Fire On Your Head

Here is the question I will tackle because numerous people in the last little while have approached me thinking that this is a loaded question that single-handedly defeats all reason to believe in divine healing:

If it’s God’s will that all should be healed, then there would be no sicknesses or diseases in the world at all, would there not?

I hope respectfully to show that this is a weak and misguided argument. Merely pointing out the fact of something being God’s will and pointing to the statistics of it not happening 100% of the time doesn’t make God a liar when He says His arm is not to short to save, nor does it mean He is unable or unwilling to carry out His will concerning a matter. For example 2 Peter 3:9 clearly states that it is not the Father’s will that any should perish. But I ask you, are all saved? Other blog entries on this site cover the issue of healing being just as much a part of the same atonement or act of redemption on the cross of Calvary as the purchase of men’s souls & forgiveness of sin, therefore time will not be given to proving that point in this entry. However, if we glean from what we know concerning God’s will where salvation is concerned, then we can see that just because something is God’s will doesn’t guarantee that thing–be it peoples’ salvation or peoples’ physical healing–happens 100% of the time.  And frankly, few are willing to apply the same logic to evangelism and salvation of souls as they are quick to say of healing of bodies, but that can be looked at more here.

So a another question poses itself out of this–why is this the case? Why not 100% of the time? Since God is not willing that any should perish and since He’s not the author of sickness and disease anymore than He could be the author of sin, we need to search the Scriptures to see how come for example He doesn’t overpower every single muslim, hindu, buddhist, jew, or atheist [or any other person of any thought] and make them believe in Jesus. We have one answer in texts like Matthew 28:18-20: “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.“

Right there lies your answer for why all have not been saved. Jesus didn’t say He would do it Himself. He told his disciples in this passage to go and teach what they’ve been taught. They had already been instructed before that freely they have received, therefore freely give–including the authority to cast out demons and heal the sick.

I see a connection in the great commission in “all authority has been given to me [Jesus]” with “THEREFORE [you] Go”. This seems simple enough to me. But you may object that these instructions were given only to the apostles, and not all of the Church universal over the centuries since. If it weren’t for passages like Mark 16:15-18, that would almost work:

“He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: In my name they will drive out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well.”

The text does not say “these signs will accompany only the 12 disciples” and, I also would hate to mention Paul was not one of the original 12, or Stephen in Acts 7 who also performed miracles and healed people brought to him. May I submit to you for consideration that the reason we teach and believe things like “miracles/healing were for the original church” come from looking at our own lives, seeing we don’t have what the Bible says we have, and then re-interpreting the Bible to match our circumstances, instead of changing, by faith, our circumstances to match what the Word teaches?  In other words, we build doctrine around our failure.

The believer is endued with God’s Spirit, whom Jesus said it was a good thing we had, because we would do the things he did and more:

But I tell you the truth: It is for your good that I am going away. Unless I go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you. (John 16:7)

I tell you the truth, anyone who has faith in me will do what I have been doing. He will do even greater things than these, because I am going to the Father. And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Son may bring glory to the Father. (John 14:12-13)

Does the word ‘anyone’ mean only a certain group of individuals, or anyone?

Does the statement “will do what I have been doing” mean exactly what it says, or if not, then what does it mean?

It seems to me that Scripture means what Scripture says. WE will do these things. A lot of believers don’t because they don’t believe they can. We categorize Jesus into a class all by Himself (rightly so in some respects) saying that only He heals and not us–when He doesn’t teach that in the Word of God. But when it comes to just obeying the Word and doing things He has told us we can and should do to GLORIFY Him and His name, then we are not following Scripture when we say things like “He makes some sick and chooses to heal others.”

Click here for some more thoughts concerning God’s will and healing along those lines.

2 Corinthians 5:20 teaches that we are Christ’s ambassadors. What is an ambassador and what does one do? According to the Greek, this is a ‘representative’. www.dictionary.com states the following definitions:

• A diplomatic official of the highest rank appointed and accredited as representative in residence by one government or sovereign to another, usually for a specific length of time.

• A diplomatic official heading his or her country’s permanent mission to certain international organizations, such as the United Nations.

• An authorized messenger or representative.

• An unofficial representative: ambassadors of goodwill.

An ambassador represents his homeland. The believer’s citizenship is in heaven (Phil 3:20), and we represent what our homeland stands for or represents. In heaven, there is no sickness, disease or sin.  Notice the second definition used states we are on a ‘permanent mission‘. As long as we are alive on this earth, our mission is not complete. An ambassador has been granted authority to both act and speak according his headquarters’ will–we carry out the will of that leader ourselves. What is God’s will? The answers are represented in the Great Commission passages cited above.

To get back to the question of why don’t all get healed, or saved: there is great responsibility on us–God has done his part by sending His Son to die on the cross. Isaiah 53 spells out in detail both infirmities and iniquities are put on him, and when Peter quotes this passage, he says it in the past tense:

“He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed.” (1 Peter 2:24).

Friends, lets stop using a double standard where about the will of God concerning healing that we don’t apply to the will of God concerning salvation. The reason we see less of healing than we ought is because WE are doing less with the Gospel in proportion to the authority we’ve been given. Nations are not being touched with the Gospel because of the lack of laborers, not because of a lack of it being God’s will.

Related Articles:

Healing for the Believer: Why, and When?

Is a Grain of Mustard Seed Really All it Takes?

Why Did Jesus Only Heal One Man at the Pool of Bethesda?

How Were We Taught To Pray?

Have you ever heard that statement “all you need is faith the size of a mustard seed and you can move a mountain”? The idea behind it whenever most Christians quote that comes from a misunderstanding that faith is not measurable, but we all have the same proportion. I hope in the next few paragraphs to show otherwise, and maybe we as a body of Christ could do away with that cliched saying that misinterprets Scripture.

Let’s look at one of the instances in the Gospel where Jesus says this. I will add emphasis, and when you read it try to pretend I’m shouting, because normally when I add emphasis, that’s all I am doing–just emphasizing something, but this teaching gets on my nerves when I hear people teach and believe this passage to mean they don’t have to do anything, and “faith the size of a mustard seed” is used to justify doing little to nothing, rather than provoking tenacity of faith to see the things of God. Here we go:

And when they came to the crowd, a man came up to him and, kneeling before him,
said, “Lord, have mercy on my son, for he is an epileptic and he suffers terribly. For often he falls into the fire, and often into the water. And I brought him to your disciples, and they could not heal him.” And Jesus answered, “O faithless and twisted generation, how long am I to be with you? How long am I to bear with you? Bring him here to me.” And Jesus rebuked him, and the demon came out of him, and the boy was healed instantly.
Then the disciples came to Jesus privately and said, “Why could we not cast it out?”
He said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you.” Matthew 17:14-20 ESV

I’m not going to teach it here, but this passage even shows it was Jesus will to heal when his followers were unable to produce the healing, even though seven chapters earlier he granted them authority to do it and they did. Anyway moving right along.

Notice how in this passage, Jesus tells them it’s BECAUSE of their little faith that they were unable to heal the boy. This translation accurately avoids translating it “faith as small” as a mustard seed. You say, “Steve, isn’t that just your preference of translation? You can’t say yours is the right one just because it translates something to prove your point.” You would be right if you said that. However, the context shows it can’t be talking about the ’size’ of your faith, since he just rebuked his disciples for not having big enough faith. Jesus was not schizophrenic.

So where do we come up with this misinterpretation, and how did it become such a cliche we use often in Christian circles? I really don’t know. But now let me ask you something, if all it took was a tiny mustard sized seed to move mountains, then how come there is still lots the Church is unable to see take place in the way of miracles and logic-defying deeds? If all it took was a mustard seed, then I’d hate to be the devil when a Christian has more than a mustard seed of faith! Ah, now that is a good segue into what I would like to submit to you for your consideration as to what Jesus means when he teaches this.

Right now as I type this, My E-Sword program has open five times in the NT where the mustard seed is listed, each instance is in the Gospels. Luke 17:6 is almost identical, but is in a different context than the above quoted Scripture. The other three instances it comes up in a different parable–the parable about the kingdom of heaven. Matt 13:31 is almost identical to its counterparts in the other gospels:

“It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when sown on the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth, yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes larger than all the garden plants and puts out large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade.” Mark 4:31-32.

He said therefore, “What is the kingdom of God like? And to what shall I compare it?
It is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his garden, and it grew and became a tree, and the birds of the air made nests in its branches.” Luke 13:18-19

(Emphasis mine)

This passage gets confused in peoples’ minds with the teaching of Jesus concerning speaking to the mountain, and therefore the teachings get mixed together and you come up with this idea it’s ok to have little faith, but in context that’s clearly NOT what Jesus taught his disciples. Could it be, based on this explanation as to what a mustard seed is and what it does, that we can glean from this parable, which uses the same illustration, and learn something that can change our understanding of the other passage?

Sure, why not? Our faith is to be like a mustard seed. What is a mustard seed like? Though it starts off like a seed, it grows and our faith is to be like that seed that has grown and becomes larger than all the other plants in our garden. Larger than our ‘TV watching plant’, larger than our ‘worldly mindset plant’, larger than our other ‘plants’. In fact, it is to become so big, that everything else in our lives is dependent on it, like birds in the air able to make nests in its shade. If anything, our faith is to be like a solid tall tree, not a tiny seed. Seed is a good way to start off, but you don’t leave a seed like that, you sow it–ask any farmer if he wants just seed, or if he wants to sow that seed and reap more of the same.

Like any seed, it needs watering and feeding, as well as the right conditions for growth. Later if people tell me they want more Scripture to prove my point, I will write more about how we each have a measure of faith God has given us–’a seed’ if you will. And then it’s all up to us how fast, and how much that seed grows. Some, would you not say, clearly walk in more faith than others? They didn’t get that way overnight, trust me. But if you and I would do the things it takes to water our faith seed, with the Word, with prayer, with meditating on the things above and not on hours and hours of TV (can you tell that’s one of my soapboxes?–you’re never going to walk in total victory if you watch TV, movies, surf the internet needlessly, and other such mindless wastes of time— more than you read and pray).

Well that’s the end of my thoughts. I better stop here, now that you’re upset I’m meddling with you.

Steve