God Is Still In The Healing Business

There was a reason that healings did not manifest in my life when I prayed for people. It was because I didn't really pray from my heart. When I prayed, I doubted and questioned if it really was God's will to heal the person. When I didn't see the results I wanted to see, I concluded that I would not pray for the sick anymore because I didn't see them healed right then when I prayed.

It is important to understand that it is not our responsibility to make sure a person is healed. We have a tendency to start analyzing the situation if we don't see God do an instant healing. We try to use human logic to explain the situation. We might conclude that our prayers don't make a difference because we don't see the results we want. The more we analyze, the more we can confuse ourselves. So we spent the entire time questioning God instead of focusing our attention on persistent prayer for the sick person. We rely on our strength and our interpretation of what God's answer should look like.

The truth is that praying for the sick is not about us or our abilities. It is about God and what He promises in His word. It is about His love and mercy and grace. And it is about what He accomplished through the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ.

People don't have to be healed instantly. Many do not feel a thing right at the moment when they receive prayer. However, they often receive a healing days, weeks or months later as they persist in believing God for what He says is rightfully theirs.

Just because we don't see something happen on the surface doesn't mean nothing is happening under the surface. We don't know what is going on in the person's life when we pray. There might be some things that God wants to deal with in that person before He manifests His healing. There may be intentional sin that He needs to convict them of so they will repent. Or there may be certain curses or rights the enemy has on that person.

It is important that we do not feel guilty when a person is not healed. It is not our responsibility to heal. That is God's responsibility. Our responsibility is to obey God's commission and pray for the sick and lay hands on them.

Praying for the sick uses the same principle as sharing our faith. It is our responsibility to share the good news of what Jesus did on the cross and in His resurrection with unbelievers. However, it is not our responsibility to prove to people that God exists; that is God's responsibility. We are to share the gospel, not argue the gospel. And when it comes to healing the sick, we are to pray for the sick. We are not question God about why He has not healed right then and there. When we start questioning God and overanalyzing the situation, it is easy to get disappointed, disillusioned, and to walk away with hurt feelings. This kind of thinking can then cause an open door for doubt to come in and discourage us even more.

If we do not follow through with our responsibility (to pray) then God will not be able to follow through with His (to heal). There are times that He will heal the person we are praying for despite our lack of faith, simply because He is a merciful God. He may do that to give us a jump start or to encourage us to continue praying for the sick just as He commanded us to do (Mark 16:15).

The Difference Between A Miracle And A Healing

I don't know about you but it helped me tremendously to understand the difference between healing and miracles. I got this concept from Todd Bentley, so I want to give him credit for it. Miracles happen instantly but healings happen as "we go."

We see an example of this in Luke 17:11 where Jesus healed ten men of leprosy. They didn't get healed instantly so this would not be considered a miracle. They got healed as "they went." We don't know how far the men had to walk to get to the next town where they were told to show themselves to the priest to be declared clean. We just know that as they were on their way, they got healed. During those times, trips were a bit longer than our trips. Many walked for hours (or even days) to get to their destinations. So it is save to assume that they may have had a long journey in order to get to the temple. Their healing may have taken a while to occur.

Many times when we receive prayer for healing we discard the prayer because we don't feel anything at the time of prayer and we don't see any immediate results. But the truth is that many who continue believing are healed in their car as they drive home. Others get up in the morning and notice that they are well. (Others see their healings weeks or even months later.)

The key is not to give up. Believe. Continue to believe that God has heard your prayer and that He is working in this situation. I can't find it anywhere in the bible that God promised instant healing all the time. I can't even find in the bible that He promised instant healing any time. That doesn't mean that He will not heal instantly but we need to understand that the timing and season is up to Him. It may just be a few hours or days until the healing manifests in the natural.

What If The Healing Doesn't Seem To Manifest?

So what are we going to do if the healing doesn't manifest even after we wait for it for a long time? Then we are to keep on pressing in. We are to keep on asking, we keep on seeking. We keep on doing until we see the manifestation of the healing. We need to be persistent but not arrogant. There is nothing wrong to come before God with the same requests as long as we have not seen a evidence that they have been answered.

However, persistence does not mean putting demands on God or ordering Him to do things. Some of us start demanding our healing in our eagerness to prove our faith to God. We quote Scripture and tell Him that He is bound to His word and thereby He is obligated to heal us. But we do not have a right to demand anything from God. God rules supreme and He does not have to bow to our demands. There is a difference between demanding and standing in faith believing Him for His promises. When we believe His promises our trust causes us to be at peace and not turmoil. It causes us to seek Him as a child seeks a Father and not act like a stubborn child demanding his right.

Others think they can get God to move by quoting the same scriptures over and over again. I used to do that when I first became a Christian. I used to quote the same scripture over and over again, even counting the number of times I quoted it. I didn't realize that when I did that, I used the word of God like some sort of magic spell or formula expecting results because I have followed a certain order a certain number of times. Please don't misunderstand me, it is good to absorb the word and meditate on it. We need to do that so it will soak into our soul and spirit and become a part of us. However, we can't use scripture like some formula. God is not bound to our formulas. We can't turn God off and on like a light switch.

God tells us to be persistent in His word. We read in Luke Chapter 18 about the widow who needed justice. The judge wasn't willing to give it to her so she paraded in front of his window daily until he got tired of her. She wasn't about to give up and he knew it. He knew that the only way she would leave him alone would be if He would grant her justice. The lady got her justice. She got it because she was persistent. That story is recorded in Luke 18:6-8. Jesus used this example to show us that it is ok to cry out to God continuously. That includes crying out for our healing or the healing of our loved ones.

Matthew 7:7-8 tells us, "Ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened."

We Don't Have To Have All The Answers

Our primary responsibility is to be obedient and follow through with God's commission. Our commission is not to try to analyze why someone is not healed. Of course it is OK to petition God and ask if there are hindrances. It is not wrong to ask Him for a strategy for praying. That would not be analyzing. The type of analyzing I am talking about is the analyzing that pretty much analyzes everything to death. This kind of analyzing kills any seed of faith and causes us to believe God less and less.

Some of us feel obligated to give an explanation for everything. But we don't always have to have all the answers right then and there. Sometimes we don't know the answers until much later. Sometimes we won't know the answers until we are on the other side in heaven. When we are asked, it is ok to say "I don't know". Only God knows all things. There is no way that we could know everything. Even though we do not have all the answers, we can live in the truths we do have.

We have those truths because God has given them to us in His word. One of those truths is that God is still in the healing business. So believe that God is on your side when you pray for the sick. He wants that person healed as much as you do. He wants that person to be free from any sickness and disease.

Conclusion

Sickness has come into human reality with the fall of men. It has never been God's intention for us to be sick. It wasn't in God's original plan and it is not in His plan now. How do we know? Well there is no sickness in heaven. If God would have wanted sickness to be a part of us then there would be sickness in heaven. So it is clear that sickness is not something God welcomes or desires.