“He said to them, ‘God, show yourselves to the priests.’  And so it was that as they went they were cleansed.”  Luke 17:14 NKJV

Step number three on my list of things you need to do in order to touch the healing power of God is: Don’t be stupid! No one should deny the reality of sickness and disease. They are very real killers, who show no partiality. At the same time, we should not deny the reality of God’s Word.

According to the Bible (especially the Hebrew and Greek texts), Jesus paid the price necessary for our complete salvation; spirit, soul and body. We are partakers in that salvation, in part while we live on earth and in fullness when Jesus returns. Healing is just an extension of our salvation in Christ and to deny it on the basis of our own personal persuasions or experiences is to be untruthful to scripture.

We can all get stuck in what is familiar to us and miss the higher truths of life. For example, it is not a ‘lack of faith’ to see a doctor, as some religious extremists preach, unless you are depending on that doctor in a way that puts him or her in the place of God in your life! In the Bible, God obviously condones the use of medicinal treatments to help alleviate the suffering of mankind. He takes exception when someone puts more faith in any idol than in Him.

In the case of the ten lepers, Jesus instructed them to go and get a physical examination by the priests as an obedience to the instructions of the Law and as a proof of the authenticity of their healing (Luke 17:14). In the parable of the Good Samaritan, the Lord commends the fact that this man “treated” the wounds of the beaten stranger he encountered on his journey (Luke 10:34). Doctors often treat many of the physical symptoms we wrestle with and if you have ever been seriously ill you know how necessary their job is. Medicine and divine healing should not stand in opposition to one another. They quite naturally go together since their aim of helping hurting humanity is one and the same. The higher truth, though, is that God alone can treat the spiritual causes behind the physical symptoms we sometimes face. No doctor is able to effectively treat a ‘Spirit of Infirmity’ (Mark 9:14-29). You will need some prayer, fasting and the leading of God’s Spirit for that!