By Robert Schwartz

“If you have run with footmen and they have tired you out, Then how can you compete with horses ?” Jeremiah 12:5

We have all heard the saying that “Everybody loves a Winner!” But as I read this passage from Jeremiah this morning I had to confess to my Heavenly Father that I am a plodding footman. Oh I long to be that strong horse, full of power, fleet of foot, leading the charge; but my ordinariness has a way of keeping me stuck in what feels like first gear, choking in the dust of the great horses that run ahead of me. I find myself wondering if there is a place in this world for the ordinary, plodding footman like me. In a culture that values success and winners where do servants and the suffering ones fit in? In a world that promises to satisfy our every need by drowning our every want where do the poor and oppressed belong? Does God remember those that the world would rather forget? Does God love the Nobodies?

If ever there was a horse it was Jesus. If ever there was someone in front, “large and in charge;” Jesus could be that person. But what do we see when we look at Jesus? He made himself a nobody that we might become rich (2 Cor. 8:9). He wasted His life in the backwaters of Galilee amongst the uneducated fisherman, Romans, Samarians and other “undesirables.” It was in this context of the ordinary life that a paralytic is brought to Jesus. I have always been struck by His words in Mark 2:5 when he first says to the paralytic “Son your sins are forgiven.” What was Jesus thinking? How would this help this man become a strong horse? He was less than a plodding footman. He was a cripple and should be left behind lest he slow down the rest of the horses. Yet Jesus saw through the physical issues to what His Heavenly Father was after in this paralytic before Him – Jesus saw a beloved son whose issue was not his broken body but his broken soul.

Healing a broken soul is a far more difficult thing than healing broken bodies. We live in our bodies in a state of what Oswald Chambers calls “unconscious unreality.” We are highly tuned to the needs of our bodies but largely ignorant of the true condition of our souls. We are a disconnected, disjointed, dislodged, and disorientated people and we sometimes only see this when our bodies give way. We bury our vague sense of nothingness in busyness, in pleasure in wealth, in comfort, and in the approval of others. These are not soul healing pursuits. It was the paralytic, a helpless nobody, whose soul was healed.

So how do I fight that sense of shame and inadequacy when I look at my life and see a plodding footman and not a race horse? How do I respond to the disappointments of life, of frustrated ambitions, and unreached goals? I think the paralytic offers me some insights. The first is to choose my helpers wisely. I am glad that our Father has placed around me those who can speak to me and carry my pallet when I am broken. And sometimes I get the privilege of carrying them as well. The second truth I learn from the paralytic is choose my Healer wisely. The paralytic and his friends chose Jesus. The third truth I learn from paralytic is perseverance and faith. The first word’s from Jesus may not have been what he was wanting, but they were far more powerful than he could ever have hoped for. Jesus speaks to me and leads me in ways not always make sense at first. If I am horse and try to run ahead of Him I will miss what He is after. I need to learn to watch with Jesus

Prayer of Response: Father, thank you that you love the plodding footman and the fleet horse. You love me, a nobody. You love nobodies so much that You became a nobody to bring all of us nobodies to Yourself. You lavish us with your love and You have spoken words of healing into my life. Help me to walk with you and do the same.

Advertisement