This author shows that Christ’s healing ministry is still available to each of us—and we are called to extend this compassion to others.
The healing ministry of Jesus garnered an incredible amount of attention during his lifetime—so much attention, in fact, that he sometimes had trouble moving about freely because of the crowds. According to the Gospels, when Jesus arrived in a new town, people were often waiting for him, bringing their loved ones who were sick or in pain. His healing ministry was an indisputable phenomenon.
For all kinds of reasons, we don’t give Jesus’ healing ministry nearly as much attention now. Jesus is many things for us, but we may not think of him as a healer. Perhaps we’ve convinced ourselves that the age of miracles is over. Healing was something Jesus did “back then,” but not anymore.
It’s natural to think and feel this way. We aren’t sure how to interpret miracles—exorcisms, restoration of sight, the dead brought back to life. And so a haze can settle over these stories; we stop thinking about them as real. But if we can find a way to break through that haze—if we can remind ourselves that these stories, as our sacred Scriptures, are living and breathing—if we can read them with expectant openness to what they have to say to us today, we just might encounter Jesus of Nazareth as the healer who is still very much with us.
Several years ago, I set out with a friend to do just that. Father Tom Stegman was a Jesuit priest and New Testament professor. Together we planned to read and pray with the stories of Jesus’ healing ministry, to dive into them anew, and to share what we could with others in a cowritten book of reflections. Our project was interrupted by Tom’s illness, an intense struggle with glioblastoma. Tom’s death in 2023 deeply impacted me—and my reading of the healing stories.
After some time had passed, I carried on with our project. I was determined to come to these Gospel stories with fresh eyes and full hope of finding healing within them, both for myself and for others. And I will say the haze over Jesus’ healing ministry lifted.
You don’t have to write a book to have this experience. You only have to pick up the Bible and open it to the Gospels. You might choose just one Gospel—I recommend beginning with Mark—and resolve to read it with your mind and heart completely open to what (and whom) you might find in its pages. Notice how the healing stories absolutely saturate the Gospel. Take in all of their beautiful details—the people, the encounters, the visceral compassion of Jesus. There is so much to experience and learn.
You will no doubt make your own discoveries as you venture into the heart of these stories. To get started, here are a few things I learned along the way, when life took me deep into the healing ministry of Jesus.
Jesus’ Deep Compassion
If you read the Gospels with an eye to the healing stories, you quickly discover the sheer number of them. You come to realize that healing wasn’t something Jesus did on the side when he had time; healing was the centerpiece of his ministry.
This dynamic healing ministry was ignited by one thing: the deep compassion of Jesus. The Gospels use a form of the Greek word splanchnon several times to describe Jesus’ response to the distress of others. Splanchnon refers to a person’s inner organs—the bowels or guts, the heart. This is from-the-gut compassion, an instinctive and authentic response to human suffering: “Moved with pity, Jesus touched their eyes. Immediately they received their sight, and followed him” (Mt 20:34).
The frequency of these healing encounters and the compassion we find assure us that God is not indifferent to our suffering. Jesus worked to alleviate illness, pain, and suffering whenever and wherever he could. The Gospels describe Jesus healing entire crowds in the evenings—tirelessly. It was, and is, Jesus’ mission to heal.
Boldly Ask for Healing
The vast majority of the healing encounters in the Gospels are initiated by the person who desires healing. These folks do not approach Jesus tentatively—they know who he is, and they know what they want. Some kneel down or fall at Jesus’ feet; some touch him or just stretch for the hem of his garment.
There are also many who bring their loved ones to Jesus and ask for healing on their behalf. We might think of the man who was paralyzed, whose four friends carried him to Jesus. When they couldn’t get into the house where Jesus was because of the crowd, they made a hole in the roof and lowered him down! Never mind the damage to the roof—Jesus saw the faith of these friends and proceeded to heal the man both spiritually and physically (Mk 2:1–12). The Gospels tell of many others, entire crowds, who brought their sick and suffering to Jesus and asked for healing.
All of these people are our teachers and role models. We must not be afraid to approach Jesus boldly, whether we throw ourselves at his feet in total vulnerability or simply stretch out our hands toward the hem of his garment. Ask, beg, seek, knock, come. The age of miracles isn’t over.
Healing Is a Process
Many healings in the Gospels are instantaneous. Some are told in the space of just a handful of verses—Jesus is approached by people in need, they ask for healing, he touches them, and they are healed. But some healings take longer. Some even get a little messy.
In one such account, Jesus is approached by a number of people who ask him to heal a man who is deaf and has difficulty speaking. They beg Jesus to lay his hands on the man, but for some reason Jesus knows that this healing will require much more. Jesus takes the man away from the crowd. He seems to need space and quiet. He then puts his fingers into the man’s ears, spits, and touches the man’s tongue. He looks up to heaven, sighs, and says, “Be opened!” (Mk 7:32–34).
Why do some healings require more time and more effort? We can’t be sure. We might see another lesson in our own quest for healing: Some healings take time, but Jesus is with us, and he is at work.
Healing Is Not a Test of Faith
Although these Gospel accounts encourage us to approach Jesus boldly and ask for healing, we should also be assured that the healing process is not a faith test. We long to hear Jesus say, “Go your way; your faith has saved you” (Mk 10:52), but we are also very aware that human faith ebbs and flows.
Sometimes we aren’t even sure what or how much we believe. We want the kind of faith that moves mountains! But sometimes all we can do is proclaim from the depths of our being, like the father who begged Jesus to heal his son, “I do believe, help my unbelief!” (Mk 9:24). Jesus required nothing more from this authentic man. He immediately cast an unclean spirit out of the boy and restored him to his father.
The healing stories portray Jesus as a healer who is intensely and profoundly aware of what is happening around him—not only what he can see and hear, but what he perceives in human hearts. And the compassionate heart of Jesus does not send away those whose faith is weak or faltering. Once we are in his presence, whether we come of our own volition or are brought there by others, healing is possible.
Two Truths
When I set out to spend time with the Gospel accounts of healing, I wasn’t sure what to think about the miraculous healings. Would I be able to find significance in the “signs and wonders” that took place so long ago in first-century Palestine?
But after reading and praying with these stories for some time, two truths rose to the surface. First was the astonishing amount of human need that Jesus encountered. The Gospels (especially the Gospel of Mark) are quite honest about times when Jesus was physically overwhelmed by the needs of the crowds.
In one raw scene, Jesus tells his disciples to get a boat ready for him “because of the crowd, so that they would not crush him” (Mk 3:9). That vast human need pervades the Gospels. It surrounds Jesus and follows him from town to town.
The second thing I came to realize is that, although these stories are full of extraordinary miracles, there is something even more remarkable: the intimate presence of Jesus Christ. In story after story, Jesus stops and spends time with people. They look him in the eye, and he gazes back. He stretches out his hand in love, and they stretch out their hands to him.
These stories are not lengthy, and in many cases the encounter with Jesus is relatively brief. But within them is a connection between human beings that is so deep and profound that it has the power to heal.
Healing and Curing
It is in this intimate presence of Jesus, who is God-with-us, that we discover that healing is about the transformation of the human person. It is a process that takes place in the presence of God; its final moment is called salvation.
However, there is a difference between being healed and being cured. A cure is the alleviation of the symptoms of an illness. The curing of an illness is an incredible feat, a very real sign of the inbreaking of the kingdom of God through Jesus. But there is so much more happening in these stories, and in us.
When the savior of the world stops and stands still on a dusty road in Jericho to listen to the voice of a man calling out, “Son of David, have pity on me,” more than a cure is about to happen. An encounter with Jesus leads to sight, yes, but Bartimaeus also begins to follow Jesus (Mk 10:46–52). A new life has begun.
To be cured is not insignificant. It is something that so many of us need and want—the alleviation of symptoms, whether physical or mental, that are debilitating, painful, perhaps even life-threatening. But to be healed is to enter into an even greater transformation. It is to be with Jesus, to follow him, even into eternity.
Jesus has indeed cured many. But he will heal us all.
We Are Healers Too
The remarkable healing ministry of Jesus has not ended, but it has changed. If healing is about presence and accompaniment, then it is we who must continue it. The body of Christ is not just an intangible metaphor. Jesus pushed himself to the limit to heal as many people as he could. We are his body now and we, too, must push ourselves to be this healing, accompanying presence for others.
One of my favorite verses in the stories of Jesus’ healing ministry comes from the Gospel of Luke. It tells of Jesus healing at the end of a long day: “At sunset, all who had people sick with various diseases brought them to him. He laid his hands on each of them and cured them” (4:40). There is something so tranquil in this single, beautiful verse. But behind this tranquility is something gritty and real: a man who was utterly consumed with compassion, who loved the crowds even when they pressed in on him and did not rest until he had touched every single one.
We may be overwhelmed by the needs of the world. We may fear that we don’t have the stamina or the compassion of Jesus. But when Jesus looked at the crowds, he saw one person at a time—one need at a time. This must be our way too. Start with the person closest to you, and do what you can.
