Here’s a heresy I was hearing a few weeks ago, it sounds something like… ‘sickness is not God’s will for you’, ‘God promises good health here and now’, ‘if you don’t get healed it’s because you lack faith’, ‘if I pray for you then God will heal you’…
The question is asked, “Does God Heal?”… How do we answer that? Yes, He can. Yes, He does, sometimes. Will God heal, in heaven yes, on earth, well that’s up to Him.
There seems to be an addition to the gospel, coming from Isaiah 53:5 – Jesus died for our sins on the cross, and he suffered for our healing (hear and now) – “By his stripes we are healed”
I can’t see any reason to then say, because Jesus suffered in this way that he paid for our healing here and now… the “healed” is in the context (verse 5) of our sin being dealt with and of a relationship with God being healed (peace).
This is one of three legs of the prosperity gospel (health, wealth and prosperity), it’s a little more subtle than your average ‘Christian’ TV preacher who wants your money… cause Jesus will give you loads back! And it sounds reasonable… God can heal, Christians are his children, why would he not heal??
What does the Bible say on the matter…?
“…there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
We don’t know what exactly Paul’s thorn in the flesh was… but we do know the Paul asked God three times to take it away… God displays his power in our weakness
“Stop drinking only water, and use a little wine because of your stomach and your frequent illnesses.”
So Timothy had dodgy bowels and was frequently ill.
“…it was because of an illness that I first preached the gospel to you. Even though my illness was a trial to you, you did not treat me with contempt or scorn. Instead, you welcomed me as if I were an angel of God, as if I were Christ Jesus himself.”
God used Paul’s illness for good
John Piper had cancer last year and wrote an article called “Don’t Waste Your Cancer“, I can’t write everything he said but his main points are:
- illness is designed for you by God
- illness is a gift, not a curse
- God brings comfort
- Death is a reality for us all
- illness is a time to seek God and treasure Him
If God is sovereign… sorry, God is sovereign (by definition) which means illness is given by Him, of course sometimes he may use illness to show his power through miraculous healing, often he won’t!
There are two dangers I feel… first we claim our promises too early, one day we will be whole, healed, perfect, but that is not until heaven… Revelation 21 says of the new earth that “There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain”, one assumes therefore there will be until then, we can’t claim the promises of God before he brings them to completion in his time. Second, we miss the point of illness… ultimately it’s appointed by God, we can use a time of illness/suffering to give glory to God, to seek him, to pray to him… or we can ignore him.
Providentially, Driscoll just started talking about this in his latest sermon (35 mins in)
Hear what JP thinks about the Prosperity gospel…
