical consistency--another reason why white Europeans are so unbearably dim and unable to discern the absurdity of most of their positions...hence the aformentions lack of faith--or should I say the investment of our basic given faith-gifts into things that don't even begin to deserve them or bring anything back to us--not even interest, as the master said to the unfaithful servant--who by the way only discerned a God of wrath.
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