In the thirty-ninth year of his reign Asa was diseased in his feet, and his disease became severe. Yet even in his disease he did not seek the LORD, but sought help from physicians. 2 Chronicles 16:12
As a physician, trained in modern medicine, I obviously prescribe medications as part of my practice. If you have strep throat for instance, penicillin is appropriate and beneficial. There are situations, however, when medication can be harmful. I’m not talking about an accidental mixup because the pharmacist couldn’t read the physician’s handwriting. Rather, I’m referring to those situations when our attitude towards a medication can make the medication itself part of the problem.
This appears to be what happened in today’s passage, which tells of how King Asa suffered the consequences of turning from God in his later years. The Chronicler explains that part of Asa’s suffering came in the form of personal pain and disease – Asa was diseased in his feet. In agony, Asa didn’t return to God as he should have, but rather, relied only on his physicians. One could misinterpret this passage to say that it’s wrong to go to the doctor, but the apostle Luke was a physician and Jesus himself acknowledged that the sick should see a physician (Mark 2:17). Asa’s sin wasn’t that he sought relief from physicians, but rather that he sought it only from physicians as he abandoned God. Previously, Asa had incurred God’s wrath by seeking help from the Syrians, instead of turning to God. His approach to his physical ailments was the same sin – Abandon God. Trust only in man.
How might we do this? I can think of several examples. When someone who’s addicted to a drug comes to me and wants a pill to fix the addiction, and he (or she) remains unwilling to change his life, he’s put all his hope in another drug. Medications may be helpful in managing withdrawal or cravings, but what he really needs to do is to abandon his old life and follow God to the new life. But that’s a lot of hard, painful work. So, he says, Just give me the pill doc. At this point, the medication actually becomes a barrier to his recovery.
Physicians bear some blame here too. When confronted with the patient with obesity, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol, we know that radical lifestyle change would be the best treatment. But we also know that most of our patients won’t commit to that, so it’s simply easier to prescribe a bunch of pills. The patient buys into this and just like the addicted patient, he fails to make healthy life changes, relying only on the pill.
God desires that we live healthy and make healthy decisions. Medications may well be a part of that. When, however, we abandon God, refuse to make any life changes, and rely only on the pill, then medicine becomes part of the problem.