International Bible teacher and evangelist, Dr. Michael Yousaf. The question is often asked, does God heal today? The first thing you need to know is that God's character is unchangeable. That God is not the God of a formula.
That God does not deal with two people in the same way, just there are no two people alike. God heals in a variety of ways. He may heal instantaneously in response to faithful prayers. On other times He used doctors and medicine, but sometimes there's no physical healing. I'm sure that at one time or another you have asked God to heal you, or to heal someone close to you. Welcome to Leading the Way, and a practical episode where you'll hear Dr. Michael Yousaf dig into what the Bible teaches about healing. Something that can be confusing, especially when we're surrounded on all sides by physical and emotional and spiritual sickness.
So listen along with me as Dr. Michael Yousaf begins this episode of Leading the Way Audio. Psychology Today magazine claimed or estimated that more than 10 million Americans are practitioners of some type of healing or another. As a matter of fact, they break them down and break down these groups, and somehow they lump the Christians together with all the other weird groups, like the metaphysics and the occultists and the Shiatsus and Eastern meditation, and all of them kind of got lumped together. But it could be part of the problem is, and the confusion in the mind of some, is that some Christians when they speak about healing, they often speak in similar language to those who are not. They say that you have the power within you to be healed. I mean, putting man to be in the place of God.
That basically God is there to obey you. And that healing power is in you, and you the one who decides. And when that happens, people get confused and to make a distinction between what the real faith is all about, which we have been talking about in this series of messages, and how it works. And some churches claim that only the pastor has the power of healing. And certainly that's not biblical, as we have been seeing how when the Holy Spirit gave the spiritual birthday gifts, he gave the gifts to the body, and different people in the body have different gifts. But I was reading about one of those churches that believed that only the pastor has the gift of healing, and there was an announcement, and the announcement went something like this, no healing service this week, due to the pastor's illness. All of the gifts are all for the body. And the scripture clearly indicates that the gifts of the Holy Spirit operates in the body, not in the super-duper, stage-walker preacher.
So what is the problem here, and how do these churches really go wrong? Well, the answer is of uttermost importance, and I hope you're listening carefully, because it applies to all of the gifts, not just the gift of healing. The moment the glory of Jesus becomes secondary, the gift and its power become ineffective. The moment the flesh and the pride enters in, the Holy Spirit goes out. The moment the heart becomes contaminated with self-importance, the Holy Spirit power is quenched.
The moment faith is used for self-centered ends, then faith is no longer operative. On the other hand, when the glory of Jesus is paramount, when the glory of Jesus plus nothing is in operation, then the gifts are empowered by the Holy Spirit to do their work. And here in 1 Corinthians chapter 12, verse 9, the apostle Paul talks about the gifts, in the plural, of healings in the plural.
The fact that those two words, gifts and healings, are in the plural is very significant. What is the word of God saying to us? The word of God is saying to us that just as there are varieties of gifts of healings, there are varieties of healings. That there is spiritual healing, and there is emotional healing, and there is physical healing. Most often we focus on the physical healing and don't realize that there is a bigger picture and a greater picture in the scripture. Let me show you the spiritual healing.
The Lord Jesus Christ in Matthew 13 and 15 said the following. He's talking about the hardness of the heart of his hearers who are refusing to believe in him. And he said, for this people's heart has been hardened, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes are closed, lest any time they should see with their eye and hear with their ear and understand with their heart and should be converted, and I should heal them. What kind of healing is he talking about here? He is talking about spiritual healing. How does this spiritual healing work?
Listen carefully please. When you lead someone to Christ, when you lead someone who is not a believer to become a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, when you are the instrument in God's hand to bring someone to faith in Christ, you are exercising your spiritual gift of healing. Spiritual healing. When you help a wayward or backslidden or misguided Christian and help that person to repent and come back to the Lord, you are exercising the gift of spiritual healing. In fact, that's what the apostle Peter said in that well-known passage, and often it's misapplied, and I'm going to explain to you why. First Peter 2.24. He's talking about the Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. He said, and he himself bore our sins.
He didn't say bore our diseases. He said bore our sins in his body on the cross, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness, for by his wounds we are made whole. We are spiritually healed. By his dying on that cross, by shedding of his blood, we have been made spiritually whole. We have become spiritually and permanently and eternally saved. We have become permanently and eternally spiritually healed.
Why? Because of the cross. I know some people like to apply this passage to physical healing. There are a lot of other passages for physical healing, but not this one.
Everything about this passage is about sin and about righteousness and about spiritual healing, being transformed from death to life, being transformed from hell to heaven, being transformed from darkness into light of Jesus Christ. That's what spiritual healing is talking about. But listen, when a body is physically healed, and I'm going to come to that in a minute, sooner or later, eventually, that body will die. But when a person spiritually healed, that person never, never, never, never, never die. You have Jesus' word on it.
So what this emotional healing then? In Luke chapter 4 verse 18, the Lord Jesus Christ goes into his hometown church, the synagogue in Nazareth, and he goes there and he sits in the synagogue and he grabs the scroll and he opens it to Isaiah the prophet. And Isaiah was prophesying about Jesus 700 years before he came. And after he read from the prophecy of Isaiah, he said, Now this prophecy has been fulfilled in your ears. Let me read it to you. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me because he has anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor.
He sent me to heal the brokenhearted, preach deliverance to the captives, and to recover the sight of the blind and set at liberty those who are bruised or brokenhearted. The word brokenhearted here means those who are emotionally and mentally being shattered. Those who are emotionally and mentally have fallen apart. And what causes that shattering?
What causes this falling apart? Sin and demonic forces. That's what causes the problem. And whether it's our sin or somebody else's sin who sinned against us, sin is sin. Listen, when a demonic force combined with you opening your heart for him to come in and set up a beach head, what the Bible calls a stronghold, then you are being harassed by the enemy.
Hear me right on this one. For liberating spiritually, for liberating emotionally bruised and brokenhearted people, there is only one power and that's the authority of Jesus. Not even the person who's been given the gift, but Jesus' power and Jesus' authority can set the captives free. Beloved, listen to me. You don't have to look very far to realize that we live in a society where the foundation has been crumbling under our feet, where right is wrong and wrong is right, where we are seeing with our own eyes that we are spending millions of dollars on saving the whales, but then killing babies in their mother's womb, then our churches have rationalized and accepted sinful lifestyle, our churches have rationalized and accepted demonic activities in the lives of believers as if it's a norm. And not only that, we are morally and spiritually crumbling as a society. Not only that we are spiritually falling apart, but not only that is causing emotional harm and causing broken hearts and causing hearts to fall apart in many people in society, but false teaching and false preaching is making it worse.
Our fast moving, rapidly changing world, there are many people unable to hold on and to hold out and then they surrender to sin and Satan. And the world is so confused. They are confused by the church. They are confused by false teachers. They are confused by many a pastor. They are confused by many a headmaster in school.
They are confused by many a teacher at school. And we have a generation of church going folks who are living in sin, enslaved to sin and addicted to sin. A generation with demonic strongholds in their lives. A generation that is shattered by demonic forces. A generation that long ago has forgotten what it means to take authority over evil spirits and demonic forces.
A generation that needs a pill to wake up and a drink to go to sleep. And those of us who have been given the gifts of spiritual and emotional healing, are feeling reluctant to use them to the detriment of the church of Jesus Christ at large. Beloved, listen to me.
I don't say this with joy. We have churches that are packed with people but empty of the Holy Spirit's power. Because God's people have taken the spiritual Christian exercise as just mere intellectual activities.
Something you do on Sunday, you go to church late and then you leave early. Just this week I saw some statistics that nearly 50% of hospital beds are occupied by people whose root problem is spiritual and emotional. And we as God's, Jesus' people have long given up on taking authority over the enemy. But then also the Bible speaks of physical healing. Yes, I'm one of those people who believe that God still healed today. I don't believe that you can put God in a box. And you can say he can do this, this, this time and he can do this, this time.
I just, that's not me. I believe a whole word of God we don't pick and choose. Listen, the Lord Jesus Christ opened the eyes of the blind. He made the deaf to hear. He made the lame to walk and he made the mute to speak. Later on we read how Peter and John were walking to the temple. And there they saw a man who was lame from birth begging. And they looked at him and they said, Silver and gold have we none but what we have we give to you. In the name of Jesus rise up and walk. And the man got up and walked.
And I'm telling you and this is a rebuke to me. We have churches that have silver and gold but lost the power of the Holy Spirit. In fact the story is told about Thomas Aquinas. When he was touring the Vatican. And they showed him all the wealth of the Vatican. And one of the Cardinals turned to him and said, You see Thomas, today the church can no longer say, Silver and gold have I none.
Thomas Aquinas said yes, neither can we say, at the name of Jesus Christ rise up and walk. Acts 8, 6 and 7, Philip used the gift of healing and got the paralyzed person healed. In Acts 28, 8 Paul was shipwrecked in Malta.
He was shipwrecked. But even there in his predicament he laid hands on the father of Pablos and he was healed. In each case the healing was instantaneous. But the one thing you must notice in the book of Acts. This is where you're truthful to the whole word of God.
The one thing that you notice. That not only the healing was instantaneous. But it was rare. Those who had the gift of healing used it sparingly. For if that was correct, Paul could not heal Epaphroditus. Who was sick for a long time, Philippians 2 25. Timothy was sick for a long time.
Why did Paul leave Tramaphos sick and malicious in 2 Timothy 4 20. And the question is often asked, does God heal today? The first thing you need to know is that God's character is unchangeable. That God's character is consistent. That God is not the God of a formula. That God is not a vending machine where you put exactly the exact change and then you get the product you want.
That God does not deal with two people in the same way just there are no two people alike. God heals in variety of ways. He may heal instantaneously in response to faithful prayers. On other times he used doctors and medicine that may take a long time. On other times and I believe today with all my heart that God uses believing doctors.
But nonetheless their whole trust is in the power of the Lord Jesus Christ. To bring physical healing. But sometimes there's no physical healing. There is complete healing when a person goes to glory and receives that body that is absolutely, I can't wait for. That knows no pain, knows no hurt, knows no sin. That is the complete healing.
And if we forget that we're sojourners and travelers and that we are going to glory. Then you're going to get into trouble. Who determines healing? Certainly not the person with the gift. Certainly not the patient.
Only the sovereign. Lord Jesus Christ he determines in his sovereign will. How to use the gifts, when to use the gifts.
So what is that gift? It's the ability to pray in faith. And see God intervene supernaturally.
It's that simple. But we must understand that according to Matthew 9 35. Jesus is the only one who healed everyone everywhere.
But even when he sent the 70 and he gave them authority and he said you go out. And they went out and they were healing and they were delivering people. And then they come back rejoicing. He said to them the greatest joy should be that your name is written in the book of life. Your spiritual healing. Your spiritual healing is of uttermost importance. Because it's going to determine all of your eternity.
Not just a few years you're going to live on this earth. But you see you got to understand in the time of Jesus the Pharisees. Who had a program for everything.
You see they come up with this system. They said if you don't get healed it's your fault. Really. That's a Pharisaic teaching. But not only that. They taught that every disease now is associated with sin.
Now the Bible says there are something I'm going to show you in a minute. Some diseases are related to sin. Personal sin. But not every one of them.
For example they said that if you have dropsy. It is a result of immorality. Jaundice was a result of hatred.
Poverty is a result of pride. Liver trouble is a result of backbiting. And that leprosy is a result of an evil tongue. My goodness I've seen a lot of evil tongues that didn't have leprosy. But see that's why Jesus had to challenge all this stuff. He had to challenge it. Now the Apostle Paul shows us there are some illnesses associated with disobedience.
And continuous disobedience. He was telling the Corinthians in 1 Corinthians chapter 11, 30. Chapter 11 verse 30. He tell them that some among them were abusing the Lord's table. Because some of them didn't realize what they were doing coming to the Lord's table. With respect and with fear and with reverence and with repentance in their faith. He said some of you, that's why some of you are sick and even died.
Ah. But not all diseases come as a result of sin. Personal sin. That all diseases come because we live in this fallen world.
But you don't have to take my word for it. The Lord Jesus himself shattered the stop of thinking of the Pharisees in John chapter 9. When the disciples who bought that false teaching coming to him said, now who's sinned? Did he sin or did his parents sin and Jesus said none.
Neither. And he shattered that Pharisaic teaching. Was Paul in the flesh a result of sin or lack of faith? Listen, I've heard preachers who say that. I'm not worthy to even shine his shoes to accuse the apostle, the great apostle of sin or lack of faith.
Hear me right please. Those who have healing gifts do not exercise them depending on the faith of the patient. No, they exercise their gifts depending on God's sovereign will and desire.
Beloved, be very careful of the counterfeit gifts that can be exercised by demonic forces. Listen, there are times when God delays the healing and he has his reasons. Who knows the mind of God?
Sometimes he lets us know, sometimes he doesn't. Beloved, don't put God in a box. Don't put God in a box. God may delay his healing but he has his purpose. In times he's waiting for a person to deal with the deep sin in their life. It could be because he is using it for the person's spiritual growth and growing and trusting God.
In fact, the apostle Paul's conclusion when he was not healed of that thorn in the flesh was that God was using it to add humility to his character. Look at Paul's conclusion when he prayed three times. And I have no doubt in my mind that he genuinely prayed.
He probably fast. He remembers those three times. He always took time to pray. He said, most gladly therefore I would rather boast about my weakness that the power of Christ may dwell in me.
For when I am weak, then I'm strong. Just like what happened in John Stott's case and many other cases. Does that mean we don't pray for physical healing?
Absolutely not. Those three times, as I told you, he probably prayed and urged the Lord. And until he got a clear revelation, he was praying. And we need to do the same. Listen, I know, I know, I know I live long enough to know that it's easy to get complacent about good health. It's easy to expect good health. It's easy to take good health for granted.
It's easy to take credit for good health. And yet often the times when we are flat on our backs that God gets our attention. Sometimes God does not heal immediately so that he may get greater glory. Whatever he has in mind, he's a sovereign God. And we come to him in humility. This is Leading the Way with Dr. Michael Youssef. And an episode from his series called, Who Me?
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Are you afraid of what the future holds? There is no need to. Jesus, in his seven letters in the book of Revelation, gives us the secret to victorious living. Hi, I'm Michael Yusef, and in my new book, God's Final Call, I explain Jesus' message for us today. Learn how to stand firm for Christ with Dr. Yusef's brand-new book, God's Final Call. Order your copy today for your gift of any amount at ltw.org. All right, it is time for me to say goodbye for now, but not before this quick invitation to join Dr. Michael Yusef when he passionately proclaims uncompromising truth. On the next Leading the Way. This program is furnished by Leading the Way with Dr. Michael Yusef.
