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The Bible gives us several models of healing prayer. What I would like to do in next few lessons is to look briefly at 21 different models of healing prayer from scripture. The first 3 models come from the Old Testament, and the remaining 18 come from the New Testament. It is not going to be possible to cover all of this in a single lesson, so I will split it among multiple lessons. We will look at the first 6 models in this lesson. They are
Straight intercession is when you petition God on behalf of another. Many times in intercession, God leads you to pray for a group of people instead of just for one single individual. We see this in Hezekiah's life, God used him to intercede for healing for a whole large group of people. There was a situation where people traveled to celebrate the Passover. The Jewish law required that they be ceremonially clean to partake of this, but many began to partake of it that had not taken the time to prepare themselves spiritually. This passage seems to imply that God struck many of them with sickness because they violated the Passover rules. Hezekiah petitioned God on behalf of those who had become ill, and God healed them. In other words, Hezekiah stepped into the role of an intercessor and God honored his prayer by healing the people that Hezekiah prayed for. We see this in 2 Chron 30:17-20:
17 Since many in the crowd had not consecrated themselves, the Levites had to kill the Passover lambs for all those who were not ceremonially clean and could not consecrate [themselves] to the LORD. 18 Although most of the many people who came from Ephraim, Manasseh, Issachar and Zebulun had not purified themselves, yet they ate the Passover, contrary to what was written. But Hezekiah prayed for them, saying, "May the LORD, who is good, pardon everyone 19 who sets his heart on seeking God--the LORD, the God of his fathers--even if he is not clean according to the rules of the sanctuary." 20 And the LORD heard Hezekiah and healed the people.
Genesis 20 is the story of Abimelech and Abraham. Abimelech was the king of Geran, one of the lands Abraham had to pass through. This king had this incredible harem, and was known for collecting women to add to his harem. He had a reputation that if a woman he wanted was already married, he would make her widow by executing her husband.. then she would be eligible for the king to take. Abraham, aware of this reputation, said that Sarah was his sister when the king sent representatives to inquire about her. She was taken to the harem. When this happened, God stuck Abimelech's household with barreness. Verse 3 indicates that Abimelech may have contracted a fatal disease himself. God spoke to him in a dream and told him to restore Sarah to Abraham. The king immediately did so, and then requested Abraham to pray for him to be healed. Abraham prayed and Abimelech and his household were healed. This was a case where an intercessor prayed for healing for a specific individual and then God healed that person in response to the prayer. The key portion of this story is found in Gen 20:14-18
14 Then Abimelech brought sheep and cattle and male and female slaves and gave them to Abraham, and he returned Sarah his wife to him. 15 And Abimelech said, "My land is before you; live wherever you like." 16 To Sarah he said, "I am giving your brother a thousand shekels of silver. This is to cover the offense against you before all who are with you; you are completely vindicated." 17 Then Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelech, his wife and his slave girls so they could have children again, 18 for the LORD had closed up every womb in Abimelech's household because of Abraham's wife Sarah.
2 Kings 20 records the story of Hezekiah. He had been a good and godly king. He fell seriously ill and God sent a prophet (Isaiah) to tell him to get his house in order and prepare to die. Hezekiah began to cry out to God and petition Him on his own behalf. He asked God to heal Him. God listened to his prayer and changed His mind and healed Hezekiah. In other words, Hezekiah prayed and asked God to heal him, and God did. Many people today cry out to God when they are sick, and God answers their prayer. Not long ago, I accidentally ate some spoiled meat on a Saturday evening... it was in a sauce and I did not realize the meat was spoiled. Boy did I get sick! I mean it was coming out both ends, my temperature dropped 4 degrees, I was shaking and I could hardly stand up. Ed had gone to bed early. I thought about waking him and asking him to take me to the emergency room. I had already made several trips to the kitchen sink to throw up, and it hurt so bad that the verse "to be absent from the body means to be present with the Lord" actually sounded attractive to me. I was supposed to teach a class the next morning, but I did not see how I could do that, because I was so sick. About 2:30 AM I began crying out to the Lord to heal me. Shortly afterewards I was able to sit on the sofa.. the bedroom was upstairs and too far away from the kitchen sink, which I seemed to need constantly. But I stopped throwing up, and I fell asleep on the sofa. When I woke up, I still felt a bit weak, but I was well enough to go teach my class. I had asked God to heal me and He did. This makes me wish I had thought to pray and ask him to heal me much earlier in the evening!
We find Hezekiah's prayer and God's response in 2 Kings 20:1-7:
1 In those days Hezekiah became ill and was at the point of death. The prophet Isaiah son of Amoz went to him and said, "This is what the LORD says: Put your house in order, because you are going to die; you will not recover." 2 Hezekiah turned his face to the wall and prayed to the LORD, 3 "Remember, O LORD, how I have walked before you faithfully and with wholehearted devotion and have done what is good in your eyes." And Hezekiah wept bitterly. 4 Before Isaiah had left the middle court, the word of the LORD came to him: 5 "Go back and tell Hezekiah, the leader of my people, `This is what the LORD, the God of your father David, says: I have heard your prayer and seen your tears; I will heal you. On the third day from now you will go up to the temple of the LORD. 6 I will add fifteen years to your life. And I will deliver you and this city from the hand of the king of Assyria. I will defend this city for my sake and for the sake of my servant David.'" 7 Then Isaiah said, "Prepare a poultice of figs." They did so and applied it to the boil, and he recovered.
A woman for Canaan came to Jesus and asked Him to heal her daughter. Jesus tested her faith, saying that He was sent to minister to Israelites, not to her. She did not give up, she continued to petition Jesus on behalf of her daughter. Jesus ended up answering her prayer and healing the daughter. Often people will have great faith for their relatives and loved ones to be healed. Sometimes all it takes is standing in agreement with them in their faith for their loved one's healing. We see Jesus doing this in Matt 15:28:
"Woman, you have great faith! Your request is granted." And her daughter was healed from that very hour.
We often see Jesus healing the sick, commanding demons to flee, etc. But in this case, the Centurion made a proclamation of faith (his servant would be healed if Jesus simply commanded it.) Jesus did not command it, as the centurion suggested. Instead He merely stood in agreement with the centurion's proclamation of faith, and that was enough to cause the servant to be instantly healed. Look at Matthew 8:8 and 13:
The centurion replied, "Lord, I do not deserve to have you come under my roof. But just say the word, and my servant will be healed."Then Jesus said to the centurion, "Go! It will be done just as you believed it would." And his servant was healed at that very hour.
This is similar to the last point, but it is slightly different. It is when our existence or presense serves as a point of contact for a person to engage their faith. Jesus did this. We all know that Jesus could heal people directly , but in one case, He was in a crowd. People were jostling and bumping Him as He walked through the crowd. Then He felt the healing anointing go forth from Him and He did not even know who around Him had been healed. In this case, Jesus was not chosing to heal this woman with the issue of blood. However, the woman had great faith in God's ability to heal. She had said to herself "If I can only touch the hem of His garment, I will be healed." In other words, her faith needed a point of contact... she needed to touch Jesus. So she pushed her way through the crowds and she touched Jesus' clothes, and she was healed.
I saw a similar thing happen when I did some volunteer work at a few Benny Hinn crusades. There was a crippled woman that had told herself, "if I can only get into the healing testimony line then God will heal me." The gottya is that this line is not to receive healing, it is to give testimonies after you have been healed. So she knew she could not come up in her wheel chair. So she got to friends to help carry her up.. one under her right arm and the other under her left arm, her feet sort of dragging on the ground. I was doing what they call "crowd control", e.g, helping to form a human wall to keep the line narrow enough that there was a path for people to walk back from the stage to their seats after they testified. The volunteers are not allowed to lay hands on people to pray for healing for anyone, Benny Hinn is very strict about that.. He has a small team that's been traveling with him for many years that can pray for people's healings.. the rest of us just act as ushers and help with crowd control. The line moves very slowly, often the same person will be in front of us for 5 to 10 minutes as we stand there. I did not know this lady's story. I did not realize the people were holding her up at first... I thought she just had her arms around them. When I looked at her, I saw the glory of God all over her. God's presense was on her so strongly that she literally glowed like the "actors" from touched by an angel. So I said that to her, I said, "Wow. The Lord is all over you. I can see His presense on you." That is all I said. It was the point of contact she had been looking for ... remember that she had told herself that if she could get into the line, God would heal her. Suddenly her legs were strengthened and she could stand up on her own! She tried taking a step or two and found that she could walk! No one had prayed for her, but God had healed her. Her faith was ready.. she just needed that little point of contact.
Matthew: Matthew 9:21-22 records when Jesus acted as a point of contact for this woman's faith. It says,
20 Just then a woman who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak. 21 She said to herself, "If I only touch his cloak, I will be healed." 22 Jesus turned and saw her. "Take heart, daughter," He said, "your faith has healed you." And the woman was healed from that moment.