Releasing Spiritual Gifts TodaySýnishorn

Gifts of Healings

In 1 Corinthians 12, Paul wrote about “gifts” of “healings.” If you look at the original Greek, both words are plural, and they lack the definite article. 

“Gifts of healings” is a perfect way to describe spiritual healing, which encompasses a multiplicity of applications. There are so many needs for healing, and so many different ways to address them. Not only do people need physical healing for all kinds of ailments and disabilities, but they also need psychological healing, emotional healing, and spiritual heal­ing. Healings sometimes happen gradually, sometimes instantaneously. Healings can happen after a word of personal prayer or a faith-filled declaration, but sometimes they occur because of the spiritual atmosphere of a group setting.

People whose gifts include healing vary in personality, position, and circumstances and thus minister divine healing in many different ways, developing many viable models for using gifts of healing. Healing is never a one-size-fits-all gift. It is always the same Spirit of Jesus who performs the healing. But through human intermediaries, He presents Himself in different “packages” for different people at different times in different situations.

The members of the body of Christ learn to use gifts of healings first from the teaching and example of the New Testament, and second from accumulated experience.

How the Gift Manifests

Again, healing—even supernatural healing—is not always instantaneous. At times, it may seem more natural than miraculous. Its many expressions of operation can involve more than one working of God’s grace.

Scriptural accounts show us that there is just as much precedent for a healing that unfolds in stages or over time as for an instantaneous miracle. For example, when Jesus prayed for a blind man (after spitting on his eyes!—an example no one should follow without specific divine guidance), his sight returned only after a second effort. (See Mark 8:22–25.) Jesus spat and prayed the first time, and queried him, “Do you see anything?” (Mark 8:23). The man could see, but only vaguely. So Jesus prayed and spat on his eyes again, after which his vision was perfect.

There are also instant healings. Jesus said to a leper, “‘Be cleansed.’ Immediately his leprosy was cleansed” (Matthew 8:3 NKJV). In another example, one moment, Simon’s mother-in-law was in bed with a fever, but the next moment, she had been healed by Jesus, and she was waiting on Jesus, her son-in-law, and the others who had come with them to her house. (See Mark 1:30–31.)

Instant healings can occur even when the person who prays or declares a healing is not physically with the person who is ill. In John 4:49–52, we read about a notable incident where a royal official’s son was near death, and he begged Jesus to come and heal the boy. Jesus was able to speak a word of healing at a distance that was just as effective as if He had touched the sick person. This account shows us the raw power of a word of healing when Jesus initiates it.

It doesn’t matter whether people request healing on their own behalf; whether someone brings them for healing (as happens often in the case of children or severely disabled ones); or if someone comes as an intermediary, seeking only a word of healing for another, as the centurion did. Often enough, the person who needs healing does not even seek it out at all, or requires some gentle persuasion to accept the idea. This was the case with the lame man at the pool of Bethesda. (See John 5:1–9.)

Where healing is concerned, we need to be sure to align ourselves with God’s timing. Remember how Jesus delayed before He went to raise Lazarus from the dead. Evidently, it would not have been good enough to heal Lazarus’ life-threatening sickness. Instead, He waited until it was “too late” so that He could perform a much more spectacular kind of healing—a resurrection.

Many times, healing occurs when someone lays his or her hands on the one who needs healing. Jesus and the members of the early church used this practice all the time. Here are a few examples:

At sunset, the people brought to Jesus all who had various kinds of sickness, and laying his hands on each one, he healed them. (Luke 4:40 NIV)

And it happened that the father of Publius was lying in bed afflicted with recurrent fever and dysentery; and Paul went in to see him and after he had prayed, he laid his hands on him and healed him. After this had happened, the rest of the people on the island who had diseases were coming to him and getting cured. (Acts 28:8–9)

These signs will accompany those who have believed:…they will lay hands on the sick, and they will recover. (Mark 16:17–18)

Praying for the sick with the laying on of hands is not meant only for individuals who have been given gifts of healings. It’s the prerogative of all believers to have faith in God’s Word and pray for the sick. Sometimes, the laying on of hands includes anointing with oil, and often the anointing is done by a church leader. (See Mark 6:13; James 5:14–15.) 

Occasionally (although this delivery method of healing has been abused), something other than hands can be laid on the sick, such as an item of clothing from an anointed person. This forms a point of contact for the one in need. The following account took place after Jesus had been teaching publicly and performing miracles for a while, and His reputation had begun to precede Him.

Wherever He entered villages, or cities, or countryside, they were laying the sick in the market places, and imploring Him that they might just touch the fringe of His cloak; and as many as touched it were being cured. (Mark 6:56)

Later, a similar thing happened with Peter and the other apostles, as we read in Acts 5. In Ephesus, Paul performed “extraordinary miracles,” some of which were extra-extraordinary because they occurred by means of items of his clothing, without Paul being present. (These miracles must have happened in this way either due to direct revelation about them or because there was no other way for Paul to lay his hands on all of the sick people in the region.) (See Acts 19:11–12.)

I have been in many gatherings where faith abounds and people bring handkerchiefs or items of clothing to be prayed over and then taken back to their sick loved ones. Notably, this releases an atmosphere of faith, hope, and love in which authentic healing can occur. Even when people are not healed, they often experience the special comfort of the love of God.

The Healing Power of the Lord's Supper

Personally, besides direct prayer and the laying on of hands, I lean heavily on the basic healing power of the Lord’s Supper. The health of our relationship with God and others helps to determine the health of our physical bodies. (See 1 Corinthians 11:28–30.) Some healings require a lot of preliminary prayer to clear up things that impede healing.

When you partake of the Lord’s Supper, you are proclaiming what the Lord has done through His death and resurrection. You receive the cleansing of forgiveness, and you forgive others. You rejoice in the fact that Jesus’ blood has triumphed over the power of the Evil One. You receive and give mercy, proclaim life over yourself, and resubmit yourself to the lord­ship of Jesus. What could be more health-promoting than that?

Become part of the healing army for the times we live in. Turn your face from the needs for healing that clamor for your attention toward our Healer and Great Physician. Let’s call forth gifts of healings for every form of sickness we know of and also for conditions we have not heard of, all for the glory of God.