We have heard numerous prophecies about the church being a place of healing, a hospital for bodies and souls. We hear, but now we have to implement a walk toward that prophetic word.
For years I have heard the stories of people who spoke of how the church has hurt them, wounded them. A common joke of sorts was that the church was the only group that shot their wounded. Sad, but true in many cases. As a result, we have the jetsam and flotsam of Christian churches floating in the sea of humanity not necessarily in the world, but not in the church. Some people I know will not even talk about what happened to them and others will tell everyone of their hurt. The statistics indicate there are upwards of 10 million confessed born again believers who do not attend church. The hurt runs deep.
Some have overcome through the years, but walk cautiously with large amounts of distrust and a wild animal wariness of church and its leadership. In talking with a man this week, he spoke of how he disliked church because of cliques. Wary, distrustful.
But, when there is a move of God, many of these will be looking, once again, to find fellowship and an atmosphere of the Holy Spirit. But for them to fully engage there will be a necessary healing to take place. We must posture ourselves to provide an avenue of healing for the distraught and distrustful. It takes time. We once had a black lab that had been abused and neglected. We found him in Pennsylvania where our friend said there was this black lab the neighbors had, but neglected. He asked the neighbor if we could have the dog. The neighbor agreed and we headed home with a back lab which we named “Pepper.” Pepper did not trust us much at first. He guarded his dog dish and water with paws on both sides, keeping it directly in his possession. He had not been fed regularly and who knows how often he was given water. As the weeks went by, Pepper realized he was being fed regularly, water was always there, and there were kids that played with him and he was not tied up. He became the best frisbee football player we had. It took time to convince him it was safe and he was cared for.
The Hospital that God is calling us to be is more than a triage where we administer some short term fix. This is a call to healing that will embrace many facets and take time. Christians need their trust rebuilt through significant, long term commitment to their health. If you notice, insurance companies are now spending much more time in preventive medicine and strategies rather than the time worn attitude of dealing with it when it is a crisis only.
Then there is the defeating “Pentecostal, Charismatic” understanding of healing which is manifested in the desire for the dramatic. Of course we want to see the instantaneous miracle, but it does not always come that way. We have produced a theology which implies or directly states that if it does not happen instantaneously that we did not have faith, the person did not have faith, or that God did not want to heal. So, we ended up in a blame game as to who was at fault.
Really, we need to change our attitude and theology. Healing is a process which man cannot duplicate. We can aid it, we can diagnose the problem, we can operate, but healing is a process of God. So, when we pray for healing, we should proceed with the idea of a process and rejoice if it happens instantaneously which, in my mind, moves it to the miracle category.
It seems John G. Lake had a grasp on that concept when he established the healing rooms where people would come and stay and be prayed for on a consistent, prescribed schedule. They had spectacular results through the years that it operated.
Our vision is to have the Healing Room available after every service where folks can be prayed for with intensity and time. In our services and ministry times we often cannot give the extended time it takes for healing and deliverance. Healing will take several prayers sometimes as progress is made. One of the approaches is to pray and if there is any movement and release of pain, the process resumes with more prayer. Sometimes it beings complete healing or a significant improvement. The prayer continues until there is no progress. Then the person is encouraged to come for prayer again next time.
We are going to take the month of July and study healing in a morning seminar and then in August or at the latest, September, we will have our healing teams in place and will begin to regularly minister healing to those who come. Healing of the body and soul is our vision.
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