I don’t work for money, I work for free, which is a rather
extraordinary. Therefore, a question I am often asked is ‘What made you do
that?’
Well sometimes people just do extraordinary things. You
might well ask Zacchaeus, the same question. YOU can read about Zacchaeus in Luke 19:1-10.
The story goes like this: Zacchaeus was a tax collector who climbed a tree to
try and see Jesus? Jesus spotted him and suddenly said ‘Hey Zac, come down from
there, I want to have dinner at your house today’. Zacchaeus did as he was
told, while other people grumbled and complained, ‘why the heck is Jesus going
there, Zacchaeus is totally corrupt, always extorting money from people, taking
bribes and overcharging. Cant believe Jesus wants to go to his house!’ Well,
both Jesus and Zacchaeus ignored what other people said. And, then something
extraordinary happened. After Zacchaeus
had had dinner with Jesus, he announced that he was going to give half of what
he owned to the poor, and pay back 4 times the amount to people he’d cheated? Now,
that’s extraordinary.
When I first announced I was going to work with Mercy Ships
some people were full of admiration and respect. But not everyone. Some thought
I was crazy, some were even a bit angry. It was totally illogical, almost
stupid to give up my well paid job. But I
wasn’t going to let passivity, fear of failure, fear of the future or fear of
what others think, stop me. The mission statement of Mercy Ships is ‘Mercy Ships aims to follow the 2000 year
old model of Jesus bringing hope and healing to the world’s forgotten poor’. I
wanted to be part of this dream, whatever the cost. I wanted to follow what I felt Jesus was
calling me to do. Rather like Zacchaeus
did too. It was illogical, it was a somewhat extraordinary decision. But I had
enough courage to take a step into the unknown, and enough humility to ask for
help and rely on others to support me – financially, emotionally,
professionally.
It would have taken courage and humility for Zacchaeus to give
up a life of wealth, built on bribery and corruption and suddenly give half his
money to the poor and pay back 4 times the amount to people he cheated. It
wasn’t logical. And I sometimes wonder, what reaction did he face from people? But if you are going to do something
extraordinary, you can’t worry what people think.
Prayer and miracles are also extraordinary and seem to fly
in the face of logic or science. Science
is logical, and I like logic. Of course I do, I am a scientist, I am a doctor. And
I publish logical research in scientific journals. But that is science. Other subjects one might
study, such as History, or English Literature are not quite so logical. Why
people do what they do, it is not always logical. I just watched some of the
BBC series on the Spanish Armada. Why the Spanish made some decisions and the
Brits made others, was not particularly logical. It had more to do with an
individuals courage or humility (or lack of it). Courage and humility are matters of the heart,
and they cannot always be explained by logic. Just like it’s hard to describe
why you fall in love with one person and not another. Christianity, or what
makes one person follow Jesus while another does not, is also a matter of the
heart. It is not logical. It is extra-ordinary. You could even say,
supernatural. The relationship of God with his people is a matter of the heart.
It always has been and it always will be.
I have seen some extraordinary things. Miraculous answers to
prayer. I have prayed and seen adults and children who are sick in our hospital
get better very suddenly and in ways I have never seen before in England. I
remember one lady who had problems with severe incontinence after childbirth,
but her problem was inoperable, we just couldn’t fix it with surgery. So
instead of consenting her for surgery, a friend asked if she would consent to
be prayed for instead. We prayed for her and the next day her incontinence was
gone. My logical scientific brain cannot explain this. It is extra-ordinary. Supernatural.
Miracles didn’t stop in the bible times, they still happen today.
I could tell more stories of extra-ordinary things. Other
patients healed in super-natural ways – ways my medical knowledge cannot
explain. Stories where my rational mind has to give way to simply an acceptance
of an extraordinary experience, for example when time literally stood still so
a car journey took only a four hours instead of 8 hours which enabled us to get
home in time for a significant event; when a translator who couldn’t speak a
patients local language, suddenly find themselves able to speak and understand,
but only with the one patient who needed it, not outside in the street; when
someone thousands of miles away who felt worried for me and prayed at exactly
the same time as I was being mugged by men with machete’s…..and that’s a whole
other story for another time, but we were incredibly lucky and I am grateful
for the power of prayer.
I love my scientific, rational, logical mind. And I love the
logic-defying, extra-ordinary life I live and the supernatural events I
experience. They can both go hand in hand. There doesn’t need to be tension
between them. The ordinary and the extra-ordinary. The natural and the supernatural.
They co-exist in perfect unity. I am made in the image of God (we all are), so
we possess his wisdom, his understanding, his logic – at least in part – and
yet how can the created understand everything about his creator. I cant. I am
glad the universe is bigger than my comprehension, I am glad God has more to
teach me, more to teach the world of science, and the world of psychology. It gives me comfort to know God has more up
his sleeve, his ways are higher than mine. Because then I can lift my eyes to
the rock that is higher than I (Psalm 61:2). I can call on him and trust in
Him.
