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Did Jesus really heal people? Physically heal them? Is this healing ministry relevant today?
Bruce Epperly calls Healing Marks a "very personal book" as it comes from over thirty years of experiencing the healing stories of Jesus. From his early years as a young college professor, he sought to make sense of the growing interest in complementary and alternative medicine. For seventeen years, Bruce was a chaplain and professor at Georgetown University School of Medicine, and was among the first to teach courses on spirituality and medicine at a major medical school.
While embracing Jesus' healing ministry as a pastor, professor, reiki teacher, and spiritual guide, he has also wrestled with the meaning of Jesus' healing ministry and God's role in healing and sickness in a personal way as a pastor, friend, child, spouse, and parent, in hospital rooms, hospices, gravesides, and healing services. "I have heard testimonies about the power of God to cure illness, but I have also sat at the bedside of dying friends and congregants, who have done everything right, according to the principles of their faith traditions and philosophies - personal and intercessory prayers, positive thinking and affirmations, meditation and diet, complementary medical treatments, and visits to faith healers and energy workers - along with the best modern medicine has to offer in treatment and palliation," says Bruce.
Each chapter includes a spiritual practice related to the healing story being considered that is easily shaped for the reader's personal and spiritual needs. Rev. Epperly also includes questions and spiritual practices for group study and spiritual formation at the end of the book. Chapter titles include "Transforming Faith," "Forgiveness and Healing," "Healing Takes Time," "Healing Broken Spirits," "A Healing Lifestyle," "Healing in a Pluralistic Age," and "God, Why am I Sick?".
This book is for everyone who would like to help in healing the broken in our world and in improving the health of all God's children.
About the author
Bruce Epperly is Theologian in Residence at Westmoreland United Church of Christ, Bethesda, MD. Over the past four decades, he has served as a seminary and university professor and administrator, university chaplain, and congregational pastor. He is the author of over eighty books, including Saving Progressive Christianity to Save the Planet; Jesus: Mystic, Healer, and Prophet; Homegrown Mystics: Renewing the Soul of Our Nation through the Healing Wisdom of America's Visionaries; and Whitehead and Teilhard: Metaphysics, Mysticism, and Mission.
