The Skilled Surgeon's Scalpel

I came home from school in seventh grade with a severe stomach ache. I have never experienced anything else like it. I had to lay down in the fetal position clutching my stomach in pain. Nauseating pain. I could not quit vomiting. My mother, who worked as a nurse, feared when nothing she tried worked. She loaded me up and took me to the hospital where she worked as a surgical nurse. Upon the physician's examination the diagnosis was clear. My appendix was about to rupture. He demanded emergency surgery without delay. 

That surgeon skillfully took his surgical knife and sliced open my abdomen to remove the damaged appendix. He told my mother later it would have ruptured if she had delayed in bringing me in. Why would my mother let a man take a sharp knife and slice open my stomach? I was already in pain. That incision only caused more pain. Through his skillful work he removed the damaged and diseased appendix that was the source of all my pain. His inflicted pain was only meant to ultimately offer healing to my sick body. 

God takes the same approach to His people as He wounds us to remove sin but then bandages us to bring healing. He does this so we will return to Him. His wounds are only meant to heal not to harm. He wants us to come back to Him. Individually. Even as a nation. 

Hosea 6:1-3 points these truths out for us. Sometimes God wounds and tears us. He does not leave us in that condition. These acts are meant to lead us to repentance. It does not seem the contemporary church puts much of a premium on urging people to repent. To return to the Lord. When we do we are offered the assurance that He will refresh us and heal us. How much do we need His skilled surgical work. It may not be what we always want. It is what we need. After the painful wounds of God's surgical work, He has more in mind for us. 

Then Hosea urges us to know the Lord. Not just know about Him. More than that, He exhorts us to press on to know the Lord. To push forward. To pursue knowing God with greater intensity. As sure as the dawning of the new day, God wants to be known. God desires to be followed. He yearns to revive us in Him. To do that, He has to first remove the things from our lives that separate us from Him and are harmful. 

God is a wise surgeon. He is extremely skilled at cutting away the things from us that kill us spiritually. I am glad my mother took me to the surgeon back in seventh grade. I am more glad God continually does spiritual surgery on me periodically to take out the things that are harming me and brings healing and refreshing from Him in return. He is both wise and skilled with His scalpel. May we all be wise enough to submit to His skilled surgeon's scalpel when it is necessary.