He Meets Us in Our Loss
A giant in the faith passed on into heaven this week–and her loss feels quite personal. Beni Johnson, a woman whose teachings on intercession, health, and love of family deeply impacted thousands and has had a profound impact on us here at The Crowning Jewels.Her book, "The Happy Intercessor", changed how many of us viewed prayer.
Thousands were contending for her to get healed from cancer. And this last Wednesday, she passed into glory. We honor her life and her legacy and her faith. Faith that included the belief in supernatural healing. She was a powerful woman of faith.
As we honor her, we can't deny that moments like this often bring up deep, hard, and uncomfortable questions.
What do we do when someone doesn’t get healed, especially when they were contending for healing?
When it seems like God doesn’t answer our prayers?
When the dream doesn’t come true?
When we experience a deep and personal loss?
Should we suddenly doubt God’s goodness or His ability to answer? Should we then conclude that God isn’t a healing God or that He only heals on occasion? Should we assign blame or assume we somehow failed and didn’t have enough faith?
Bill Johnson, Beni’s husband, has more than once encouraged us not to make a theology out of our experiences. Rather, we are to come back to Scripture and to God’s character and allow Him to be the one to guide us into truth.
So together, let’s do that.
Scripture says in Isaiah 55.8-9:
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways,
declares the Lord.
As the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
As humans, our brains are constantly searching for a story, for reason, for a way to make sense out of things. But sometimes, we simply don’t have answers. God’s ways are, quite simply, higher than our ways. In the moments we don’t have answers, it can be tempting to discard our faith or assign blame or limit what we believe is possible.
Don’t do that.
In Hebrews 11, Paul gives us a lesson on faith. And he shares the stories of many giants in the faith who experienced wild miracles, radical healings, and amazing encounters with God. However, many of these giants of the faith also experienced incredible hardship, persecution, and opposition. Some even died tragic deaths because of their faith. The Apostle Paul eventually became one who was martyred for his faith.
In prophetic culture, we can often focus on declaring the positive and releasing hope and joy—and this is a CORE of what we believe. We believe God has an incredible purpose for TODAY. But we also must remember that we were created for eternity and eternity goes beyond what we experience in the day to day on earth. Jesus himself said, “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart, I have overcome the world” (John 16:33).
This world is not our ultimate goal. We believe God wants to release heaven on earth. YES! We believe miracles are for today. YES! We believe God still heals (and we’ve seen it!). YES! We believe God cares about the details of our hearts and lives. YES!
And yet we also believe that His ways are higher than our ways.
We also believe that we will not fully understand the way He moves because He’s God and we’re not.
We also believe He sees a bigger picture than we ever could.
And we also believe that He is good no matter what. Our experiences of heartache, loss, and disappointment on this earth will NEVER change the fact that He is good. Unless we are willing to stake our faith on the immovable truth that He is good no matter what, His character will always be at the mercy of changing circumstances. God’s character isn’t up for debate. And if you find yourself wondering if He is truly good, there’s an invitation today to stake yourself to this truth: His ways are higher than our ways and nothing can change the fact that He is good.
If you have recently experienced heartache or loss, you don’t need to stamp a cliché Christian phrase over your pain in order to make sense of it. Instead, you have permission to mourn, you have permission to grieve, and you have permission to be deeply honest with God about how you feel. Take your pain to Him and run into the arms of a loving Father and a good God. He is the God who hears, who comforts, and who responds to your heart’s cry.
So today, as a community, we’re doing just that. We are grieving. We are celebrating the life of a wonderful woman of faith and honoring her legacy. And we are also running into the arms of our good, kind, and loving Father. And we invite you to do the same.
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Written by Katelyn Alexander