GIFTS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT – GIFT OF HEALING
DR. JIM DIXON
OCTOBER 6, 1985
JOHN 11:17-44
It’s called Lourdes. It’s a city in southwestern France, a city of approximately 17,000 people, in the Pyrennes foothills, and it’s the great center of Roman Catholic healing. It was in the city of Lourdes in the year 1858 that the virgin Mary allegedly appeared 18 times to a 14-year old peasant girl named Bernadette, telling her that the waters of the grotto spring were supernatural, endowed with healing powers for every generation. That was 127 years ago, but today, more than two million people every year journey to Lourdes to see the statue of the virgin, to see the beautiful church called Rosary and to bathe in the sacred waters, hoping that somehow, supernatural power might be unleashed for the healing of their physical afflictions.
Between the year 1980 and the year 1972, 995 people submitted written documentation of their healing in the grotto spring in Lourdes to the Roman Catholic church, but the Roman Catholic church was skeptical so they hired two thousands doctors to examine thoroughly those 995 cases. Those doctors met with the people who had allegedly been healed, checked their ongoing progress or lack of it, developed profiles on them physically and psychologically, took into consideration any possible psychosomatic factors and finally concluded that only 15 of the 995 hat actually received supernatural healing. They then examined thorough the 15 and concluded that only 7 would be officially classified by the Roman Catholic church as supernaturally healed. Seven people in a period of 12 years, a little more than one person every two years, and that in the greatest center of Roman Catholic healing in the world.
Some people might suggest that the Roman Catholic church is a little bit skeptical, perhaps a little too skeptical, but I must say that I am sometimes skeptical when I see certain healing services or when I hear of a certain healing. I’m skeptical when I see a television evangelist lay his hand on a stack of letters—letters that have come from all over the United States—letters that represent real needs and hurts of people and I see that evangelist put his hands on that stack and say a short prayer for a bulk healing—I’m skeptical. No matter what he reports in the subsequent weeks. I’m skeptical when I see a TV healer rub his forehead and say, “I see somebody down in Florida, perhaps in Miami, who has scoliosis of the spine. God is healing that and I see somebody else in Southern California, perhaps in the city of Los Angeles—one leg shorter than the other—it’s bothering you—you’re walking with a limp. God’s lengthening that leg. I see somebody else in the Pacific Northwest. His name is Richard, maybe it’s Ralph. I see a spot under the left ear, maybe the right. God’s healing that.” I’m skeptical. I’m skeptical when I hear reports from third world nations in primitive parts of the world, when I’m told that Christians there are routinely walking on water and raising the dead. I’m told that these things are occurring there because they’re not corrupted by 20th century technology and the prejudices of the scientific method, they have simple childlike faith, but I’m skeptical because when many of these reports are examined, they are found to be spurious, dubious and contrived.
But having admitted that I am sometimes skeptical I also want to say that I believe that God heals. I believe in God’s power. I believe God’s power is for today. I believe God’s power is sufficient to heal and I believe that in the church of Christ, there are people who are given a very, very special gift and this gift is called the Gift of Healing.
This morning I have three brief teachings, all of which are meant to help us understand more clearly this gift. The first teaching is this. The Gift of Healing is not always effective. Not everyone who has this gift is always able to heal.
About ten years ago, Dean Wolf, pastor at Faith Presbyterian Church in Aurora and Mark Moore who is associate pastor and myself went to Estes Park. We would go there periodically just as a kind of retreat from the busy-ness of ministry and there was a home there that we were allowed to use. It was a beautiful home on top of a mountain with a 360-degree view and we would just gather there and build a fire in the fireplace and we’d kind of discuss the things that were going on in the church and we’d pray together and we’d share scripture together. We bought a lot of food. We ate a lot. Sometimes we would take walks in the woods and just talk. A special time. It was particularly special because of the couple that owned the house named Newt and Millie Newton. They loved each other very much and they loved the Lord Jesus Christ with all their heart. One day something tragic happened to Millie. She was discovered to have cancer. They discovered that the cancer was inoperable. We all began to pray for Millie. I think it’s safe to say, and I’m not exaggerating when I say, that thousands of people prayed for Millie Newton. On a Tuesday evening at Praise and Prayer, a person with the Gift of Healing prayed for Millie. More than one person with the Gift of Healing prayed for Millie. Millie believed, she truly believed, that God was going to raise her up but it didn’t happen at least not in the way she expected it because the Lord took her home. She in the presence of Christ today but I think every minister has had the experience of praying for somebody and not seeing that person healed. I think this is true also of people with the Gift of Healing—that they’ve prayed for people and not seen them healed, because this gift is not always effective.
Nobody could deny that the Apostle Paul had the Gift of Healing. You can’t read the second half of the Book of Acts and deny that He was endowed by the power of Christ with the Gift of Healing and yet Paul wrote to the Christians in Philippi. He told them that he had not been able to send Aphroditus to them because Aphroditus had been so sick and for so long. Paul wrote to Timothy and told Timothy that he had to leave Prophemus behind at Miletus because Trophemus was ill. And to Timothy himself, Paul said, “take a little wine for your belly’s sake, for your chronic stomach problems.” Why didn’t Paul just heal Timothy? Why didn’t Paul heal Trophemus? Why didn’t he heal Aphroditus? Because he simply wasn’t able to heal everybody even though he had the Gift of Healing.
Now this Gift of Healing the scriptures tell us can sometimes be blocked. It can sometimes be thwarted. It can sometimes be frustrated. The Bible tells us that a lack of faith can limit healing. Now faith is not always required for a person to be healed but sometimes it’s required, and when it’s not there, sometimes healing is not given. The Bible says our Lord Jesus Christ, in portions of Galilee, did no healings because of the lack of faith. Many times, when Jesus did heal, he would say to the person, “ your faith has made you well.” When the disciples were unable to heal an epileptic in the 17th chapter of Mark, Christ rebuked them for their lack of faith. And the Bible also tells us that sometimes—healing powers are limited by sin—either in the person who has the Gift of Healing or the person being prayed for. We’re told in the fifth chapter of the Book of James that sometimes for healing to take place, there needs to be confession of sin and repentance. But not everyone who is not healed lacks faith or is involved in some grievous sin.
I am convinced that sometimes healing does not take place simply because God does not then will it. You see we have a sovereign God, and this is hard for many Christians to accept, but I don’t see anything in the scriptures that promises that God will always heal when we want Him to. God is sovereign. Sometimes he chooses to unleash his supernatural power on our need and other times he withholds it, and I believe that sometimes suffering can be redemptive, that God can use it in our lives for beauty and growth.
You know the Apostle Paul sought the Lord regarding a thorn in his flesh. Most theologians believe that that thorn in the flesh was a physical affliction. We don’t really know. It might have been a physical affliction. It might have been emotional. It might have been spiritual in nature but Paul was afflicted and he said, “Lord, take this from me.” He asked again and again and the Lord said, “no.” Again and again, the Lord said, “no.” The Lord said, “My grace is sufficient for you and my strength is made perfect in your weakness.” Ours is to bring the needs of the saints before the throne of God and it’s His to unleash power or to withhold it by His will. But if we would be faithful, we pray, realizing that even those who have the Gift of Healing are not always able to heal.
The second teaching this morning is this. The Gift of Healing is more prevalent in some periods of history. There have been special periods of Biblical history when God’s power has been uniquely poured out upon the earth. Many theologians see four great periods of miraculous power in Biblical history when God did special things. The first was 3500 years ago. It was the time of Moses and Joshua when God poured down his power upon the earth, from the crossing of the Red Sea to the crumbling of the walls of Jericho, God poured down His power and it was necessary for the establishment of the nation of Israel.
The second period of God’s unique pouring out of power on the earth was 700 years later, around 2800 years ago. It was the time of Elijah and Elisha. A special time that God poured forth His power upon the earth. As fire descended from Heaven upon the 450 prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel, as the dead were resurrected by Elijah and Elisha and it was all necessary for the moral transformation of a people who had begun to be corrupted by the heathen nations.
A third unleashing of God’s power on the world was 2400 years ago in the time of the exile. It was the time of Daniel and Shadrack, Meshack and Abednego, the fiery furnace and the lion’s den. God’s power was poured forth to give people hope in a time of despair, but the greatest outpouring of God’s power upon the earth was 1950 years ago in the first century. It was the time of Christ our Lord, the Son of God and His Apostles, and this outpouring of God’s power was expressed uniquely in healing ministry.
Sometimes I think we fail to comprehend the healing power of Christ. We’re told that when Jesus was in Galilee, having preached the Sermon on the Mount, descended the mountain, and there came to Him a leper. Luke, the beloved physician, tells us this leper was riddled with leprosy, full of leprosy. He probably had a combination of anesthetic and tubercular leprosy; most Biblical cases of leprosy combine the two and this man had a particularly tragic case of it. His skin would have been ulcerated, covered with ulcers and sores, so bad that his skin would have stunk. His tendons and his cartilage would have begun to contract so that his hands and his feet began to look like claws. His nervous system and his muscular system had begun to degenerate. He knew that coma and death was his destiny. Tragically, as all lepers, he had been banished from family and friends and community. He was forced to live in dens and caves of the earth, wandering over the deserts. He was not allowed by Jewish law to come closer than 100 yards to a normal human being. If ever he came that close, he had to shout, “Unclean! Unclean!” But he was desperate and probably very near to death and so he came to Jesus Christ.
Violating all the law, he came to Christ and he fell on his face before Christ and he simply said, “Lord, if You will, you can make me clean.” The Bible says that, “Jesus Christ was moved with compassion and He reached down and He touched the untouchable. He touched that man’s ulcerated. skin. He touched him and He said will be clean.” And the Bible says that in a moment in time instantly, that leper was healed. His skin was made whole. His tendons, his cartilage, his muscular system, his nervous system, everything in a moment in time was made whole. Such is the power of Jesus Christ, and when Jesus Christ was in Jerusalem, at the pool called Bethsaida, sometimes called Bethesda, near the Sheep Gate. He found people all about the pool, invalids, lame people waiting for the waters to be troubled because they believed that an angel of God came down periodically, troubled the waters and when the waters were troubled, the waters would be endowed with healing powers. But this one man had been there for 38 years. His friends carried him there. He couldn’t move. He hadn’t moved in 38 years but no one was there to put him into the water and he was just a tragic victim, and Jesus Christ came up to him and the Bible says, “He was moved with compassion.” And though this man had not moved in 38 years, Jesus said, “Rise. Take up your bed and walk.” And such was the power that was in Jesus Christ that that man would instantly be healed, and he rose and he took up his bed and he walked.
When he came to Bethany—as we saw in the passage of scripture which we had for today—He came to the home of Mary and Martha, whose brother Lazarus had just died, He found that Lazarus had already been dead four days. His body had begun to decay, but Jesus said to Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in Me though he die, yet shall he live and he who lives and believes in Me will never die.” Jesus said to Martha, “Did I not tell you that if you would but believe you would see the glory of God.” And He stood outside that tomb and He cried out ‘Lazarus, come forth!” The Word of God tells us that “the dead man came out made whole, resurrected.” Christ had resurrected the widow’s son of the village of Nain. He had resurrected the daughter of Jairus. He had proved his mastery over the elements. He had changed water to wine, walked on water. He had rebuked the wind and calmed the sea. Such is the power of the Son of God and that same power of Christ was manifested in the apostles.
We’re told in the book of Acts that as Peter and John came out of the city of Jerusalem by the gate called Beautiful, there was a man there who had been carried by his friends on a bed and set by the gate, this man had been lame, the Bible says, from birth. Every day his friends would carry him and set him by the gate called Beautiful and the man would just lay in his bed and beg—beg for money all day long—and as Peter and John came out through the gates of the city, they saw him there, begging, and Peter looked at him and said, “look up at me” and the man looked up. Peter said “silver and gold have I none but such as I have, I give. Rise. Take up your bed and walk” and the Bible says that that man rose, took up his bed and walked by the power of Christ.
We see the same kind of healing power manifested through the Apostle Paul. He performed healing after healing, so great was the power of Christ within him that people began to circulate Paul’s aprons and handkerchiefs, just touching them that they might be healed. The Bible tells us that Barnabas, Steven, Philip, and many others manifested this healing power in the first century of the church. And today, some Christians say “Where have all the healings gone? Where’s the power of God today? Where are the miracles today?” Some Christians in more charismatic or Pentecostal churches say that, “it’s not gone anywhere—we simply don’t have faith anymore.” Others would say that perhaps we’re entering into a special period once more, perhaps a fifth period of outpouring of God’s power upon the earth and we’re beginning to see the miraculous again and the healing again and they cite examples of healings all over the world and they cite how in this century we have seen many faith healers, Christian faith healers arrive, an inordinate number when compared to the centuries past. People such as Amy Simple McPherson and Kathryn Kuhlman and Oral Roberts, and they say that certainly some of these people in some measure have manifested the Gift of Healing. They cite conferences conducted all over the world, healing conferences, such as the Signs and Wonders Conference that Bob and I went to in Vancouver, British Columbia not too long ago. And it’s hard to appraise the times in which we live,
Certainly, I believe that God’s power is poured out upon this earth because the Kingdom of Christ has invaded this world and His Kingdom comes with power. We’ve seen healings in our church, in this church. We’ve seen children healed and we’ve seen adults healed. A few months ago, we had a prayer service where a hundred people came forward and our elders’ laid hands on them and prayed and God did beautiful things. I believe in healing. I believe God heals in every century. But it is not possible to know whether the measure of what is being done today is the same as what was done in the first century. I suspect it’s not.
You know, some Christians think that what God did in the first century, he’s got to be doing in every century. It’s always got to be the same. What was good for the Apostles, is good enough for us. I don’t think the Bible teaches that. God is sovereign. He pours out his spirit when and where He would and throughout history there’ve been many times of special outpourings and perhaps, we are entering into such a time. The Bible certainly teaches that the close of the world, the consummation before the second coming of Jesus Christ will be a special time of God’s outpouring of power. Perhaps we’re beginning to see an inkling of this special outpouring again.
Thirdly and finally, we have this teaching. The Gift of Healing is multifaceted. The Greek words for the Gift of Healing are karismata imatahn and these words literally mean the Gift of Healings, it’s in the plural. Most theologians would agree that this gift involves more than one type of healing. It does not simply refer to the healing of physical afflictions but physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual. We live in a world of suffering. People need more than physical healing. They need to be healed emotionally.
More than 140 years ago in the year 1843, a man named Henry and a woman named Frances were married. They loved each other very much, most married people do, but their love for each other was greater than most and their friendship was deeper, and the years of their marriage were extremely happy years and they had everything this world has to give. Frances had been born into great wealth. Frances and Henry lived in a mansion in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Henry was a professor at Harvard University and he had become one of the most famous men in the world. But in the year 1861, when they’d been married nearly for 18 years, their next-door neighbor, Oliver Wendell Holmes, told a friend that he was concerned about Henry and Frances. He said, “they’re too happy. They’re just too happy. Any change in their life at all would have to be a change for the worse.” He said “every time I walk past their house, I tremble. I have a foreboding that something horrible is going to happen.”
His words turned out to be prophetic because on July 7, 1861, as Henry was studying in his study, reading, and writing, and Frances was working in the adjoining library, she was putting together their keepsakes and she had two locks of her daughter’s hair and she was trying to put them into a book with some hot wax. Somehow Frances set her dress on fire and in a matter of seconds, she was engulfed in a blaze and she was screaming and Henry came running into the room. He was desperate. He grabbed the rug in front of the fire and he began to wrap it around his wife that he loved so much, but he couldn’t quench the flames. In desperation, Frances screamed and just ran into Henry’s arms, and with his own body he put out the fire. Henry was badly burned but not so badly as Frances. When the doctors came, Henry desperately wanted a doctor to keep her alive. All the doctor could do was give her some medicine to induce sleep. The next morning Frances awoke and she asked for some coffee. She told Henry she loved him and those were the final words she spoke. She slipped into coma. She died on July 9, 1861. She was buried on July 13, which would have been their 18th anniversary. Henry could not come to the funeral. He was bedridden, horribly burned on his hands and face but his physical wounds would heal. His emotional wounds would not. He grew a beard to cover the scars on his face and for that beard, he became famous, but he could not cover the scars in his heart. When Frances died, a greater portion of Henry’s heart died with her. He lived for almost 21 more years on the earth. They were lonely years. He poured himself into his work. His work was writing. He wrote poetry and prose. Today he is famous for his narrative poems such as, The Courtship of Miles Standish, The Song of Hiawatha. Famous for his historical poems such as Paul Revere’s Ride, “Listen my children and you will hear the midnight ride of Paul Revere.” His full name, of course, was Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. He died in the year 1882 and when he died, they found a poem in his home that he had written shortly before his death. The poem is called The Cross of Snow. Most critics, most scholars today, regard it as the greatest poem he’d ever written. In that poem he says, “There is a cross of snow upon my heart. It’s been there since the day that Frances died.” He said his heart was in a condition of perpetual winter—no spring—no summer—no fall, no change, just barrenness since the day she died through all the years. What a tragic way to live on the earth.
And yet there are many people in this world who are like that. Perhaps some people in this room who in some measure are like that—having wounds that just seem too great to heal, having grief so deep that there seems to be no release, no hope for joy and happiness again. The Bible tells us that as Christians, it’s never meant to be that way, because as Christians we have the sure hope that is given in Jesus Christ, the promise of resurrection and eternal life and the promise that all of our loved ones in Christ we will one day be united with again in the life to come. And also, because as Christians we’ve been given each other. We are the church, the body of Christ. We are children of God, brothers, and sisters in Jesus Christ, and we’ve been given to each other to minister to each other. Not everyone in this room, I’m sure very few of you, have the Gift of Healing, but all of us have been called to minister in healing. And when you see someone among us who is afflicted physically, emotionally, or spiritually, we are called to pray for that person that the power of God might come upon them, and we are called to reach out to them in love and in compassion. Jesus. said “He came into this world that the blind might see and the lame might walk.” He said he came “to heal the brokenhearted, to proclaim the year of the Lord.” He’s left this earth. He’s gone to Heaven. He’s at the right hand of the Father on high. Until He comes again, he has entrusted this ministry, His ministry, into our hands in the power of the spirit. He said “I’ve given you an example, that you should follow in my steps.” Let’s pray.