The Nine Gifts of the Spirit -- part 9
The Gifts of Healing
Along with the spiritual gift of faith we often see the other two “power gifts” operating at the same time. Today we will look at the “power gift” called gifts of healing. This gift is exercised supernaturally when diseased and infirmed people are healed without natural means.
Jesus operated in the gift of healing all the time. Matthew 4: 23 (NKJV) tells us that 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.”
The leper was healed in Matthew 8: 3 (NKJV). “Then Jesus put out His hand and touched him, saying ‘I am willing; be cleansed.’ Immediately his leprosy was cleansed.”
When Jesus healed a man with a withered hand in chapter twelve of the book of Matthew, He stirred up religious controversy with this particular spiritual gift.
Matthew 12: 10-14 (NKJV)
10 And behold, there was a man who had a withered hand. And they asked Him, saying, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?” -- that they might accuse Him.
11 Then He said to them, “What man is there among you who has one sheep, and if it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will not lay hold of it and lift it out? 12 Of how much more value then is a man than a sheep? Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.”
13 Then He said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” And he stretched it out, and it was restored as whole as the other. 14 Then the Pharisees went out and plotted against Him, how they might destroy Him.
Another example of the spiritual gifts of healing in operation is found in Matthew 21: 14 (NKJV). “Then the blind and the lame came to Him in the temple, and He healed them.”
Mothers of Nations, in reading about all these healings that Jesus performed we are also reminded by the Lord that we are to perform what He did and even more!
John 14: 12-14
12 Most assuredly, I say to you, he who believes in Me, the works that I do he will do also; and greater works than these he will do, because I go to My Father.
13 And whatever you ask in My name, that I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 If you ask anything in My name, I will do it.
Once while I was ministering in India, I was taken to the home of a man who was lying on a cot. He had just recently suffered a stroke. He was asleep so we prayed for him and left. I told the wife of this man to ask him to do something he could not do beforehand when he awoke. The man moved his paralyzed arm and was healed. The whole village heard the story and a new church was birthed out of this one healing!
Another time I prayed for a lady who was deaf and dumb. As we finished praying with her, she was then able to say the word, “Jesus.” Numerous times people have testified of healings after the laying on of hands or praying for them from the microphone in a large meeting.
There are multiple ways to be healed, yet all of these avenues of healing are still spiritual gifts to us. These include personal prayer, the laying on of hands, the command of faith, the spoken word, anointing cloths, and acts of faith such as Naaman dipping in the water seven times. “So he went down and dipped seven times in the Jordan, according to the saying of the man of God; and his flesh was restored like the flesh of a little child, and he was clean.” (2 Kings 5: 14 NKJV)
Mothers of Nations, Jesus still heals today! May we fervently believe that gifts of healing will flow as we are willing to be used by God to pray for those in need.
Dr. Sharon Predovich
