And He Healed Them All: Second Edition

by Jeffrey McClain Jones

“He looked at her, or maybe looked into her would better describe it. Nearly a half a minute passed before the teacher spoke. She tried to return his gaze during this silence but couldn’t sustain it for more than a few seconds. She kept trying, and then looking away, and trying again. Finally, she dropped her head and wept openly.

  “The teacher put his hand on her shoulder. ‘What is your name, little sister?’

  “She shook with sobs, but I could just hear her mumble, ‘Sarah.’

  “He spoke to her like a man correcting a misunderstanding. ‘This Sarah will not be barren.’ His prophetic declaration seemed to break what resistance remained. She dropped to the ground, dissolving into more sobs and tears.

  “The teacher knelt in front of her.

  “‘Sarah.’ He spoke her name as if it were a spell or incantation, as if the very sound of it had power when it came from his mouth. She didn’t stop weeping, but she raised her eyes to his. The teacher returned her look of longing, giving no hint of hesitation at the intensity of her emotions. The teacher spoke gently to her, like a husband consoling his bride or a loving father attending his mourning child. I couldn’t hear his words, giving me the impression that even in my dream their conversation was too intimate for anyone else’s ears.

  “With all this, it occurred to me that the teacher had neither said nor done anything regarding her misshapen face. I even started to think that perhaps he might not heal her face at all. Wouldn’t that be better, to teach her to love herself just the way she is? But this notion only shows the extent to which I was still myself in this dream, viewing Sarah with my own understanding and lack of faith. It was as if I hadn’t learned a thing from all that I had seen in these dreams.

  “Several people around them wept, some on their knees, apparently caught in the spirit of the intimate healing experience, even though many of them were still waiting for their own healing.

  “Ministering so many people, the teacher often moved quickly from one person to the next. When he did pause, he often seemed to connect instantly with the person standing before him. But this time, it was like he launched himself into the very core of one soul. For whatever reason, he chose to linger with this young woman, maybe to savor the process of her healing, or allowing her to savor all of the healing that he had for her.

  “Once more, Sarah looked at him, her sobbing somewhat abated. He reached up and held the deformed side of her face. At that moment, she seemed to enter a state of ecstasy, closing her eyes, tears streaming into her broad smile. I suspect that no one had ever ventured to touch that gruesome part of her. Within seconds, the teacher had massaged the distorted clay of her face into the shape God had intended. When he removed his hand, her face was symmetrical, her beauty complete. It was like a glorious work of art restored before our eyes.

  “Sarah touched her face, stroking her cheek and tracing the line of her mouth, her chin, and her jaw. But still she looked at the teacher. He was her mirror, it seemed. The teacher stood; Sarah followed. In her gratitude she clasped her hands around his neck and hugged him.

  “A look from the teacher stopped his friend John from intervening. With his own gentle hands, the teacher coaxed Sarah’s hands from his neck. He spoke one last word, his eyes locked on hers. ‘You are free now.’

  “Sarah’s eyes followed the teacher as he moved to the next person. She stood rocking slightly, quite wet with tears and, even so, she was the most beautiful woman in the crowd. She slowly turned and pressed her way through the gathered cornucopia of people, all of whom paused to look at her when she walked past.

  “The teacher gently punched John in the shoulder when he noticed the younger man staring after Sarah. The two men exchanged a knowing glance and laughed. John bowed his head a moment, shaking it, still smiling. No doubt the teacher could read his thoughts, but this time anyone who saw the way he looked at Sarah knew what John was thinking.

  “Two young men waited for the teacher to turn his attention on them. The manner of the connection between these two men seemed obvious to me, although I don’t know if it was by some physical sign or some special knowledge given me in this dream. I simply knew that they had a homosexual relationship. I figured if I knew it, the teacher also knew. The way the two looked at the teacher, with mixed expectation and apprehension, eyes refusing to land on his face, repeatedly glancing away and at each other, suggested that they feared the possibility that he might condemn them for the deadly secret they shared. Surely, they both knew stories of men who were stoned to death for such a relationship, and they knew that many rabbis authorized such punishment. But what about this rabbi?

  “‘What is it you want?’ the teacher said.

  “I’m not sure whether he asked people this because he had no revelation about the nature of their ailment, or if some of them would benefit from openly expressing their need.

  “The shorter of the two men spoke. ‘I have this lump on my throat that is growing bigger and making it very difficult to speak or even breathe.’ He pulled back his robe and raised his bearded chin to reveal a bulbous lump protruding from the side of his throat.

  “The teacher gently touched the lump. Instantly, it disappeared. In that instant, the young man jerked back an inch and then took a deep breath. And he smiled. He began to praise God for his healing, his voice rising clear and strong. He grasped the teacher’s hand and thanked him.

  “When the teacher shifted to the next person, the two men hung there a moment, as if wanting to ask a question. The teacher appeared to ignore their sustained attention.

  “As they remained, the teacher healed the swollen leg of a man who reeked of alcohol. Then he healed the uncontrollable tremors of a woman who wore the clothing of a prostitute. As the two young men witnessed this, I wondered if they saw a message for them in the way the teacher healed everyone and condemned no one.

  “As the two young men turned to exit the crowd, the teacher touched a little girl whose back was bent as if she were an old woman. When he touched her, she began to shiver and shake then slowly stood up straight, as if invisible pulleys raised her head. She stretched a full foot taller than she had been only a moment before. Her eyes and mouth opened in wonder.”

  Walter stopped there. “There was more. I recorded it yesterday. This was just the part I remember most clearly.”

  He surveyed me for a moment, without words, then cleared his throat in a way that again called to mind when he used to teach classes.

  Glancing briefly at Jillian, Walter explained. “I stopped where I did in telling you the dream because I didn’t want to get too far from the girl with the misshapen face. I’m sure I didn’t do that scene justice, but for me it was thoroughly captivating. I got so focused on the intensity of his eyes peering into her soul and her obvious vulnerability in his presence. Yet it wasn’t the sort of vulnerability that leads to regret, if you know what I mean. I lost track of where I was for a while. The sun, the grass, the stones, the crowd seemed to fade way and I could only see the teacher loving her, and conveying that love before she was healed and made so beautiful.” He lifted both hands to his chin, his elbows resting on the arms of the chair. “That’s why he waited to heal her after he showed her with his eyes that he loved her, I think. He wanted her to know that he loved her no matter what, that she didn’t need a perfect face.”

  He grinned at us, leaning on his right arm and looking at Jillian. “It reminds me of when I was a young boy and in love with Connie Tenopir.” His attention ventured toward the wall behind me, as if his mind leaped into childhood memories. “I don’t mean the story, I mean the feeling. It made me feel like a boy in love all over again.” He chuckled.

  He gestured to the book that lay on his nightstand. “I don’t get any of that sort of feeling from these scholarly books, of course.” He shook his head, closing his eyes briefly. “Jesus is this far-off historical character, part of this epic timeline of events, either religious or political, or both. He’s not the gentle lover of a girl who hates herself
for the life she’s been cursed with.”

  Jillian nodded, her lips a straight line as she eyed the book.

  Walter’s scratchy baritone voice slowed with the weight of his thoughts and perhaps weariness from speaking for so long. “This is why we get the idea that we can just nod our heads at words about God and feel like that’s enough. If Jesus is just an idea, or an ancient person way back there, then our hearts don’t get locked in to something that stirs us and changes our lives.” He looked at me then, as if waiting for me to say something.

  Without planning where I was going I responded to the opening. “That’s me. That’s me all the way.” I felt my breath rushing, shallow and rapid. “You must know it Walter. I’ve never cursed God or denied anything about him explicitly, but I just let God get away. I let Jesus become that faded historical figure. It was like neglect instead of open rebellion.”

  Walter nodded, like he understood what I meant.

  I felt like I had cracked open my soul like an eggshell.

  “I think I figured out why these dreams came to me,” Walter said.

  Jillian and I spoke in unison. “Why?”

  He snickered, but his eyes remained locked on me, his eyebrows lowered, lending intensity to his words. “After my stroke, when I was lying in this bed, unable to do much at all, I decided I had better check in with God. I started praying quite a lot in those first days. As I did, I realized how worried I was about you.”

  “Me? Why were you worried about me?”

  “You seemed so unhappy, or at least so thoroughly not happy. I thought that you had allowed the weight of the losses in your life to crush your hope, your light. I hadn’t really assessed it before, but I began to realize that you had faded away from your faith, and that lapse seemed connected with your bleak outlook on life.”

  I was speechless. He was right, so I made no effort to defend myself or resist his assessment.

  “So I started to pray for you, to pray that you would find that spark again, that God would connect with you again.”

  I felt beads of sweat forming on my forehead, and yet my hands were icy.

  “I think God gave us, not just me, these dreams in answer to those prayers. I know the dreams have literally saved my life, but I think they were primarily meant to save yours, James.”

  Walter and I had navigated some treacherous waters in our years of friendship, sharing our grief, our fears, and our pain. But Walter had never before spoken so pointedly to the state of my soul, never reached so deep inside of me and wrenched my heart free from its well-maintained display case in there. I tried not to break down crying, releasing the storm I had been containing in that floor model of my heart. Jillian slipped off the bed and knelt beside me, wrapping one arm around me and leaning her face on my shoulder.

  For a brief window in time I returned to that Sunday school class with Sandy Schaefer’s telling of what happened before Jesus fed the five thousand, how he healed all the sicknesses and injuries of the crowd gathered there. I flashed forward from that musty class room to Walter’s disinfected nursing home room and the extraordinary coincidence of his dreams illuminating that same story. How unlikely.

  I knew that Walter was not the sort of manipulative person who would have manufactured the dreams to match my childhood experience, even if he had known about that enigmatic Sunday school lesson beforehand. But apparently God observed no such restrictions against devious manipulations.

  My two sensitive friends reclined their hearts it seemed, to allow me to silently spiral down into my own shocked thoughts, fully aware, I guess, that the one who created the dreams in answer to Walter’s prayers would take care of their impact on my soul.

  Chapter Eight

  Finding My Way Home

  I went to church on Sunday, for the first time since several Christmases before, and that previous visit was only to please my mother. This time Jillian accompanied me. Actually, it’s more accurate to say that I accompanied her. And she didn’t have to drag me there, not even metaphorically. With my expired faith, I had lost connections with any particular church. I had indexed the shortcomings of any congregation or minister I had associated with in the past, and that’s not conducive to a warm homecoming.

  Besides, I was falling in love with Jillian, so I fully expected to love whatever church she called home. I wasn’t disappointed.

  Instead of with cynicism and criticism, I greeted the songs and the preaching with the images of Jesus from Walter’s dream. That view of God, and God’s work through Jesus, rescued the church experience from the disappointments and distractions of the past.

  After the singing and the sermon, and after I had survived reintroduction to the civil society of saints, we left the warehouse that the congregation had converted into offices, classrooms, and worship space, and we walked to my car. Jillian hooked her arm through mine as we made our way past friendly faces and half a dozen introductions.

  “Pretty hospitable people,” I said when we were alone.

  “Actually, I think they’re holding back.” She glanced around and smiled. “I got a couple of waves from friends who normally would have talked to me. I think they were being careful not to scare you away.” She laughed.

  But I knew she wasn’t joking. Her laughter, full of voice and girlishly awkward, sounded like relief.

  “You’ve brought men to church before?”

  “Oh, no, it’s not that. It’s just that my church friends are so overly invested in me finding someone, that they’re on their best behavior this morning. I hope you know how many people must be praying for us just now.” And again she laughed.

  I marveled silently at this rare giddiness from the woman I had begun to know. I was glad to see the girl inside of her as she suppressed laughter and rolled her eyes at her own lack of inhibition. All I could do was laugh along. I could certainly relate to both relief and exhilaration with all I had experienced that morning.

  After lunch I took Jillian home to fulfill her aspirations for a restful Sunday afternoon, though she did mention laundry, which never seemed completely restful to me. From Jillian’s townhouse on the edge of town I headed back toward campus and the retirement home.

  Walter greeted me when I found him sitting in the game room, soaking in the afternoon sun, a finished chess match on the board at his elbow. He looked thoughtful, as he did when he was working out a problem in his head.

  “Looks like a victory.” I noted the chess match. I draped my coat on the back of the chair opposite Walter and then settled into it.

  He nodded slightly, apparently uninterested in talking chess. “It’s good to see you.”

  I noticed the absence of a wheelchair. A walker stood between Walter and the window, a significant improvement over four wheels. “How are you feeling?”

  “Getting better every day.” A playful grin returned to his face. “The physical therapist saw me using the walker and talked about getting me into his torture chamber. I had to apologize for laughing at him.”

  I snickered and shook my head. “You’re gettin’ cocky.”

  “I think it’s allowed. I’m not cocky about myself or anything. I know who’s taking care of me. I get to visit him in my dreams.”

  I felt a stirring of jealousy at Walter’s unique opportunity. He bypassed my hesitation.

  “Let me tell you some more from that dream that I already started telling you about.”

  I laced my fingers over my crossed leg. “Please do.”

  “Back on that hill, though no longer near the top, for the teacher had been making his way slightly downhill, he stood among the scrub brush and sandy-colored stones. But what I saw most clearly was the people. He was working his way through pain and sickness and meeting the eyes, hands, and hearts of hundreds and hundreds of people.

  “At this point in the dream, I remember three women standing before the teacher. They wore long cloaks in spite of the warmth cast by the sun. Those cloaks were not for warmth, however, but a clumsy disguise. F
or below the hem of those cloaks I could see that these three were not dressed like the rest of the women in that crowd. There was no rough cloth, often-repaired sandals, or hand-me-downs for these three. They wore gold-trimmed sandals, ankle bracelets dangling gems, and silken dresses that peeked out from beneath those cloaks. They were not just a little better off than the average people in the crowd; they were surely from some very fine house or even a royal court.

  “‘What can I do for you, ladies?’ the teacher said, addressing them with a tone that made me think of when I met the mayor of my hometown, a well-known stately woman; certainly a different tone than his playful banter with children or his familiar respect for the elderly. I didn’t sense that he was pandering to these young women; rather, I think he spoke in their language, with a manner they could understand.

  “Then I saw that the two outer girls—for they were really teenage girls—supported the middle one. Her smooth young cheeks flushed as she responded. She bowed slightly, and then pointed to her ankle. ‘I hurt my ankle, and it’s not healing. It’s too painful to walk on, and I certainly cannot—’ then she stopped, as if remembering something she didn’t want to let him know.

  “He didn’t wait for her to finish her thought. ‘The doctors in Herod’s court could give you no relief?’

  “Her mouth gaped in surprise. I expect she was thinking the same thing as me: How had he known she was from Herod’s court and not his brother’s court or some other king’s or prince’s palace?

  “Her friend came to her aid. ‘She went to them and they couldn’t take away the pain. They said to wait and it would heal, but it’s been weeks.’ She lowered her voice. ‘If she doesn’t get well soon, she won’t be able to dance, and Herod will send her away, or maybe something worse.’

  “I don’t know what she meant by that, but the fiery glint of her eyes as these words pressed through her clinched teeth imparted a sense of danger.

  “The injured girl spoke again. ‘I know that I haven’t been good, that I haven’t been pure and righteous in everything. I know I’ve not been pleasing God, but I don’t know where else to turn for help.’