Authors: Praying Medic
About 10 years ago I developed severe allergies and I avoided going outside from April to August at all cost. My eyes felt painfully dry, my nose was constantly running, even with blood sometimes. It was no fun at all. The doctors gave me medications to get through that time, but each year it got worse. After I was invited to learn about supernatural healing, I commanded that stuff to leave. It was a constant struggle. Half the day it was fine and I could even breathe through my nose, but it always came back.
Two years ago, I was crying as blood came from my nose. I had pain all over my face. I cried out to the Lord, “What’s going on, why am I not being healed?” He said to me, it’s because I see myself as still being sick.
I was embarrassed and angry. I said, “No way, I know I’m healed by your stripes.”
Silence then… so I decided to take a nap and lie down for a while, still crying.
Then I remembered what the Lord said and asked him, “I see myself as sick? What does that mean?”
Suddenly I was in a dream. I found myself walking in the midst of a field with all the triggers I could imagine – without fear of them. I just stood there looking around and all of a sudden I realized how these flowers smelled. In all these years, I forgot how spring smells with all its flowers in bloom. I realized what Satan had taken away from me. I cried, and cried and cried. The dream went on for about 20 minutes. It took me that long in that dream to realize that I really was healed. When I woke up, I was healed!
Mike saw himself as a sick person. Even though he was trained in divine healing, he still believed he wasn’t healed and he feared going outside. It was fear of still being sick that allowed the symptoms to persist. Once he saw himself through the eyes of faith as a healed person, his symptoms disappeared and they never returned.
I
N THE DISCUSSIONS THAT
I
’VE
had with believers who heal the sick, there is much controversy over whether those who are miraculously healed need to do anything to remain healed. The controversy stems from the belief by some that it is not necessary to maintain healing that comes from God. They look at the Bible and see no mention that people healed by Jesus had to maintain their healing. From this they conclude that it’s neither necessary nor possible to do it. In this chapter we’ll look at what Scripture says about maintaining our healing. I’ll also share a dream I had and we’ll look at some personal experiences.
I’ve met a number of people who have experienced healing, only to have the symptoms return a few days later. I’ve also experienced this myself and so have friends who are used by God to heal others. Roger Sapp, who has prayed with over 25,000 people for healing, estimates that 25 percent of people who are healed experience a return of symptoms.
The evidence seems to indicate that losing the effects of healing is a real phenomenon, even if we don’t completely understand why it happens.
One perspective on healing is that if we, as the ones praying, have the right kind of faith, people will not only be healed, but they will remain healed. Adherents to this view believe that a return of symptoms indicates weak faith on our part. They see healing as a mechanical process brought about as our faith releases the power of God. They reject the idea that the sick person has any part in receiving or keeping their healing, putting all the responsibility on the one who is praying. Again, this view is based on the fact that the Bible doesn’t specifically discuss whether or not we must do anything to keep our healing.
I’d like to address the absence of biblical instruction on maintaining our healing by comparing it to the absence of biblical instruction on maintaining our salvation, since salvation is more extensively covered and better understood by most of us.
The narrative passages in Scripture tell us that people were added to the church at different times. An example is when approximately 3,000 people were added to the church on the day of Pentecost (see Acts 2:41). We know these people were saved, but what isn’t revealed is that all these believers would wrestle with the realities of their salvation for the rest of their lives. Salvation is not just a matter of accepting Jesus as your savior. If you died five minutes after becoming a believer, yes, your soul is saved from the consequences of sin. But if you live longer, your salvation also requires you to maintain your relationship with God. For most of us salvation becomes the ongoing process of being transformed into the image of Christ, know as sanctification.
Those saved on the day of Pentecost were people just like you and me. Some of them would wonder at times if they were really saved. Some would struggle with rebellion against God. Some may have even walked away from God before their death. But the details of how their salvation and sanctification were worked out are not mentioned in scripture because the Bible was not intended to be a biography of their lives. Similarly, the Bible is not a biography that records the details of how people lived after they were healed. If these details had been included we may have read about the same struggles we see today.
If people who are saved do not maintain their relationship with God, do we blame the evangelist? The same question can be asked about healing. If symptoms return after a person is healed is it because the healer wasn’t able to keep them healed?
My point is this: If we are going to hold the healer responsible for the continued manifestation of an individual’s healing, why don’t we hold the evangelist responsible for maintaining their relationship with God?
Most of us understand that we have a responsibility to participate with God in working out our salvation and being conformed to His image. But when it comes to healing and deliverance, we expect that we can sit back and let God sovereignly keep the demons out of our lives or keep us from having sickness and pain. Unfortunately, healing doesn’t always work this way. We must start asking what our responsibility is in cases where remaining healed is an ongoing process, as opposed to the one-time miracles, which don’t require any further battles.
I had a dream that revealed one of the keys to keeping our healing. The dream involved people who were being treated at a hospital for various diseases. As they were healed, they left the hospital and had to make a decision. They had to either leave their account with the hospital open or close it. Those who kept their account open could continue discussing their disease or injury as long as they wanted. They could return for more treatment and discuss the progression of sickness with a doctor or make payment arrangements. These people always became sick again.
The other group decided to close their account after they were healed. They were not allowed to come back for follow up appointments. They didn’t talk about their disease or even think about it after being healed, except to testify once in a while about their healing. This group never again became sick. This was the content of the dream.
The dream reveals two mindsets or types of people and how they view and respond to healing. One mindset is focused on sickness and the process of treating it. The other is focused on health and healing itself. The key to keeping our healing is how we view healing and sickness themselves.
Let’s examine a passage from Scripture where Jesus addresses the issue of keeping our healing. There was a man at the pool of Bethesda who had an infirmity for 38 years. After he was healed, Jesus caught up with him and shared these words of warning:
Afterward Jesus found him in the temple, and said to him, “See, you have been made well. Sin no more, lest a worse thing come upon you.” The man departed and told the Jews that it was Jesus who had made him well.
JN. 5:14-15
Jesus told the man to sin no more, lest something worse would come upon him. This instruction suggests that sickness can be the result of sin and that our healing might be maintained if we avoid sinful behavior. Since Jesus was the one who healed him, the return of his symptoms would not be a result of inadequate faith on the part of Jesus. It was the man’s responsibility to keep his healing. We have the same responsibility today. Notice that the man went to the Jews and testified about his healing. In the dream that I had, those who remained well, were those who testified about their healing. Could our testimony of healing contain a key to remaining healed?
One problem that many of us have is that we love to testify about our sickness. We complain and grumble and tell everyone we know about how bad our condition is. Some of us believe that our ability to put up with our illness proves something about our character. Some people complain to get sympathy from others. And many of us refer to our condition with terms like “my diabetes” or “my cancer.” We’ve seen previously that life and death are in the power of the tongue (see Prov. 18:21). Our words are a reflection of our thoughts. Our thoughts flow from the things that we meditate on in our hearts. The things we focus on are the things we talk about. And that which we talk about we give power to. It is the tongue that holds the power of life and death and it may hold the power to keep us healed. Our words reveal that sometimes, we take possession of our diseases and acknowledge ownership of them. Once we take ownership of something, getting free of it can be a difficult process.
Some people I’ve asked to pray with confessed that they didn’t want me to pray with them because they knew if they were healed they would lose their disability check. Others choose to remain sick because they receive attention or sympathy. When we use sickness to obtain something that we want, we become dependent on what it provides and we become slaves to sickness.
Whether it brings money, attention or the opportunity to obtain pain medications, some of us are accustomed to a lifestyle of sickness. We expect to have doctor appointments for the rest of our lives. Healing Rooms Ministry founder Cal Pierce noted that our health care system is more like a disease maintenance system. It becomes the thing around which our world revolves. Some of us are so dependent on this lifestyle that we fear what life would be like without doctor visits and medications. Those who allow sickness to become their lifestyle may have sickness return no matter how many times they are healed.
In the dream that I had, those who continued a lifestyle that focused on sickness always became sick again. Those who refused to talk about sickness kept their healing. Their words and the fact that they refused to focus on sickness helped them to remain well. I’m convinced that one key to keeping our healing is a matter of what we choose to focus on and what we talk about.
There is one more section of Scripture we might examine to learn how to maintain our healing. In 1 Corinthians chapter 11, Paul addresses several things, one of which is sickness and premature death. He begins the discussion in verse 17, with an observation about the behavior of believers toward one another:
But in the following instructions, I cannot praise you. For it sounds as if more harm than good is done when you meet together. First, I hear that there are divisions among you when you meet as a church, and to some extent I believe it. But, of course, there must be divisions among you so that you who have God’s approval will be recognized!
1 COR. 11:17-19 NLT
Paul continues his list of complaints against them:
When you meet together, you are not really interested in the Lord’s Supper. For some of you hurry to eat your own meal without sharing with others. As a result, some go hungry while others get drunk. What? Don’t you have your own homes for eating and drinking? Or do you really want to disgrace God’s church and shame the poor? What am I supposed to say? Do you want me to praise you? Well, I certainly will not praise you for this!
1 COR 11:20-22
Paul then describes how the Lord passed on to him the celebration of the breaking of bread and drinking the cup in remembrance of His death (see 1 Cor. 11:23-26). He then adds this observation:
(27) So anyone who eats this bread or drinks this cup of the Lord unworthily is guilty of sinning against the body and blood of the Lord. (28) That is why you should examine yourself before eating the bread and drinking the cup. (29) For if you eat the bread or drink the cup without honoring the body of Christ, you are eating and drinking God’s judgment upon yourself. (30) That is why many of you are weak and sick and some have even died.
1 COR. 11:27-30
It would be easy to assume that Paul was referring to how believers viewed the Lord Jesus when he said they should honor the “body of Christ”’ when they eat the bread and drink the cup. But I don’t believe that’s what he was referring to. In this passage, two different terms are used. He refers to “the body and blood of the Lord” in verse 27, and “the body of Christ” in verse 29. Paul often referred to the body of believers, or the
Church
as “the body of Christ.”
In this passage Paul was telling the Church that their behavior toward one another (the body of Christ) was the reason some had become sick and died. Remember, his complaint against them was division, quarreling and selfishness. As he brings the discussion to a close he again emphasizes their behavior toward one another:
So, my dear brothers and sisters, when you gather for the Lord’s Supper, wait for each other. If you are really hungry, eat at home so you won’t bring judgment upon yourselves when you meet together.
1 COR. 11:33-34
In this last section Paul ties the judgment that some people had received (sickness and death) to the fact that they didn’t honor one another when coming together. According to Paul, showing honor to others can actually prevent us from becoming sick or dying prematurely.
One night as I went to bed I developed sudden pain in my lower back that radiated down the back of my left leg. I’d never had this type of pain before, but I knew from transporting people with these symptoms, it was consistent with a herniated lumbar disc. The pain was severe and for a moment I panicked, thinking I’d done something to injure my back.