Does God still heal?

Divine Miraculous Healing

1.      Direct healing that takes place when God heals directly by His sovereign power with no secondary agent used. There are 35 incidents in Scripture of direct healing.

• Gen. 17 and 21: Abraham and Sarah
• Isaiah 38:1–6: Hezekiah
• Luke 7:1–10: the centurion’s servant

2.      Indirect healing, which takes place when God heals through a secondary agent. The majority of the healings recorded in Scripture refer to secondary agents.

• 1 Kings 13:1–6: Jeroboam healed by the prayer of the man of God
• Acts 3:1–16: the lame man healed through the ministry of Peter and John
• Acts 28:8: Publius’ father healed through the prayer and laying on of hands
• James 5:14–16: Elders commanded to anoint with oil and pray for the sick

3.      Healing through prayer alone (five incidents in Scripture)

4.      Healing through prayer and laying on of hands (12 incidents in Scripture)

5.      Healing through prayer and anointing with oil (two incidents in Scripture)


The Gift of Healing in Scripture

Important Principles of Approach

• Beware of being “gift centred” instead of being “character centred.” It is not what you do in the Christian life or the gifts that you have that determine the level of your sanctification. It is what you are in your character that determines your spiritual condition. The Corinthian Church was a “carnal” church but had a great abundance of spiritual gifts at the same time. The exercise of the gifts did not indicate true spirituality.
• Beware of extreme positions on this subject: “God always heals.” “God does not heal today.” “He stopped healing when the last Apostle died.”
• Unscriptural positions will often reveal themselves by producing depression and despair in the lives of those who hold to those positions. Francis Schaeffer said, “If you have biblical Truth, you can live what you believe and believe what you live.”
• The human experience is a test of doctrine, but never the proof of it. Let Scripture interpret experience. Never let experience interpret Scripture.

The Major Issues

A.      Does God heal today?
          Answer: Yes, of course, God heals today.

•      There is nothing in Scripture that says He will not or cannot heal today.
•      There are too many cases of healing to be ignored.
•      Jesus is still the same (Heb. 13:8).

     
B.      Does God always heal?
          Answer: No, God does not always heal.

• There is no promise in Scripture that He will always heal.
• It is appointed for all men to die (Heb. 9:27). Those who teach that a Christian should never be sick or get sick and die are living in a fantasy world. They all die in the end.
• The Apostles who had the gift of healing got sick themselves. Those who worked with them also got sick. There is no record of a sickness-free ministry in the New Testament (Phil. 2:26, 27; 2 Tim. 4:20; 2 Cor. 12:7–10).
• There are too many illnesses among God’s people for this to be true.
• God never promised in Scripture to deliver us from those common ills which beset mankind.

C.      Is the failure of healing due to a lack of faith or of positive confession?
         Answer: No, God has never made healing or anything else depending on man’s will or faith (Rom. 9:14–18).
       

• It is God’s will which determines who is healed and who is not healed (1 John 5:14).
• Two equally good Christians can be sick; both ask for healing with the same amount of faith, yet, one is healed and the other is not. The sovereignty of God is the ultimate.
• False teaching puts poor sick saints on a “guilt trip” by blaming their illness on a supposed lack of faith.

 D.      Is there healing in the Atonement?
           Answer: Yes, there is healing in the atonement.

• Isa. 53:5: “by His wounds, we are healed.”
• Matt. 8:14–17, Jesus is the Messiah because of the physical healings He did.
• In 1 Peter 2:24, Peter speaks of spiritual healing through Christ’s death.

E.      When are we to receive the healing in Christ’s Atonement?
         Answer: At the second coming of Christ.

• There is no logical reason or scriptural basis for the assumption that the healing that we have in the Atonement is something we get NOW by an act of faith.
• We will receive our physical healing at the Resurrection and it will be final, perfect and complete when Jesus returns (1 Thess. 5:23).
• Any miraculous healing which is given today is incomplete and does not render anyone immortal.

F.      Are the gifts of healings mentioned in 1 Cor. 12:9, 28, 30 still in operation today?

Beware of approaching this subject with unproven assumptions, distinctions or ideas in your mind which you never got out of Scripture but which you bring to the Scriptures.

Such distinctions as:

• natural/supernatural gifts
• permanent/temporary gifts
• sign/church gifts

Beware of such arbitrary interpretations as:

• some gifts for today/some for first century
• some necessary now/some not needed

       
Either all the gifts stay or all the gifts go. To go through the various lists of gifts given in Scripture and choose the ones you like as being still present today and to leave the ones you do not like as no longer present is the height of hypocrisy.

• God wants us to understand the nature and purpose of spiritual gifts (1 Cor. 12:1).
• Beware of a “scissors and paste” approach to the New Testament in which various sections are arbitrarily set aside as having relevance only to the Jews or to a supposed “Apostolic Age.” Scofield stated that the four Gospels and the first 10 chapters of Acts are for the Jews and do not relate to the Church.

Biblical Answer:

• Just as the entire Old Testament was for Israel, the entire New Testament is for the Church.
• Scofield’s position is impossible to carry to its logical conclusion and is disastrous to the unity of the New Testament.
• Scofield’s position would take the Lord’s Prayer, the Lord’s Supper and the Great Commission from the Church and give them to the Jews because they were instituted in the Gospels.

5.      The classic example of an arbitrary interpretation is what the anti-gift people have done with 1 Cor. 13:8–12.

• This is the only text in the New Testament which supposedly speaks of the cessation of spiritual gifts. It has become the basic text for doing away with certain gifts such as healing and tongues. It is claimed that all spiritual gifts would be withdrawn once the New Testament canon was complete.
• A survey of the classic commentators on 1 Cor. 13 reveals that in 2,000 years of church history, none of them states the closing of the canon in 1 Cor. 13. Without exception, they saw that Paul was saying that the gifts would change when Jesus returned.
• Most biblical translations with parallel references on this text point to such places as 1 John 3:1–3 as being the scriptural parallel to 1 Cor. 13:8–12. Thus the context is the return of Christ and not the closing of the canon.
• A detailed examination of 1 Cor. 13 reveals that Christ’s return is the subject in Paul’s mind.
• The point of 1 Cor. 13:8–12 is not that prophecy, tongues and knowledge shall be done away with as soon as the New Testament is finished. The point is that “perfection” will be ushered in when Jesus comes back.
• Paul is saying that imperfect tongues, prophecy and knowledge will be supplanted by perfect tongues, prophecy and knowledge. There is a transition from part to whole, from imperfect to perfect. The emphasis is not on cessation but on a transition from the lesser to the greater. It emphasizes completion and fulfilment, not cessation.

G.      Is sickness ever God’s will?
          Answer: Yes, of course, it is.

• There is a sickness unto death, for God has determined when we are to die (Job 14:5). Even those who say that sickness is never God’s will die like everyone else.
• There is a sickness unto chastisement as God punishes us for our sins. This is true both for unbelievers (Exo. 8–12) and God’s people (Num. 12:4–10; 1 Cor. 11:30).
• There is a sickness unto God’s glory (John 9:3).
• There is a sickness unto humility (2 Cor. 12:7–10).

H.      What are the gifts of healings?
     
Remember that there are three basic kinds of gifts.

           a.      Motivational gifts
             (1)      Your basic gift and responsibility.
             (2)      Given by the Spirit as He wills.
             (3)      Given at the time of rebirth.
             (4)      Each Christian has one and only one.
             (5)      The list of gifts is in Rom. 12:6–8.
           b.      Ministry gifts
             (1)      Maybe offices in the Church (elders, deacons, etc.).
             (2)      Opportunities of service.
             (3)      You may minister in more than one gift.
             (4)      The list of gifts is in 1 Cor. 12:28–31.
           c.      Manifestation gifts
             (1)      What happens to the people as you minister.
             (2)      The end result of your ministry.
             (3)      The list of gifts is in 1 Cor. 12:7–11.

The gifts of healings may be a ministry or a manifestation gift. Paul refers to “gifts” instead of “gift” for this reason.

The ministry gift of healings is not a basic gift but a temporary ministry. It comes and goes according to the Spirit.

• Examples of healings (Acts 14:8–10; 19:11–12; 20:9, 10)
• Examples of not being healed (Phil. 2:25–27; 1 Tim. 5:23; 2 Tim. 4:20)
• Examples of times when Paul was sick himself (1 Cor. 2:3; 2 Cor. 11:30; 12:5, 9–10)

         
It is rarely mentioned in the New Testament and does not seem to be frequently given by the Spirit.

• You can seek this ministry through prayer.
• You may pray for the sick to be healed and/or lay hands on the sick if desired (Jas. 5:16).
• You should call for the Elders of the Church to anoint with oil and pray for the sick (Jas. 5:14–15).
•  If you are sick because of divine punishment, healing will come only after confession of sin is made (Jas. 5:16).
• Healing depends on God’s will (1 Jn. 5:14; Jas. 4:15).

The manifestation gift of healings
Paul says “healings” because there are different kinds of healing.
             (1)      healing for the body
             (2)      healing for the mind
             (3)      healing your relationship with God
             (4)      healing your relationship with others

Why does God not always heal?
         1.      He does not want to (Rom. 9:15–18).
         2.      For greater glory.
         3.      For growth in grace.
         4.      For lessons in humility.
         5.      To make Heaven sweeter.
         6.      As a punishment for sin.

Conclusion
We should pray when sick that if it is His will, God would heal us in order for us to serve Him here on earth. if He does not heal us, we should realize that He has opened a new path of service for us in which we can still praise Him for all things. God accomplishes His sovereign will through pain and suffering as well as by pleasure and health (2 Cor. 4:16–18).


Morey, R. A. (2004). The encyclopedia of practical Christianity (pp. 124–128). Las Vegas, NV: Christian Scholars Press.