p. 3 | Healing the Sick

Pacific Press Publishing Association

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 33, No. 50.

Healing the Sick.

AMONG the evidences of unbelief in Biblical Christianity is the rejection of the miraculous. There are many professed Christian ministers who do not believe in the incarnation, the vicarious atonement, the resurrection. With disbelief of these, goes belief in miracles. Logically, with these goes belief in the entire Scripture record of the life and work of Jesus. For if these are not true, when so expressly stated, why should we believe any part of the record? We are told in effect that Jesus may have been a good man, but He was greatly deceived as to His own mission, as were also His disciples. The unbelief is not generally expressed as baldly, but it means this if it means anything.

CHRISTIANITY itself is a great miracle, working above and beyond all natural laws, or it is nothing. It is not evolution; it is creation; and when there is evolution manifest in it, it is the evolution of creation, of divine life, of infinite power. It is, as D'Aubigne expresses it, "a heavenly life brought down to man." It is thus that the Master declares His mission: "I came that they may have life, and may have it abundantly." John 10:10, A.R.V. This life was indeed a heavenly life. It was not the natural life-flow of the physical man. It was not the life fed on the food of the world. It was and is spiritual, the life of God, eternal life; for "he that believeth on the Son hath eternal life; but he that obeyeth not the Son shall not see life." John 3:36. Therefore the apostles were given a mission of life. It was a Gospel of life they were to give; words of life they were to speak. So declared the shining messenger of God to the disciples he released from prison: "Go ye, and stand and speak in the temple to the people all the words of this Life." Acts 5:20.

AND hence the miracles, the healings. How many times we are told of the wonders, the signs, the miracles, the powers, Christ wrought. From the beginning of His blessed mission to the close is one constant record of miraculous ministry. Here is an instance: "And when even was come, they brought unto Him many possessed with demons; and He cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all that were sick." Matt. 8:16. Again: "And Jesus went about in all Galilee, teaching in their synagogs, and preaching the Gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of disease and all manner of sickness among the people." Matt. 4:23. "And the report of Him went forth into all Syria; and they brought unto Him all that were sick, holden with divers diseases and torments, possessed with demons, and epileptic, and palsied; and He healed them." Verse 24. "And Jesus went about all the cities and the villages, . . . healing all manner of disease and all manner of sickness." Matt. 9:35. On "a great multitude" "He had compassion," "and healed their sick." Matt. 14:14. "There came unto Him great multitudes, having with them the lame, blind, dumb, maimed, and many others, and they cast them down at His feet; and He healed them." Matt. 15:30. "Great multitudes followed Him; and He healed them there." AND there are many other instances, all given to show the power of the word of God. Many, many miracles He wrought which are not left on record; but those which are recorded "are written that ye may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing

ye may have life in His name." John 20:31.

THESE miracles, these healings, were not wrought by some process of "mental treatment," by some effort to induce the patient to believe that he was not sick, not palsied, did not have the leprosy, was not blind. All these were actual conditions and were so treated. It was no illusion that this one was blind, or that one maimed, or another one palsied or leprous. They were sad and sober facts. But the word of the Master healed them. He did not do it by medical treatment, by baths, or massage, or applications of any kind, but by the word, by the touch, which imparted the divine life. While physicians and nurses may do noble work for God in instruction, treatment, and nursing, let us not draw level comparisons between their work and that of the Great Physician. They use remedies, blessed indeed of God, which help nature to repair broken tissues and restore health; but Christ Jesus healed by the touch, by the word. The "power of an endless life" thrilled the afflicted one with divine creative energy and immediately he was healed.

To His disciples He gave the same power, and the same results followed. Why do we not see more of it to-day? Let us confess it frankly,—lack of power among His people. Should they seek for that healing power? —No, not of itself. They should seek first for His creative power to do the greatest of all miracles,—put away sin and regenerate the soul,—and then they can be trusted with all lesser gifts. "Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness." Believe into Him as a Saviour from sin and bodily ills, but first of all as the Saviour from sin.

They refused to have God in their knowledge." And having thus "refused" God, He "gave them up unto a reprobate mind." The fact that the Lord gave them up shows that He made an effort to save them. He did everything He could to keep them from plunging into such a vortex of iniquity. But having refused God and broken away from the restraining influences that He was exerting to draw them into the ways of righteousness, they impart to themselves an intense momentum in the downward course of sin. They have had to know about God in order to refuse to have Him in their knowledge. But knowing about God, and actually having a personal knowledge of Him are two very different and opposite things. The one who merely knows about God may be very intelligent concerning all the history of religion, and may consider himself a very wise and well-educated person, but to actually know God thru the workings of His Spirit in the mind and heart is the only thing that will keep men from falling into the iniquities that are described in this first chapter of Romans.