September 8th: Faith Healing

Speaker: Dr Duncan Wyncoll

The first of two addresses looks at the Scripture texts. Can ‘gifted healers’ help with intractable diseases? What is the New Testament teaching on healing for the seriously ill?

Reading Luke 8.49 to 9:1-6, (Hymn 542)

Introduction
· Healing scene today – TV Evangelism, potentially dangerous (people stop taking vital medication!) Young man with Asthma, Brain dead patient…
· We need answers! – Healers? Laying-on of hands? expectations to heal…
· N.B. Reported miraculous healing is not specific to Christianity
· Charismatic view Vs. Our position – There are no healers today, but God most often uses medical means. “Name it & Claim it, Confess & Possess”
· Does God not have sufficient power? No
Jeremiah 32.27 - ’Behold, I am the Lord, the God of all flesh: Is there any thing too hard for me?’
· The Lord does heal (e.g. gravely ill church members who have pulled through…)
John 14.12 - ‘Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; & greater works than these shall he do, because I go unto my Father’
i.e. preaching the gospel & conversion of souls

A. Why do people still believe miraculous healing should be about today? – Common misunderstandings
1. ‘Sickness is Satan’s work’
· “Sickness is never God’s will”. Job’s comforters view – primitive, pagan view
· Demons everywhere! Gross misunderstanding of the NT scene
· The human body is visibly subject to change & decay ®
Resulting from God withdrawing special blessings in the Garden of Eden ®
Leading to God sealing the world under the principle of death & decay
So, we must never credit Satan with the Lord’s work
· Paul’s thorn in the flesh… given by God, taken advantage of by Satan

2. ‘God promises Health’
· Atonement/conversion texts are misinterpreted
Isaiah 53.5 – ‘But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; & with His stripes we are healed.’
· Misunderstanding of texts in Exodus (23.25) while in the wilderness
· These were conditional promises to Israel (as with many other promises)
· They were ‘unique blessings for unique hardships’
· An extreme view - ‘Illness is always the result of sin!’ [except Job]
· But believers are to expected to run a Hard Race….
· Hymn 243 v4 – Demands my soul, my life, my all.

3. Jesus is our example
· He healed the sick – so we must follow. But why did the LJC heal the sick?
John 20.30 – ‘& many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book: But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; & that believing ye might have life through his name’
· Authentication of divine nature & power, witness to the disciples, character of Christ was mercy & compassion
· Many miracles were spiritual pictures e.g. restoration of sight, Luke 8 from the dead…
· Why can’t present-day healers achieve the same results?
· Why don’t they clear the hospital wards?
· ‘Healed the dead’ – don’t see modern healers doing this…
· Interesting that in our reading – ‘he charged them to tell no man’. Mark 1.44 & 5.43
(not always but frequently) I wonder why?? A. Practical, B. Real mission, C. Too early.
· Notice also: No faith required by the Maid… cf. modern day healers

4. ‘Jesus told the disciples to heal’ – Luke 9/10
· Was the commissioning of the 12 & 70 a pattern?
· But note; Jews only, hospitality dependent & no spare clothes
· It was a unique one-off task, in preparation for the Lord’s ministry
· No mention of healing in the Great Commission!
Matt 28.19,20 – ‘Go ye therefore, & teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, & of the Son, & of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: & lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.’

5. ‘The early church had constant miracles
· ‘Everyday occurrences not limited to the apostles’ they say…
· However – in NT all healing miracles were by apostle/deputy (no other records)
· Writer to Hebrews – was already looking back by AD 60
Hebrews 2.4 – ‘God also bearing them witness, both with signs & wonders, & with divers miracles, & gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will?’
· ‘Everyday occurrences’ is a created illusion
· What was the reaction of the people? – It was surprise, awe, & novelty
· Example of Eutychus falling off a wall (Acts 20) – During Paul’s long sermon
· People were troubled… not a little (greatly) comforted?
Remember - Their prime purpose for the apostles was – to prove they were God’s instruments & the bearer of revelation (before the Word of God was complete)

6. ‘Evangelism needs healing miracles’
· Gospel is too weak & powerless without them – or hopeless!
· Wimber - ‘Paul failed in Athens because there were no miracles!’ Is this right?
Romans 1.16 – ‘For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, & also to the Greek’ - Preaching is the power of God

B. So what is the teaching of the Bible? – James 5.14f – N.B written AD 45
· Often ignored in the healing books & one of the 1st NT books
Only NT passage to give healing instruction & invalidates all other methods

V 14 Sick – Gk: Astheneo Refers to bedridden, house-bound, impotent, diseased – seriously sick individuals
· The walking wounded attend the ‘means of grace’
Illus: Of the person feeling down – should really come to the services… [Balm of Gilead Jeremiah 8.22 – A universal cure in figurative speech]
· Call for the elders of the church – NOT the gifted healers
· Do they command the disease/demons to leave? Lay on hands?
· Do they call down the Holy Spirit? No - All are extra-biblical
What do they do? – PRAY; not special meetings, visions, words of knowledge
· ‘Oil’ – lit. anointing, oiling with oil/perfume. Gk: Aleipho, not Chrisma
· Not really an anointing, but more an act of help
· Not necessarily curative, but soothing & possibly of medicinal benefit?
· I.e. practical help – dynamic equivalent also includes ‘care, finances, help children…’

V 15 ‘And the prayer of faith shall save the sick’ Gk: Kamno Refers to faint & weary
[Not that the Christian must have a certain amount of faith – as if the healing would depend upon us…]
· Forgiveness of sins – illness maybe as a result of sin
· What is the prayer of faith? Is healing bound to result?
James 4:15 [determines the context]
· But rather – ‘You may use oil, but the prayer of faith is the only way by which God’s healing may be served.’

V 16 ‘The effectual fervent prayer’ –
· NOT fatalistic resignation (a great danger 4 Calvinists)
· Energy, activity… but God’s sovereignty & predestined purpose
· All according to thy will
· One of the great eternal mysteries – Our prayers were taken account of when He planned the future
· He is sovereign, but we are allowed to be instrumental in blessing

And finally
V 17 An example
· That God may intervene directly
· He may use miraculous mean over the ordinary – overruling in treatment et