Calvary Baptist Church

The most difficult questions as we consider the Spirit’s work in our lives today arise around the question of healing.  Three questions frame the issue:

• • Does God still heal?  This is the easiest of the three questions.  Of course He does.  He heals through medicine and despite it.
  • Does God heal through individuals?  That is, does He invest individuals with the power to be the conduit for healing.
  • Does God want everyone to be healed? I will address this question later in this blog.  The answer to this question has a significant impact on the larger issues.

The significance of this issue affects our faith.  When someone is not healed, we are left with a faith problem.  Is it the person’s fault?  Is it God’s fault? Can I trust God when my family or friend remains unhealed?

Charismatic healers like Benny Hinn readily blame their countless failures on a lack of faith—not their own faith, of course, but the faith of those who do not get healed. As a result, “many people believe, as Hinn preaches, that God fails to heal them because their faith is not strong enough. Maybe they did not give enough money to Hinn’s ministry. Or maybe they just did not believe enough.” Thus, while Hinn gets all the credit for supposed successes, he takes none of the blame for his countless failures.

How disgusting and misleading this tendency is!  To blame sick people for failed healing

Blaming sick people for failed healings might provide the “healer” with a convenient excuse, but it places an unbiblical and unfair burden on the person who needs God to touch them.

Benny Hinn’s healing crusades are a case in point. He claims, “hundreds of verified healings and thousands of conversions,” this is a lie. Though he regularly boasts about “people rising from wheelchairs and leaving crutches . . . blind eyes and deaf ears [that] have been opened and verified,” evidence to support those claims simply does not exist.

Mike Thomas investigated Hinn’s miracle crusades. He wrote: Despite all the thousands of miracles claimed by Hinn, the church seems hard pressed to produce any that would convince a serious skeptic. If God cures through Hinn, he does not cure ailments such as permanent paralysis, brain damage, retardation, physical deformities, missing eyes, or other obvious ailments.

There is no documented case of anyone being healed.  There is no credible evidence.  If there were individuals who have the gift today it would be simple enough to prove their power.   While the list of fantastic claims and incredible healing stories continues to grow at a frantic pace, any real evidence of genuine miracles is conspicuously absent.

A 2001 HBO documentary entitled A Question of Miracles followed the lives of seven people for a year, after they had supposedly been healed at a Benny Hinn crusade. At the end of that time, Anthony Thomas, the film’s director, concluded that no one had been healed.

In an interview with the New York Times, Thomas gave this raw assessment: “If I had seen miracles [at Hinn’s crusades], I would have been happy to trumpet it . . . but in retrospect, I think they do more damage to Christianity than the most committed atheist.”

How does Hinn answer such accusations?  He claims that the one healed must continue to believe for their healing.  Hinn can tell his followers, “After you have received your miracle, turn away from those who oppose miracles. . .  Continue to see yourself well and whole, healed in Jesus’ name.”  So, the Christian must believe to maintain the miracle.

One further word.  Watching any of these “faith healers” reveals that only people with the least noticeable injuries allowed near the “healers.” Those who are quadriplegic, those with mental handicaps, and those who are missing limbs are not welcome on stage.

The issue of healing also affects our prayer life.  How do we pray for those who are sick?  Do we ask for healing?  Do we believe God and ask Him to heal?  What if we doubt when you pray?  Will He ignore our request?

Finally, these questions affect our practices.  If someone has the power to heal, why are they not walking the halls of hospitals?  Why not go to the children’s wards and empty them out?  Please, healers, give back the ability to reason to those whose minds have failed to keep up with their bodies.

Sadly, there are those who believe for healing and shun doctors and medicine.  They feel guilty for allowing human hands to bring them strength.  Their faulty beliefs and subsequent doubts result in a hindrance in their relationship with God.

FIVE BIBLICAL ASSERTIONS ON HEALING

It is critical that we approach these questions in a reasonable manner.  We seek insight primarily from God’s Word. We must let the Bible speak.

 

• Assertion One: Sometime sin can cause sickness, other times it is not related.

Tragically, some misguided Christians have been guilty of placing the blame for human sickness on the person who is sick.  While it true that because of original sin, people have forever been linked to sickness, suffering and death, we CANNOT place the blame for individual sickness or injury on the already slumping shoulders of the individual.

Are there Biblical cases where sin caused sickness. Yes.  David’s sin with Bathsheba resulted in the death of his infant son.  Some in the young church became sick because they took the Lord’s Supper in an unworthy manner.  So, we can see a connection in some cases between sickness and sin.

We must not over-reach to make such a connection.  The best example is the question posed to Jesus in John 9:2. The religious leaders sought to use the tragedy of a man born blind to trap Jesus.  They wanted to know whose fault it was that the man was struck with this illness.   

“Was it his fault or his parent’s fault?” Without regard to the plight of the man, who could hear their question, they barged into the situation.  Their question displayed a tremendous lack of empathy or compassion.

Jesus’ answer is clear.  Neither the man’s nor his parents’ sin caused blindness.  God would use the sickness to bring glory to the Son. 

We do irreparable harm when we assert that every person with cancer is somehow guilty of sin.  How would we explain the sickness of a child?  Such explanations leave deep wounds on those already suffering.

• Assertion Two: God heals some people because of the faith of the people and other times despite it. 

There were times when Jesus brought healing specifically because of the faith of the individuals.  (See Mathew 9:22, Mark 5:34, Luke 10:52, Luke 7:50)

Many new charismatics insist that faith is required for healing. Again, Hinn, put the responsibility for healing on the individual.  According to Hinn, “Faith is vital to your miracle. Healing is received by faith, and healing is kept by faith.” Again, “it takes aggressive faith . . . to bring salvation from that sickness.”²⁵

And again, “You cannot receive healing unless your heart is right with God. . .. Healing is easily attained when your walk with God is right.” Elsewhere, he wrote: “Often in our crusades, I will tell people to touch the part of their body that they want God to heal. I will encourage them to begin moving their afflicted arms or bending their hurting legs. These actions do nothing in themselves, but they do demonstrate that the person has faith in God’s healing power. And in the Scriptures, you see repeatedly that when the Lord Jesus healed the sick, He asked them to do something before the miracle took place.”

In many cases people were healed when they had little or no faith.  Jesus healed the man at the pool of Bethesda even though the man expressed no faith in God, whatsoever.  He only had excuses for not getting into the water.

The blind man in John 9 was healed even though he did not know who Jesus was.  Only later did he understand who Jesus was.  On several occasions Jesus raised people from the dead.  They obviously did not express faith much less make a positive confession.

The healing ministries of the apostles, likewise, did not require belief from the sick to be effective. Peter healed a man with disabilities without requiring faith from him (Acts 3:6–8). Later, he revived a woman named Tabitha after she had died (Acts 9:36–43). Paul likewise delivered an unbelieving slave girl from demon possession (Acts 16:18) and later raised Eutychus after he fell to his death (Acts 20:7–12). A profession of faith was not a prerequisite for any of those healing miracles.

• Assertion Three: God sometimes brings healing through his servants, but sometimes without them.

Reading the gospels and even the book of Acts finds a surprising lack of examples of those who were the instruments of God used in healing.  God certainly could, and did, use Peter, Paul, and the other apostles as instruments to bring healing. 

God can use people to perform these miracles. The gift of healing is listed by Paul and there is no strong Biblical proof that God has caused that gift to cease. 

“The gift of healing is the special ability that God gives to certain members of the Body of Christ to serve as human intermediaries through whom it pleases God to cure illness and restore health apart from the use of natural means.” (Wagner, 238)

• Assertion Four: God does NOT promise or desire that all would be healed.

The Apostle Paul was left with a painful thorn in the flesh (2 Corinthians 12:7-ff)

⁷ or because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. ⁸ Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. ⁹ 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. ¹⁰ 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. ^[1]

What was the issue? It was a thorn in the flesh.  IN THE FLESH.  There are those who assert that it was not a physical ailment.  But Paul clearly identifies the thorn as in the flesh. 

Why did Paul have a thorn?  He identifies the reason clearly.  He says that the thorn was given because of the revelations God gave him and to keep the apostle from being prideful. 

Three times Paul asked the Lord to take away that painful thorn.  Three times God clearly said, “no!”  Instead of healing, God offered Paul grace.  In the place of wellness Paul received strength. 

If God wanted every person healed, would He not have healed his servant.  Paul could have healed himself but did not.

Consider additional cases:

• Paul could heal but left his friend Trophimus sick at Miletus.  (2 Timothy 4:20)
• When Timothy, another co–worker, had stomach trouble and other ailments Paul did not heal him but rather advised him to drink some wine (1 Tim. 5:23).
• Paul’s friend Epaphroditus had been terribly ill and would have died but for God’s intervention.  Finally, “God had mercy on him, and not on him only but also on me, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow” (Phil. 2:27).  That divine intervention could have come earlier but eventually came.
• It is possible to walk in truth and still by physically ill. (3 John 1:2).

The truth that God does not heal everyone give some of the faith healers a real struggle. 

Benny Hinn is forced to admit, “I don’t know why every person isn’t touched and healed.” He tells of times that he has laid hands on people “and nothing happened.” News reports tell of four seriously ill patients who were released from a Kenyan hospital to attend one of Hinn’s miracle crusades in hopes of being healed. Instead of being cured, all four died at the crusade. Such realities contradict Hinn’s written claims.

Somehow, he still insisted that healing should be expected.  In his book Rise and Be Healed, Hinn said of God, “He promises to heal all—everyone, any, any whatsoever, everything—all our diseases! That means not even a headache, sinus problem, not even a toothache—nothing! No sickness should come your way. God heals all your diseases.”

We must be willing to call such assertions false considering the truth that not all are healed.

• Assertion Five: We are to minister by praying for those who are sick.

¹³ Is anyone among you in trouble? Let them pray. Is anyone happy? Let them sing songs of praise. ¹⁴ Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. ¹⁵ And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. If they have sinned, they will be forgiven.^[2]

 

The elders of the church are called to minister to those who are sick.  They are to anoint the person with oil and pray over them. 

Several questions help us understand this passage.  First, note who initiates the prayer.  Those who are sick request the laying on of hands by the elders of the church.  They have faith and request such an anointing.

Second, what are the results?  The prayers of the elderly and the faith of the individuals can result in healing and forgiveness. 

There does appear to be, in this case, some connection between the sins of the individual and the sickness they incur.  Please see the previous discussion and exercise great caution in asserting that all sickness is the result of sin.

God can bring healing and wellness because of our prayer.  David Jeremiah said it well, “We have a right to ask for healing, but He is not obligated to give it.” Trust God for the results.  Leave the answer to God’s hand.

Can we watch the healing ministry of Jesus to verify these assertions?  Yes, His ministry is an example.

• Jesus healed, but never to draw attention to Himself.  Contrast that with the focus faith healers bring to themselves.  Jesus did not put on a show.  They do.
• When Jesus healed there were no failures.  When he wanted someone healed, they were.
• Jesus did not specify a method.  His healing could be done with a word or a touch.  He spit in the mud once, while other times speaking healing.
• The healing of Jesus was always instant and complete.   
• Sometimes Jesus waited for faith, at other times He touched people apart from their faith.

Four practical principles to claim.

• Confession of sin is healthy-employ it.
• Praying for one another is essential-practice it.
• Medical assistance is imperative-obey it.
• When healing comes from God-claim it.

Finally, we can trust God that ultimate healing will come when we step into heaven.  Ultimately, we are not made for this world.  We are citizens of heaven.  Once we assume our heavenly residence, we will be free of all sickness.  There will be no more pain, sorrow, or sin.  We will be ultimately free.