10 Ways to Release God’s Healing Power by RON PHILLIPS for Charisma News
Healing is one of the most controversial subjects we can raise in the church. Yet there is no doubt that the Bible is filled with accounts of Jesus’ healing miracles. It seems clear as well from the following three Scriptures that healing is a by-product of the stripes Jesus endured before going to the cross:
“But He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement for our peace was upon Him, and by His stripes we are healed” (Is. 53:5);
“They brought to Him many who were demon-possessed. And He cast out the spirits with a word, and healed all who were sick, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying: ‘He Himself took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses'” (Matt. 8:16-17);
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“Who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness—by whose stripes you were healed” (1 Pet. 2:24).
Furthermore, the Christians in the early church experienced miracles of healing as well. In fact, health and prosperity were objects of prayer for the believers: “Beloved, I pray that you may prosper in all things and be in health, just as your soul prospers,” the apostle John wrote in 3 John 1:2.
When we look at the healing ministry of Jesus, we must also recognize the vital connection we have with it: We are His body on earth today (1 Cor. 3:16). Therefore, we must exhibit the same passion for healing that we have observed in Him.
Any examination of Jesus’ healing miracles during His generation will reveal facts about how He healed and whom He healed. Note that the Bible shows us that He healed: by the Word; by the faith of the sick; to release service; to restore life; to deliver from demons; through the faith of others besides the sick; through the faith of the desperate and persistent; to reveal God (and God’s heart); His enemies. Therefore, we as His body must release His healing power to our generation as well.
Releasing the Power
Knowing all this, there are still questions and controversy that swirl around ministries of healing. Questions often asked include: 1) Does God heal everyone? 2) Why are some people not healed? 3) Whose faith is necessary for healing: the sick person’s, the minister’s, both?
I confess I don’t know all the answers. But I have searched the Scriptures so that I can know how God healed. In doing so, I’ve found 10 ways the church can release God’s healing power:
1. Through the presence of the gifts and the anointing to heal. There are times when God releases the gifts of healing in certain places. In these instances, the anointing is so great that even clothes are used as points of contact. People are healed in a Spirit-saturated environment where gifts of healing are released.
“Now God worked unusual miracles by the hands of Paul, so that even handkerchiefs or aprons were brought from his body to the sick, and the diseases left them and the evil spirits went out of them” (Acts 19:11-12). “To another faith [is given] by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healings by the same Spirit” (1 Cor. 12:9). Clearly healing is a gift given for the benefit of the church and for the glory of God.
2. Through the laying on of hands. It is the privilege of every true believer to lay hands on the sick and pray for their recovery. When this is done, a spiritual transference takes place in the invisible realm. “They will take up serpents; and if they drink anything deadly, it will by no means hurt them; they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover” (Mark 16:18).
