Christ Became Sickness So That We Could Be Healed! Continued

With the death of many loved ones over the past couple of years, the reality of sickness and death have stared me in the face. Many people ask me how a loving God could allow people to suffer from sickness or experience premature death. This is probably one of the hardest questions a believer will ever be asked. Since we are human and we experience the emotions that come when a loved one is sick or when they die, we have to ask God for His wisdom and understanding if we are going to have an answer for the people who ask these kinds of questions.

This is why it is so important to know the Word of God and have it treasured in our hearts because these questions will come. It is also the reason we need to rightly divide the Word of God so we do not give a humanistic answer to a spiritual question. Over the years I have studied this out and this blog is what I have discovered. May it bring hope and encouragement to you as you read it and may it inspire you to study the Bible and grow in your knowledge of God for yourself..

The first verse to understand is James 1:17, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.” Sickness and premature death are not good or perfect gifts and therefore, sickness and premature death do not and cannot come from God, because in God there is no sickness or premature death. What people often do not understand is that since the fall of man, the world was put under a curse. The god of this world satan, was given dominion and reign in this earth and as John 10:10 says, ““The thief (Satan) comes not, but to STEAL, and to KILL and to DESTROY!”

Jesus came to fulfill the law and He became the curse of sickness and death for us on the Cross. Before Jesus died he gave this command, “Go into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature. And these signs shall follow them that believe. They shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover. Mark 16:18 So, with the understanding that God does not cause sickness or premature death and that Jesus gave us a command to lay hands on the sick so that they will recover, we can see that sickness and premature death are a part of the fallen world, not God’s plan or a part of His good and perfect will.

All sickness and premature death are of the enemy. We also have to understand that until Christ returns we are going to be in a battle against the enemy of this world because we do not wrestle with flesh and blood. We do not wrestle with cancer or heart disease. We do not wrestle with suicide or premature death. We wrestle with demonic forces of darkness! So it is now easier to understand that sickness and premature death are not a physical enemy. They are a spiritual one. Ephesians 6:12 says, “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly places.” We have to fight for our healing because there are forces of darkness fighting against it! I believe that too many Christians stop in the midst of the battle and because of this the enemy gains speed and momentum on his mission to steal, kill, and destroy people’s lives!

I also believe that one of the biggest tactics of the enemy is to get the believer to buy into the lie that says, “it must have been God’s will or it would not have been allowed.” Disillusionment is one of satans biggest weapons of warfare. If he can get the believer to be disillusioned and to buy into this lie then he knows we will not fight until his works of sickness and premature death are conquered.

In Luke 10:19 Jesus says, “Behold, I give you the authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.” We have to understand that we fight from a stance of victory because Jesus overcame satan at the Cross! Therefore we have to continue to fight until we see our reality catch up with the truth of God’s Word.

Does this mean that people won’t ever suffer sickness or premature death? No, that won’t happen until the day of Christ’s return. What it does mean is that we have the authority to fight against it and to stand in faith and give God the permission to execute His healing power in our lives.

From here it is your job to study the Bible and ask God to give you wisdom and understanding about His healing for your life. What I can promise you is that when you do, your eyes will be open to a new and amazing understanding that will increase your faith and empower you when you lay hands on and pray for the sick.

Own Your Life, Live On Purpose! Part 6

In the last blog I said I was going to expand on the truth that God’s will for us is His Word and His Word says that by the stripes of His Son we are healed. So if this is true then why are so many people sick and why do people die sooner than we think they should? This is something I get asked a lot.

What I am not going to do in this blog is make a statement of argument against theological teachings. This would only cause strife and then I would be no different than a religious teacher who Jesus spoke against when He walked the earth. What I am going to do is give some insight and then you can choose what you do with it. What I have learned and lived may be different from what you have, and that doesn’t make me right and you wrong, and vice-versa. We have an individual responsibility to search the Scriptures, commune with God, and learn for ourselves. So what I write today is from my perspective and my intention is that it will stir up a desire for you to go deeper in your relationship with God and encourage you to spend more time building that relationship. My desire is that you will want to seek God’s wisdom and understanding with your whole heart as Jeremiah 29 talks about. We seek Him and find Him when we seek Him with our whole heart.

Here is my observation:

We live in a fallen world and there are natural laws in effect. If Adam and Eve would have not chosen to eat of the fruit we would all be living in a perfect world and these natural laws would not be present the way they are as we know them. Unfortunately that is not the case. As a result we live in a world that has sickness and premature death. I hear people say that God is Sovereign and He is, but these people say that in the context that God is in control of everything and that He causes everything to happen. This is not a belief I hold to and here’s why. God does have ultimate control but He does not use that control in an abusive way. God is not a respecter of persons and He does not choose to heal some while choosing to cause some to suffer and die prematurely. That would be cruel and contradictory to His Word, which would make Him a liar.

In John 8 Jesus said that satan is the liar and in fact, the father of lies. Through our covenant relationship with Jesus Christ we have been given the ability to be healed and to heal, yet so many people don’t see this covenant promise at work in their lives on a consistent basis. Why? I believe there are several reasons for this but I am only going to talk about a couple of them in this blog. One reason I believe is that we get overwhelmed by what our natural eyes see and oftentimes lose sight of the spiritual battle that is taking place in a realm that is beyond it. I believe that because of this it is easier to accept what is going on in our natural world and easier to say things like, “It must have been God’s will or it wouldn’t be happening or it wouldn’t have happened.” I also believe that for some people it gives them the right to blame God’s sovereignty when sickness and death occur. This kind of thinking gives satan a foothold in our faith and makes us question God’s Word. Both are destructive to our relationship with God through Jesus Christ.

When Jesus walked the earth, healed the sick, and raised the dead, He didn’t heal everyone. In fact if you study out when and who He healed you will find that every time there was a measure of faith in the person or the people coming to Him that believed He had the power to heal. Those who believed were healed and those who believed were strengthened in their faith. But Jesus didn’t play favorites with the people He healed. There was something taking place that we have to study and understand if we are going to see the healing power of Jesus Christ working in our lives. One of those things is that with every promise there is a condition, and one of the conditions is acting in faith on the promise. We also have to understand that there is a natural realm and a spiritual realm and both are in effect in every situation. Sometimes there is physical healing and sometimes there is spiritual healing. And sometimes there is both.

This has played out in my life on many occasions. There have been times I have been sick and prayed and been instantly healed physically, while other times I have suffered for weeks. Why? Was God being kind on the occasions of instant healing and cruel during the other times? Absolutely not! He is the same yesterday, today, and forever! He doesn’t change and He cannot contradict Himself. I believe that at times when I believe and act in faith I get physical healing accompanied with spiritual growth and at other times I get a spiritual healing and then my body recovers over time. So just my faith alone doesn’t assure instant healing and just because I have a lack of faith doesn’t mean I won’t be instantly healed. My responsibility is to allow God full access to my physical, spiritual, emotional, and mental condition and allow Him to work in me to bring the healing in my body.

My confusion or misunderstanding of God comes when I try to dictate the healing He needs to provide. When I surrender my will to His, I see healing take place every time. The healing isn’t always in the areas I feel need healing and when I let go of my control over the situation I see the power of Christ working in my life to bring the healing that was promised through His death and resurrection. I also understand that there are times when healing is instant and there are other times when healing is a process. So to say I didn’t have enough faith during the times I was sick for weeks would also be ludicrous!

Here is a truth I have discovered that I want you to understand. We cannot peer into the spiritual realm and the truth of God’s Word in our natural mind and with our natural eye or we will go crazy trying to make sense of it all. We have to set aside our limited understanding as Proverbs 3 talks about and trust in God, acknowledge Him in all our ways, and submit ourselves to learning about Him for ourselves. This is the only way we will be able to accept Christ as our healer. This will also keep us from becoming embittered or feeling condemned if we or someone we know is suffering from sickness and they are not recovering or if someone dies prematurely.

Christ took on the stripes of sickness and death at the Cross and we have the promise of healing and if we are going to see that promise take root in our lives , we have to go deeper in gaining wisdom and understanding in this area. The first step is to trust in God. If we lack trust then when we learn a truth about healing we will instantly question that truth. This will cause us to counter that truth from a human prospective and stunt our growth in gaining wisdom and understanding. This is the enemy’s first tactic in getting us to accept the natural realm as a fact of life, and get us to question the truth that Christ is our healer. Isaiah 53:1 says, “Who has believed our report? And to whom has the arm of the LORD been revealed?” So the first thing we have to do is choose whose report we are going to believe. Before I write the next blog this is the question I want to pose. Whose report do you believe?

Here is something else I want to ask you before I write the next blog. Do you believe that God’s desire is that everyone should come to a saving knowledge of Christ and be saved? Do you believe that Christ died on the Cross so that all could come to a saving knowledge of Him? Do you believe that Christ paid the price for sin? Do you believe that God causes people to sin? Do you believe that the Cross is the finished work of God and that at the Cross Jesus overcame the world and that God made a new covenant with His people through Christ’s death and resurrection? Do you believe that people have to have faith and believe in Christ to obtain the promise of salvation?

I know this may sound like it is off the subject but it isn’t. There is a reason I am asking these questions and in the next blog you will understand the reason for them. Again, this blog series is written to encourage you to go to the next level in your walk with God and intended to stir up a desire to grow more intimate in your relationship with Him. Be blessed and may the peace of God reign in your heart today.

To be continued………………………………..