A Testimony Of Healing

In Matthew 8:1-17, we read the accounts of the healing power of Christ as He heals the leper, the Centurion’s servant, Peter’s mother-in-law, and the multitudes. Matthew 8:17 records the reason for these healings: Matthew8:17 (KJV) That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses.

The Lord Jesus Christ ministered healing through a number of different ways. He laid hands upon people and prayed for them calling upon the power of His father heal the sick; He spoke a word of faith and the word of healing sometimes in the sick persons presence, other times in their absence, sending it to them by the spirit of God; He rebuked infirmities and diseases and the devil thereby bringing in the supernatural; people were healed by touching Jesus or His clothing; and many times He said, “Thy faith had made thee whole.”

The Scripture also says that He healed people for a number of reasons: so they would have understanding, so that their will would have a bent to the will of God instead of its own selfish will. Jesus healed the affections, mind, and the body.

Healing is for today.

Malachi 3:6 (KJV) For I am the LORD, I change not. God always was the healer. He is the healer still and will ever remain the healer.

Hebrews 13:8 (KJV) Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.  Christ has come to heal, not just yesterday, but today and forever. There are many promises of healing in the Word of God that we must preach, teach, and believe because the Bible states it.

Steps to receiving healing

1.​We must believe that healing is ours

2.​We must have faith

3.​We are to ask for the anointing with oil

4.​We need to lay hands on the sick

5.​We must look to Jesus who is our healer

Faith and believing for healing can be hard at times, but God will work mightily if we will pray mightily.

It was in the late 1940’s.  I am not sure of the exact year.  There was a family with 4 boys and one girl.  The girl was in the middle.  I mean smack dab in the middle.  There were two older boys, then the girl, and then two younger boys.  The girl was the princess being the only girl in the family.

And then as a teenager, she got sick.  She saw the doctor.  Doctor she has afever, severe headache, stiff neck and back, and deep muscle pain. Her leg muscles are especially weak. The doctor tested her muscle reflexes and found muscle weakness, abnormal muscle contractions, and decreased muscle tone.

Things got worse in a hurry.  She started talking so as to be barely heard.  There were long pauses in her sentences as she tried to breathe and talk only as she exhaled her breath.  The muscle groups in her chest began to be paralyzed.  

Mr. and Mrs. Hobart, your daughter has polio.  Her only chance is to get her by ambulance to a hospital with an iron lung.  The iron lung will be waiting.  The iron lung was a tank respirator that could maintain respiration artificially until a person could breathe independently, usually after one or two weeks. The machine was powered by an electric motor with two vacuum cleaners. The pump changed the pressure inside a rectangular, airtight metal box, pulling air in and out of the lungs.  Inside the tank respirator, the patient lay on a bed (sometimes called a “cookie tray”) that could slide in and out of the cylinder as needed. The side of the tank had portal windows so attendants could reach in and adjust limbs, sheets, or hot packs.

But Mr. and Mrs. Hobart, the iron lung may not do any good. People in the acute, early stage of polio who are unable to breathe when the virus’s action paralyzes muscle groups in the chest…let’s just say that death is frequent at this stage.  And even if by some miracle she lives, she will never be able to walk again.

But the Hobarts were people who knew how to get a hold of God.  They believed in divine healing. Their little Assembly of God Church in Whitehall, WI was praying.

And on the way to the hospital, in the ambulance, that teenage girl was healed.  She asked for her daddy. She never needed the iron lung.  She never had trouble walking, walking without so much of a limp.  God had healed her completely.

You know, I shouldn’t be here today because that teenage girl, was my mother…Hazel Hobart. You better believe that I believe in divine healing. Nobody can tell me that Jesus doesn’t heal. He is the great physician.  He is Jehovah Rapha, the Lord, the Healer.

As the song says,

I am the Lord that health thee,

I am the Lord your healer.

I sent my word, and healed your disease

I am the Lord your healer.

So rise and be healed, in the Name of Jesus,

Let faith arise in your soul.

Rise and be healed in the Name of Jesus,

He will cleanse you and make you whole.