September 9, 2018 - Inscriptions From The Heart
September 9, 2018
Pastor Immanuel Garcera
DIVINE HEALING
In the past week or so, Erica, Elion and I have all gotten sick. I notified the pastoral staff messenger group on Facebook about our current condition so they could know and also pray for us. Later during the week, someone asked from the group chat: “how are you and your family doing?” to which I immediately typed up “we are being sustained by medicine” – to which I quickly edited to say instead “we’re feeling better, thank you for praying”. I thought to myself, I “shouldn’t say that, it is only God who sustains”. Being a C&MA pastor has taught me a lot about certain doctrines – one I find interesting is our doctrine on divine healing. In my Christian walk, divine healing is something I’ve often overlooked. With this in mind, one of the things I’ve come to appreciate about the Alliance is what I’ve learned about divine healing. Believe it or not, divine healing is supposed to go hand in hand with the proclamation of the Gospel.
Divine healing, to me might be something different than what you’re thinking of. To me, and I think for most pastors, divine healing isn’t far off, mysterious, or mystical. It’s not an event that rarely happens that when it does it’s a big deal. Instead, I believe that divine healing happens all the time and we don’t always recognize it for what it is. Anyways, back to the gospel and divine healing going hand in hand – in Matthew 4:23 it says:
“Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness among the people.”
And in Luke 9:1-2:
“When Jesus had called the Twelve together, he gave them power and authority to drive out all demons and to cure diseases, and he sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal the sick.”
In those two instances, first with the example of Jesus, divine healing was part of His ministry to preach and teach people of the Gospel. It’s the same story when Jesus sent out the twelve. To me personally, divine healing and the ministry of healing the sick is this: praying of people who are sick. That’s it, simple right? Because at the end of the day, the one who heals, weather through medicine, doctors or physicians, prayer, or the ultimate healing when we see Jesus face to face – it’s all by the will, means, and timing of God. So pray away, because our part is diligence in praying. With that said, how many times has someone prayed for you when you were sick? When you got better, these instances when someone prayed for you could have been when divine healing happened. Keep in mind, without what God has given us, a simple flu and cold could be life threatening. So here’s my next question: when was the last time you prayed for someone to be healed, specifically, for a non-believer? Friends – it’s to be part of our outreach ministry! Not just to each other, but it was part of Jesus’ ministry to reach the world. Yes, we pray for each other in our groups like my pastoral staff messenger chat – but think of the people outside our groups missing out on some much needed healing! So go out there and pray, pray for divine healing.
To God be the glory!