Subject: Did Jesus go to hell? |
Bible Note: Does God Always Heal? 'We have been made disturbingly aware of a number of problems that predictably arise wherever the healing/prosperity/confession movement spreads. It finally reached a point where we no longer had any choice but to do something about it. 'One very real problem is that the emphasis that is placed upon Christ bearing our diseases at Calvary undermines the biblical emphasis upon Christ bearing our sins. Whereas the preaching that we read in the New Testament is always centered around Christ’s death or our sins and resurrection for our justification (Romans 4:25), one finds that the preaching, and even the casual conversation of this current movement is dominated by the subject of bodily healing. Followers of the movement display practically an obsession with the topics of healing and “confession,” as though these subjects were the gospel and there’s little else in the Bible worthy of much discussion. Even if these doctrines were Biblical many who hold them would be guilty of being extremely unbalanced, not giving enough attention to many important aspects of Christian faith and living. 'Another unfortunate result of the preaching of these doctrines is that people lose their victory in Christ, and become shaken in their faith, because someone gave them a “biblical” formula for success, and it didn’t work. (...) 'To have the audacity to tell one of God’s children that if they are sick it is because of their own sin or lack of faith is to abound in presumptuousness, and be bankrupt in compassion. I’ve known of more than one person who demonstrated this insensitivity until God dealt with him by laying him flat on his back, and when none of his “principles” would work he suddenly developed an empathy of those he had once judged. We never see it portrayed in Scripture that perfect health is the sign of spirituality. To set up such a standard is to divert God’s people from the spiritual standard that Scripture does set forth (such as in 2 Peter 1:5-9). 'Ken Copeland and others teach that we must resist sickness in the same way that we resist sin. This also disturbs us. We’ve seen too many good Christians striving to “believe” their sickness away, and finally collapsing into self-condemnation and utter discouragement over their “lack of faith” or the “sin” in their lives. Most likely, there was a divine purpose for that sickness in their lives, and it would have been a lot easier on them, after they prayed in faith and nothing happened, to have ceased striving and simply rested in the comforting sovereignty of God. 'After being forced to go to this extent to prove that it is not always God’s will to heal, we do want to close on the positive note that we do believe that divine healing is for today. We see no Scriptural basis to doubt that we can expect to see healing take place here and now. Healing should be a regular part of the life of all churches (James 5:14-16). We also believe that faith plays an important part in receiving healing, and that the Church has much to learn about faith, and how to more effectively receive it for healing. We feel that many who saw this need embraced the “healing in the atonement” doctrine because it seemed to offer a more solid basis for faith. Unfortunately, however, this basis is not the Scriptural basis, and therefore it has created more problems than was hoped it would solve.' - Elliot Miller (This article has been edited due to space limitations. To read the entire article, see STATEMENT DH018, Healing: Does God Always Heal? [www.equip.org]) |