Is Jesus Our Heavenly Handyman?

Theology and Politics from a Conservative, Biblical Perspective

“Angry? Depressed? Lonely? Uptight? Forlorn? Anxious? – Jesus is the Answer”

We’ve probably all seen questions like the ones above. They point out that Jesus can solve all your problems. In reality – and I want to state this clearly – I fully believe that Jesus can solve our problems. However, the solution to these problems we face is not necessarily automatic. Beyond this, things we at times believe are “problems” are problems of our own making. Jesus will help in His time and way. Are you willing to accept this truth?

This idea that Jesus is the Heavenly Handyman is often how He is portrayed today. Here’s the truth as far as I understand it. Jesus came to provide salvation for us. This means that beyond death, we will continue to live and it won’t be in hell. In other words, we will be the perfect human beings as we were meant to be before sin got in the way and destroyed all aspects of God’s Creation.

But the real question is what does salvation mean for us now? If/when a person receives salvation (by receiving Jesus), should we expect our problems, issues, difficulties, and even medical situations corrected?

I think it is too easy for Christians to present Jesus as the panacea for all problems. After all, if Jesus is who He said He is and did what He came to accomplish, then surely, He will fix those things within us that create problems for us; things that are connected to our sin natures, right? Not necessarily. We need to remember that physical and mental ailments are a direct result of sin entering into this world. All of this culminates in physical death and no one escapes that, even Christians (except for those who are alive when the Rapture occurs). Sickness, ill-health, and death are inevitable for all people including Christians.

A person who is anxious, depressed, lonely, angry, or something else may experience those things because they have medical issues that need attention. Gaining salvation may bring a limited time of joy, but salvation itself is not going to fix mental issues or even heart ailments and other medical problems. These are separate and distinct issues. The Christian must arrive to a point of being willing to submit to His Lordship and the truth is that He may not fix all of our problems…in this life.

For instance, there are Christian who are extremely overweight. They eat all the wrong things and enjoy too much of them. They are essentially killing themselves but likely do not see it that way. What if – due to their obesity – they suffer from congestive heart failure for a long while before they succumb to a heart attack that kills them? Their quality of life up to the point of their death was terrible. Doesn’t God want them to have a decent quality of life? Yes, I believe He does, but He’s not going to force someone to avoid eating the garbage they should not eat. Beyond this, some ailments go beyond the ability of medicine to fix today because of a lack of knowledge.

What about someone who is clinically depressed because they lack the necessary neurotransmitters in their brains that cause healthy brain activity? This can be attributed to several things, like diet or DNA. Sometimes, it’s the way a person’s brain is hardwired due to terrible situations they went through growing up. For others, it might be tied to diet and a lack of exercise. Because this person might gain salvation does not mean that they are going to be healed by God instantaneously in the mind as well.

About four years ago I started praying that God would heal me because I had physical issues that were just relentless and annoying, robbing me of good health. My prayer was that I wanted God to heal me instantly. I wanted to start feeling better and I wanted to start feeling better right then and there. After all, I had salvation. I was and remain a child of God, part of God’s adopted children. I had a right to ask, didn’t I? Yes, but God was not obligated to “fix” me, at least the way I thought He should.

Instead of fixing me right away, I can see since I first prayed that God has literally taken me on a journey for my health. I also realize now exactly why God did not instantly heal me as I felt He should have.

What God has done has been to show me with increasing clarity how important diet is to the body and soul. I’m not talking about being on a diet. I’m talking about eating the right kind of foods and avoiding the wrong kinds. I’m talking about learning about your own body and what foods you might be allergic to so that you can avoid them. I’m talking about avoiding certain foods because of the preservatives, chemicals, fillers, and other things routinely added to our foods to make them taste better, but in the end, they are not really foods at all.

I’ve learned what not to eat, what I should eat, supplements I should take, and other valuable things. I’ve also learned that I have allergies that are being dealt with through shots and food avoidance. Beyond this, I have been officially diagnosed with Fibromyalgia, which is too often relegated to the area of “phantom” illnesses. It’s not. There are physical reasons people have Fibromyalgia and it was actually called something else during WWI and WWII. There are specific ways to treat it the underlying source of the problem instead of simply treating symptoms. Too many doctors remain unaware though.

Had God healed me when I originally asked Him to do so in the way in which I felt He should have, there were things I never would have learned, like which foods I should avoid, or why many preservatives (such as nitrites, nitrates, BHA, or other things) are so bad for us. In short, I would have continued eating like I had always eaten and would have eventually seen my problems return even if God had healed me instantaneously.

Isn’t this what Jesus meant when He said in John 5:14, “Afterward Jesus found him in the temple and said to him, ‘Behold, you have become well; do not sin anymore, so that nothing worse happens to you’.”

In this case, the reason for the man’s ill-health was possibly sexual sin of some sort. Jesus was saying that though the man was fully healed, if he did not change his behavior, he would do the same things that got him to the point of needing to be healed again. Specific behaviors needed changing to avoid the same problems.

It is the same with our health in other areas. So much of our life is under our own control, yet we act as though it doesn’t matter what we eat, what we drink, or what we do. We act as though these things have no effect on our health when they have everything to do with our health.

Jesus came to provide salvation to our souls. That’s the best gift He can give us. Sure, we all want to feel good. We all want to be healthy and have the stamina we had as young people. A good bit of that is under our own control. What we cannot fix is something He fixes for us in the area of salvation.

Four years ago, I prayed that God would heal me. He began to show me what needed to be done in my life to make that happen. Let’s face it, even under the best of circumstances, I will still die. My body will come to a point where it will stop working. Even though my body dies, my soul will live on because of salvation that I have in Jesus. Nonetheless, I continue to live in a dying body.

The best thing I can hope for in this life is that God will grant me the ability to see what I can control regarding my own quality of life (health). I can’t eat whatever I want to eat and believe that God is responsible for “healing” me. Poor health can contribute to depression, anger, anxiety, and a host of other things, including the constant pain and inflammation of Fibromyalgia. God is under no obligation to fix these things and they should not necessarily be part of the gospel presentation. Certainly, God wants us as healthy as possible but our health is often in our own hands.

Jesus came to provide salvation. This He does. Be thankful.

Theology and Politics from a Conservative, Biblical Perspective