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What should come as a shock to no one, I’m a big fan of reading the Bible. There are so many beautiful stories of healings, and I have spent a lot of time recently ruminating on some particular miracles Jesus performed during his days on earth in human form. What a radical, wild shift for that paralyzed man who spent his life dependent on others seeing them bring him to the feet of Jesus. How could he not spend his life serving others in response? And that other paralyzed man who sat by the pool at Bethsaida and had an intimate confession to Jesus that he had no friends to help him in the pool. Was he constantly on alert to connect those on the margin into community from then on?

Significantly, those aren’t the stories at the forefront of my mind as I reflect on twelve years in a wheelchair. No, I’m thinking a lot about that woman who bled. For twelve years.

Matthew’s recounting is the shortest in the synoptics, but it’s perhaps the most powerful phrasing in the NIV. Two things stand out to me. First, the woman is single minded and confident she just needs to touch his clothes. Here’s where Mark adds some important context, telling us, “She had suffered a great deal under the care of many doctors and had spent all she had, yet instead of getting better she grew worse.” There is desperation.

I get that.

Back to Matthew, and really why I love it most, is that it says, “Jesus turned and saw her.” Saw her. The compassion. He met the need she had above the physical. Just like the paralytic to whom he said “Your sins are forgiven” before the words “Take up your mat and walk.” However, the physical need was still met and still real. He knew she needed physical and emotional healing. In her culture, she’d been excluded from society because of this particular suffering. He was giving her back a wholeness to her humanity with this physical healing that allowed for future relational healing to happen.

Dude, the Gospels are cool. Jesus is cooler. He knows more and does more. Beyond what we can ask or imagine.

And I’m still asking and imagining a future where I can walk and dance.

When I first read the story of the bleeding woman after my accident, I distinctly remember praying that I wouldn’t have to wait twelve years. Heck, that first week, I thought it’d be less than a month until I was back in my classroom. I know now that I needed to be in a wheelchair a little longer for God to do some different miracles in a few other lives around the world. I also know that he’s recently burdened a friend here to ramp up her prayers for my physical healing. I know God is stirring, and I know he doesn’t want me to give up on praying for my whole healing. I’ve been emotionally healed from this wound – that story’s in the archives under my trip to Denmark – but God told me to ask for everything, and there’s still a bit left for him to do.

For those of you praying along for my birthday in a few days, here are my annual prayer requests.

1. Pray that God is glorified.
2. Praise God for the ways I’m set up to be safe in this interim living situation.
3. Pray for a long term viable living situation that is safe and affordable.
4. Pray for my heart to be protected from the well meaning but cynical comments about my wild faith.
5. Ask God for everything – for my whole body to reconnect nerves from my brain to my toes, for all the function to return, and for my hips and knees and ankles to move the way they were meant to.