I read a story this week by Christian author Philip Yancey. Yancey recounted a story in the life of a man named Richard. He had been looking for evidence to prove to him the existence of a living and active God when one day, by chance, he stumbled upon a mass healing service being broadcast on television. The service was being conducted by Kathryn Kuhlman, and as he watched he was mesmerized by the people who come to the stage and recounted their healing experiences. He said that in that moment his doubts melted away. He had found the evidence that he had been looking for.
Weeks later when Kathryn Kuhlman was holding another service in a neighboring state, so Richard skipped class and did everything he could to be in the audience. In his book, he describes the atmosphere as you could hear people quietly praying, some even in different languages. He recalled that every so often you would hear a shout of “I’m healed!” from somewhere in the auditorium.
One person in particular caught his attention. He was awestruck when he saw a man who had been carried in on a stretcher walk across the platform and profess his story of healing. The crowd cheered as he walked on stage, and the man proceeded to give his name and to tell the audience that he was a physician from Milwaukee. He had been diagnosed with an incurable form of lung cancer, and he had been given only six months to live. He went on to praise God and to tell the group of people how that night he was able to walk for the first time in months. He proclaimed before everybody that he believed God had healed him that night.
As Richard watched, he knew that if God could heal that man he had wonderful things in store for him. In that moment, he wrote down the name of the physician on the stage and determined to follow-up with him. Exactly one week later he called directory assistance in Milwaukee and asked for the doctor by name. They connected him, and a woman answered the phone. He explained who he was and who he was looking for, telling the woman that he had admired the doctor and had wanted to speak with him ever since he had seen him at the Kathryn Kuhlman event. He explained that he had been very moved by his testimony.
There was a long silence on the other end of the line. Then the woman spoke in a low, flat voice. She pronounced each word very slowly, “My… husband… is… dead.” She immediately hung up the phone without another word. The realization sent his world spinning. It was like the wind had been knocked out of him. He staggered into the next room where his sister was sitting. She asked him what was wrong, but he was unable to speak. He had staked his life on the certainty that this man had been healed by the living and active God, and now he didn’t know what to believe.
I’m sure that each of us have had a situation like this, and if you haven’t there’s a good chance you will. Situations like this beg the question, how do we come to terms with this concept of divine healing? We see repeatedly in scripture Jesus, as well as God’s prophets, healing the sick and raising the dead. If you ask the elders of the church today, each one will attest that they believe that God has the power to heal the sick. They may even have stories of loved ones who’ve been healed.
I remember one such story as a child. My Grandpa Kakert had had numerous heart attacks, and he wasn’t in the best of health. He had gone to the doctor for something and they determined that he had an irregular heartbeat. Since these types of things can be dangerous, the doctor had determined that in his case the best option was to undergo a procedure that would stop his heart and start it again, hopefully correcting the irregularity.
I was a child at the time, so I don’t have all of the details, but as you can imagine, this was a risky procedure. My mom and her siblings were beside themselves with the idea that their father might not make it through the procedure. I remember that as a family and as a church we prayed that God would take care of my grandpa.
When the day of the procedure arrived, the doctors and the nurses began to prep my grandpa for the procedure, but as they took his vitals they discovered something interesting. Over the time of the previous appointment and the procedure, which hadn’t been very long due to the seriousness of the condition, his heart had begun to beat regularly. The procedure to stop and restart his heart was no longer necessary because he had been healed.
However, with as many stories as we have about people being healed, we have just as many stories like that of Richard where the people involved are ultimately lost. As we begin to look at this topic and the doctrine of divine healing in the Church of the Nazarene, we will be falling back on our understanding of who God is, who we are, and how we attempt to understand the relationship between the two.
As we look at scripture, we see accounts of healing over and over. In 2 Kings we see Naaman being healed of leprosy after being told to dip himself into the Jordan River seven times. It took faith on his part before the healing took place. Likewise, in the gospel of Luke we’re told of a woman that had been subject to bleeding for twelve years. Upon touching Jesus’ clothes she is healed. When confronted, Jesus tells her that it was her faith that had healed her.
This is a common theme throughout biblical healings. Either the person healed sought after God through faith or were required to perform some sort of task by faith. We even see the opposite happening. In 2 Kings we read of King Asa who suffered with a foot disease for many years prior to his death. During that time he did not seek the Lord, and he was not healed.
As we comb through these biblical references we can see a theme that tells us, “If you have faith you will be healed.” Some have even taken that and begun to preach it in churches across the world. I’ve been in church services where an evangelist with the gift of healing lays hands on people to heal them. Many people reported experiencing healing by his hands, but those that did not were dismissed because “they didn’t have enough faith.” Is that true? Our own reason and experience seems to tell us that sometimes God doesn’t heal those who have faith, but what does the bible say about that?
In the gospel of John Jesus and the disciples come upon a man who was born blind. Jesus ends up healing him, but up until this point in his life he had not been healed. Are we to understand that in this moment he finally had gained enough faith to be healed? Likewise, Paul tells us in 2 Corinthians that he was given a thorn in the flesh in order that he might not become conceited. He says that he asked God three times to remove it but God replied, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Are we to understand that Paul didn’t have enough faith to be healed? The man that was called by God to be the apostle to the Gentiles and who wrote a significant portion of the New Testament was filled with the Holy Spirit but didn’t have enough faith to be healed of a thorn in the flesh?
Instead it seems more reasonable to say that while God’s healing requires faith on the part of the person being healed, God has the final say of if, when, and where that person will be healed. There are times when, like Paul, God says, “my power is made perfect in your weakness.” While lack of healing may indicate a lack of faith, it’s just as likely to mean that God has a plan to glorify himself through your weakness.
In regard to divine healing, Article of Faith #14 in the Manual of the Church of the Nazarene states, “We believe in the Bible doctrine of divine healing and urge our people to offer the prayer of faith for the healing of the sick. We also believe God heals through the means of medical science.” Often when we think of divine healing we envision the lame walking, the deaf hearing, and the blind receiving sight. We think on all these things and mourn the thought that we don’t see healing like that today. Even in the story of Richard, what was believed to be a healing from lung cancer ended in the loss of a husband.
However, when we narrow our definition of divine healing to only include those of miraculous, biblical proportions, we neglect a great deal of God’s hand at work in this world. I’m reminded of an illustration in which a man is living in his house. There is word in the news of an imminent flood, but the man had a vision of God reaching his hand down and saving him from the flood, so he remained in his house.
As the flood waters began to rise, his fleeing neighbors ask if he needs a ride. Confident in his vision, He tells them that God will save him, so he watches as his neighbors drive away in their pickup truck. In time, the first floor of his house begins to flood, so he moves up to the second floor, all the while praying that God would save him. As he looks out his window, a boat comes by and offers him a ride. The man remembers his vision and refuses stating that God will save him.
As the flood waters continue to rise, the man is forced to go up to the roof of his house. Once again he prays that God would deliver him. Shortly after a helicopter comes by and offers the man a ride to safety, but once again the man refuses stating that the Lord would rescue him. Eventually the man is unable to withstand the waters any longer, and he is swept away and drowns.
When he wakes up at the pearly gates of heaven, the first thing he says to God is, “God, why did you not save me? I believed in you with all my heart. Why did you let me drown?” God replied, “I sent you a pick-up truck, a boat and a helicopter and you refused all of them. What else did you want me to do for you?”
Not all divine healing looks like a miracle. Many times it can look perfectly ordinary. In 1 Timothy 5:23 Paul doesn’t lay hands on Timothy to heal his ailing stomach. Instead he recommends a medicinal remedy. Likewise, through advances in technology and medical science, we are able to see the paralyzed walk again. Those who are deaf are able to hear, and those who are blind are able to receive their sight. While we may not see a spectacularly miraculous healing, God is still at work healing those in need. In the Church of the Nazarene, we believe that God uses these medical advances and the wisdom of doctors and nurses to heal the afflicted.
However, even with modern medicine, not every case has a happy ending. I’m reminded of Pastor Kent Sperry from the Prince of Peace Lutheran Church in town who recently lost his mother. They had faith, and they prayed for healing. Some would say that healing never came, but those of us in the church know differently. We are more than just our physical bodies, and when we go to see our savior we know that he will give us a new body, a glorious body, a body that will not get sick and will not decay.
God heals in many ways, from calling Nahum to perform a task to Paul telling Timothy to take medicine. There are also times when God’s healing is done through glorification in heaven. Our’s is not to question why he chooses one way over the other. We know our God is powerful and that he bring about his will in a number of different ways.
