Introduction:
In our last post in this series we looked at various principles related to miraculous healing from Jesus’ ministry here Growing Christian Resources: Post #5 Principles For Miraculous Healing - Patience by the Word of God. We defined a miracle as follows:
A miracle is an infrequently occurring act by God in a spiritually significant setting that confirms His messenger and message.
We had looked at the healing of the leper in Luke 5:12-16. We noted two principles that can aid us when praying about healing or in understanding God’s healing power related to prayer.
1. Pray by the will of God. Luke 5:12-13
2. Patience by the Word of God. Luke 5:14-16
We learned that it is appropriate to pray according to God’s will for healing. That is, to pray “if it be your will” is not unbelief. Modern faith healing often neglects the Bible’s designations of God’s unrevealed and revealed wills. There are aspects and purposes of God’s will that are unrevealed, for which we cannot know.
To pray in faith recognizes that I won’t know everything with certainty, thus it is Biblical to yield oneself to God by praying “if it be your will”. The leper asked Jesus “if your are willing, you can make me clean” in Luke 5:12. Then a second principle, “patience by the Word of God” meant we exercise patience by God’s Word by obeying it and praying according to it. God’s Word is to be our guide. In today’s post we will conclude this series on "principles for healing" as we aim to better understand how to pray for those who need healing.
1. The patterns of God’s healing today.
I had mentioned in the last message that I take what is called a “cessationist view” of the miraculous gifts. We find over 250 miracles in the Bible of all sorts, with roughly 90 or so involving healing of different types (spiritual maladies, psychological ailments, and physical diseases). I wanted to at least clarify where I land on this issue before we move on to the text before us in Luke 5:17-26. Below focuses upon miracles of healing.
I hold to a “cessationist” view on the miraculous gifts, meaning that the manifestation of genuine miraculous giftings and offices like Apostles and Prophets ceased at the end of the Apostolic era in the first century. God certainly still heals today, mainly in answer to prayers and the working of His providence.
Those who would disagree are called “continuationists”, who believe to one degree or another, the route of miraculous gifting has not ceased, but continues. What do we see in the Bible pertaining to the pattern of miraculous giftings for healing? Were there periods where it stopped and then started again? Or has it always continued alongside the normal route of healing in answer to prayer?
In the Bible, we find large stretches of time where no miracles occurred, interspersed with sudden bursts of them. In the lives of the Patriarchs in Genesis, God would heal the infertility of Sarah, Rachael, and Rebekka (2,000 b.c.-1,800 b.c.), enabling them to bear forth children.
Another 400 years would pass until Moses’ ministry in 1440 b.c., where only once do we see him perform a miraculous healing (Exodus 4:6-7). Another 300 year period would pass, with Gideon the Judge complaining in Judges 6:13 that it had been centuries since any miracle transpired in Israel from the days of Moses.
From Gideon’s time in 1150 b.c. or so we wait fifty or so years until God heals Hannah of her infertility for she and her husband to give birth to Samuel in 1 Samuel 2 in roughly 1100 b.c. From that point we pass by another two hundred years before we see the healing of King Jeroboam’s hand (1 Kings 13:4-6) in 930 b.c.
Over a century would pass again until the ministries of Elijah and Elisha in 850 b.c. A century or so would pass again until the healing of King Hezekiah in 2 Kings 20:5-7 by the prophet Isaiah applying medicine on his wound in 750 b.c. After the prophet Isaiah, another 700 years would pass where no healing miracles through individuals took place. Answers to prayer for healing went forward, yet miraculously gifted individuals would wax and wane depending upon the need for validating God’s revelation and progressive revelation.
It is with Jesus and the Apostles we find a huge clustering of healings. Jesus performed over 15 healing miracles in the four Gospels of His 35 or so total miracles. Then the Apostles performed roughly ten healing miracles in Acts. We see periods where God worked miracles through gifted individuals in addition to the route of prayer/providence, followed by long stretches where God chose to use the more conventional route of prayer.
Then as the Apostolic age closed, the pattern of God using miraculously gifted people would wane and cease once again. God is God and if He would ever so choose to heal somebody by manifesting a sudden gift of healing, He could do so.
Yet the Biblical pattern we just reviewed suggests miraculous healing occur in our world today through the primary route of providence and prayer, rather than through Apostles, prophets, or those gifted with such miraculous gifts.
Other than Paul’s letter of 1 Corinthians in 12-14 and one reference in Galatians 3:5, I find no other reference to miracles or healing gifts in any of his other letters or any of the remaining letters of the New Testament.
The Book of Revelation indicates that after the Rapture of the Church, in the final seven year period of history known as “The Tribulation Period”, miraculous healings, and corresponding signs will resume as one final testimony of God’s judgment. We’ve observed then patterns for God’s healing today. With that review, we can still glean principles that can help us when praying for healing today.
2. Presence and power of God. 5:17
A. The presence of the Lord who heals.
We read in Luke 5:17 “One day He was teaching; and there were some Pharisees and teachers of the law sitting there, who had come from every village of Galilee and Judea and from Jerusalem; and the power of the Lord was present for Him to perform healing.”
Jesus was already living His human life as one who was under the Person and work of the Holy Spirit. It is most likely that the Holy Spirit is the Person of the Trinity mentioned here in the text.
We must also not forget too that when one Person of the Trinity is acting or working in our world, the other two are automatically included. Although Jesus submitted His human will under the Spirit’s leading, and even though He chose not to use His Divine power for personal advantage or effect, He could utilize the power of His divine nature when the occasion was deemed appropriate by the Father. Thus, we could say too that the same Lord Jesus being truly man was also present as truly God, ready to do a Divine working.
In a later miracle in Acts 3:16, God works a healing through Peter to heal another paralyzed man. We read there in Acts 3:16 “And on the basis of faith in His name, it is the name of Jesus which has strengthened this man whom you see and know; and the faith which comes through Him has given him this perfect health in the presence of you all.”
As we will see in a bit, Jesus was going to heal the man on the stretcher back here in Luke 5:17-26. Thus, the presence of the Lord who heals. What else about the presence and power of God?
B. Purpose of God determines healing.
When you and I pray for healing, it is important we ask for God’s power to operate as He wills it. God is everywhere present (Psalm 139:1-6). His power is without limits (Romans 11:36). In circumstances of Divine healing, God chooses when and how to direct His power to heal, whether at that moment or for another purpose. All faith can do is receive whatever God gives. Faith doesn’t determine when I’m healed. Instead, it’s God’s purpose.
I recall the four times my father was anointed with oil for various cancers, God chose to heal him of a brain cancer, causing the tumor to disappear. The other times, God had different purposes in mind.
For instance, Moses prayed for his sister Miriam to be healed from leprosy and God did not grant his request because He had another purpose in view (see Numbers 12:13-14). God’s purpose for not granting the request was to discipline Miriam for having spoken out against Moses. She never again spoke against her brother. If God had healed her right then and there, she may had done it again. God is most wise (Romans 16:27). His power and purposes never conflict.
His power can heal diseases, as well as strengthen faith, and even bring about salvation as others observe trust in God for the one waiting on Him. Thus, the presence of the Lord who heals. The purpose of God determines healing. What else about the presence and power of God?
C. Don’t stop praying for healing.
God’s power is certainly able to heal when we pray. We often quit praying for healing after one or two times. Part of coming to God in prayer is the exercise of our faith. God is cultivating patience with His timing, while also urging us to not quit too soon in our praying. James 5:16 reminds us, “therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The effective prayer of a righteous man can accomplish much.”
May this post and the last several in this series on principles for healing guide the reader in praying for healing either for themselves or for others.
