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- Pastor Ben
- Sep 8, 2025
A Short Theology of Healing
Creation: We were made whole—shalom.
Fall: Sin vandalized shalom; fracture entered bodies, minds, systems.
Redemption: In Jesus, God takes our pain into God’s own life and begins mending everything—now in part, one day in full.
Church: We’re a field hospital and a training kitchen for wholeness—practicing forgiveness, boundaries, truth, and love.
Consummation: The story ends with healing for the nations (Rev. 22). We live toward that day.
- Pastor Ben
- Sep 8, 2025
What Healing Is—and Isn’t
Healing is God’s will—because wholeness is God’s heart. Scripture paints God as the One who “heals the brokenhearted” (Ps. 147:3), binds up wounds (Isa. 61), and in Jesus brings good news to the poor and freedom to the oppressed (Luke 4). Catholic priest Francis MacNutt spent his life reminding the church that healing prayer sits at the core of the gospel. God delights to heal—often, and in many ways—even as we honor the mystery when we don’t see what we hoped for.
Healing is multi-dimensional. In Mark 5, the woman doesn’t only get a medical miracle. She’s restored to community. Her shame is named and lifted. She becomes “Daughter.” That’s spiritual, emotional, social. That’s shalom.
Healing doesn’t erase scars; it reframes them. Thomas meets the risen Christ by touching wounds (John 20). Scars can become testimonies, not open wounds. Some relationships won’t be “fixed,” but you can be reconciled to reality, grieve what was lost, and live forward with wisdom and boundaries. That’s real healing.
Healing sometimes looks like endurance, wisdom, and new limits. Paul’s “thorn” didn’t vanish; grace met him in it (2 Cor. 12). Sometimes the deepest healing is courage, clarity, and community in the midst of the thing that doesn’t change.
Ultimate healing is promised—but not always on our timetable. Revelation ends with “the leaves of the tree for the healing of the nations” (Rev. 22). Sometimes the final healing arrives in God’s presence. We say that with tenderness and hope, not as a cheap answer.
- Michael Minch
- Aug 18, 2022
Friends, you are invited to Healing Conversations.
Our training workshop for conducting Healing Conversations will take place on Saturday, September 10, from 9:00 to 4:00. We will meet in our RFC space at Immanuel. There is no cost for the workshop, and we will have lunch together. You will pay for your own lunch.
There is still space available for participants, please let me know if you would like to join us. Feel free to contact me if you would like to know more about the training event.
Here is a brief description of the day’s work.
The United States is in a precarious situation. The divide and hostility between those on the cultural and political “right” and those who are typically understood as “liberal” or “progressive” has reached a dangerous place. As Christians, we are all given the ministry of peacebuilding and reconciliation (e.g., Matthew 5.9; 38-48; 2 Corinthians 5.14-24). I have become convinced that it is now time to implement peacebuilding and conflict transformation methodologies that are used in conflict zones around the world (e.g., Northern Ireland, the Balkans, Columbia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo). The first set of training events were conducted in Utah in March of this year. I am now at work to disseminate them across the country.
The day will include information about the importance of our stories, trauma, values, identity, fears, needs, and more. We will discuss the meaning of violence, peace, democracy, conflict, systems, truth, justice, compassion, reconciliation, humility, courage, and moral imagination. I will do some teaching, but mostly the workshop will be a matter of discussion and participation in practices of conflict transformation. Techniques necessary to overcome toxic polarization will be learned and practiced. The training event will have a double, overlapping purpose: to train participants in the facilitation of such an encounter group, and to model the organization and process of such an event.
The skills learned and information gained will be useful for engagement in conflict of various kinds (at work, in the family, etc.) even though my purpose and focus is located in the political danger of our moment.
You are welcome to invite others to participate in this training session and persons need not identify as Christian to be involved. The workshop will not rely on theological language.
I hope to see you on the 10th! Please let me know if you are interested.
Grace and peace,
Michael
Michael Minch
Education for Global Peace
801.651.5659
