Today I want to share with you excerpts from chapter two of the book "Healing the sick" by T. L. Osborn. Be blessed reading!
Is it still the will of God, as in the past, to heal all who have need of healing? The greatest barrier to the faith of many seeking healing in our day is the uncertainty in their minds as to it being the will of God to heal all. Nearly everyone knows that God does heal some, but there is much in modem theology that prevents people from knowing what the Bible clearly teaches - that healing is provided for all. It is impossible to boldly claim by faith a blessing which we are not sure God offers, because the blessings of God can be claimed only where the will of God is known, trusted, and acted upon.
Read the Will
If we wish to know what is in a person's will, we read the will. If we want to know God's will on any subject, we read His will. Suppose a lady would say, "My husband, who was very rich, has passed away. I wish I knew whether he left me anything in his will. " I would say to her, "Why do you not read his will and see?" Testament means a person's will. The Bible contains God's last will and testament, in which He bequeaths to us all of the blessings of redemption. Since it is His last will and testament, anything later is forgery. If healing is in God's will for us, then to say that God is not willing to heal all, as His will states so clearly, would be to change the will - and that, after the death of the testator. Jesus is not only the testator who died; but He was resurrected and is also the mediator of the will. He is our advocate, and He will not beat us out of our inheritance, as some earthly advocates might do. He is our representative at the right hand of God. There is no better way to know the will of God than by reading the Gospels, which record the teachings and the works of Christ. Jesus was the physical expression of the Father's will. His life was both a revelation and a manifestation of the unchanging love and will of God. He acted out the will of God for us.
A Faith-Destroying Phrase
When Jesus laid His hands on everyone of them and healed them, He was revealing and doing the will of God for all people. Lo, I come, to do your will, O God. [Heb 10:7] I came down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him that sent me. [Jhn 6:38] Everything Jesus did for needy humanity during His earthly ministry was a direct revelation of the perfect will of God for the human race. F. F Bosworth says in his book, Christ the Healer: Perhaps no one could be more conservative than the scholars of the Episcopalian church. Yet, the commission appointed to study the subject of spiritual healing for the body, after three years of study and research in both the Bible and in history, reported back to the church: The healing of Jesus was done as a revelation of God's will for humanity. Because they discovered that His will is fully revealed, they reported further: No longer can the church pray for the sick with that faith-destroying phrase, If it be your will. Mr. Bosworth goes on to say: The message taught in the Gospels is one of complete healing for spirit and body, for all who will come to Him. Many today say,"I believe in healing, but I do not believe it is for everyone." If it is not for everyone, then how could we ever pray the prayer of faith? Among all those who sought healing from Christ during His earthly ministry, there is only one who prayed for healing with the words, If it be your will. This was an outcast leper, in Mark 1:40, who did not know what Christ's will was in healing.
Uncertainty Corrected
The first thing Christ did was to correct this uncertainty by assuring him, I will. It is no longer, if it be your will - it is God's will. The leper said: If you will, you can. Jesus answered, "I Will". Let that settle it forever with you: God will heal the sick. If He wills to heal one, then He wills to heal all.
He is not willing that any should perish. James asks: Is any sick among you? Any includes you if you are sick. Of those who were bitten by the fiery serpents, the Bible says that as many as looked to the brazen serpent lived. Even now, as many as look to Christ as redeemer are saved - are healed. When it comes to the benefits of Christ's redemptive work, all are on an equal basis. The words whoever and whoever will are always used to invite the unconverted to be saved. The words as many as, everyone, all, and any are used to invite the sick and the diseased to be healed.
The Universal Invitation
Both invitations are always universal, and the results are always positively promised: shall be saved; shall have life; shall recover; shall raise them up; healed them all and as many as touched him were healed. Sometimes parents show favoritism among their children, but God does not. When we meet the same conditions, we reap the same results. When we do our part, God is always faithful to do His part. The benefits of redemption are for you. If God healed all then, He still heals all; that is, all that come to Him for healing. Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever. [Hb 13:8] Great multitudes followed him, and he healed them all. [Mt 12:15] As many as touched (him) were made perfectly whole. [Mt 14:36] The whole multitude sought to touch him: (and he) healed them all. [Lk 6:19] When the evening came, they brought to him many that were possessed with devils: and he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were sick: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, himself took our infirmities, and bore our sicknesses. Christ is still healing the sick, in order to fulfill the prophet's words: Himself took our infirmities (weaknesses), and bore our sicknesses (diseases). Always remember: You are included in the our of Matthew 8:17, and God is bound by His covenant to continue to heal all who are sick and weak, in order to fulfill Isaiah's words. My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of My lips. [Ps
89:34] When the sun was setting, all they that had any sick with various diseases brought them to him; and he laid his hands on everyone of them and healed them. [Lk 4:40] Healing was for all in those days, and Christ the Healer has never changed.
Healing Is for All and Should Be Preached to All
Philip preached Christ at Samaria: And the people with one accord gave heed to those things which Philip spoke, hearing and seeing the miracles which he did. For unclean spirits, crying with loud voice, came out of many that were possessed with them: and many with palsies, and that were lame, were healed. And there was great joy in that City. [Acts 8:6-9] Jesus proved to be exactly the same when Philip told the people about Him. Peter preached Christ to the cripple's to the multitude, to Aeneas. All were healed. Jesus was the same for Peter. Wherever and whenever Jesus Christ is proclaimed as our sacrifice for sin and sickness, physical healing as well as spiritual salvation will result. Paul preached Christ. And there sat a certain man at Lystra, impotent in his feet, being a cripple from his mother's womb, who never had walked: the same heard Paul speak: who steadfastly beholding him, and perceiving that he had faith to be healed, said with a loud voice, Stand upright on your feet. And he leaped and walked. [Acts 14:8-10] Paul must have preached the gospel of healing, because the lame man received faith to be healed while listening to Paul's message.
This Method Works
Wherever healing is taught as God's provision for all, faith is always imparted and the people are always healed. This method never fails. Faith cannot fail. But faith cannot be exercised when one is undecided as to whether or not God will heal all. If He will not heal all, then we are forced to consider in every case: "I wonder if God will to heal this one? Or is this one of the unfortunate ones whom God wills to remain sick and to suffer?" How could we ever pray the prayer of faith with such uncertainty in our minds? Let it be a settled fact: It is God's will to heal you. You have a right to healing as well as forgiveness - when you believe. God said: I am the Lord who heals you. If God said this, and God cannot lie, He meant it. What God says is true. So, healing is yours. Healing is part of the gospel and is to be preached throughout all the world and to every creature, to the end of the world.Being part of the gospel, the divine blessing of physical healing is for all.
Is it still the will of God, as in the past, to heal all who have need of healing? The greatest barrier to the faith of many seeking healing in our day is the uncertainty in their minds as to it being the will of God to heal all. Nearly everyone knows that God does heal some, but there is much in modem theology that prevents people from knowing what the Bible clearly teaches - that healing is provided for all. It is impossible to boldly claim by faith a blessing which we are not sure God offers, because the blessings of God can be claimed only where the will of God is known, trusted, and acted upon.
Read the Will
If we wish to know what is in a person's will, we read the will. If we want to know God's will on any subject, we read His will. Suppose a lady would say, "My husband, who was very rich, has passed away. I wish I knew whether he left me anything in his will. " I would say to her, "Why do you not read his will and see?" Testament means a person's will. The Bible contains God's last will and testament, in which He bequeaths to us all of the blessings of redemption. Since it is His last will and testament, anything later is forgery. If healing is in God's will for us, then to say that God is not willing to heal all, as His will states so clearly, would be to change the will - and that, after the death of the testator. Jesus is not only the testator who died; but He was resurrected and is also the mediator of the will. He is our advocate, and He will not beat us out of our inheritance, as some earthly advocates might do. He is our representative at the right hand of God. There is no better way to know the will of God than by reading the Gospels, which record the teachings and the works of Christ. Jesus was the physical expression of the Father's will. His life was both a revelation and a manifestation of the unchanging love and will of God. He acted out the will of God for us.
A Faith-Destroying Phrase
When Jesus laid His hands on everyone of them and healed them, He was revealing and doing the will of God for all people. Lo, I come, to do your will, O God. [Heb 10:7] I came down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him that sent me. [Jhn 6:38] Everything Jesus did for needy humanity during His earthly ministry was a direct revelation of the perfect will of God for the human race. F. F Bosworth says in his book, Christ the Healer: Perhaps no one could be more conservative than the scholars of the Episcopalian church. Yet, the commission appointed to study the subject of spiritual healing for the body, after three years of study and research in both the Bible and in history, reported back to the church: The healing of Jesus was done as a revelation of God's will for humanity. Because they discovered that His will is fully revealed, they reported further: No longer can the church pray for the sick with that faith-destroying phrase, If it be your will. Mr. Bosworth goes on to say: The message taught in the Gospels is one of complete healing for spirit and body, for all who will come to Him. Many today say,"I believe in healing, but I do not believe it is for everyone." If it is not for everyone, then how could we ever pray the prayer of faith? Among all those who sought healing from Christ during His earthly ministry, there is only one who prayed for healing with the words, If it be your will. This was an outcast leper, in Mark 1:40, who did not know what Christ's will was in healing.
Uncertainty Corrected
The first thing Christ did was to correct this uncertainty by assuring him, I will. It is no longer, if it be your will - it is God's will. The leper said: If you will, you can. Jesus answered, "I Will". Let that settle it forever with you: God will heal the sick. If He wills to heal one, then He wills to heal all.
He is not willing that any should perish. James asks: Is any sick among you? Any includes you if you are sick. Of those who were bitten by the fiery serpents, the Bible says that as many as looked to the brazen serpent lived. Even now, as many as look to Christ as redeemer are saved - are healed. When it comes to the benefits of Christ's redemptive work, all are on an equal basis. The words whoever and whoever will are always used to invite the unconverted to be saved. The words as many as, everyone, all, and any are used to invite the sick and the diseased to be healed.
The Universal Invitation
Both invitations are always universal, and the results are always positively promised: shall be saved; shall have life; shall recover; shall raise them up; healed them all and as many as touched him were healed. Sometimes parents show favoritism among their children, but God does not. When we meet the same conditions, we reap the same results. When we do our part, God is always faithful to do His part. The benefits of redemption are for you. If God healed all then, He still heals all; that is, all that come to Him for healing. Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and today, and forever. [Hb 13:8] Great multitudes followed him, and he healed them all. [Mt 12:15] As many as touched (him) were made perfectly whole. [Mt 14:36] The whole multitude sought to touch him: (and he) healed them all. [Lk 6:19] When the evening came, they brought to him many that were possessed with devils: and he cast out the spirits with his word, and healed all that were sick: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying, himself took our infirmities, and bore our sicknesses. Christ is still healing the sick, in order to fulfill the prophet's words: Himself took our infirmities (weaknesses), and bore our sicknesses (diseases). Always remember: You are included in the our of Matthew 8:17, and God is bound by His covenant to continue to heal all who are sick and weak, in order to fulfill Isaiah's words. My covenant will I not break, nor alter the thing that is gone out of My lips. [Ps
89:34] When the sun was setting, all they that had any sick with various diseases brought them to him; and he laid his hands on everyone of them and healed them. [Lk 4:40] Healing was for all in those days, and Christ the Healer has never changed.
Healing Is for All and Should Be Preached to All
Philip preached Christ at Samaria: And the people with one accord gave heed to those things which Philip spoke, hearing and seeing the miracles which he did. For unclean spirits, crying with loud voice, came out of many that were possessed with them: and many with palsies, and that were lame, were healed. And there was great joy in that City. [Acts 8:6-9] Jesus proved to be exactly the same when Philip told the people about Him. Peter preached Christ to the cripple's to the multitude, to Aeneas. All were healed. Jesus was the same for Peter. Wherever and whenever Jesus Christ is proclaimed as our sacrifice for sin and sickness, physical healing as well as spiritual salvation will result. Paul preached Christ. And there sat a certain man at Lystra, impotent in his feet, being a cripple from his mother's womb, who never had walked: the same heard Paul speak: who steadfastly beholding him, and perceiving that he had faith to be healed, said with a loud voice, Stand upright on your feet. And he leaped and walked. [Acts 14:8-10] Paul must have preached the gospel of healing, because the lame man received faith to be healed while listening to Paul's message.
This Method Works
Wherever healing is taught as God's provision for all, faith is always imparted and the people are always healed. This method never fails. Faith cannot fail. But faith cannot be exercised when one is undecided as to whether or not God will heal all. If He will not heal all, then we are forced to consider in every case: "I wonder if God will to heal this one? Or is this one of the unfortunate ones whom God wills to remain sick and to suffer?" How could we ever pray the prayer of faith with such uncertainty in our minds? Let it be a settled fact: It is God's will to heal you. You have a right to healing as well as forgiveness - when you believe. God said: I am the Lord who heals you. If God said this, and God cannot lie, He meant it. What God says is true. So, healing is yours. Healing is part of the gospel and is to be preached throughout all the world and to every creature, to the end of the world.Being part of the gospel, the divine blessing of physical healing is for all.
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