A Perfect Design
Have you ever fallen asleep using your arm as a pillow? Do you remember that feeling when you first wake up? Not the tingles, before then, when it feels completely numb - now it could be because I have a big head but if you have ever had that feeling, I think that you can understand. We know what happened, it is because we have cut off the circulation to our arm. The blood flow stops reaching the entire extremity and your arm essentially dies, and becomes lifeless. We can’t get it to move - at least not without the assistance of our other hand.
It’s a strange, eerie, feeling and for a split second, I panic - “What if it never regains its feeling?” Only to start to feel the blood flow return which is noticeable only because now I can feel the tingling as it moves down my arm and towards the tips of my fingers. Then finally, it’s fine. No more of the tingly feeling, full mobility, and all is as it should be. My arm is just as strong and useful as it once was.
So this, of course, made me think of what Jesus stated…
“5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.”
John 15:5
Veins and Arteries are the branches of the human body and Jesus is its life’s blood. If he stops flowing through us we can feel numb. He also said that…
“53 Jesus said to them, “Very truly I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day. 55 For my flesh is real food and my blood is real drink. 56 Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood remains in me, and I in them. 57 Just as the living Father sent me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on me will live because of me.”
John 6
We know that the bread of life is the word of living God, are we taking it in every day like we do a meal?
So how about another question?
Has your discipleship ever felt numb? You can see that you are a spiritual person because of the Bible on your desk at home, your cross hanging from the rearview mirror in your car, and the bumper sticker in the shape of a fish with Jesus’ name prominently displayed inside. It is just like how we can still see the arm attached to our body, but it doesn’t matter what we see - if it is numb and unusable. Without Jesus’ Spirit (The Holy Spirit) coursing through our bodies we have no life.
What heavy thing has been lying on top of our hearts that has stopped the Spirit’s circulation there?
Whatever it is. Could it be the reason that we are cold and dismissive when we see a mentally challenged person stumble past us on the train platform? And we turn a cold shoulder in disgust, fear, and resentment that we have to deal with this today? The numbness that arises when we have seen the same homeless person in front of the supermarket for weeks on end asking for a handout? Or, how about the screeching, screaming baby that you can hear from the next outpatient clinic over from your doctor’s appointment at the hospital? Are you thinking warm and fuzzy thoughts or are you thinking in a very cold-hearted manner - “That someone needs to shut that kid up!” With no care or concern for the pain that the baby must be feeling to elicit such a response?
Numbness is a sign that something is wrong. Could it be that too much pressure has been applied in one area of your life and it has cut off the circulation of the Spirit? Are you pressured by doubts? By fears? By money concerns? Are you pressured by disrespectful co-workers? Maybe just crushed under the weight of unforgiveness? Or, a million other things that apply pressure in our lives. Are we not now just as numb and spiritually useless as that bloodless arm?
Talk to another spiritual person, confess your fears, resentments, and doubts to them, and pray together. In this way, you will be allowing your other hand to help you when you are too numb to move on your own. And then with…
Faith in Jesus’ name through prayer, Faith in God the Father’s promises, and Faith in the Holy Spirit’s power, then we must allow Jesus to flow into those areas that we have blocked through unbelief and worry.
The beautiful thing about God is that HE IS LIFE, HE brings LIFE wherever HE goes - we just have to let him in. Allow God to bring back feelings, usefulness, purpose, and life to those numb places. I know we can feel that quick sense of panic but when we let Jesus (our life’s blood) into our hearts again, we become as strong and useful as we were before.
