Sunday, January 31, 2016

Pleasing God Part 3

Pleasing God
        Part 3
Gtcotr/ss013116

Proverbs 16:7  When a man’s ways please the LORD, He makes even his enemies to be at peace with him.

The last few Sundays we have been talking about pleasing God. If I could leave my family and friends with only one key with which to unlock the doors to success in this life and for eternity, it would simply be to “Please God”.
·        I believe if I please God that He will bless me, my children and their families and introduce Himself to them for generations to come.
·        I believe if I please God that my friends will see the life I live and the blessings I enjoy and they will want to know this God I serve.
·        I believe if I please God that He will make even my enemies to be at peace with me.
·        Those who were water baptized today pleased God … they made God happy. They were water baptized because they believe in Jesus.

Which of us would buy a previously used vessel made of clay and use it to prepare and serve food to our family without first washing it in water? Washing it won’t make it yours … but it will make it clean and ready for use. That’s another picture of water baptism.

Our lesson today continues to follow the baptism theme.

1 Corinthians 10
1  I don’t want you to forget, dear brothers and sisters, about our ancestors in the wilderness long ago. All of them were guided by a cloud that moved ahead of them, and all of them walked through the sea on dry ground.
2  In the cloud and in the sea, all of them were baptized as followers of Moses.
3  All of them ate the same spiritual food,
4  and all of them drank the same spiritual water. For they drank from the spiritual rock that traveled with them, and that rock was Christ.
5  Yet God was not pleased with most of them, and their bodies were scattered in the wilderness.

There are 5 reasons listed in the verses that follow this passage. Allow me to summarize the reasons why God can be unhappy with His Children who have been delivered from bondage, water baptized, spirit baptized and in daily communion with Him.
1.   Lusts - Craving for evil things
2.   Idolatry – Worship of and trust in things other than God
3.   Immorality – Sexual pursuits which go against the Word of God
4.   Pride – Arrogantly challenging the Word of God – (Testy Attitudes)
5.   Grumbling about God – Complaint oriented individuals

God wasn’t pleased with them because they weren’t pleased with God. These people wanted a different God – or they wanted God to be different. They wanted to have an almighty God but they didn’t want almighty God to have them. They simply wanted what they wanted and they refused to be happy with anything but what they wanted. Spoiled brats … children of God … but spoiled children … not all of them … but most of them!

So the Apostle Paul continues to encourage us to please God by saying:

1 Corinthians 10
12  If you think you are standing strong, be careful not to fall.
13  The temptations in your life are no different from what others experience. And God is faithful. He will not allow the temptation to be more than you can stand. When you are tempted, he will show you a way out so that you can endure.


God is faithful. God so loved the world that He gave His only Son for our sins. That’s right … God has a Son; His name is Jesus; He is the Messiah and Savior of the world. I have made every objective study and this is the truth. Jesus of Nazareth was born of a virgin; lived a sinless life; died a sacrificial death; was buried in a tomb; was resurrected to life after three days victorious over sin, death, hell and the grave; appeared to more than 500 people; was received up into heaven; is seated at the right hand of God; and is coming again to gather all who believe on Him. Do you believe? It would make God eternally happy to know you believe!

Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Healing The Reason He Came Part 3 – What Is The Truth?

Healing
        The Reason He Came
        Part 3 – What Is The Truth?
Gtcotr/ws012716

John 14:6  I am the Way, the Truth and the Life, no man comes to the Father but by Me.

Jesus is the Truth and He came from heaven to earth so that mankind could see, hear, know and follow the Truth.
·        See the Truth
·        Hear the Truth
·        Understand the Truth
·        Follow the Truth

Because … if any person knows and follows the Truth they will be set free from:
1.   Eternal Death
2.   The Hell of this Life

There is a strong and solid thread of truth running throughout the whole Bible. Moses declared it; Isaiah said it more than once; Jeremiah declared this truth; so did Ezekiel; and Matthew; Mark; the Apostle Paul and the beloved physician, Luke. Jesus said it this way:

Matthew 13:15  For the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, And their eyes they have closed, Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, So that I should heal them.’
  
·        See the Truth
·        Hear the Truth
·        Understand the Truth
·        Follow the Truth

The devil, who is the prince of the darkness of this world, tries his best to hide the truth from our eyes; argue the truth in our ears; confuse the truth in our minds; and distract us from following the truth.

Luke 6
17  And He came down with them and stood on a level place with a crowd of His disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea and Jerusalem, and from the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear Him and be healed of their diseases,
18  as well as those who were tormented with unclean spirits. And they were healed.
19  And the whole multitude sought to touch Him, for power went out from Him and healed them all.

Sad to say not everyone who hears the truth believes the truth. Not everyone believed Jesus was telling the truth.

Matthew 13:58  Now He did not do many mighty works there because of their unbelief.

Mark 6:5  Now He could do no mighty work there, except that He laid His hands on a few sick people and healed them.

Jesus came to reveal the will of God. It had always been God’s will to include healing as a part of the benefits and blessings which belonged to God’s children.

What Is The Truth?

Hebrews 13:8  Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Malachi 3:6  "For I am the LORD, I do not change …”

Psalms 89:34  My covenant I will not break, Nor alter the word that has gone out of My lips.

Numbers 23:19  "God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?”

Exodus 15:26 "If you diligently heed the voice of the LORD your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the LORD who heals you."

Exodus 23:25  "So you shall serve the LORD your God, and He will bless your bread and your water. And I will take sickness away from the midst of you.”

Deuteronomy 7
9   Therefore know that the LORD your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments;
14  You shall be blessed above all peoples; there shall not be a male or female barren among you or among your livestock.
15  And the LORD will take away from you all sickness, and will afflict you with none of the terrible diseases of Egypt which you have known, but will lay them on all those who hate you.”

Psalms 103
2  Bless the LORD, O my soul, And forget not all His benefits:
3  Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases,

Psalms 107:20 He sent his word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions.

Jesus came to save us from an eternity in hell and from the hell of this life. Sickness and disease is straight from the pit of hell and Jesus took our infirmities and sicknesses, pain and sorrows to the cross and then to the grave. Divine healing is a forever settled truth and no sickness has a right to claim the health of a child of God.

Isaiah 53
4  Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted.
5  But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed.

The Reason He Came …

1 Peter 2:24  who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness — by whose stripes you were healed.

The Eternal Curse of Man
·        Hell and Eternal Damnation

The Temporal Curse of Man
·        Sickness; Pain; Worry; Fear; Poverty; Shame

Jesus cared so much for both the Temporary Needs of man and the Eternal Needs of man that He not only died for our eternal sins but He also suffered for our temporal needs.

Both the Eternal Salvation of our Soul and the Temporal Healing of our Body takes our Faith in God to be remedied. 
·        Faith as a Force – active and dynamic – a powerful offensive weapon
·        Faith as a Shield – steadfast and unmovable – a strong defense

Ephesians 6:16  above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.

Faith is both a force and a field. I believe faith is best used as a shield against sickness and disease as we live a righteous and holy life in accordance with the scriptures and make our professions of faith to cover us as a shield. I think it is better to keep the enemy from getting to us than to deal with the problems afterwards. In many cases Faith works better as a shield than it does as a pair of tweezers … however … faith has the power to do both.

Anyone will tell you that preventive medicine is the best approach to living a long and healthy life. Doctors recommend we take flu shots, exercise, eat right, get vaccinations, visit the dentist regularly, get yearly blood tests, after certain ages have other screenings and procedures just to help insure we won’t get sick or that in hopes we can take the advantage against any problems which might want to attack our health and rob us of time, energy, money and perhaps life.

I stand behind the preventive approach to health not only from a medical standpoint but from a spiritual standpoint as well. I believe it is important to take our daily God’s-pills (Gospel) and have our regular Spiritual Checkups to insure we are not leaving ourselves open to some of the enemies who want to rob us of time, energy, money or life.

We can use our faith in the Word and Will of God to fight against sickness, infirmity, disease as well as other curses, to appropriate healing for ourselves and others. We fight the good fight of faith. (Divine Healing)

As well, we can use our faith in the Finished Work of Jesus as a shield to stand against these same curses to keep them unable to successfully attack. (Divine Health)

In both cases we fight the good fight of faith or stand in faith from a position of Divine Justice. The fact that Jesus paid the price for our healing and health, both now and forever, is settled. Sickness has no more legal claim on the Believer. We have an all knowing Judge, (God); an all powerful Advocate, (Jesus); a great cloud of witnesses, (Patriarchs & Saints both in Heaven and Earth); a final decree, (The Word); innumerable enforcers, (Holy Angels); and someone to comfort us, teach us and guide us through the process who will never leave us nor forsake us and who has unlimited resources at His disposal, (The Holy Spirit). I’d say we ultimately win on every case and each appeal. On top of all of that we are right and the devil is wrong and we are all family and the devil is a known liar and thief.

Divine Justice demands our appeal be heard, the evidence be weighed and the case settled in favor of Pardoned Believer.  What can we do to participate in our miracle?

James 5
14  Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.
15  And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.
16  Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.

There are also some other things we can do that agree both with the Word of God and the medical practice to help prevent sickness and also help us to recover from attacks as well.
·        A Merry Heart (does good like a medicine)
·        Stressful Relationships (contention and continual drops of water)
·        Wounded Spirit (dries up the bones)
·        Bitterness and Unforgiveness (Don’t forgive, won’t be forgiven)
·        Unrepentant (stiff-necked; stubborn; rebellious)
·        Anger (does not work the righteousness of God)
·        Take no pleasure in the infirmities of your enemies
·        Critical spirit; Judging  (Judge not … with the same measure …)
·        Sowing and Reaping (When Job prayed for his friends …)

This sets us up for Our Next Topic in this Healing Series …
        The Power of Confession

Saturday, January 23, 2016

Critical Decisions

gtcotr/ss012416

Share Linda’s testimony about her pet cow … She said, “If you die it’s going to be because I killed you trying to help you, it won’t be because I stood around doing nothing and just watched you lay there and die.”

Tell the story of:
·        King Jehoram, King of the ten northern tribes of Israel;
·        King Benhadad of Syria
·        The Siege of Samaria in 890BC during the time of Elisha the Prophet
·        and 4 Leprous Men who were greatly used by God

2 Kings 7:3  And there were four leprous men at the entering in of the gate: and they said one to another, “Why sit we here ‘til we die?”

At times the only decision is the best decision.
·        The 4 Leprous Men made the only sane decision they had
·        Critical times call for bold decisions
·        While people are waiting on a move of God … God is waiting on a move of people!

In the case of the leprous men, one man’s simple logic prevailed, as it often does. God is not opposed to reason and logic although He is superior to our reason and logic. When it is time to do something and you don’t have a word from God - do something! God directs our steps - so take one!

1 Kings 18:21  And Elijah came to all the people, and said, "How long will you falter between two opinions? If the LORD is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him." But the people answered him not a word.

Joshua 24:15  "And if it seems evil to you to serve the LORD, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell. But as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD."


Today I am asking you to make a Critical Decision for you and your family.

Wednesday, January 20, 2016

Healing The Reason He Came Part 2

Healing
        The Reason He Came
        Part 2
Gtcotr/ws012016

Jesus came to:  
                Preach              Deliver

Why? Because the two things the devil has done to people is:
                Deceive             Imprison

Lies hold us captive – Truth sets us free …

What is happening in your life? Is it Jesus or the devil? Are you believing lies or the truth?
·        If you are imprisoned you are deceived and believing a lie of the devil.
·        If you have heard and believe the truth which is in Jesus, you have been delivered and are set free.

Neither money nor the lack thereof is going to determine my wealth
·        Luke 12:15  A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses.

Situations and circumstances aren’t going to limit my joy
·        Habakkuk 3
17  Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls:
18  Yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will joy in the God of my salvation.
19  The LORD God is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds’ feet, and he will make me to walk upon mine high places.

Pain will not determine my perspective
·        Job 2
9  Then his wife said to him, "Do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die!"
10  But he said to her, "You speak as one of the foolish women speaks. Shall we indeed accept good from God, and shall we not accept adversity?" In all this Job did not sin with his lips.

My peace is determined only by His presence
·        Philippians 4:7  and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

The lies of the devil imprison men and hold them captive in fear – the truth of God will set men free.

Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil:
·        1 John 3:8  … For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.

Jesus came to destroy the lies of the devil by proclaiming the truth and setting the captives free.

Part Two

Healing and Deliverance are miracles:
·        Purchased by God
·        Paid for with the blood of His Only Son
·        Given to the Children of God
·        Received by faith

God requires us to participate in our miracles most often by faith and works.

Sometimes faith demands action … take Noah and Abraham for example …

Faith is a process
·        Hearing before healing
·        Believing before receiving

Luke 4
18  "The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, Because He has anointed Me To preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives And recovery of sight to the blind, To set at liberty those who are oppressed;
19  To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD."

Jesus came to tell and heal … It’s man’s job to believe and receive …

Matthew 4
23  And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people.

Matthew 9:35  Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.

What happens between hearing and healing? People get a chance to believe the truth and the truth will set them free!

Luke 6
17  And He came down with them and stood on a level place with a crowd of His disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea and Jerusalem, and from the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear Him and be healed of their diseases,
18  as well as those who were tormented with unclean spirits. And they were healed.
19  And the whole multitude sought to touch Him, for power went out from Him and healed them all.

Sad to say not everyone who hears the truth believes the truth. Not everyone believed Jesus was telling the truth.

Matthew 13:58  Now He did not do many mighty works there because of their unbelief.

Mark 6:5  Now He could do no mighty work there, except that He laid His hands on a few sick people and healed them.

Jesus came to reveal the will of God. It had always been God’s will to include healing as a part of the benefits and blessings which belonged to God’s children.

Hebrews 13:8  Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Malachi 3:6  "For I am the LORD, I do not change …”

Psalms 89:34  My covenant I will not break, Nor alter the word that has gone out of My lips.

Numbers 23:19  "God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?”

Exodus 15:26 "If you diligently heed the voice of the LORD your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the LORD who heals you."

Exodus 23:25  "So you shall serve the LORD your God, and He will bless your bread and your water. And I will take sickness away from the midst of you.”

Deuteronomy 7
9   Therefore know that the LORD your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments;
14  You shall be blessed above all peoples; there shall not be a male or female barren among you or among your livestock.
15  And the LORD will take away from you all sickness, and will afflict you with none of the terrible diseases of Egypt which you have known, but will lay them on all those who hate you.”

Psalms 103
2  Bless the LORD, O my soul, And forget not all His benefits:
3  Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases,

Psalms 107:20 He sent his word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions.

Jesus came to save us from an eternity in hell and from the hell of this life. Sickness and disease is straight from the pit of hell and Jesus took our infirmities and sicknesses, pain and sorrows to the cross and then to the grave. Divine healing is a forever settled truth and no sickness has a right to claim the health of a child of God.

Isaiah 53
4  Surely He has borne our griefs And carried our sorrows; Yet we esteemed Him stricken, Smitten by God, and afflicted.
5  But He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; The chastisement for our peace was upon Him, And by His stripes we are healed.

The Reason He Came …

1 Peter 2:24  who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness — by whose stripes you were healed.

The Eternal Curse of Man
·        Hell and Eternal Damnation

The Temporal Curse of Man
·        Sickness; Pain; Worry; Fear; Poverty; Shame

Jesus cared so much for both the Temporary Needs of man and the Eternal Needs of man that He not only died for our eternal sins but He also suffered for our temporal needs.

Both the Eternal Salvation of our Soul and the Temporal Healing of our Body takes our Faith in God to be remedied.  
·        Faith as a Force – active and dynamic – a powerful offensive weapon
·        Faith as a Shield – steadfast and unmovable – a strong defense

Ephesians 6:16  above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one.

Faith is both a force and a field. I believe faith is best used as a shield against sickness and disease as we live a righteous and holy life in accordance with the scriptures and make our professions of faith to cover us as a shield. I think it is better to keep the enemy from getting to us than to deal with the problems afterwards. In many cases Faith works better as a shield than it does as a pair of tweezers … however … faith has the power to do both.

Anyone will tell you that preventive medicine is the best approach to living a long and healthy life. Doctors recommend we take flu shots, exercise, eat right, get vaccinations, visit the dentist regularly, get yearly blood tests, after certain ages have other screenings and procedures just to help insure we won’t get sick or that in hopes we can take the advantage against any problems which might want to attack our health and rob us of time, energy, money and perhaps life.

I stand behind the preventive approach to health not only from a medical standpoint but from a spiritual standpoint as well. I believe it is important to take our daily God’s-pills (Gospel) and have our regular Spiritual Checkups to insure we are not leaving ourselves open to some of the enemies who want to rob us of time, energy, money or life.

We can use our faith in the Word and Will of God to fight against sickness, infirmity, disease as well as other curses, to appropriate healing for ourselves and others. We fight the good fight of faith. (Divine Healing)

As well, we can use our faith in the Finished Work of Jesus as a shield to stand against these same curses to keep them unable to successfully attack. (Divine Health)

In both cases we fight the good fight of faith or stand in faith from a position of Divine Justice. The fact that Jesus paid the price for our healing and health, both now and forever, is settled. Sickness has no more legal claim on the Believer. We have an all knowing Judge, (God); an all powerful Advocate, (Jesus); a great cloud of witnesses, (Patriarchs & Saints both in Heaven and Earth); a final decree, (The Word); innumerable enforcers, (Holy Angels); and someone to comfort us, teach us and guide us through the process who will never leave us nor forsake us and who has unlimited resources at His disposal, (The Holy Spirit). I’d say we ultimately win on every case and each appeal. On top of all of that we are right and the devil is wrong and we are all family and the devil is a known liar and thief.

Divine Justice demands our appeal be heard, the evidence be weighed and the case settled in favor of Pardoned Believer.  What can we do to participate in our miracle?

James 5
14  Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.
15  And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.
16  Confess your trespasses to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.

There are also some other things we can do that agree both with the Word of God and the medical practice to help prevent sickness and also help us to recover from attacks as well.
·        A Merry Heart (does good like a medicine)
·        Stressful Relationships (contention and continual drops of water)
·        Wounded Spirit (dries up the bones)
·        Bitterness and Unforgiveness (Don’t forgive, won’t be forgiven)
·        Unrepentant (stiff-necked; stubborn; rebellious)
·        Anger (does not work the righteousness of God)
·        Take no pleasure in the infirmities of your enemies
·        Critical spirit; Judging  (Judge not … with the same measure …)
·        Sowing and Reaping (When Job prayed for his friends …)

This sets us up for Our Next Topic in this Healing Series …

        The Power of Confession

Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Healing The Reason He Came


Gtcotr/ws011316

Jesus came to:  
                Preach                      Heal
                Proclaim                    Deliver

Why?

Because the two things the devil has done to people is:
                Tell a lie                     Take people captive
                Deceive                     Imprison

Lies hold us captive – Truth sets us free …

What is happening in your life? Is it Jesus or the devil? Are you believing lies or the truth?
·        If you are imprisoned you are deceived and believing a lie of the devil.
·        If you have heard and believe the truth which is in Jesus, you have been delivered and are set free.

We can be free in Christ even when we are enslaved by other elements of life. Paul and Silas were the Lord’s freemen long before those prison doors opened and their chains fell off in Acts 16.

·        Neither money nor the lack thereof is going to determine my wealth
Luke 12:15  A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses.

·        Situations and circumstances aren’t going to limit my joy
Habakkuk 3
17  Although the fig tree shall not blossom, neither shall fruit be in the vines; the labour of the olive shall fail, and the fields shall yield no meat; the flock shall be cut off from the fold, and there shall be no herd in the stalls:
18  Yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will joy in the God of my salvation.
19  The LORD God is my strength, and he will make my feet like hinds’ feet, and he will make me to walk upon mine high places.

1 Peter 1:8  … Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.

·        Pain will not determine my perspective
Job 2
7  So Satan went out from the presence of the LORD, and struck Job with painful boils from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head.
8  And he took for himself a potsherd with which to scrape himself while he sat in the midst of the ashes.
9  Then his wife said to him, "Do you still hold fast to your integrity? Curse God and die!"
10  But he said to her, "You speak as one of the foolish women speaks. Shall we indeed accept good from God, and shall we not accept adversity?" In all this Job did not sin with his lips.

·        My peace is determined only by His presence
Philippians 4:7  and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.

The lies of the devil imprison men and hold them captive in fear – the truth of God will set men free. Freedom is decided by what we believe not by where we are or what we are going through.

1 Corinthians 7:22  For he who is called in the Lord while a slave is the Lord’s freedman. Likewise he who is called while free is Christ’s slave.

The desire of the devil is to deceive us. It was in the beginning with Eve – the devil deceived her and made her think she was not what she could be or that she was relegated to some second class existence.

Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil:

1 John 3:8  … For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil.

Jesus came to destroy the lies of the devil by proclaiming the truth and thereby setting the captives free.

Faith is a process of:
·        Hearing before healing
·        Believing before receiving

Luke 4
18  "The Spirit of the LORD is upon Me, Because He has anointed Me To preach the gospel to the poor; He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted, To proclaim liberty to the captives And recovery of sight to the blind, To set at liberty those who are oppressed;
19  To proclaim the acceptable year of the LORD."

Jesus came to tell and heal … It’s man’s job to believe and receive …

Matthew 4
23  And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of sickness and all kinds of disease among the people.

Matthew 9:35  Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.

What happens between hearing and healing? People get a chance to believe the truth and the truth will set them free!

Luke 6
17  And He came down with them and stood on a level place with a crowd of His disciples and a great multitude of people from all Judea and Jerusalem, and from the seacoast of Tyre and Sidon, who came to hear Him and be healed of their diseases,
18  as well as those who were tormented with unclean spirits. And they were healed.
19  And the whole multitude sought to touch Him, for power went out from Him and healed them all.

Sad to say not everyone who hears the truth believes the truth. Not everyone believed Jesus was telling the truth.

Matthew 13:58  Now He did not do many mighty works there because of their unbelief.

Mark 6:5  Now He could do no mighty work there, except that He laid His hands on a few sick people and healed them.

Jesus came to reveal the will of God. It had always been God’s will to include healing as a part of the benefits and blessings which belonged to God’s children.

Hebrews 13:8  Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Malachi 3:6  "For I am the LORD, I do not change …”

Psalms 89:34  My covenant I will not break, Nor alter the word that has gone out of My lips.

Numbers 23:19  "God is not a man, that He should lie, Nor a son of man, that He should repent. Has He said, and will He not do? Or has He spoken, and will He not make it good?”

Exodus 15:26 "If you diligently heed the voice of the LORD your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the LORD who heals you."

Exodus 23:25  "So you shall serve the LORD your God, and He will bless your bread and your water. And I will take sickness away from the midst of you.”

Deuteronomy 7
9   Therefore know that the LORD your God, He is God, the faithful God who keeps covenant and mercy for a thousand generations with those who love Him and keep His commandments;
14  You shall be blessed above all peoples; there shall not be a male or female barren among you or among your livestock.
15  And the LORD will take away from you all sickness, and will afflict you with none of the terrible diseases of Egypt which you have known, but will lay them on all those who hate you.”

Psalms 103
2  Bless the LORD, O my soul, And forget not all His benefits:
3  Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases,

Psalms 107:20 He sent his word, and healed them, and delivered them from their destructions.

Isaiah 53:4&5
1 Peter 2:24
James 5:14-16

Jesus came to save us from an eternity in hell and from the hell of this life. Sickness and disease is straight from the pit of hell and Jesus took our infirmities and sicknesses, pain and sorrows to the cross and then to the grave. Divine healing is a forever settled truth and no sickness has a right to claim the health of a child of God.

Brenda recently relayed to me a story she heard about a man who came into the living room to find his young daughter playing on the couch with a friend. When he walked past the girls he heard a strange sound underneath the couch. Upon investigation and much to his surprise he found that a rattlesnake had somehow decided to occupy that place in his house.


The man said that he never once wondered if the rattlesnake had a right to be there or if it was there to teach his daughter some lesson or if he should ignore it and hope it went away or that perhaps it was the will of God that his little girl get snake bitten or that for some reason this snake had a right to stay … he knew it was an enemy of all that was good and acted immediately to thwart any attempt or desire that snake to remain in his house. He was willing to do whatever it took to deny that snake rights to anything or anyplace in this house or power over his family.