How to walk in the Gift of Healing - God's Will, Frauds, Misunderstandings - Spiritual Gift Series

It was one of the most famous signs of Yeshua's ministry. People started traveling far and wide to hear this new rabbi who taught the Torah and prophets like no one else and who had signs follow his life like no one else. Even Nicodemus professed to Yeshua, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. And when John's disciples come to inquire who Yeshua is, he sends them back with the confirming word that the blind received their sight, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear. He confirmed his ministry and authority by the gift of healing. The gift of healing is not only a sign of Jesus ministry, but a proclamation and demonstration of the kingdom of God that has come near you. But at the same time, the gift of healing is now one of the most misunderstood gifts and rife with false assumptions, both in the body of Christ and in the world. But not only today. Even way back in the first century, Yeshua heard words like physician, heal yourself. Today we hear, if this is for real, go and clear out the hospitals. And more mockings as this. Because we don't understand the purpose of the gift of healing or the complex relationship between the gift of healing, our will and the will of God, we misunderstand its application. Welcome to the most comprehensive video on the gift of healing we've ever published. In this teaching, we're going to be looking at the will of God in the gift of healing. False assumptions about the purpose of the gift of healing. We will look at biblical examples, practical examples, how to walk in the gift practically, and of course, very importantly, we'll look at abuses, warnings and other considerations for those who seek to walk in the gift of healing. First, let us begin with the will of God. The role of the will of God and the gift of healing is often misunderstood because in the minds of some, they unknowingly create a tension between the power and the will of God and the power and will of man. If God has given a man power to heal the sick, they should just be able to do it on demand. This is one assumption that people often carry. And then we create these false tests that, well, if someone has the gift of healing, every sick person they pray for must therefore be healed. It becomes like a superpower that becomes a knight to the person. But in truth, 1 Corinthians 12:11 tells us that all of the gifts of the Holy Spirit are are both apportioned and empowered by God. It is not our will or our power that allows a gift to flow, but God's. So is a spiritual gift then on demand, something that we can just do whenever at will? Well, a person can walk out a spiritual gift. The result of the gift is directed by God's will. We see, for example, that Paul failed to heal epaphroditus in Philippians 2:26. For he has been longing for you all and has been distressed because you heard that he was ill. Indeed, he was ill, near to death. But God have mercy on him, and not only on him, but on me also, lest I should have sorrow upon sorrow. Why did Paul worry about having sorrow upon sorrow? Why was he concerned for the life of his brother? I mean, he could have just healed him on demand, at his own will. Of course, Paul did walk in the gift of healing. But Paul also recognized that his gift is subject to the empowerment of and will of God. Another example is how Paul failed to heal trophimus in 2 Timothy 4:20. Erastus remained in Corinth, and I left Trophimus, who was ill, at Miletus. Why leave Trophimus if you could just heal him? Dear Paul, Paul again is facing the will of God in his life. Even if Paul wants someone healed, delivered, and to live even forever, it's not up to Paul, it's not up to you, it's not up to me. Even if God apportions us a gift and empowers us with a gift, it is still subject to his will. This does not mean that we don't have a large role to play in the walking out of that gift. In communion with his will doesn't mean that we just sit back and we wait for God to do everything. Of course not. We have to walk in the Holy Spirit. But God's will is king. So when we hear these statements that come from false assumptions like, well, just go to a hospital and clear it out. If you believe that people can be healed by prayer, why don't you just go and do it? But at the same time, Yeshua did not go and do it. He did not heal everyone in Jerusalem. There were people before his ministry who were sick, during his ministry who were sick, and after his ministry who were sick. He healed many, but not everyone in Jerusalem was healed. And the need for physicians was not gotten rid of. Yeshua also warned the crowds that they would mock him to heal himself. We see this in Luke 4:23, and he said to them, doubtless you will quote to me this proverb, Physician, heal yourself. What we have heard you did at Capernaum do here in your hometown as well, even Yeshua had to be perfectly submitted to his Father's will. We see in Luke 22:42 he said, Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours be done. If Yeshua, being the king, being gifted with spiritual gifts and being one with his Father, still submits his will at the feet of his Father, how much more should we. Therefore we should be careful when we get too exhorted about our own will. So often I have found myself and my own thoughts running away with it would be so perfect if this person gets healed and then their whole atheist family would just see it and they would then all come to faith and it would just be amazing. Have you ever had those kind of things, thoughts and ideas, stop and ask, have I prayed about this? Have I considered God's will in this matter? For what seems obviously God's will to us is not always God's will. Think about God's will in the resurrection of Lazarus of John 11:14, where it's written, when Jesus told him plainly, lazarus has died. And for your sake, I am glad that I was not here so that you may believe, but let us go to him. Jesus is actually saying, I'm glad that I wasn't here when he got sick and when he was on the brink of death because he needed to die for the glory of God. And in this case it was God's will for Jesus to not heal Lazarus, but for Lazarus to die and be resurrected as a sign to all who was present. We may think in our simple minds, like Lazarus, family and friends, Jesus, if you could have just come earlier, all of this would have been prevented. Why are you light? And so we say to God, the God, if only you would have healed this person in this time, why are you late? But yet, just as Jesus delayed his appearance as the will of God, we must understand that his will is higher than ours. And part of walking in faith and in spiritual gifts is trusting his will as always being good even, and especially when we don't understand it, even when God's timing doesn't make sense. Don't lose hope and don't lose trust. Let all be done to his glory, and if we place it in his hands, truly his will will be done and let him have the glory. John 11:4 but when Jesus heard it, he said, this illness does not lead to death, it is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it. We also make false assumptions about the purpose of the gift of healing. Now this may shock you. The gift of healing is not about replacing hospitals or physicians. Physicians were needed in the first century and they are needed today. I want to remind you that even those who Jesus prayed for to be healed of their leprosy and to be of being lame or being blind, all of those people this day have become as dust. And they are, if they believe in him, to be resurrected. They have not received immortality. They were healed for a moment, for a time, until their appointed time of death. The primary purpose of the gift of healing is not to heal people over and over again. It is to glorify God, make His gospel famous, and draw people near him by his loving compassion. The gift of healing is a shadow of things to come. It brings the kingdom of God nearer people when they experience or witness healing, as in Luke 10:9. And it gives people a glimpse of the kingdom that is coming to be established upon the earth. Revelation 21:4 gives us a glimpse of this. Where it's written, he will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more. Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away. The coming resurrection's purpose is to give those who are in Yeshua a glorified body. It is to heal them all. It is to grant them all immortality and to draw them to perfection. Some today who are passionate about the gift of healing confuse the coming resurrection's purpose with the gift of healing's purpose. They think that if we just have enough faith, everyone will be healed. Everyone will be healed, therefore, over and over and over again. And we will have bodies that become as being perfect because we just need enough prayer and enough faith for that all to happen. But we fail to understand that the gift of healing is to give a taste of the kingdom that is drawing near this day that comes with the resurrection of the dead. Today we are dealing with the remnants of this fallen sinful world, a world that is fallen, that is passing away, to be replaced with the world that will not pass away and the kingdom that will not be corrupted. But as for now, we still suffer the effects of sin that came in in the Garden of Eden. While the gift of healing is to give God glory, perhaps it is quite inevitable that some men have used it to give themselves glory. We even see a glimpse of this in the first century with Simon the Sorcerer regarding the gift of the Holy Spirit, where in Acts 18:19, Simon said, give me this power also, so that anyone whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit. But Peter said to him, May your silver perish with you because you thought you can obtain the gift of God with money. And so today there are ministries who have charged for ministry, charged for the gift of healing to be prayed for, or the prosperity gospel teachings of sow a seed and then perhaps you stand a better chance of being healed. We will discuss these issues in our later section of Warnings and Cautions. But I think that we should at least now identify how many of these abuses have caused people both in the world and in the body of Christ at times to despise the gift. For their vision have become blurred and colored by the abuses and the hurt and the trauma that they may have witnessed. And for that I am sorry. But also let us not let the abuse of God's gifts cause us to be become blind to the authentic gift of healing that is evident in the life of Yeshua. We should be careful of a stigma being created of a faith healer as a negative connotation, because of course, our Messiah prayed with faith and the early church continued therein. Let us yearn for the authentic, and that's what we're going to be looking for in this teaching as we now head into our biblical examples. In our first example, we're going to be looking at the leper who was cleansed. In Mark 1:40 we read, and there came a leper to him, beseeching him, and kneeling down to him, and saying to him, if thou wilt, thou can make me clean. And Jesus moved with compassion, put forth his hand and touched him, and said unto him, I will be made clean. And as soon as he had spoken, immediately the leprosy departed from him and he was cleansed. Let's make a few observations. First we see that the leper expressed faith in the Messiah, that the Messiah is able to make him clean. And then, of course, the Messiah himself had great faith. We also see that the Messiah healed the leper with a word. He just simply told him, go and be made clean. Today I want you to see that the objective of the Messiah is his compassion that he is demonstrating for this leper. And it is from this compassion and this love for this man that the healing flows. We see in Matthew 9:35. And Jesus went through all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction. And when he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them because they were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. Over and over again we see that the first ingredient to healing in the Messiah's ministry was his compassion. May God's compassion upon his people become your compassion. For it is when you have love and compassion that the Spirit of God can come and empower you to accomplish the will of God when it comes to the gift of healing and even the rest of the spiritual gifts. Let's look at another example, this time about the blind man who was healed. In John 9:1, as he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth. And his disciples asked him, rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents that he was born blind? And Jesus answered them, it was not that this man sinned, nor his parents, but that the works of God may be displayed in him. This is a very interesting story for in the first century and even amongst some circles today, there is this belief that if someone is sick or if someone has a disability, it must be because they have done something wrong. It must be because of their sin that there is some curse upon them. Jesus quickly debunks this idea that his disciples had and tells them that it wasn't that this man has sinned or that he had some generational curse of his parents having sinned, but he is blind for the glory of God, that the works of God may be displayed in him. Jesus is literally saying that this man was born blind and has lived his entire life as being blind for this day. And then of course, Jesus heals him and his name is made great amongst all who sees it. And even 2,000 years later today as we read of this account, therefore let us not be quick to cast a stone or play a blame game of telling someone, well, it's because of your sin that you are sick. So thus far we're seeing a few ingredients that was in the ministry of Christ when it pertains to his healing. We see that we need faith in God's ability to heal as the leper did. We see that we need faith in God's compassion for us. Sometimes it's easy to believe that God can heal someone else. But do you believe he can heal you? And we also need faith in God's will for when he heals and that his timing is always good. See, if you only have faith in God's ability to heal, but not faith in his good will and timing, you will stop exercising the gift when it doesn't arrive, when the healing doesn't come in your will and in your timing. And this is in fact I want to submit to you what happens to many people who attempt to walk in this gift. They stop praying for people to be healed because someone didn't get healed and it rocked them too much, they could not bear it. But it is part of the gift to walk in faith and trust in God's will and timing. That even when we didn't align with his will and timing in thinking that today is the day, we thought, this must be it. This must be the moment. And even when it's not, we must rest in his perfect will and trust that his will is good. For as God told job in job 38 4, where were you when I laid the foundation of the earth? Tell me if you have understanding. And perhaps this is a test for us. Those who stopped promptly in the pursuit of this gift because things didn't go according to their own plans and who now feel embarrassed and who now feel like, you know, their will was not established, perhaps they do not have the faith necessary in the will of God, never mind in the ability of God. We can have faith in his ability, but do we have faith in his will so that his glory may be established? And on the other hand, we might also assume that God's sovereign will means that, well, we will just wait around for God then to do it without any intervention from our side being needed at all. But remember that the biblical examples in Scripture shows us that it also is dependent upon the call that has gone out to us as his disciples to walk in the Holy Spirit. Peter needed to literally say, silver and gold I don't have, but rise up and walk, as Yeshua said to his disciples, with the blind man we must work the works of him who sent me, while it is day, for night is coming when no one can work. Yeshua emphatically tells us to work and labor with the Holy Spirit. This kind of speech, like the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few, invokes the call to us that we must work. We can't wait around and expect God to do the work. There is work that is called of us to do with him and that God seeks to labor with us in the Gospel. In the next example that we're going to be looking at regarding the man healed at the pool of Siloam, I want to just zoom into verse 14 of John 5. After this man is healed at the pool, we see that Jesus tells him, see you are well. Sin no more. Let nothing worse may happen to you. In the previous example of the blind man, we see that Jesus said that in his case it was not caused by his sin or his parents sin. But in the case of the man who was laying at the Pool of Siloam. Jesus actually does identify that his issue was caused by sin, and he even warns him that if he does not repent of his sin, that something worse may come upon him. This shows us that sin at times can be the cause for disability or sickness, although not always, and that our refusal to repent even after being healed it can cause the sickness or disability that we had in the first place to come back on our life. We also see Jesus deepening the connection between healing and sin in the example of the paralytic in Matthew 9. 4, where we read and behold, some people brought to him a paralytic lying on a bed. And when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic, take heart, my son, your sins are forgiven. When the scribes took issue with Jesus saying that he forgives sin, he explained to them why he had said this and said, for which is easier to say your sins are forgiven, or rise up and walk, but that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins. He then said to the paralytic, rise, pick up your bed and go home. And he rose and went home. Jesus stating that your sins are forgiven is the same as bringing forth a healing, at least in the case of this paralytic draws a very interesting revelation regarding the gift that Yeshua is forgiving people as he is healing people at the same time establishing, of course, his authority as God having the authority to forgive give sins of men that have been done against God. But now where does that leave us? But he then grants this authority to his disciples in John 20:22. And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them. If you withhold forgiveness from any, it is withheld. We see that with the receiving of the Holy Spirit given to his disciples, there comes an authority that he allows them to administer the forgiveness of sins. What he is telling them is that as you minister and proclaim the gospel to other people, what you are doing is you are ministering God's forgiveness, for that is the Gospel, is it not? When we proclaim to people that Christ has come and died for you to be united with the Father and forgiven of your sins. We have been given that authority by Yeshua to proclaim that gospel of forgiveness, that he is the one who forgives them, because that forgiveness has already been established to all who repent and come to him. So when we make that gospel message known, we are ministering that forgiveness of God to the hearer. And so, just as the disciples received the Holy Spirit and this authority, so In Acts chapter 2, God made known that he has now poured out his Spirit upon all of his people and that they have this same authority to proclaim the gospel of forgiveness. And the gospel of forgiveness accompanies healing. For what's the difference for them to be forgiven or to be healed, as Yeshua said? This is why, when Yeshua sends out the 72 in Luke chapter 10, he instructs them to proclaim the gospel and heal the sick, for they were seen as one combined commission. As you can see, understanding authority is essential to understanding the gift of healing. And ironically, it is but a Gentile that Yeshua came across that understood this authority the best. We see in Matthew 8, 7 about the Centurion, where it says, and he Jesus said to him, I will come and and heal him. But the centurion replied, lord, I am not worthy to have you come under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant will be healed. For I too am a man under authority, with soldiers under me. And I say to one, go. And he goes, and to another, come, and he comes, and to my servant do this. And he does it. And when Jesus heard it, he marveled and said to them that followed, verily, I say to you, I have not found so great faith, not in Israel. Yeshua identifies in the centurion that his amazing grasp of authority and what it means is integral to his great faith. So much so that he says that this centurion has a greater faith than all else in Israel. But what does this mean? What is that authority that he was grasping? He understood that when authority is in him as a centurion, he can simply tell someone to go here or there, and it is done by a word of authority. A matter is established. And he then sees in Yeshua, because Jesus has the authority to heal, that only by a word the matter will be established. This gives us a hint of what type of prayers Yeshua had. Prayers of authority that established the matter because with him was the authority to establish it. That is why we so often see him by a word healing a leper or a servant, saying, be made well, and then that servant was made well, as in this case. This should also now teach us if we have been given authority to heal the sick, in what manner we should do so. There is nothing wrong with long, intricate prayers. But be wary of placing great faith in in your long prayer as doing the work. For we no longer then place our faith in Christ as having the great authority, being the king to heal the sick. But now we have placed our faith in our own work of prayer. Be careful of that. Rather, recognize that if you truly believe, as the centurion did, that Yeshua has the authority to heal the sick, then let it be done by a word. And let you then proclaim by a word for the sick to be healed, as Peter did when he said, with a word, rise up and walk, and the layman was healed. So often we attempt to pursue formulas and invest great time in finding the secret to healing. But the secret is no secret at all. It is to have great faith and to understand the authority that Yeshua has now invested in his people when he gave them the Holy Spirit. Think about a signature on a long contract. When you have to sign a contract, there is a lot of words that you are agreeing to. It is but by a stroke of your pen to make a signature that you agreed to every word on the page. And so it is because you have the authority invested in that signature to agree to it all. In the same way, when we, by a word, profess, we invest the authority that has been given to us in that word, and thereby what we have professed must come about according to the will of God. Matthew 6, 7. And when you pray, do not heap up empty phrases as the Gentiles do, for they think that they will be heard for their many words. In Matthew 8, 13, we read the conclusion of the story, and to the centurion, Jesus said, go, let it be done for you as you have believed. And the servant was healed at that very moment. Next we're going to be looking at some practical examples. A few months ago, I was ministering in South Africa with two brothers and my wife. And as we were there ministering on the beaches, telling people about Yeshua, the amazing commandments that he has given us, and the call to repentance he's given us. We made our way back to the parking lot. When we were done, and just as we thought we were done in the square where there were many people going to and fro as tourists, there was a church group that had just set up there of believers. They were starting to worship God in the public square. We stopped and looked at them for a minute, and then the pastor walked up to us and made conversation. And in this conversation I asked the pastor, hey, is there anyone in your group who needs prayer themselves? And a lady comes forward, a young lady, she's got a shoulder issue and neck issues and in a lot of pain and she asks to pray. And so I pray. And the way I pray is in accordance to the biblical examples we've laid out in the authority that Yeshua has given me by the Holy Spirit he has given me. I speak a word. And so I say, father, I thank you for her. I thank you for your love for her. We speak to this now be made well in the name of Yeshua, Amen. And so I ask her next, can you move around and feel, because you said you were in a lot of pain. And so immediately she moves around and she did not expect anything to happen. But she is healed. And as all the pain leaves her, she is astounded. She cries out in praise. And all of her fellow congregants see this. Notice how I asked her right after praying for her to move and feel. When we have true faith, that means we actually expect the person to get healed. That's what faith is. This is why Peter said to the man who had an issue as a beggar, I don't have sovereign gold, but rise up and walk. A call to action, to rise up was the call of authority that he gave out for the man to be healed. And so a call to action should be a part of our prayers for healing, if at all possible. After she proclaimed this praise to God for her healing, another older lady came up to me and asked, can you pray for me? But I have a serious issue. And she said, during the days of COVID and the pandemic, she had the virus, and the virus attacked her nervous system. She went to a neurologist who said to her that they have seen this where the virus starts attacking the neurological system of the body. And she suffered paralysis from the waist down and numbness. She was bedridden and over many months got a little bit better to the point we can. She could start walking again. But now, years later, standing here with me in the square of Mossa Bay, South Africa, she still has numbness in her feet. She cannot feel, she has weakness in her legs. And she says to me, my greatest desire is to be able to worship God in the way that I had before being able to dance, jump, and praise him with expressive worship. And this truly put a heart of compassion on me, the Father's compassion. The Holy Spirit welled up in me in love for her, for she wants to be healed in order to praise him. And so we prayed, we prayed for her feet, for her legs, in the same manner of authority. Pain go in the name of Yeshua, numbness go in the name of Yeshua. Be Strengthened in the name of Yeshua now. And so after a few prayers, she says, the numbness is gone. But here's the test. I haven't jumped in three years because I was too weak to do that because of this disease. And she steps back and she jumps. And as she jumps and she comes back down to the ground, all of her fellow congregants are praising God. She is praising God. She is crying. I'm crying like there's a commotion going on. She starts telling me the whole story from the beginning. You don't understand how serious this is. You don't understand how many years this has been a problem. You don't understand. And she begins in the front, and as she and I tell her, you need to testify. You need to tell other people of what God has done for you. And as I say that, a lady off the street who we have not known, who is not part of this group, has been observing all of this, but from afar. And she comes up and says, testify to me, Testify to me. And she testifies the story from the front to back again of how God has healed her this time. Later, we also see that the group has their social media out and they're doing an Instagram live and they're telling their fellow people on social media, she just got healed, professing the glory of God. And of course, whenever this happens, my hand is quick to go up into the air to say, remember that it is his name who's to be glorified, that it is in the name of Jesus that it is Yeshua who heals. We are simple disciples of our Messiah who's been entrusted with the Holy Spirit. But we are of dust, and to dust we will return. It is only by his promised resurrection that we can have a glorified body, that we can, who have any glory or holiness at all. So let us not allow men to give us glory. Another example I can give you is I attended a fellowship years ago and prayed for a man's hand. Immediately there was no change. It didn't seem like he was getting healed based off what the eye can see. But he went home and he had a tingling, a feeling that was strange in his hand and wrist. And the next day he realized that he was healed. I was long gone. But years later, I visited again, and I have actually long forgotten about praying for this man. But he came up to me saying, peter, I need to tell you I got healed the next day. Thank you for your prayer. I want to submit to you that healing comes in different ways. Sometimes it comes instantaneously, as with that lady. Sometimes it comes the next day, sometimes it comes the next month. Sometimes it is God's will for us to go to a doctor and receive his hand of empowerment through the hands of a doctor that he has entrusted that with. We all have different journeys. People have different journeys, and he desires to walk different journeys. He could have given Israel the Promised Land immediately just as they came out of Egypt, but He put them on a journey through the wilderness, and that was their journey towards healing and promise. So let us not despise the wilderness. Let us ask God, what do you want me to learn in this season? Help me to trust you even when I don't see what I want to see right now. A few months ago, I was at a conference, ministering, and there were a table of elderly women and a gentleman, and they had many different issues. And they asked me to come and pray for them, but they confessed. Look, we're old. You know, this is what happens when you get old, you know, and this is something that all of us could think right. When you get old, pains come, sickness comes. The gentleman professed how he was in a car accident 15, 20 years ago and has an injury in his legs or foot. And the lady has pain in her hands. The other lady has shoulder and neck pain. And I'm immediately confronted with this thought of, yeah, they're old. So what would Yeshua do with that thought? Would he say, yeah, this person's old? Oh, well, no. So I quickly put aside that thought. See, whenever we have a thought that is of the flesh, the carnal mind, which is at enmity with the spirit of God and which will tell us it will not happen for this or that reason, or you're gonna look like a fool. Fool. Or, you know, it's always concerned with the things of this world and the flesh. We have to put those thoughts aside. And even when we have had them, we simply ignore them. Because just having a thought does not mean that it has put this person's healing in jeopardy as long as we do not allow it to rule our heart. And so I put it aside, and I lay hands in trust and in faith. Father, I thank youk for making his legs free of pain. Now, okay, sir, please stand up and feel. And he says, there is nothing anymore. The lady says, please pray for my hands. I pray for her hands, she says. And just as she is about to speak, there is a tarp that is over the. Over this. This hole that we are in. And a wind comes out of Nowhere into this place and blows this tarp off of the roof of this place that we are having the conference in. And she has a massive fright. We have all the fright. We're all. We're all looking up. We're all, what's going on? Right? And as we realized what had happened, that it was a wind, I asked her, what's going on? And she says, the pain is gone. And the Holy Spirit had come to make her free. And the other lady, I prayed for her back as well. And the Father heals her, all three of them, in that moment. And then about 20 minutes later, I'm called by another lady, and she asked me to pray for her eyes. And I do the same. And she does not get healed in that moment. And see, this is what I want you to understand, that God can heal people. Boom, boom, boom. Amazing. Praise God. And then there's someone that doesn't get healed in that way. And that doesn't mean that there's something wrong with that person's faith. Sometimes it's the journey that the Father is walking. And sometimes God wants to demonstrate to someone who may not have had great faith of how he loves them regardless and still heals them, even regardless of their struggling faith. There's a myriad of reasons of why healing can or does not common. And we should be careful to not let the enemy get a foothold, to let the enemy come in with lies if you're not worthy of lies, if it's because of your sin, as he attempted to do with Job. And sometimes when we suffer and struggle in this life, we can not see in the moment why, but in the end, we will praise him for it. We will praise him for it. What do we do when we pray for someone and they don't get healed? Recognize that God has a journey that he is walking with them. Recognize that your healing prayer is often the beginning or an important step of that journey that God has with them. Don't just chase the final results of the healing, but appreciate also watering the plant as much as the bloom. Appreciate the moment that you have with them. Encourage them through further ministry. Allow this to open a deeper conversation for ministering to them in their trials and their worries and their struggles. Love them. Lean on other spiritual gifts in that moment, like words of knowledge for the Father to speak to them. Be careful at grasping for straws, for excuses and reasons as to why this healing hasn't come when you aren't absolutely sure why. Be careful of hurting people because of that and giving them ill advice. But as for now, I want to give you some more practical tips when it comes to praying for people to be healed. Number one, remember the authority of Yeshua, and then recognize the authority given to believers as seen in Mark 16:17. And these signs will accompany those who believe in my name. They will cast out demons, speak in new tongues, they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover, put off the flesh. Romans 8:6 tells us to set the mind on the flesh's death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, and it doesn't submit to God's law. Indeed it cannot. When we submit our mind on the flesh, the Spirit of God is not going to move. We must set our mind on the things of the Word and the Spirit. Rest in his compassion. Walk out compassion, love people, and let the Spirit move through you as living waters. Number four, rest in his perfect will and timing. And number five, have faith. As Hebrews 11:1 tells us now, faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. Faith is when we are convicted of something that will happen even before we see it with our eyes, in the natural. Faith manifests in what we believe and in our action, not in what we feel. Do not be led by your feelings, and do not let your feelings rule your faith. Unbelief affects us, and it can affect whether God heals people. Although, of course, unbelief is not the only reason someone may not get healed. We see an example of unbelief in the town of Nazareth in Matthew 13:58, where it's written that Jesus did not do many mighty works there because of their unbelief. We also see the demon that the disciples were unable to cast out in Matthew 17:19. And when they asked Jesus why they could not cast him out, he replied and said, it's because of your unbelief. For I say to you, if you have the faith as a grain of a mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, remove hence and yonder place, and it shall remove, and nothing shall be impossible to you. However, this kind goes out not but by prayer and fasting. We must recognize that to grow in faith and to get rid of unbelief. Fasting and prayer is what Yeshua gives us as tools for doing so. Also recognize that in this example, Yeshua did not blame the person oppressed by demons for the fact that they could not get delivered. He blamed his disciples and their unbelief. Let us as the one praying, take responsibility and accountability and not just blame other people when we need to also look to ourselves instead of making excuses. Recognize could it be that I have unbelief? But notice that even in their unbelief, Jesus had mercy and love and stepped in for them and he overruled their unbelief, still healing the person who was oppressed by demons. We also see in Mark 9:24 how the one father cried out to Yeshua with tears, saying, lord, I believe, but help my unbelief. And even in his frustration feeling unbelief, Yeshua had mercy and still overruled it. Healing the Son so whose faith then matters? When we pray for healing, we see in these examples that it is our faith and that the one who is six faith can have an effect. And also those around like the man whose friends brought him through the roof, lowering him to be healed. Their faith was seen by Christ and He had mercy and healed the person. I have also found myself praying for people who have no belief, like atheists. One case many years ago when I was still studying at university, there was an atheist with a brace and I asked, can I pray for him? And as he walked with his crutches he said, well, why would you? I don't believe. And I said, well, it's okay, you don't have to believe, but I do. And as I laid my hands on him, the Father had mercy on his unbelief and healed him right there. He was speechless. He couldn't understand why this had happened. But see, it was because the Father wanted to reach his heart and love him that this had occurred. And so recognize that even, and especially with those who do not know him, the Father wishes to demonstrate his healing power. Now let's look at some cautions and warnings relating to the gift of healing. First, I would like to give a caution to those who may be sick who are watching this teaching, even though this teaching is for those who are attempting to exercise the gift of healing. I would like to also tell those who are sick, regarding doctors and regarding hospitals. God's healing can come in many ways. God is not competing with doctors and hospitals. And God can and he does use doctors and hospitals to bring about healing to people's bodies. And he can do it also without the intervention of a doctor or a hospital. Think about it. The ability for the body to heal itself is truly miraculous. Humans have not been able to replicate this in anything that we have been able to build in this world. But yet God has done this because our bodies are given life by God every day as we breathe, he is giving us life. When it comes to doctors and hospitals and so on, they are merely assisting the body in that healing. So seeing a doctor is not a sin or a lack of faith, as long as your faith remains in God as your healer, recognizing that ultimately God is my healer. Even when I go to a doctor, God is my healer. Because without God's power giving life to your body, you have no life in you in the first place. Romans 8:11. If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit who dwells in you. God has a will regarding these things. His will may be for you to be miraculously healed instantaneously on the streets of Mossel Bay, South Africa. Or he may have you be healed a month after someone prayed for you miraculously overnight. Or he may have you go to a doctor, get diagnosed, and have a surgery. All things, however, needs to be brought before his feet, asking him and trusting in him for his ways to be established. And then let his ways be established. But do not be one who says, well, God has to heal me on my terms or not at all. It is his way, it is his terms, it is how he wants to do it. That is how his healings will be established. So we must submit ourselves to his will. Secondly, as warnings to those who are pursuing the gift of healing or praying for healing, beware of the idea of the prosperity Gospel. We must be a generation that condemns the manipulations of the past. Those who have come to say, if you give, you will be blessed, you will be healed. When we look at the Pool of Siloam, we actually see a case of the Prosperity Gospel even there in John 5. 7, where the sick man answered Jesus saying, sir, I have no one to put me in the pool when the water is stirred. And while I am going another steps down before me, Jesus said to him, get up, take up your bed and walk. This man sitting at the Pool of Siloam thought, as the world has been teaching him, that healing is a competition, that if I'm fast enough for God to get in the pool faster than everyone else, I'll get healed. If I give enough, more than anyone else, maybe I'll get healed. If I do enough, I'll get healed. But Jesus walks up to the man sitting at the pool who is the slowest, the least, the destitute, unable to get in the pool, and he says, be made well, and he is healed. He goes out of his way to go to the one who has nothing to give, and he gives him freedom. See, brothers and sisters, the kingdom of God is not evolution, the survival of the fittest. It is the kingdom of God. Let us speak against those who have come to proclaim a prosperity gospel, which is disgusting, which takes people away from God, and which confuses people. Next, let us also stand against the charging for ministry that has gone out. Yeshua said in Matthew 10:8 that when we are commissioned to heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, cause our demons, that we ought to do so as we have received, we have received without paying, and now we give these without pay. I want to read to you also of The Prophet, Micah 3:11, who warns against this the heads thereof judge for reward, and the priests thereof teach for hire, and the prophets thereof divine for money. Yet will they lean upon the Lord and say, is not the Lord among us? None evil can come upon us. Therefore Zion, for your sake be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house, of the high places of the forest. God takes it so seriously when ministry is charged for that he said that he will plow Jerusalem as a field. See, brothers and sisters, it is important for us to recognize how serious God sees us. We see that the model that the kingdom of God is flourishing on is the one that the Messiah gave us, that of free will, offerings. As we read in 1 Timothy 5:17, Let the elders who rule well be considered worthy of double honor, especially those who labor in preaching and teaching. For the Scripture says, you shall not muzzle an ox when it treads out the grain, and the laborer deserves his wages. If we have been blessed by someone's ministry, by all means we should sow into that ministry. But we as ministers, you watching me, and everyone else, shall not teach for a price. And now, furthermore, if someone does get healed, God calls us to have integrity in our testimonies, that we truly verify that it all in fact happened in the way that we desire to testify. Allow the person to make sure that they have in fact been healed. And when you testify, when they testify, let there be no exaggeration regarding the healing. Let there be no falsification regarding the facts. There is no need for us to lie for God when we testify regarding his glory and his works. And when someone gets healed, let us always point to God. In every case. When the disciples were glorified for something that they did, they corrected the crowds, saying, do not think that it is by our holiness or our power. It is by God. And on the other hand, if someone does not get healed, it's important for us to fight any thoughts of rejection that they may face. We must be sure that they don't feel like there's something wrong with them, that they are unworthy of God, or that he doesn't love them, that he rejects them because they didn't get healed the way that someone else got healed. And I have found this especially true for our youth. We must reinforce God's compassion and love for them. That God's will is not rejection of a child, but redemption and healing in his timing. And also be reminded, please, that God would not ask us to pray for the sick if that was going to harm his kingdom. As long as we do so orderly in love, compassion, they will experience our love and we will build his kingdom. Beware also the race of results. Someone not getting healed is never a good excuse for us to stop exercising the gift of healing. It's going to be difficult at times, but it's also going to be glorious. As long as we remember the purpose of the gift is to glorify his name. And if we do so according to his will and timing, we will not break when it doesn't come about according to our will and timing, for we trust Him. As we start concluding, I want to remind you that we are in a battle for souls. And this battle is worth, is worth going forth in boldness to lay hands on the sick to see them recover. It is worth it even when we lay our hands on the sick and they didn't recover in the timings that we thought they should. Remember that all people who are in him will one day be healed in the resurrection as they receive a glorified body. But as for today, he is giving us the kingdom, putting it within us so the Holy Spirit can manifest and give them a taste of that kingdom of glory and power and freedom, even this day, so they can put their faith in him in order to receive that glorified body and to be resurrected in the last day. Let your light shine before men, and let your light never be overcome by the doubts, by the words of the unbelievers, by the doubts of your own flesh as you go out to lay your hands on the sick. I would love to pray for you, Father. I ask for everyone who is listening today that you would pour out your spirit upon all flesh, that you would give them your eyes to see your discernment, your wisdom and your understanding. And that you would give them your boldness to go out and step out and lay hands on the sick to see them recover and even when they do not see it, that they would continue to lay hands on the sick. They would not walk by sight, but by faith. Not by what the world says or what their eyes tell them they see, but by the faith of that which they do not yet see. Faith in the word of God which cause us to believe for what men call impossible. Father, I thank you that you are the one who guides the body. Help us to be accountable to one another. Help us to walk this gift out in order. Father, I thank you that you have entrusted us with your spirit. Help us to walk in it. I pray this in the name of Yeshua. Amen. Thank you for joining me in this series. Subscribe to this channel for more just like this and consider partnering with the ministry to help us continue equipping the Body of Christ with the spiritual gifts. We'll see you in the next one. Shalom Sa.