Seventh-day Adventist® Church

Just after midday today the Olympic Torch spent time at the Stoke Mandeville Stadium, near the Stoke Mandeville Hospital, the claimed birthplace of the Paralympic Games. 

A German born Jewish doctor, Professor Sir Ludwig Guttmann,fled the Nazi regime in 1939, and ended up working in a British Hospital. By 1943 he was asked to head up a new spinal injury hospital. Under his leadership, the Stoke Mandeville Hospital provided care for injured servicemen. Until his work, most patients with spinal injuries died within a year "having been given no hope of returning to their previous life."
(http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14896776)

Part of Guttmann's treatment was the morale boosting challenge of sport. Using wheelchair polo, wheelchair basketball, and archery, he encouraged a "can-do" spirit within people. 

The first Stoke Mandeville Games took place in 1948, coinciding with the London Olympic Games that year. The first games were just 16 people, and archery was the first discipline. I reckon getting tickets for the archery at the Paralympics this year would have strong historic significance. ((Just checked and it seems these have all gone!)).

A team from the Netherlands joined the games at Stoke Mandeville four years later, and by 1960 in Rome the Parallel Olympics, later to be known as the Paralympics, became an Olympic event.

One man, with healing in his heart, made such a difference to so many people, directly and indirectly. 

A paralysed man was once brought to Jesus. (Matthew 9, Mark 2, Luke 5). The disabled man had great friends. The house where Jesus was visiting was packed full, and the friends could not get the disabled man near Jesus. So they went up on the roof, broke a hole through the roof, and lowered the paralysed man down in front of Jesus. These are the kind of friends to have!

Jesus told the man his sins were forgiven. The religious leaders were outraged, because only God can forgive sins. They did not accept Jesus was God in human form. If I was the man, I would have been confused. I think I would have been hoping for physical healing not spiritual healing. Jesus asked which is easier to give, forgiveness for sins or physical healing. 

But then Jesus did both. He looked at the man, and with the opportunity to teach different people different lessons, Jesus told the man to get up, pick up his bed, and walk. And the man did. He walked home.

People with spinal injuries were not expected to live long after their injury even back just 60 years ago. But what made a difference was hope in something better. Hope in a healing man.

The paralysed man received spiritual and physical healing. He had hope in a healing Man.

What do we need most? Physical healing, or spiritual healing? Whatever your answer, I figure that we need to do two things. Come into the presence of Jesus. Don't let the roof stop you from going into the presence of God! And have hope in the healing Jesus. Proximity, and hope. It's time to top-up on both.

-Pr Nathan Stickland