Here’s what ran through my mind as I ate my dinner in 3 minutes at 8:45:

Crutches. I have crutches.

You know what I always tell people when I’m going to ask to pray for them? I usually ask what happened to them and they explain but wonder why I even care. I usually say something along the lines of:

“Well, I just noticed you have crutches, and crutches suck. I saw your bandage/boot/cast and thought, that must hurt. Pain sucks, and I just wanted to see you better.”

Not that I have some neatly rehearsed lines, but I do mean that when I say it. I think about how their armpits must be sore from crutching sometimes. I don’t like crutches. But I realized, while I chewed my pizza, that I have crutches. My crutches are things that I run to instead of running to God. The lesser pleasures that I replace God with. Things like Facebook, Tumblr, the internet, my friends, sleeping, reading about Jesus without connecting with him, all that stuff that is a replacement. These are my crutches, they bruise my armpits and keep the pressure off my pain, but don’t make me well. I feel like Jesus says, Crutches suck. Pain sucks. I want to see you better.

You know the one thing that will keep a person from getting better? The one thing that will every single time keep a person from getting healed? It is when they say, “It’s okay, I’m already getting better, I’ll be fine on my own”, trusting the strength of their own ability to recover.

Right now I am wondering if I crutching along and telling the Lord, “You know, God, you’re really nice but I don’t really need it right now. I’m totally fine on my own, I mean I’m already getting better. The pain isn’t THAT bad (but you know it really is).” And then I crutch away and refuse to let him heal me.

God, take my crutches. I want to walk with you.