'I do choose. Be made clean!'

I sometimes have found that, during Lent, a specific question or task emerges for me. Over the past couple of days, my spiritual mission for Lent this year has become apparent.

One of the features of the Gospels is that Jesus heals people. Most often, he heals people who come to him asking to be made whole in some way. This Lent, I am reading the Gospel of Mark, which is the assigned Gospel just now in the Daily Lectionary. (Book of Common Prayer, page 953.) This Lent, as my task, every morning, I am reading the stories in the belief that one of them is in fact my story. In one of those stories, it is in fact not the leper, or the mother, or the tax collector that Jesus heals, but it is me. My spiritual detective work is to discover which story tells my story.

There are two challenges. One is to understand that I am in need of healing and so to have an image of what it is that ails me, even if it is not as immediately apparent as leprosy. The other is to trust that, if, like the people in the Gospels, I take the risk of pursuing Jesus and asking for healing, he will grant my wish.

This morning's reading contains this story. Might it be my story? Might it be yours?

'A leper came to him begging him and kneeling he said to him, 'If you choose, you can make me clean.' Moved with pity, Jesus stretched out his hand and touched him, and said to him, 'I do choose. Be made clean!' Immediately the leprosy left him, and he was made clean.' (Mk. 1:40-42)