Healing

Brentwood Baptist Church
People finding God

DOES GOD HEAL TODAY?

1. Jesus healed the sick

Healing the sick was central to the Ministry of Jesus Christ. Healing miracles make up a QUARTER of the gospel accounts of the life of Jesus.

Let’s be clear from the start just why it was that Jesus performed miracles. Jesus DID NOT work miracles to prove who He was (the Messiah and the Son of God). NEITHER did Jesus perform miracles to prove that His gospel was true. The miracles were not intended to prove anything to anyone. Jesus explicitly refused to give any "sign" to prove His identity, except "the sign of Jonah", the resurrection (Matt 12:38-41, Mk 8:11-12). In His day, every village had its own "miracle worker" - most of Jesus's miracles wouldn't convince very many people about His Messiah-ship or His teaching. And obviously they didn't!

The real reason Jesus healed is simple. He came to proclaim the Kingdom of God (Mk 1:15). His manifesto in Luke 4:16-21 declared that the time had come when God would begin His Kingly Reign in the world (which is the meaning of the Jewish word we translate as "Kingdom"). This would include putting right all the wrongs in the world caused by sin. Whenever God speaks, things happen! Jesus's miracles are the out-workings of that Kingly Reign of God, concrete expressions of the truths which Jesus was proclaiming, demonstrating God's power, love and grace towards fallen mankind (Matt 12:28, 10:6-8). Miracles are the gospel in action!

2. Jesus commanded his disciples to continue His healing ministry

In commissioning both the Twelve Apostles and the 72, Jesus commanded and empowered them to continue His healing ministry.

Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness.

He called his twelve disciples to him and gave them authority to drive out evil spirits and to heal every disease and sickness. …

“As you go, preach this message:`The kingdom of heaven is near.' Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons.” (Matt 9:35, 10:1, 7-8 )

After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go.

“Heal the sick who are there and tell them, `The kingdom of God is near you.'” (Luke 10:1, 9)

So whenever the gospel is preached, we should expect to see miracles and healings. The Risen Christ declared that healing and miracles were to be signs of the growing church.

He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptised will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well." (Mark 16:15-18)

3. The Early Church healed the sick

There are so many healings throughout Acts. For example the crippled man at the Temple Gate who went walking and leaping and praising God (Acts 3:1-10). In Acts 5:12-16 we read

The apostles performed many miraculous signs and wonders among the people. And all the believers used to meet together in Solomon's Colonnade. No-one else dared join them, even though they were highly regarded by the people. Nevertheless, more and more men and women believed in the Lord and were added to their number. As a result, people brought the sick into the streets and laid them on beds and mats so that at least Peter's shadow might fall on some of them as he passed by. Crowds gathered also from the towns around Jerusalem, bringing their sick and those tormented by evil spirits, and all of them were healed.

And healing was a part of Paul’s ministry too.

God did extraordinary miracles through Paul,

so that even handkerchiefs and aprons that had touched him were taken to the sick, and their illnesses were cured and the evil spirits left them.

(Acts 19:11-12)

So the Early Church continued Jesus work, proclaiming the Kingdom of God in both word and deed. The miracles in Acts weren’t just to authenticate the Apostles' message or their authority. Miracles in the name of Jesus by the Spirit's power continued as part of God's ongoing Kingly rule. And there is no Biblical reason to suppose that such activities of the Spirit would end at any time until Christ returns. As long as there is sickness and suffering, God will continue to heal! “I am the LORD who heals you!” Exodus 15:26

4. Christians through history have healed the sick

History confirms for us that miraculous healings did not cease when the Apostles died. They continued widespread in the church and we have detailed records of healings until at least the fifth century from writers like Irenaeus (140-203) Origen (c. 185-c .254) and Augustine (354-430).

“Those who are in truth his disciples, receiving grace from him, do in his name perform [miracles], so as to promote the welfare of other men, according to the gift which each one has received from him. For some do certainly and truly drive out devils, so that those who have thus been cleansed from evil spirits frequently both believe [in Christ], and join themselves to the church. Others have foreknowledge of things to come: they see visions, and utter prophetic expressions. Others still, heal the sick by laying their hands upon them and they are made whole. Yea, moreover, as I have said, the dead have been raised up, and remain among us for many years.” Irenaeus (c. 130—c. 200) Bishop of Lyons.

“They expel evil spirits, and perform many cures, and foresee certain events … The name of Jesus …. can take away diseases.” Origen (c. 185—c. 254) another theologian.

(QUOTES from Questions of Life Nicky Gumbel p 207-208)

And those miracles were not restricted to the hierarchy of the church, the bishops and priests. There have been reliable reports of healings throughout the history of the church. And around the world today there are many parts of the church where frequent healing in a normal part of their Christian experience.

But the expectation of such miracles occurring was greatly reduced after the Reformation. Christians in the growing towns condemned the magical or superstitious elements of the "folk religion" of rural churches. Liberal Theology has worked hard to deny the supernatural. Many Christians only really expect God to heal through modern medicine and psychiatry. And it’s generally true that the extent of incidence of the miraculous has always been, and still is, related to the level of expectation of Christians. "Ask and you will receive!" But if we don’t ask, we won’t.

5. The promises of Jesus encourage us

"If you remain in me, and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you."

"I tell you the truth, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. .... Ask and you will receive." John 15:7; 16:23-24)

So we should pray for healing!! Maybe the biggest reason why Christians don’t pray for healing so much is that we have prayed for people in the past, and they have not been healed. It sees as though God has not answered our prayers. So we don’t dare to pray because we are scared of being disappointed. Especially we are scared that the sick person will be disappointed or hurt if they are not healed. So we need to answer one very important question.

WHY THEN ARE SOME PEOPLE NOT HEALED?

It is now more widely recognised that physical healings are aspects of the salvation and wholeness which God's Kingly Reign brings. Ordinary Christians in all kinds of churches are praying with boldness, faith and perseverance, and God is working very many remarkable healing miracles. But along with many great blessings, this increased expectation of miraculous healing has produced certain difficulties.

(a) In some circles the miraculous is seen as the spiritual alternative to medical treatment, and medicine is rejected. This "super-spirituality" is most unhelpful. We must always recognise the hand of God in healing, whether through surgery, drugs or miracle. It is no less spiritual to pray for healing for someone in hospital than in church. And God's healing is always a process - sometimes quick, sometimes slower. But we must beware of falling into the opposite trap and saying that God only heals through medicine nowadays. The God of the Bible is a God of miracles, and "His touch has still its ancient power!"

(b) The context of healing in the New Testament is normally the local fellowship rather than in separate "healing meetings". It is expected that healings will be a part of the on-going life of all true churches.

Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him with

oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective. (James 5:14-16)

And we must remember that when we read of “healings” in lists of spiritual gifts then the gift is the specific healing miracle which is the work of the Holy Spirit in the body or mind of the individual who is healed The gift of healing is NOT some spiritual gift possessed by the Christian who might have been praying when the God gave the healing. So a Christian can never say “I have the gift of ministering healing”, only that “God gave a gift of healing to a certain sick person on a particular occasion, and I was blessed to be present at the time”.

(c) The Bible teaches us that illness and suffering entered into the world as a consequence of sin and the Fall. Because of this, some people quite wrongly try to associate a particular illness with specific sins in the patient's life. The interplay between body, mind and spirit within the one individual is very complex, and medical science certainly recognises psychosomatic illness. But almost always the reason we fall sick is simply that we share the common lot of fallen mankind in a fallen world. Some people make the mistake of saying that a person needs only to discover the particular sin or sins which are the root cause of their illness (whether physical or psychological) and then when they repent of their sins they will be cured. This teaching is false and terribly cruel. Specific sin can have effects on health, but Biblically this is very rare.

(d) Some folk often look at the gospels and find that healing miracles are usually require a measure of faith from the patient (Of course this means that the miracle can't be seen as a "proof" trying to generate faith). Therefore their explanation when someone is not healed is that, although God wants to heal, the patient simply does not have sufficient faith. This sounds convincing and it may occasionally be valid, but it is still generally false and cruel. And if unconfessed or unrepented sin or lack of faith on the part of the sick person are barriers to healing, then we should not forget that the same problems can equally be present in the lives of the other people who are praying for healing. But again, this is usually NOT the issue.

We need to be clear that God does not answer prayers as a reward for our faith - we can never earn or deserve God’s grace. Faith is NOT some kind of good work we have to do to earn enough heavenly brownie points so that God will answer our prayer. Rather our faith is merely the channel through which God pours out His blessing as He alone chooses in accordance with His eternal purposes.

(e) There is one mistake often made by Christians who are enthusiastic about God's healing power. It is to go to the extreme of saying that it is God's will for all Christians to be healed all the time. Some people argue that Jesus healed all who came to Him, completely and immediately, and so they believe that everyone who has entered into the life of the Kingdom should enjoy its benefits of complete wholeness too. I want to make very clear that the Bible does NOT teach this anywhere and NO churches or Christians in history have ever experienced this kind of total healing. But why is it that we are not always healed?

The Biblical picture is more complicated than some like to believe. Yes, God's Kingly Reign has begun. But it has not yet completely arrived. We are not in heaven yet! We are living "life in the overlap", between Christ's First Coming and His Second. We are ALREADY in God's Kingdom, but we have NOT YET left this world. All the blessings of salvation have been bought for us by Christ’s death and resurrection, and we have begun to experience these blessings, but we will never experience them completely in this life. We still fight the battle against sin and sometimes we lose and give in to temptation. Christians still die, of old age if not from illnesses. Christians are not all miraculously protected from accidents or natural disasters.

There is no Biblical reason to believe that God will guarantee us healing from every physical illness. As long as we live in the tension between the ALREADY and the NOT YET we will still share the sufferings of this fallen world. Christians share in Christ's resurrection life, but they also share in His dying (2 Corinthians 4:10-12).

So complete healing from every illness is not a “right” for every Christian to claim. We will never fully understand the mystery of God’s purposes in this life. And it is evident that, for reasons we may not understand, it is not always God’s will to grant healing. Remember the apostle Paul’s experience.

To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Cor 12:7-10)

It was more important for Paul to learn to trust and depend on the grace of God in his weakness than for him to experience healing from whatever this “thorn in the flesh” actually was.

So Christians will not always be healed. But healing IS often the gift of our loving God for His children, given according to His purposes and for His glory, in His way and in His time. It is within God's master-plan that we may not always be healed, not least because otherwise some might become Christians for completely wrong and selfish motives. But as for all of God's gifts which we cannot earn or deserve, we may confidently pray and ask for healing, and leave the answers to the wisdom and love and purpose of God. And if we don't expect and we never ask .... !

HOW CAN WE MOVE ON IN PRAYING FOR HEALING?

If we want to move on to experience more of God’s healing in our own lives and minister healing more effectively to others, then I am convinced that we actually need to learn more about prayer.

To begin with, prayer should be an expression of our dependence on God. But if we are honest we spend most of our lives depending on other things. We don’t need to depend on God for our Daily Bread when we can depend on Tescos and Sainsburys and the money in our bank accounts. Similarly we don’t need to learn to depend on God for our headaches and toothaches and colds when we can turn to aspirin and paracetamol and Boots the chemists. When we have learned to depend completely on God from day to day for the little details of our lives, then I believe we will find it easier to pray for healing in the “bigger” illnesses and crises.

Then also I believe we need to learn more about spiritual gifts and Listening to God in prayer.

Richard Foster gives four steps in praying for healing:

1. Listen; 2. Ask; 3. Believe; 4. Give thanks.

We fall short at Step 1. We do not listen well enough to the person, to discover whether their greatest need is physical healing, or psychological healing, or emotional healing or assurance of forgiveness. Then we do not know how to listen to God well enough to discover what His will is for that person’s life, so that we can truly pray in Jesus’s name, in accordance what God has revealed to us that He is wanting to do. I believe we need to move on in spiritual gifts like prophecy and words of knowledge and words of wisdom, if we want to know more answers to our prayers for healing. As our relationship with God deepens we will know God’s will more clearly. In that way we can bolder and more persistent in our requests for healing.

Listen again to the encouragement Jesus gives us!

"I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it." (John 14:12-14)

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Brentwood Baptist Church May 2002

Brentwood Baptist Church People finding God