This post is written by Leslie Hudson as a companion for Unit 22, Session 3 of The Gospel Project for Adults, Volume 8: From Wonder to Rejection (Summer 2023).

I was 38 when I hurt my back.

I’d tweaked it before, standing up too quickly from a weird position or stretching funny to grab something out of the back seat of my car. But this time was different. I was jumping on the trampoline with my kids (yes, I know that is the main problem) and I felt something stab me in the back as I jumped up. I knew landing would be painful and I was right. After 30 painful seconds, I convinced my kids, then five and three, to stop bouncing me so I could roll out.

Sure that the pain would subside in just a few minutes, I stood and calmly stretched; no relief. I came inside and lay flat on my back on the floor; no change. I could still function, but every movement was pure torture. I decided to simply get on with my day—after all, it was almost time for dinner—and I’d slowly feel better. Only I didn’t. I had to ask my five-year-old to get the crock pot off the bottom shelf of the cabinet because I couldn’t squat that low. At bedtime, I had to sleep on the floor because I couldn’t lift either leg high enough to actually get into my bed. I was confident, though, that I’d be significantly better in the morning.

I wasn’t. I hobbled around in tears all day. I was afraid I’d done something really, really terrible. My mom had pinched a nerve in her back when she was in her 30s, so I knew that was a possibility. And I’d had friends with vertebrae issues; that was lurking in the back of my mind. All day long, I tried everything I could think of (or could find from a desperate internet search), but nothing changed the terrible state of my back.

Standing hurt. Sitting hurt. Bending was impossible. After two days, I made an appointment with a chiropractor. He took x-rays and did a thorough analysis. After he finished, he simply said, “It’s muscular.” I was a little shocked; I was an occasional exerciser! I ran sometimes! I had just completed a 30-day, 15-minutes a day online workout challenge! He gave me a series of stretching and strengthening workouts and told me to do them as often as I could; the stronger I got, the better I’d feel.

I did the stretches probably ten times the first day and felt 1% better. The next day, I did them ten times again and could actually crawl (literally) into my bed. I saw that, as I got stronger, I was feeling less pain.

As all this was going on, I was a walking testimony to what it meant to really hurt. My steps were shuffled, I was very slow, and I winced whenever I had to sit or stand. Most people who didn’t know me well didn’t notice (at least, that’s what I told myself). But the people at church and other friends saw me take two steps and immediately asked what happened. When I said, “I hurt my back,” ninety percent responded, “I hurt my back in my 30s, too!”

Ever so slowly, I began to feel like myself again. And when I could again think about all that had happened and the slow months of recovery, I began asking myself, “Why is this hurting-your-back-in-your-30s such a pandemic? Why aren’t we helping each other avoid it?” So I became a back-strength missionary, showing friends and family (and acquaintances and strangers, if I could) the exercises that had healed my back and kept me pain-free.

I thought about that experience when I started studying this week’s Scriptures. In three stories, we’ll see that Jesus is Lord over the body: over blindness, over uncured bleeding, and even over death. His calm in the midst of panic and power in the midst of hopelessness is a beautiful picture of His presence in our lives.

But maybe these stories will help all of us who are hurting or struggling physically. Jesus hears our prayers and He sees the faith of those who plead with Him for healing. But His healing isn’t always necessarily immediate. A little girl was already dead before Jesus came to her bedside; a woman had been dealing with an issue of blood for twelve years; we don’t know how long the men had been blind. But Jesus had perfect timing for their imperfect bodies. He healed them just when He wanted them healed. Could He have healed them earlier? Sure. But perhaps their waiting and hoping for One to save them from their own frail bodies is exactly what bolstered their faith with humility, boldness, and desperation. Maybe this week’s passage will remind us to do the same.

Leslie Hudson loves her mornings of silence, coffee, and Jesus—not in that order. She lives with her husband and kids in White Bluff, Tennessee, where they raise blueberries, figs, and bees. She loves to spend her free time reading, writing, journaling, and helping others know and follow Jesus.