Ministry of Healing

NNEC Prayer RetreatOctober 2015

Overview• Our world is a vast lazar house, a scene of misery that we

dare not allow even our thoughts to dwell upon. Did we realize it as it is, the burden would be too terrible. Yet God feels it all. In order to destroy sin and its results He gave His best Beloved, and He has put it in our power, through co-operation with Him, to bring this scene of misery to an end. {Ed 263.2}

• "Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature" (Mark 16:15), is Christ's command to His followers. . . . all may be workers with Him in giving the "glad tidings" to their fellow men. To all, great or small, learned or ignorant, old or young, the command is given. {Ed 264.1}

Healed from what?Diagnosis?

• Is.1:5&6– Everyone’s head is sick,– and everyone’s heart faint. – From the sole of your foot to the top of your head

there is no soundness– only wounds and bruises and open sores, – not cleansed or bandaged or soothed with

ointment.

Healed from what?

• Jer.17:1 - sin is written with a pen of iron; With the point of a diamond it is engravedOn the tablet of (our) heart,

Healed from what?

• Damage – Wounds – Violation – Abuse – Manipulation – Injury – Guilt – Shame – Fear – Depression – Sadness – Discouragement – Failure – Pride – Insecurity – Etc.– Comission and Omission– Environmental and (Epi)genetic– Victims and Perpetrators– Individual and Corporate

Damaged Together & Heal Together

• The interests of the different classes of society are indissolubly united. We are all woven together in the great web of humanity, and we cannot, without loss, withdraw our sympathies from one another. {GW 331.2}

• We are all woven together in the web of humanity. The evil that befalls any part of the great human brotherhood brings peril to all. {MH 345.1}

Do we know our condition?

• Jer. 17:9 - The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?

• Rev.3:17 – you say, ‘I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing’—and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked

Biblical Terms for Healing• Salvation (soterios) – “salve”– SALVATION = HEALING

• Saved (sozo)• Justification = healing begun• Sanctification = healing in process• Glorification = healing completed• E.g. “being justified (healed) freely by His

grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus

Biblical Healing

• New Covenant = healing in relationship– I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their

hearts; Jer.31:31-33• Restoration– “the times of restoration (healing) of all things” Acts 3:21

• Reconciliation– Relational healing – with God/others– 2Cor. 5 – God committed to us ministry of reconciliation

(healing)• Freedom and Redemption

Biblical Healing

• Righteousness = Right-doing = Healthy Living– Living as a Healed person

• Righteousness by Faith & Justification by Faith = Healing by faith/trust (heart appreciation)

• E.g. Forgiveness:– “God’s forgiveness is not merely a judicial act by

which He sets us free from condemnation. It is not only forgiveness for sin, but reclaiming from sin. It is the outflow of redeeming love that transforms the heart. {Pr 298.1}

Biblical Metaphors for Healing

• Cleansing of the Sanctuary = Healing of the heart/mind – individually and corporately– Cleansing is Healing

• Investigative Judgment = Diagnosis to facilitate healing

• Latter Rain = Outpouring of truth/power to heal– E.g. “he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the

children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers” – Mal. 4:6

Biblical Words for Healing• Now a certain woman had a flow of blood for twelve years,

26 and had suffered many things from many physicians (iatros). She had spent all that she had and was no better, but rather grew worse. 27 When she heard about Jesus, she came behind Him in the crowd and touched His garment. 28 For she said, “If only I may touch His clothes, I shall be made well (sozo).”

• 29 Immediately the fountain of her blood was dried up, and she felt in her body that she was healed (iaomai) of the affliction. . . .

• 32 And He looked around to see her who had done this thing. 33 But the woman, fearing and trembling, knowing what had happened to her, came and fell down before Him and told Him the whole truth. 34 And He said to her, “Daughter, your faith has made you well (sozo). Go in peace, and be healed (hygies) of your affliction.”– Mark 5:25-34

Biblical Words for Healing

• Now a woman, having a flow of blood for twelve years, who had spent all her livelihood on physicians and could not be healed (therapeuō) by any,– Luke 8:43

Salvation is Healing• Matt.1:21 – “And she will bring forth a Son, and

you shall call His name JESUS, for He will sozo (save/heal) His people from their sins.”

• Lk 7 – Then He said to the woman, “Your faith has sozo (saved/healed) you. Go in peace.”

• Jn.3:17 – “For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be sozo (saved/healed).

• Rom.1:16 - For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto soterios (salvation/healing) to every one that believeth

Healed how?

• Heb.12:1 - let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us

• Heb.12:2 - looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of faith

• 2Cor.3:18 - we all, beholding the glory of the Lord, are transformed into the same image

• 1Jn.3:1 - Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us

• It is a law both of the intellectual and the spiritual nature, that by beholding, we become changed. The mind gradually adapts itself to the subjects upon which it is allowed to dwell. It becomes assimilated to that which it is accustomed to love and reverence. Man will never rise higher than his standard of purity or goodness or truth. . . The grace of God alone has power to exalt man. {GC88 555.2}

• A person will worship something, have no doubt about that. . . . That which dominates our imaginations and our thoughts will determine our lives, and our character. Therefore, it behooves us to be careful what we worship, for what we are worshipping we are becoming.

• Ralph Waldo Emerson

Healed how?

• 2Cor.4:6 – God is the one who shined (communicated) in our hearts to give us the light (truth) of the glorious knowledge (character) of God in the face (life) of Jesus Christ.

Healed how?• “Behold! My Servant whom I uphold,

My Elect One in whom My soul delights!I have put My Spirit upon Him;He will bring forth justice to the Gentiles.

• He will not cry out, nor raise His voice,Nor cause His voice to be heard in the street.

• A bruised reed He will not break,And smoking flax He will not quench;He will bring forth justice for truth.

• He will not fail nor be discouraged,Till He has established justice in the earth;– Is.42:1-4

Healed how?

• The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, • because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel

to the poor; • he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, • to preach deliverance to the captives, • and recovering of sight to the blind, • to set at liberty them that are bruised, • and that the time of the LORD’s favor has come.– Luke 4:18-19

Healed how?

• “by His stripes we are healed”– Is.53:5

Healed how?

• 1ST chapter Ministry Healing?• 1st chapter Steps to Christ?• 1st chapter Desire of Ages?• 1st chapter Patriarchs and Prophets?

Healed how?

• The one thing essential for us in order that we may receive and impart the forgiving love of God is to know and believe the love that He has to us. {MB 115.1}

GOD WITH USThe Hoarded Love of Eternity

Phil.2:5-7

• 5 Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus,

• 6 who, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, 7 but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men.

• 8 And being found in appearance as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.

• 7 Billion (7,000,000,000) suns would fit in Canis Majoris

• 7 quadrillion (7,000,000,000,000,000) earths would fit in Canis Majoris

• 16 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him. 17 And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.– Col.1:16-17

• Upholding all things by the word of His power– Heb.1:3

Empty Space or Inhabited Universe?

• Who has in these last days spoken unto us by His Son . . . by whom also he made the worlds. Heb.1:2

• By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God. Heb.11:3

• the rulers and authorities in the heavenly places – Eph.3:10

• I call heaven and earth as witnesses today. Deut. 30:19

• Listen, O heavens, and I will speak; hear, O earth, the words of my mouth. Deut.32:1

• Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth! Is.1:2• the whole family in heaven and earth – Eph.3:15

How big is the family?

• “thousand, thousands ministered” and “ten-thousand times ten-thousand stood before Him” – Dan.7:9-10

• “host of heaven cannot be numbered” – Jer.33:22

• “millions of worlds above” – {RH, March 1, 1881 par. 17}

• “Every eye in the unfallen universe”– {RH, September 29, 1891 par. 1}

• Peace and joy, in perfect submission to the will of Heaven, existed throughout the angelic host. Love to God was supreme, love for one another impartial. Such was the condition that existed for ages before the entrance of sin.—4SP 316, 317

• . . . pure contentment, the peace, the exalted happiness and unalloyed joys, of the heavenly abode. . . the satisfaction of the full approval of God. ST Aug. 4, 1887

• . . . heart was filled with love and joy in serving (the) Creator.—ST Sept. 18, 1893

Phil.2:6• “Who, being in the form of God”

– Though the divine nature was His from the beginning– He has always been God by nature– He had equal status with God– Possessing the fullness of the attributes which make God God

• Thought it not robbery to be equal with God:– He did not cling to His privileges and rights as God’s equal– He did not consider (feel, think, regard) equality with God

something to be held on to.– He set aside the privileges of Deity– He did not see, in the rank (position, status) of (divinity), an

(honor) to be desired or coveted.

Phil.2:7

• But made himself of no reputation– He emptied Himself– Stripped Himself of every advantage– He gave up His divine privileges– Stripped Himself of His glory, of all His privileges

and rightful dignity

• From this distant vantage point, the Earth might not seem of any particular interest. But for us, it's different. Consider again that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

• The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity – in all this vastness – there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves.

• -Carl Sagan

• “This is the only time I’ll ever be in the news.”

• “I’m so insignificant,”

• When God gave His Son to our world, He endowed human beings with imperishable riches--riches compared with which the treasured wealth of men since the world began is nothingness. Christ came to the earth and stood before the children of men with the hoarded love of eternity, and this is the treasure that, through our connection with Him, we are to receive, to reveal, and to impart. {MH 37.1}