![\"\"](\"http:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/Church-Membership-Certificate-Inside-Cropped.jpg\" "\\"Church")
<\/a>As You know Father, it\u2019s been quite some time since I\u2019ve gotten sick, so when this illness came on me hard and fast last week, it very much caught me off guard.\u00a0 Respiratory infections have always hit me rather intensely, and this current bug is no exception.\u00a0 However, as I was driving in to work sniffling and coughing this morning, something important dawned on me\u2026<\/p>\nMy physical body may be ill at the moment, but I\u2019m more Spiritually Healthy<\/span> than I\u2019ve ever been.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n The distinction between physical and spiritual health is actually one I believe to be fairly significant Father.\u00a0 I\u2019ve known a number of physically sound people who are absolutely lost spiritually, and yet, some of the brightest signs of Your Holy Spirit have come to me from people whose bodies have turned against them.<\/p>\n In the opening greetings of his Third Epistle, John indicates this division as well by wishing his friend Gaius good physical health, while noting that he\u2019s already quite sure of Gaius\u2019 spiritual well-being:<\/p>\n The elder, Dear friend, I pray that you may enjoy good health and that all may go well with you, even as your soul is getting along well. \u2013 3 John 1:1-2 (NIV)<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201c\u2026even as your soul is getting along well.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0 John already knew Gaius\u2019 devotion to Your Truth was firm, and with that \u201cspiritual fitness\u201d<\/em> as a reference, he sent wishes that Gaius\u2019 physical well-being would follow suit.<\/p>\n So Father, what can we do to achieve the Spiritual Health that\u2019s so vital in our lives?\u00a0 If we break it down clinically as we would a physical ailment, I believe it would go something like\u2026<\/p>\n Examination<\/span><\/em><\/strong>: Evaluate our lives regularly, and ensure that we\u2019re living as God desires us to.\u00a0 Identify sinful behaviors and actions.<\/em><\/p>\n Diagnosis<\/span><\/em><\/strong>: For the \u201csymptoms\u201d noted during the Examination, consult the appropriate reference (The Bible) and seek additional consultation (pray) to determine the correct course of treatment.<\/em><\/p>\n Treatment<\/span><\/em><\/strong>: Follow the prescribed course of action as determined in the Diagnosis.\u00a0 Quiet time and rest (Stillness), and increased fluid (Living Water) consumption will aid in healing.<\/em><\/p>\n Follow Up<\/span><\/em><\/strong>: A proper diet (Daily Bread, Eucharist) and exercise (Worship) will help maintain Spiritual Health.<\/em><\/p>\n Now that\u2019s reasonable health care reform.\u00a0 \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n Heavenly Father,<\/p>\n I thank You for the \u201cHeavenly Health Care Plan\u201d<\/em> You\u2019ve provided for us Lord.\u00a0 Please nourish our needy spirits, and bring to us that divine healing that only You can provide.<\/p>\n In Jesus\u2019 Name we pray,<\/p>\n Amen.<\/p>\n ~Phather Phil<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Dear Lord; Happy Meditations Monday Father! Well Father, as always I want to begin the week by thanking You for the multitude of Blessings You bestowed on us over the past weekend.\u00a0 Due to a nasty respiratory infection I\u2019ve been fighting since late last week, our time was spent in much less energetic pursuits than […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1385,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[691,745,724,505,1869,1868,618,289,359,168,256,419,511,1727,556,899,1872,807,1047,915,143,640,282,1190,259,1873,1291,1725,173,403,844,24,966,444,1187,1871,471,593,916,1865,1874,592,121,269,839,222,389,133,206,1325,506,1547,84,845,1525,509,492,239,217,69,1080,1867,727,629,232,796,655,117,134,512,1870,1866,66,631,114,1744,785,240,481,49,212,378,379,138,604],"class_list":["post-1386","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-daily-emails-to-god","tag-accept","tag-act","tag-actions","tag-afternoon","tag-alpaca","tag-alpaca-farm","tag-bed","tag-behavior","tag-bible","tag-bless","tag-blessed","tag-blessing","tag-bodies","tag-church-family","tag-conversation","tag-correct","tag-daily-bread","tag-days","tag-dear-friend","tag-dear-lord","tag-desires","tag-diet","tag-divine","tag-divine-healing","tag-driving","tag-eucharist","tag-ewells-st-paul-umc","tag-ewells-st-paul-united-methodist-church","tag-father","tag-fighting","tag-follow","tag-friends","tag-god","tag-happy","tag-health-care-insurance","tag-health-care-reform","tag-healthy","tag-heavenly","tag-heavenly-father","tag-heavenly-health-care","tag-heavenly-health-care-plan","tag-holy-spirit","tag-illness","tag-jesus","tag-john","tag-joy","tag-lost","tag-love","tag-meditation","tag-meditations-monday","tag-morning","tag-multitude-of-blessings","tag-name","tag-need","tag-niv","tag-nourish","tag-off-guard","tag-physical","tag-pray","tag-quiet","tag-quiet-time","tag-respiratory-infection","tag-rest","tag-saturday","tag-sick","tag-significant","tag-sinful","tag-son","tag-soul","tag-spirits","tag-spiritual-fitness","tag-spiritual-health","tag-stillness","tag-sunday","tag-thank-you","tag-the-bible","tag-truth","tag-vision","tag-week","tag-weekend","tag-wishes","tag-wonder","tag-wonderful","tag-work","tag-worship"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/Stethescope-on-Heart-1-Cropped.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p18mMc-mm","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1386","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1386"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1386\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1390,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1386\/revisions\/1390"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1385"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.phatherphil.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nTo my dear friend Gaius, whom I love in the truth.<\/strong><\/p>\n