Jessica Levy Books

Fun fact: expectations are serial killers.

They are killers of joy, killers of peace, of relationships, of vision, of hope. Our expectations kill goodness in our lives. They cause us to miss the point. They blind us to the truth. We get so wrapped up in the mismatch between how we thought it would be and how it is that we miss how it is.

We expect a bright sunny day and lament the cloud in the sky because we forget that growth also requires rain. We expect Prince Charming to bring us a glass slipper in our size, so when he puts one. more. dirty dish on the pile instead of just washing it, we’re sure we deserve better.

We plan for happiness in our lives, through fulfilling relationships, through accomplished careers, through perfect families and when these don’t meet our expectations, we shake our fists at heaven and convince ourselves God must not see our pain or surely he would relieve us. Worse, sometimes we convince ourselves there must not be a God.

Consider the paralyzed man of Mark 2. Life for the man who was paralyzed in the first century was brutal. He had no way to get around, he couldn’t have a job, he would have to beg for food. He must have felt invisible and useless. It is doubtful he had a hope in the world that he would amount to anything. Convincing him that he was a prized creation of the Lord most high would have proven impossible. His situation sure didn’t call him “royal.” To him, hope took the form of physical healing. If he could walk again, he could see his life change. Short of that, he could see nothing.  

He wasn’t alone. The crowd of people in the building that day also found hope and wonder only in what they could see. As Jesus performed one miracle (healing) to prove his power to accomplish another (restoration), it was clear that such an expectation is common among men (and women). When Jesus forgave the man’s sins, the only sound came from the doubting Pharisees, but when he physically healed the man, suddenly there were exclamations of praise to God.

There is no belittling the healing miracle that took place. God is a physical healer and it is amazing what he can do with our bodies. His healing is an incredible gift that should be treasured. But it wasn’t what restored the paralyzed man.

His life didn’t change when he picked up his mat. It changed when the forgiveness of his sin allowed the man into the presence of the healer, himself. As God drew him back, he found his creation, his purpose, his life. He was brought back. He was restored. And then he was also healed.

As I read stories like this, I sometimes long for my “pick up your mat and walk” experience. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God is a healer and that he is completely capable of healing my body. I haven’t always been so sure. When I measure God by the manifestation of things he can do that I want done in my life, I get lost in my expectations. If he doesn’t deliver, I doubt his ability or his concern for me or even his presence altogether. In the middle of my faithlessness, I have often missed my restoration. I have missed the greater healing. I have missed God pursuing my heart and bringing it back to himself, where it has always belonged.

I revealed earlier that expectations are killers. I should mention now that I have met a few good ones. Faith, for example, is an expectation that God will perform as he promised. Trust is an expectation that God is good no matter what happens. Hope is an expectation that God has something greater for us than we could imagine for ourselves.

We get sidetracked and blinded when our expectations are in things other than God. We expect restoration of things that never made us who we are. Our health never made us who we are. Our perfect marriages and families never made us who we are. Our successful careers never made us who we are.

For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight  

EPHESIANS 1:4

Holy and blameless. That’s what was built into us before. Before those who promised to restore us burned us and caused more damage than they should have. Holy and blameless before we believed the lie and ate the fruit and fell from the grace of a good God who loved us with literally the whole world.  

If he doesn’t heal you like you prayed, if he doesn’t bring you Prince Charming. If he doesn’t bring your child home, if he doesn’t enrich your bank account, if he doesn’t raise your loved one from the dead.

If he doesn’t restore your circumstance, you can be assured that he is working day and night to restore your holiness, to present you as blameless, to make you a light in the darkness, to turn your mourning into dancing, to give you a hope and a future, to give you new life. To bring you back into his presence, back to your father, back to his love. To restore your heart to him.

---