Miracles of Healing

Reblogged from Blogos.com 

 By Steve Webb

I have been active in church ministry of various kinds for many years and have a Master of Divinity degree. I say this because I want to explain that even though I have a good theology background, there are different views among Bible-believing Christians as to God's miraculous work in the world today, and I cannot give each of these views justice. I will explain what I believe and I encourage you to seek the viewpoints of other knowledgeable Christians for comparison.

First of all, let me remind you that God is not equally active at all times in all places with respect to the outward working of miracles. As shown in the Bible, I believe that God most powerfully shows His miraculous hand at work during the historical times when there was important revelation being given. Specifically, these times were during the days of the Patriarchs, during the prophets (Elijah, Elisha, etc.), and during Jesus' ministry followed by the establishment of the church in Acts. Miracles were virtually absent at other times. The accompanying miracles during these three times were designed to provide God's clear affirmation to the revelation being given. That we may believe in this revelation was the main purpose of the miracles (John 10:38).

Outside of these periods of time, God continues to work His miraculous gifts, but less openly, and I believe, less frequently. As examples of this, you may be aware of statistical studies that show Christians, on average, live longer than nonbelievers, but not dramatically longer. The rather small lifespan discrepancy can be readily explained by healthier lifestyles (less smoking, drinking, lower stress, less AIDS, etc.) rather than God extending lifetimes via miraculous healing. 

In contrast, I would expect Christians to live considerably longer than nonbelievers if miracles were prominently involved. Similarly, surveys that have been done of hospital patients who have received prayer for healing versus those without prayer. These studies generally show a greater amount of healing for those who receive prayer, but only by a slim margin. Once again, I would expect there to be a huge difference rather than a small difference if miraculous healing was commonly occurring. ScienceDaily.org has an article that would be a good place to start for those who wish to dig further into the statistical side of this subject.

Somewhat similarly, people who are desperately seeking relief for themselves or loved ones from dire health problems are not stupid. If it became obvious that Christians, and only Christians, were receiving the gift of healing, then this would become openly acknowledged and would result in a nonstop flood of people seeking healing in a Christian venue. People will do most anything to avoid a medical death sentence and there is no doubt that they would go through whatever the church requested of them in order to achieve their healing.

There are very important implications to this. If God heals Christians, and only Christians, this is actually not a good thing. It is a terrible thing. It turns God into a tyrant instead of a loving Father. People no longer would have the free will to seek or not seek God. Pretty much everyone, however reluctantly, would be forced to come to God in order to receive His miraculous gifts. People would no longer be seeking God from an open heart, but rather seeking Him because they had no other choice in order to receive miraculous healing. This is not the God of the Bible who brings rain on both the just and unjust (Matthew 5:45). 

God wants people to seek Him from a humble heart, loving Him as their father, rather than because He will reward them with healing miracles. I encourage you to do a study sometime of the word "seek" in the Bible to see its importance. In the New American Standard Version the word "seek" (with its cognate forms) is used 452 times, mostly in connection with man seeking God. God wants people to voluntarily search for Him. He does not want to display the power of His hand. He could easily shake the foundations of the Earth and announce His presence from the heavens in a manner that would instantly knock everyone to their knees. That is not our God; that is not the God of the Bible. He does not work that way. He wants people to knock on the door and to seek so that it will be opened.

Miraculous healings are just common enough that we seek God; not so common we think we control Him.

Let me repeat that these thoughts are my own. I am not trying to speak for all Christians, many of whom disagree with me. In my opinion, the prominent faith healers of this generation are mainly hucksters who are either consciously or unconsciously deceiving people. I don't believe that they are doing significant healing. Have you ever seen someone healed who suffered from an arm or leg being chopped off? Or a quadriplegic having their limbs restored? Or Siamese twins being separated without surgery? Or a person born with a tragically deformed face having their face instantly healed? Most likely not. Is God too weak to do these kind of miracles? Of course not! He could heal all of these, and cases worse than these, in a microsecond. Instead you have heard mainly of headaches, arthritis, back pains, etc. "healed" that are known to commonly respond to psychosomatic suggestion similar to how placebos work. It is only because of our desperation to believe in such faith healers that they continue to draw their followers.

Having said these things, let me tell you in no uncertain terms that I continue to pray diligently for healing both for myself and for others, and likewise encourage others to do the same. I believe wholeheartedly in miracles. God does heal and He may be willing to answer your prayer in the positive. I just caution you to realize that this is not God's normal way of doing things in this generation for the reasons I have spelled out. Whether or not God answers our prayers the way we want, we must keep communication channels open with Him. He is our Father who loves us and knows our problems and weaknesses. 

But in the same way that God did not allow Jesus' request to "Let this cup pass from me" (Matthew 26:39) nor did He grant Paul's request to have a thorn in the flesh removed (2 Corinthians 12:7-10), likewise a request to avoid pain or death is not likely to be excused from us. This world is not our home. We have trials to go through. If we did not have these trials we might begin to mistake this life for our home. God may not spare us from pain and suffering, but He will be there walking with us just as He walked with Jesus. "Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me." And indeed He will be with us.

Miracle On Ice – Under Water 15 Minutes, No Pulse For 45 Minutes, Then Mom Started Praying…

Reblogged from http://theconservativetreehouse.com/ 

via http://servehiminthewaiting.com/

Posted on February 5, 2015 by sundance

 

A 14-year old St. Charles boy who spent 15 minutes under water after falling through the ice of Lake Ste. Louise has made a recovery no one can explain.
It’s a recovery so complete, our Kay Quinn spoke on-camera to young John Smith about his near-drowning, and his amazing story of survival.

Three 14-year-old boys fell through the ice on Martin Luther King Day.
When rescuers arrived, one was almost out of the water, another was holding onto the ice and one couldn’t be found.

Eighth grader John Smith is doing something doctors never believed would be possible.
“I don’t remember much about it to be honest, but I do remember the tubes,” says Smith.
He is walking and talking, here with his pastor Jason Noble by his side. And trying to make sense of how he’s not just alive, but thriving after being under water for 15 minutes.

“After listening to what the paramedics and doctors said I’m pretty surprised at the outcome,” says John.
[…] “In my mind this is a very grim, very poor chance of survival already,” says Dr. Sutterer of the moment John came in.

Dr. Sutterer and his team performed CPR on John for 27 minutes with no success. The question was raised: how long should they continue?
“He was dead for 45 minutes,” says Dr. Sutterer.
What happened next defies explanation. Dr. Sutterer called John’s mother into the room to give her the news.

“She started praying loudly,” says Dr. Sutterer.
“I don’t remember what all I said,” recalls John’s mother, Joyce Smith. “But I remember, ‘Holy God, please send your Holy Spirit to save my son. I want my son, please save him.’ And they hadn’t been getting a pulse at that time, so all of a sudden I heard them saying, ‘We got a pulse, we got a pulse.'”

“Within a matter of a minute or two, his heart started again,” says Dr. Sutterer.
It’s an experience that’s shaken many of those in the emergency room that day. This veteran of responding to medical crisis wrote a letter about it as a way to cope.
“His heart was jump started by the Holy Spirit listening to the request of his praying mother,” reads Dr. Sutterer, from the letter he wrote.

Dr. Jeremy Garrett who oversaw John’s recovery even goes a step further. “It’s a bonafide miracle.” (read more)

Baby pronounced dead, ‘came back to life’ 3 hours later on the altar of a hospital chapel

Posted on July 11, 2013 by shekinah419

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A baby girl pronounced dead at birth ‘came back to life’ three hours later on the altar of a hospital chapel, it was reported today. 

The body of Yasmin Gomes had been placed in a box and left in the chapel at the hospital in Londrina, south Brazil, by a nurse who ‘couldn’t face sending her to the morgue’, according to reports.

But when the newborn’s grieving grandmother arrived with a mortician to pick up her body for burial they were stunned when the baby suddenly kicked one of her legs, then opened her eyes.

Shocking: A baby girl pronounced dead at birth ‘came back to life’ three hours later on the altar of a hospital chapel, pictured

Relief: Yasmin’s father Cleverson Carlos Gomes, 26, said he received the news where he was waiting in the hospital’s corridor and went straight to the chapel

The baby’s grandmother Elza Silva told Brazil’s Globo G1 website: ‘At first I couldn’t believe it, we couldn’t accept that it could happen.

More…

• American mother and daughter, 6, ‘trapped’ in Brazil amid bitter custody battle expect to return to U.S. ‘soon’

‘Then we saw that she was breathing. We hugged each other and started to shout, ‘she’s alive, she’s alive’. It was a miracle.’
Hospital records show Yasmin was born alive after a normal birth on Tuesday morning at the Lincoln Graca hospital, but stopped breathing immediately after birth.

Doctors unsuccessfully tried to revive the baby several times but she was finally declared dead at 11am, and a death certificate issued.
Yasmin’s mother Jenifer da Silva Gomes, 22, told Brazils Tanosite website she was the first to be told that he daughter had died.

She recalled: ‘My world crashed down right then. It was the most desperate moment when all my dreams were snatched away.’ 

Nurse Ana Claudia Oliveira, who accompanied the birth, said she asked for the baby’s body to be laid in the hospital chapel, instead of the normal procedure of being sent to the refrigerated morgue.
She said: ‘She’s a little angel, a child. I just couldn’t face the thought of her being sent down to the morgue.’
She added that she washed and dressed the dead baby and had no doubt that she was dead.
She said: ‘I can assure you, the child was dead. Her pupils didn’t respond to light. All her signs pointed to the complete absence of life.

‘I saw it with my own eyes. She was blue all over, completely dead,’ she said.

Return home :Yasmin Gomes’ room which had been made ready for her birth. Her body had been placed in a box and left in the chapel at the hospital in Londrina, south Brazil, by a nurse who ‘couldn¿t face sending her to the morgue’, according to reports

Yasmin’s father Cleverson Carlos Gomes, 26, said he received the news where he was waiting in the hospital’s corridor and went straight to the chapel.
He said: ‘I saw my daughter’s pale, lifeless body. I couldn’t stay there. I ran out of the chapel in tears.’

Yasmin’s body remained in a box in the chapel until 2pm, when her grandmother arrived with the owner of a funeral parlour, family friend Rosilis Ferro, carrying the baby’s coffin.

But as soon as they went to pick her up, the newborn kicked a leg, according to Ms Ferro.

Doctor Aurelio Filipak, who battled to save Yasmin and signed her death certificate, said: ‘People can make their own conclusions, but only those who were there know what really happened’

She said: ‘It was an incredibly emotional moment. I began to shake and I couldn’t speak, I was overwhelmed with happiness.
‘I called a nurse who at first didn’t believe it, she told us they were just spasms. But then the baby opened her eyes.’

Mum Jennifer said she was still being comforted by family members when a nurse burst into the room and shouted: ‘Your daughter’s alive’.
She remembered: ‘At first I had no reaction, I didn’t know what to think. Then I started to be sick. But after that I couldn’t contain my happiness.’

The baby was rushed to an intensive care unit at the nearby Sagrada Familia children’s hospital, where her condition is described as stable.


Doctor Aurelio Filipak, who battled to save Yasmin and signed her death certificate, said: ‘People can make their own conclusions, but only those who were there know what really happened.

‘In 20 years of medicine, I have never witnessed anything like this.’
He said a team of medics tried to resussitate the baby for nearly an hour. ‘All the equipment, like the cardiac monitor and oximeter, all showed that she was not breathing and had no heart beat,’ he added.

Today Yasmin’s family said they plan to change her name to include Victoria – ‘victory’ in Portuguese – and said they believed her ‘ressurection’ was a miracle.
Jennifer said: ‘There is no explaining miracles. They happen as God wants. If it was his will that our daughter had died, we would have accepted it, but he brought her back, so there must be a higher purpose in all this.’

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2360068/Baby-girl-pronounced-dead-birth-comes-life-hours-later-left-hospital-chapel-s-altar.html#ixzz2Yk1JASqA
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