@FirstChurchofJerusalem
Today's Early Church Wisdom
“I shall not hesitate also to put into ordered form for you, along with the interpretations, everything I learned carefully in the past from the elders and noted down carefully, for the truth of which I vouch. For unlike most people, I took no pleasure in those who told many different stories, but only in those who taught the truth. Nor did I take pleasure in those who reported their memory of someone else’s commandments, but only in those who reported their memory of the commandments given by the Lord to the faith and proceeding from the Truth itself. And if by chance anyone who had been in attendance on the elders arrived, I made enquiries about the words of the elders—what Andrew or Peter had said, or Philip or Thomas or James or John or Matthew or any other of the Lord’s disciples, and whatever Aristion and John the Elder, the Lord’s disciples, were saying. For I did not think that information from the books would profit me as much as information from a living and surviving voice.
~ Papias of Hierapolis (c. 60–130 AD) From the Preface to his lost ‘Expositions of the Sayings of the Lord’
This week's Psalm is Psalm 31 'My Rock, My Shield, My Song'

Spiritual Wellbeing

History records many astounding miracles of physical healing, but even the most dramatic healing – that of being raised from the dead – is, of course, only partial, for the one raised must die again. Restoration to physical life does not, and cannot, change the body from a corrupted to an incorruptible state. Only resurrection can achieve that. The same point may be made in relation to other terms denoting absolute or perfect health states. Wellbeing is one such term. Relative wellbeing, like relative health, is achievable in our present corrupted world. But perfect wellbeing, in the sense of being fully well, must await the transformation of the resurrection. The oft quoted World Health Organisation definition of health reflects such an absolute view, describing health as ‘a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity’ (WHO, 1946). Apart from this being an unobtainable state given the human condition, this definition represents an understanding of personhood that is limited to mind, body, and social relations. The main problem with this definition is that it lacks any reference to the most fundamental healing need of all, the spiritual, and if you remove the spiritual from your view of healing, you will never attain to complete healing! In such a definition there is no recognition that we are spiritual beings. A more accurate definition of health might sound something like this: “Health is a state of complete physical, psychological, spiritual and relational well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” When we choose Jesus, we take the greatest step of spiritual healing possible.