Kneeling & Healing

My wife accidentally dislocated her right knee cap last week. She was in such tremendous pain, she started sweating profusely and became acutely nauseous, but fortunately, she was able to pop it back in place. I have never personally dislocated a knee cap but I have dislocated my shoulder and I’m pretty sure that any time you dislocate a joint it’s going to be extremely painful and impossible to ignore. Or is it?

She went to the doctor and is doing better but her knee is still sore and she’s really worried about dislocating it again. So I got some advice from several friends who are athletes and then went on line to do some research where I came across a story that was hard to believe, but true. A group of Finnish Doctors did a controlled study on the power of “fake” surgery. They solicited a group of 146 volunteer patients who had knee injuries such as a torn meniscus and enrolled them in a trial study. Half of the patients had real surgery, while the other half received only minor incisions on their knee to make it look like they had surgery. The amazing results were that in terms of healing, there was no significant difference between the two groups. Does that prove that surgery is a waste of time? Absolutely not. But it does prove that the human mind has tremendous power and if we can learn how to tap into it better, we just might end up in a lot less pain.

So how do we tap into the power of our minds? I keep hearing the term “mindfulness” a lot these days and I think I am beginning to understand the concept. “Mindfulness is the basic human ability to be fully present, aware of where we are and what we’re doing, and not overly reactive or overwhelmed by what’s going on around us.” So how does mindfulness relate to the results of the clinical trials performed by the Finnish Doctors? Perhaps practicing “mindfulness” is the first step towards being truly able to tap into the immense power locked under our lids. You can call it the ability to focus, or you can call it extreme concentration, but the bottom line is having the ability to be fully focused and not bothered by people or events around you.

So where can we find a good example of someone using the power of their mind to be fully focused? Look no further than the Bible. Jesus was the most focused person to ever walk the earth. Once He began his journey, He never wavered, never sinned, never got distracted, never veered to the left or to the right, never once. He simply stayed on course until his goal was accomplished. Furthermore, like the Finnish Doctors recently discovered, He had the ability to heal hundreds of people without the aid of a single scalpel. I can find a lot of interesting stories and ideas on the internet, but I’m starting to think that I can learn a lot more by surfing the New Testament than I can by paddling across the internet… and it’s absolutely painless!

Some minds seem to create themselves, springing up 

under every disadvantage and working their solitary but 

irresistible way through a thousand obstacles.

~ Washington Irving