In the Gospels both Matthew {Matt 9:1-13} and Mark {Mark 2:16-18} record an occasion when Jesus is challenged by the religious leaders as to who he was spending his time with. His response was that he had come to bring health and healing to those who were not receiving it. It is easy for us to look at this incident and cast our agreement with Jesus for calling out the religious leaders while not taking the time to examine our own lives. In the Matthew accounts Jesus, says, “ But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice…” he is speaking in a way that his listeners had forgotten or not understood the phrase “I desire mercy, not sacrifice” which was taken from the book of Hosea. To desire mercy over sacrifice is to understand that we must love and heal before we can instruct and disciple. And so we are left to examine ourselves each and every one of us in the light of what Jesus has said and how he lived. Are you relatively healthy? Do you require the services of the great Physician Jesus? Or perhaps you have simply forgotten who you have been called to reach? A doctor can only help others if he is healthy and the Church Health Partnership exists to help those who are ministering to the unhealthy by helping those who are called to be doctors to be healthy themselves. Are you yourself unhealthy and trying to work among those who are just like you? Consider your own healthy before considering others and make the choice to become healthy.
Brian Brunke 