HEALING TRUTH

I have come to the point of feeling that one of the greatest frustrations for me spiritually is listening to people talk about healing who adhere to the gross Christian misrepresentation that God is glorified in illness.

It was at my women's Bible study, and the subject came up as a spider-webbed side-track. As much as I would have loved to share the truth in Scripture about this, it would have taken our study in a direction it is not meant to go. So I just listened, and remembered that I used to be all of them. I used to buy into Satan's great lie that God is glorified in sickness.

Oh, how sad it is when people believe this.

There is NOTHING in the gospels anywhere which supports this. Not in one instance did Jesus EVER say, "No, your leprosy glorifies my Father, so you need to hang onto that," or " 'Fraid not, sonny, your blindness brings God so much glory.....I just can't consider healing you."

Jesus came to earth to do his Father's will. He was the exact representation of the Father's will here on earth. He did nothing but his Father's will. 

And he healed.

Everyone who asked.

"Oh, you poor thing.....bleeding for so many years.....I know you touched my garment in hopes that I would heal you....but that bleeding does my Father in heaven so much good... he is so glorified by it that I have to let you continue to bleed."

IT DID NOT HAPPEN LIKE THAT! 

I wanted to tell my Bible study-mates that God is no more glorified by illness than He is by sin. He does not tell people to continue to wallow in sin because it glorifies His father. And He does not tell people to continue to be sick because it glorifies His father.

As if His work on earth was not tell-tale enough for Christians to read and discern for themselves that healing is the thing that glorifies God, Jesus made one epic comment which should seal the deal for any doubters.

Lazarus had died and Jesus went there at the urging of his sisters. They blamed Him for not coming earlier. 

Did Jesus say that Lazarus' sickness and death was glorifying God? NO! 

When he heard the sisters' grief, Jesus told the family that Lazarus' life would not end with this illness, but that Lazarus' resurrection/ healing would glorify God, and in turn glorify Himself, God's son. It was the HEALING that would do the glorifying!

How much clearer can it be that Jesus got no honor and praise for sickness. He got no honor for sin either. He hated both sin and sickness and healed and saved all who asked Him.

If sickness glorifies God more than healing, then any attempt Christians make to get well would be an effort to rob God of the glory we should want Him to have.

If sickness glorifies God, then we should rather be sick than well.

If sickness glorifies God, Jesus robbed His Father of all the glory He possibly could by healing everyone.

We do not glorify God in our spirit by remaining in sin, and we do not glorify God in our body by remaining sick.

If I had bought into this theological misspeak 3 years ago, I would be long dead by now. I used to believe this, until I studied God's Word about the whole issue. The Bible clears this up pretty easily, and I am so thankful that He led me to the truth.

As healing evangelist T.L.Osborne says, "Let us not stand by the bed of the sick to sympathize with their pains. Let us never insinuate that it must be God's will to "take them," or that "it will teach them patience," or that perhaps "they will be drawn closer to the Lord" through their sickness. Let us rather declare war on every form of sickness and take authority over it through the name of Jesus Christ. Let us minister deliverance to those in need of healing."

The true glory, according to the Bible, that God receives is when his children are saved and healed and redeemed from the devil's schemes and lies.

My spider-webbed side-track here got a little long-winded. But I am alive today to BE long-winded only because I don't think my incurable cancer glorifies God in the least.