Richness in Christ

The Healing Reawakening

All across the world God's Holy Spirit is leading a healing reawakening. One of the most concise descriptions of the history of the Holy Spirit's ministry (as well as of those seeking to quench the Spirit's ministry) is to be found in the recently published book The Healing Reawakening: reclaiming our lost inheritance, by Francis MacNutt.

In this document, however, I wish to reflect on some of the issues regarding the denial of the Spirit's work, for there are those who claim that we are now in a period of "dispensation" from the Spirit's work and that the gifts of the Holy Spirit ceased with the last of the twelve apostles. Two scriptures usually given in support of Dispensationalism are I Corinthians 13:8-10 and 2 Timothy 4:20, and I will comment on those later in this document. One other name given to this school of thought is Cessationism.

I sometimes want to cry when I hear people denying the work of Jesus Christ through the person of the Holy Spirit. Barb and I conduct a healing ministry in Marquette, Michigan and we know that that work is very, very real.

I cry when I hear people denying the ministry of the Holy Spirit because it speaks of several possibilities and none of them is good. One issue is that it never ceases to amaze me how far we will go to avoid intimacy with Jesus and to quench the Spirit living within us (Scripture says that our body is the Temple of God's Holy Spirit). It suggests to me that we are much more comfort-able keeping the Spirit at arm's length.

Why would we want to do that? One of the issues, I think, is fear. And the really big fear for many people is the fear of total surrender to Jesus. If we are called to salvation in Christ, and we are, then we are also called to intimate relationship and intimate relationship can be scary. Intimacy with Christ means not being able to avoid an every moment presence with the one who says "The same things I do you shall do, only greater."

Surrender also means unquestioning obedience. I recall the first Sunday that I returned to the pulpit after I had been divinely healed of a disease that left me almost totally dysfunctional. The missionary who ministered healing to me also anointed me to carry on a ministry of healing. I shared with the congregation what had been my experience and then I invited those who desired healing to come. Do you think I was not anxious? "Anxious" only begins to describe what I was feeling. What would I do if I extended the invitation, and people came, and I ministered healing but nothing happened? Ten people came and the Spirit was faithful. Ten people were healed and there were even a couple of miracles. But here's the issue for many people: admitting that healing is a work of the Holy Spirit means that the Spirit might want to do that through me and if the Spirit heals through me what else might the Spirit call me to do and I am not ready to take that risk or to pay that price. And that is sad because that person is missing out on a truly rich relationship with Jesus Christ, a that richness only grows deeper with time.

A second reason for this claim of "dispensationalism" is that for three hundred years after the resurrection of Christ healing was an important ministry of the church. With the arrival of Constantine and the institutionalizing of the Christian faith, Healing slowly became a "control issue". It was taken away from the people and reserved only for the clergy, and is still that way in many places today. All kinds of reasons and explanations were developed to justify that move and to keep it out of the hands of the common people. And all this time the Holy Spirit was being quenched.

Thirdly, there is no doubt in my mind that many of those who hide behind "dispensationalism" really love the Lord, but they have just fallen into the deceptions that have been piled upon them by others. This, too, is so sad.

A fourth reason given by many as to why ministering healing is not a part of their worship services is that "There is just no time". Now, think about this. The thing that drew people to Jesus was healings and miracles. His teachings alone would not have done that. Some pastors say, "Well, we have our elders praying for healing off to the side." Excuse me. When it was healings and miracles that drew people to Jesus, are we dealing with confused priorities here? No time for healing in the service usually translates into "We have a schedule to meet" (remember the Good Samaritan ? Apparently he was the only one who did not have a schedule that day). "Schedule" usually means "We have three services this morning, services mean people and people mean money and money pays the bills."

Now, let's address dispensationalism from the standpoint of scripture.

If the ministry of the Holy Spirit went out with the apostles...

1. Tell that to the people who have been physically healed, and had sight and hearing restored. They would be interested in your explanation.
2. Is dispensation Jesus' term or man's term? Answer: It was first coined by John Nelson Darby in the 1830's.
3. How does one live out the Sermon on the Mount, especially the beatitudes, with out the indwelling of the Holy Spirit?
4. Is dsipensationalism a way of drawing a line around our hearts and saying, "Jesus, just don't get too close?" The rich young ruler said, in effect, "Jesus, just don't go there."
5. Every war has its armchair generals and battlefield commanders, while reality is taking place down in the trenches. The war with Satan is replete with armchair theologians on the issue of healing while at the same time there are people in the trenches ministering healing through the ministry of the Holy Spirit. The people who are ministering, being ministered to and healed are the sick, the lonely, the hurting, the dispossessed, and apparently those who don't know any better (the Bumblebee doesn't know that mathematically it cannot fly). Is this a modern day version of Jesus' prayer, "Father, I thank you that you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned..".?
6. If there is no present day ministry of the Holy Spirit as we have outlined here, then why pray? Why read Scripture? What separates God's Word from any other word?
7. In Genesis we read how the Kingdom was lost through some bad decision-making. Jesus came to restore the Kingdom. Jesus also said, "When I go my Father will send another Counselor, the Holy Spirit, to be with you forever." If Jesus is gone, then the Holy Spirit becomes the most important person in the world. If we deny the ministry of the Holy Spirit as here discussed, are we not totally undermining the concept of The Kingdom? Or of restoring the Kingdom?
8. In John's gospel we read that God's Word cannot be divided. If Father, Son, Spirit and Word are all the same, how then can we deny the ministry of one without denying the ministry of the other?
9. Jesus taught that reading the Word without living the Word is hard-heartedness. Would not the same be true of the Spirit living in us but not having expression through us? Or is the Spirit to only lay dormant for the period of our lifetime? Love unexpressed can lead only to hard-heartedness. The results are intellectually knowing the Word but standing outside the Word.
10. If the ministry of the Holy Spirit ceased with the deaths of the apostles, is this not the equivalent of God saying to Satan, "O.K. It's all yours. You have unhindered access. Go at it?"
11. If all the above are true, what then happens to "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow?"
12. If the present ministry of the Holy Spirit is ineffectual, what then is/was the value of The Blood, the Cross and the Resurrection?

And last of all, how can we justify serving the bread at communion when we deny the healing of the Holy Spirit? In Isaiah we read that the Gospel has two parts: forgiveness of sins and healing of the sick. "He was wounded for our transgressions (sins) and by his stripes we are healed (sicknesses)." The cup represents the forgiveness of our sins, and we can all relate to that. But the bread represents the body of Christ and it would seem pointless to serve the bread which typifies the body of our Lord beaten and scourged for our physical healing, and then teach that divine healing is no longer available to us.

Now, back to the scriptures mentioned earlier. I Corinthians 13;8-10 says in part, "... as for prophecies, they will pass away, as for tongues they will cease...when the perfect comes the imperfect will pass away." Well, Jesus Christ is the Perfect and he has not yet returned to put into place his Kingdom here on earth. The second scripture (II Timothy 4:20) states, "...I left Trophimus sick at Miletus". Some use this as an indication that the gifts of the Spirit had ceased and Paul was therefore unable to heal Trophimus. But let's look at this realistically. Why was Trophimus not healed? Well, does the rich young ruler's walking away from Jesus and rejecting the Kingdom indicate that Jesus was unable to save when he offered salvation?

People are not healed, and people are not saved for many reasons, but the fact that many reject salvation and healing when offered does not negate the fact that millions are saved and millions are healed and experiencing the fullness and the richness of the Holy Spirit.

While the ministry of the Holy Spirit is being denied and debated by many, the fact is that there are those in the trenches who are seeing the sick healed, the lame walk, the blind see, the deaf hear, the dead coming to life—it is happening all across the world. And in the meantime millions more are crying out to receive the same, and the Spirit is crying out for a new unleashing and expression of His ministry.

Mark, age 52, came stopped by our Wednesday healing class this week. Last summer he had a rare form of cancer with only a very slim chance at survival. He had no hope. We ministered healing. The cancer is gone and now in Mark's words, "I have nothing except hope".

And within this past month Barb and I have received invitations from India, Kenya, and the Philippines to come and minister to the lame, the blind, the lost, the deaf, the unsaved...

How long are we going to play games with the Lord's work? Help us, O Lord, and keep us free from the Nazareth syndrome.

Note: an excellent work to reference is A Handbook on Holy Spirit Baptism, by Don Basham.