GOD, STILL OUR HEALER

GOD, STILL OUR HEALER

Exodus 15:26; 23:25

In spite of the increase in medical practice with different areas of specialization, God is still our Healer. In spite of the tremendous breakthroughs in the field of medicine and the ever-increasing use of high-cost modern medicine, sicknesses and diseases have continued to rise. In fact, the cost of health care everywhere today is steadily increasing while the health of people steadily declines. Not just that, terrible and killer diseases that were unknown to humanity when God created the universe now ravage the world, claiming hundreds of thousands of human lives. After accidents, cancer has become the number one cause of death in the world, while diabetes abounds everywhere, not to mention stroke, malaria, tuberculosis, STDs, HIV/AIDS and most recently, Ebola.

Medicine and doctors have their place; they are God’s blessing to us. But they don’t have the lasting solution to the sicknesses and diseases ravaging the world. Health professionals, especially medical doctors, are intelligent, smart, hard-working and compassionate, and we all should be grateful to them for their expertise in diagnosing illnesses, making and prescribing medications, setting broken bones, stitching up wounds, and relieving our sufferings on many occasions. I strongly advise that you don't undermine them and their services. But don’t place your faith in them rather than God, because they are not healers, God is. As most of them will admit, “Doctors treat, but only God heals.”

God is the healer. He was the healer to His people, the Israelites, and is still the healer of those who put their trust in Him. Healing is an integral part of His character. He cares about every area of your health—your physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being—and He has the ultimate power to heal you of whatever illness you're suffering from. He said Himself, “I am the LORD that healeth thee” or “I am the Lord thy Physician”—Jehovah-Rapha or Jehovah-Ropheka (Exodus 15:26). He is the greatest physician who ever came to heal the sickness of the world. In fact, medical doctors do not really know how healing takes place in the human body because healing is the work of God. It’s a miracle, and if you will come to God today with your sickness, He will perform the miracle of healing in your body in Jesus’ name.

1.      GOD’S UNFAILING PROMISES FOR OUR HEALING

Exodus 15:26; 23:25-26; Deuteronomy 7:11-15; Psalm 103:2-4; Jeremiah 30:17; 33:6

Exodus 15:26 is referred to by many as the “healing covenant” or “God’s covenant of divine health.” It is called, “covenant” because, in it, God promises to keep His people free of sicknesses, diseases, and infirmities, although He conditions this promise to their diligent obedience and faithfulness to His word.

Here, God absolutely confirmed the covenant by joining His own powerful name to His promise, calling Himself Jehovah-Rapha, which means, “God is the one that heals.” The name declares that it is part of His nature to be the healer of those who obey his word and to recover and sustain them in perpetual health for the rest of their lives (Exodus 23:25).

The promise of divine healing is for those who have been redeemed by the Blood of Jesus; those who have repented of their sins and are reborn. In Mark 7:27, Jesus says that divine healing and health are meant for children of the Kingdom and not those outside the Kingdom: “It is not meet to take the children’s bread, and to cast it unto the dogs.” So if you will repent of your sins, denounces every work of Satan, and pray, fulfilling God’s conditions of healing, He will heal you of your sickness and made you perfectly whole.

2.      GOD’S UNCHANGING PREREQUISITE FOR OUR HEALING

Matthew 8:13; Mark 9:22; 11:22-24; 5:34

“If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth” (Mark 9:23). Virtually, what Jesus was saying to the man addressed here is, “It all depends on you. Can you fulfill the necessary condition for your son’s healing?”

Like this man, we are made to feel in our approach to Jesus that His power to do us good is conditioned by something in us, something we have to provide before His power is available. That requirement is faith. The problem is not, “If He can do anything for us,” but “If we can believe.” “All things are possible to him that believeth.” In order to appreciate a physician and avail yourself of the benefits of his skill, you must have faith in him. Without faith that his skill is superior to yours, and that he can help you, you will not go to or call on him.

Faith is the invariable condition of receiving divine healing. Time and time again, Jesus said to the recipients of His healing power, “Thy faith hath made thee whole.” Not My power, but your faith has made it possible for Me to heal you (see Matthew 9:22). At another time we read that He did not many mighty works at a certain place because of the unbelief of the people (Matthew 13:58). Unbelief was one attitude or state of mind that shut up the Saviour's compassion and made His power inoperative. But wherever He was touched by faith, even as small as a mustard seed, His power wrought spontaneously; virtue flowed out of Him. Faith is the one thing needful for receiving God’s blessings. “If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.” Do you believe that? Believing is the key. If you believe in divine healing and health, “nothing shall be impossible unto you” (Matthew 17:20).

3.      GOD’S UNDENIABLE POWER TO HEAL ALL SICKNESSES AND DISEASES

Matthew 19:26; 28:18; Colossians 1:16, 17; Luke 5:17; 9:1; 10:19-20

Unlike the medical doctors who use science, God’s healing is miraculous. He heals by divine power, and no sickness—pestilence, fever, inflammation, cancer, ulcer, boils, swellings, itching, madness, blindness, deafness, dumbness, heart-failure, plagues, diseases, nameless sicknesses and sore sickness of long continuance as well as HIV/AIDS—can defy His power. When Jesus was on the earth, He healed all who were brought to Him, not simply one or two individuals at different times, but all, including the woman with the issue of blood who was said to have seen many doctors but without any cure for her ailment (Mark 5:26-29). He even raised the dead (John 11:43-44). The healing power from Him went beyond curing broken bones and ailing bodies to healing broken hearts and saving sinners from their sins. He said in Luke 4:18-19, “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, To preach the acceptable year of the Lord.” This shows that sickness and healing are not simply biological or physical phenomena. They touch every level of our existence as human beings: physical, emotional, social, and spiritual.

Jesus came to heal the sick and that’s whether you were sick because you were living in sin or sick from a physical condition. Whatever your condition is, Jesus, the Great Physician, is there for you. He has the power to heal every sickness and infirmity, and He will heal you of whatever sickness or illness you are suffering from and keep you healthy if you will repent of your sins, accept Him as your Saviour and Lord, denounce every work of Satan, and fulfill the ultimate condition of receiving His healing.