Pastor's Corner: I Am Healed

Last Sunday, I preached a message titled "I Am Healed." Here are some highlights from that message: We have to be careful not to draw conclusions about the will of God based on bad experiences. Bad things happen all the time that God doesn't desire.

For example, in 2 Peter 3:9, the Apostle Peter says that it is God's will that no one dies without first coming to salvation; yet unfortunately, unsaved people continue to die every day. The earthly reality of something doesn't change God's will. Most often something else is at work. As an illustration, consider yourself as an owner of a junkyard. You have a group of customers come into the junkyard, and after looking around a bit, they ask the question, "Why did the manufacturers create these vehicles like this?" After a baffled look at them, you let them know that the problem is obvious; somebody wrecked these vehicles.

The same is true with our bodies: the devastation we see today was never the intention of God but is the result of a "reckless driver" called the devil, and a "visual impairment" called sin. Divine health was God's will from the very beginning. Again and again in Genesis 1:4, 10, 12, 18, 21, 25, God creates something and declares that it is good! At the end of His creating that first week in Genesis 1:31, God saw that it was very good! God created everything perfect. God's original creation was a place inhabited by His presence and therefore free from the contamination of evil. It was a place of complete provision. Creation was a place free from death. There was no sickness, disease, or infirmity of any kind. So what happened? Sin! With disobedience to God, Adam and Eve brought sin and all its ugliness into God's perfect world.

Now flash forward in time to the ministry of Jesus Christ. In 1 Peter 1:20 we see that Jesus was the plan to restore what would be lost should humankind fall into sin. In 1 John 3:8, we see that Jesus entered this world for a single purpose: "to destroy the works of the devil. Everything Jesus did through His ministry was meant to begin a restoration back to how it was in the beginning. One of the primary effects of Jesus' ministry was for Him to come to defeat sickness and disease, to restore the health of God's people. In Matthew 4:23; 9:35 and Acts 10:38, we find that Jesus went about "proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people."  What is the "good news of the kingdom" spoken of in Matthew 11:4-6? Jesus made His ministry about proclaiming the news that the infirmities that cause blindness, lameness, deafness, and death stand no chance in His presence. Jesus' words serve as a heads-up to the devil that God's will for health is being restored. And Jesus didn't just talk about healing; He did it! He cured every one of the people that came to Him for healing! In dealing with a man that was born blind, Jesus reiterated God's will to heal: "He was born blind so that God's works might be revealed in him." John 9:3. Healing was so prominent in Jesus' ministry that it was the reason He was put to death. The scandal was that Jesus healed on the Sabbath. It was Jesus' decision to heal on the Sabbath that began the religious leaders' persecution of Him, which ultimately ended in His crucifixion.

So, how, where and when did Jesus heal? Some people look at Scriptures like Isaiah 53:5 and 1 Peter 2:24 and conclude that these references only suggest spiritual healing, but upon deeper inspection it is clear that the Bible intends to mean physical healing as well:

Psalm 103:3; Isaiah 30:26; Jeremiah 30:17. In the Old Testament, God's people sometimes referred to God as "Jehovah Rapha," the Lord who heals. What kinds of healing?

Every kind of healing: spiritual, emotional, and physical. Matthew 8:16-17's report that Jesus "cured all who were sick" is used by Matthew to celebrate the fulfillment of Isaiah prophecy. Both Isaiah and Peter indicate that physical healing was a primary purpose for Christ's death on the cross. Their words tell us about three very important aspects of healing: how Jesus healed, where Jesus healed, and when Jesus healed.

How Jesus healed: in John 9:1-2 the disciples asked Jesus, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" The Jewish people concluded sickness was always a result of one's immediate sin, either of themselves or their parents. They were partially right: sickness is a consequence of sin. Still, as Jesus explained, one's sickness is not necessarily the direct result of his or her personal sin or the parents' sin. Rather, sickness is the general outcome of sin at work in the fallen world. Since God's covenant with Abraham in Exodus 23:25, God's people trusted that He would take sickness away from them. In Psalm 103:3, they praised Him for His benefits, which included the forgiveness of sin, and thus healing of all diseases. To them, being physically healed was the indication of the forgiveness of sins. But this of course was an act that only God could perform. So Jesus' healings confronted them with the truth that He was God in the flesh - a truth they refused to accept. Jesus' death wouldn't stop this newfound healing awakening. Jesus was the pure, sinless Lamb, sacrificed on the altar of Calvary for the once-an-for-all forgiveness of whoever would later accept His sacrifice - Hebrews 9:22. The question of how Jesus healed is answered by the shedding of His blood brought forth "by His bruises," which provided the removal of sin, resulting in the restoration of God's original will of health and healing for His people.

Where Jesus healed: in the account of the man born blind in Matthew 9:1-8; Mark 2:1-12; Luke 5:17-2, Jesus began by forgiving the man of his sins. In Matthew 9:2 Jesus assured the paralyzed man - "Take heart, son, your sins are forgiven." Then, in Matthew 9:6 Jesus declared, "Stand up, take your bed and go to your home." In this, Jesus' earthly ministry of healing was a foreshadowing of His finished work on the cross. Yes, the cross where Jesus ultimately forgave our sins is also the place where He ultimately provided for our healing.

When Jesus healed, Isaiah 53:5 notes, "By His bruises we are healed," and 1 Peter 2:24 similarly declares, "By His wounds you have been healed." Neither refers to a healing that might take place but to a healing that has already happened. In John 19:30 Jesus declared "It is finished." He declared that the works of the devil were finished in the lives of God's people. As with the forgiveness of sins, our healing, once and for all, was paid for by His blood sacrifice at Calvary. This means that God doesn't still heal today - He already healed!

So how do we activate this divine healing? People still experience healing today. Divine healing happens when you are confident that God already decided to heal and you activate His healing by speaking it in faith over situations, symptoms, or body parts. Call out the issue by name and command it to go in Jesus' name - Matthew 8:3; Mark 2:10-11. Jesus never prayed to ask God to heal someone. Rather, in every instance, he declared healing upon them. In Matthew 10:8 Jesus' directs His disciples: "Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cast out demons." Peter spoke healing over a man who was crippled in Acts 3:6. James instructed the early church to pray a "prayer of faith" over the sick and they will recover in James 5:15. You and I are also tasked to continue Jesus' ministry to heal the sick. The power to do so is already available through the work of the cross, which is received in faith by activating the power of God's Word in the name of Jesus.

What if I am not healed? If it is God's will to heal, then what do we say about the reality that some people of faith get sick and don't recover? Do these people not have enough faith? There are a variety of reasons why people might not be healed in the way they would like, and lack of faith is only one reason. While healing can and does sometimes happen instantly, more often than not, it is a process. In Mark 8:22-25 Jesus' ministers healing to a blind man in a progressive way. In Luke 17:11-14 we find that 10 lepers were healed "as they went." Also, it shouldn't seem like a cop-out to believe that passing on from this world is the ultimate healing, as Paul declares in Philippians 1:21. Never accept that healing isn't God's will just because it doesn't happen instantly. Rather, from the moment healing is declared on yourself or someone else, trust that it is received and begin to thank God for it. For as long as it takes, remain standing on the truth of God's Word about His will for healing. Then trust God's timing for the results.

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The Rev. Edroy "Curt" Curtis; president of the Greater Havre Area Ministerial Association, Northern Montana Care Center chaplain and lead pastor of Havre Assembly of God Church