March 4th

1 Peter 5:1-4
Sara Baron


The people seeing what Jesus did were trying to discount his actions. They said to themselves, “Well, the only reason he is succeeding in getting bad-stuff out of people is because he is united with bad-stuff.”

I'm not so sure they are the only ones who have ever felt that way. Rather than delight in the good around us, sometimes we want to discount it. I suspect this is often because we're a little bit jealous- and worried that if someone else can do good that we can't do, then it speaks poorly of us.

God, however, works differently in different people, and in different churches. We aren't all supposed to have the same “good.”

There was a summer when I was working as an intern chaplain at a hospital when I started to become very jealous of social workers. When people had serious problems, the social workers would swoop in and find the person housing, food, and transportation. I could just listen and pray. I wanted to DO!

God needed a listener/prayer and a doer. With my work combined with the social workers, more good was done – and then we added in the medical professionals and there was a lot of HEALING.

I see God at work in healing – when it comes from human hands and when it comes from Divine strength. What a miracle it is that good overcomes and healing is possible!