Big Healing Book - All About Healing Services

All About Healing Services

What Is a Healing Service?

A healing service is a special meeting centered around ministry to the sick. Some of the ideas in this discussion can apply to other services as well. The Holy Spirit can change the order of a regular service and move in a healing flow for a certain time within another service.

Healing services are generally conducted by one or more ministers whom the Holy Spirit has specifically anointed to minister this way. While any believer has a right to lay hands on the sick in the name of Jesus and expect them to recover (Mark 16:17-18, John 14:12), some ministers have a special grace for this. We see in 1 Corinthians 12:8-11 that there are “gifts of healings,” “working of miracles” and “faith” to be in operation in Christian services. (See the question on these gifts for more information about them.) Any believer, including you, could be called upon to operate in these gifts at certain times. These are technically “manifestations” of the Spirit, since you cannot “own” any of them. These manifestations occur “as the Spirit wills” (1 Corinthians 12:11).

This notwithstanding, there are definitely individuals whom the Holy Spirit uses consistently in such manifestations. We see this in 1 Corinthians 12:28-30. This lists ministry offices, not single manifestations in services. The people used in this way often, but not always, stand in the office of “evangelist” (Ephesians 4:11). We know that Philip, who later on in his ministry was called an evangelist, flowed in these so-called “power gifts.” However, there are those in all the ministry offices who flow in these gifts. It is unfair to criticize a minister who flows in the gifts of healings for “not being evangelistic enough.” The minister may stand in another ministry office, such as prophet, and may not focus on reaching the lost in his meetings. It is equally unfair to criticize an evangelist for “not doing enough in-depth teaching” when his primary goal is to present the simple gospel to the unsaved. God uses different men in different ways and there is no cookie-cutter stereotype of a “healing minister.” It is pointless to try to compare different men’s ministries with each other because each person’s ministry is unique.

These meetings are frequently advertised in advance with exhortations to “Bring the sick! Bring someone who needs a miracle!” The more genuine needs there are in the service, the more the gifts of the Spirit will be in operation. If an evangelist holds such a meeting and no one brings any sick people to it, there may be no manifestations of gifts of healings at all. If there are no sinners present who need to see signs and wonders, there is less chance of seeing any.

Who Are Healing Services for?

Healing services are for anyone who needs healing, but they are particularly for the unsaved, young Christians, and people with very difficult conditions. Mature believers are expected to believe the Word of God and receive their healing for themselves without a special healing service. Thank God for healing services, but simple faith in God is a better way to receive your healing. Still, if you need healing, it’s not a sin to attend a healing service, even if you’ve been a Christian since you were a kid!

This service is indirectly for the co-workers, relatives and friends of the people there. Many of these may take a sudden interest in the gospel when someone they know is healed. They may be there the next night, and they may get healed and tell even more people, and so on. That is the gospel pattern. It did not take long for entire cities to find out about Jesus in the Gospels and Acts. Healings were an important way to advertise the gospel.

You will probably see some very unlikely people get healed. That old boozer downtown may suddenly be healed of liver problems, while Sally the Saint who has faithfully taught Sunday school for 25 years may walk in with eye trouble and leave with eye trouble. Critical Chris, who has not had a kind word to say about the pastor in eight years, is suddenly healed of terrible back pain and runs around the room rejoicing, while Deacon Dave still has arthritis when the service ends.

This can lead to jealousy and criticism from the older Christians, who fancy themselves as being more deserving of healing. Perhaps this is the problem in many cases. The sinner and the backslider know that they need the mercy of God while the older Christian can forget that healing has always been based on his righteousness in Christ, not his own righteousness. No one “deserves” healing on his own merit. Every Christian “deserves” healing based on his right standing with God through Jesus Christ. Rather than being jealous, older Christians should rejoice with those who rejoice (Romans 12:15) when the less mature people are healed.

The fact that some people are healed miraculously while others are not has led to some very bad doctrine based on experience instead of the Bible. People assume that it was God’s will to heal some and not others. That is not true. It was God’s will to heal some in a dramatic way on this particular occasion. But it was, and is, God’s will, to heal everyone.

Different Methods of Ministry

Many healing crusades feature lengthy “healing lines” where hands are laid on the sick. In this way, the healing anointing is transmitted to those who need it. However, beware of putting God in a box. Some ministers rarely lay hands on anyone and instead “call out” certain conditions that God is currently healing in the congregation. This is a manifestation of “the word of knowledge.” In some cases, people are healed spontaneously while worshipping God, or for no readily apparent reason, and the minister may not even be aware of it! (God does not always tell the minister everything!) A person may teeter all over and fall down “drunk in the Spirit” and get up healed. The minister may simply wave at a section of the congregation, and the power of God may suddenly fall on a large number of people at once. There is no “right” or “wrong” way for God to minister healing to people. The way he is moving in that service is the right way if the Holy Spirit is leading him, and any other way is the wrong way – at least for that service.

The manifestation of the Spirit differs from service to service. I have seen services where a large number of people flopped all over the place laughing in the Spirit. Sometimes, the next evening, God was trying to move primarily through the preaching of the Word, and some people (bless their hearts) started whooping it up in the flesh trying to make the same thing happen that happened the night before. Beware of this. Always purpose in your heart to “hook up” with however God is moving in that particular service. Let God direct you rather than trying to direct Him. If you start working yourself up into a tee-hee fit in the wrong service, you will be completely out of order and you will disrupt the anointing. (If the ushers are wise, they will usher you out.) On the other hand, you are equally out of order to resist the Holy Spirit if He is moving in laughter and you just decide that you don’t like it and won’t participate in it. You will end up being one of the jealous ones, moaning that those people who “made total fools of themselves” walk out with their healings and a whole bunch of joy, while you, you dignified thing, never flinched – and never got anything from God, either.

Sadly, some Christians viciously criticize genuine moves of God. (“They’re just working it up. They’re in the flesh. That can’t be God. They’re acting like fools. This is an embarrassment to the Body of Christ. It’s all emotional. Those people are insane.”) Sometimes these are the very Christians who said that they wanted a move of God in the first place! (They wanted a “dignified” move, but you don’t have the right to restrict God to doing what you think is dignified.)

As mentioned in the discussion Strange Ways to Get Healed, the minister could ask you to do something unusual, such as run around the room, put your hand on the part of your body that hurts, or try to do something you couldn’t do before. You would be wise to do it, even if you don’t feel the anointing (tangible power) on you at the time. As you move out in obedience, your healing will manifest. (I am assuming that the minister heard from God, of course.)

I am not saying that everything that happens in every service is genuinely of God. Ministers are people; they can miss God just as you do sometimes. (Shhhhh...we won’t tell anyone.) Some people in the congregation can overdo things and get into the flesh. But that doesn’t mean that God wasn’t moving.

Also, you must realize that different ministers have different personalities. Although a minister is to speak for God, the message will always be “colored” by the vessel it flows through. Nothing is wrong with that. In fact, one of the worst things a minister (or any believer, for that matter) can do is to try to act like someone else. Much unwarranted criticism is aimed at ministers because of the way they minister. Joe Hollywood might try to make the service a “healing extravaganza,” and people will complain, “He’s too showy – that can’t be God.” Another minister can be so low-key that people complain, “He’s no fun to listen to. Joe Hollywood’s services are much more exciting.” The apostle Paul had a wonderful healing ministry, yet people complained, “His bodily presence is weak, and his speech contemptible” (2 Corinthians 10:10). You see, these types of pot shots at ministers are not a new thing, though they are never a good thing.

If you’re not careful, you can start regarding the minister “in the flesh.” In other words, you can get so caught up with what he wears, how he acts, or what kind of music he likes before he preaches, that you get your eyes on him instead of on the Lord. This mistake can prevent you from receiving your healing. The gifts of healings are from God, not from the man. You are there to receive from the anointing that is on that man’s ministry, not on the clothes or jewelry that are on that man’s body. If you stew over his expensive watch (that someone probably gave him anyway), you may miss your healing completely because you’re in a critical mood rather than a mood to receive from God.

I am not saying that everything that every minister does is right. I am saying that you need to look past the man’s possible imperfections or personality quirks and consider the anointing upon him. I have had the power of God get all over me in more than one service I attended where I was not fond of the minister’s methods or delivery. I’m glad that God is full of grace. He is bigger than all our shortcomings.

Don’t Be Like Naaman the Syrian

Naaman the Syrian got healed, but first he had to repent of an improper attitude. He wanted Elisha to lay hands on him, and Elisha told him to bathe in the Jordan River seven times. Naaman got very upset because he thought the rivers back in Damascus were better than the Jordan, and the request seemed ridiculous. He was healed when he obeyed Elisha’s instructions. You can read about this in 2 Kings 5:1-14.

It is possible to be like Naaman the Syrian today. The minister instructs those around you to lay hands on you instead of laying hands on you himself, or he tells you to lay hands on yourself and receive from the anointing in the room. Then you get mad because you wanted a regular healing line! Or someone other than the man you like was anointed that night to minister in the healing line, and you’re mad because you wanted your favorite preacher to lay hands on you. Well, you can either stay sick or you can go with the flow. Rather than getting upset over methods, cooperate with the way that the individual service is going.

Jump in!

I don’t know that you’d want to make theology out the Pool of Bethesda, but there does seem to be a parallel in practice. When the minister says that the Holy Spirit wants to minister to certain people, and you’re one of those people, get down there as fast as you can without walking out of love (or running and shoving out of love). Just as only the first person in the pool got healed when the angel troubled the water, often the people who respond right away are ministered to by the anointing, while those who sit there debating whether they really feel like going down there lose out. Allegorically speaking, when the angel troubles the pool, jump in and receive!

This is very important to the “flow” of the service. If the minister has to wait for people to obey God, it can disrupt the flow of things and the manifestation of the anointing may wane.

I’ve watched with some annoyance when “late-to-the-party” people decide after 15 minutes that they want to get into the healing line after all. If that’s all the conviction they have, they’re not likely to receive anything. The only exception would be people who are physically so weak that they simply can’t stand in line for a long time, so they wait until later to go up, which is understandable.

How Do You Know It’s Really God?

There are indeed fake healing ministers out there, and still others who have a genuine anointing but mix a lot of flesh with it. How will you be able to tell if God is really behind what is happening?

First, if you are a Christian, your born-again spirit will be comfortable in a service where a man of God is ministering. If the man is a fake, something just won’t seem right to you on the inside and you’ll be uneasy the whole time. Now it is possible to be in a godly service where your flesh cringes at some things that are going on, but you still know in your heart that they’re done under the anointing. If the Holy Spirit bears witness with your spirit concerning your salvation (Romans 8:16), you can expect that He will bear witness with your spirit about other matters, also. The anointing that is within you will teach you without any man having to say anything to you about it (1 John 2:27). Part of growing as a Christian is having your senses exercised by reason of use to discern good and evil (Hebrews 5:14).

Second, the message preached will be biblical. This does not mean that every word will be a Scripture verse. It means that the point of the message will be found in the Bible. Some ministers are fond of telling long stories to illustrate points. Some evangelists may seem to say nothing about God or His Word until they get to the conclusion of their message and they “throw out the net.” Some prophets may spend a good deal of time speaking specific things about specific situations under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. But when all is said and done, you should be able to point to one or more verses in the Bible that summarize the message brought forth by the minister. If you can’t, you have reason to suspect that something is wrong.

Third, the message will be liberating. Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty (2 Corinthians 3:17). If you leave feeling like you were just beaten up, either you misinterpreted the message or the message was not from God. Note that your flesh may not enjoy a good message on repentance, but that is still a liberating message because repentance brings liberty. Some preachers wrongly divide the Word of God and use it to try to bring people into bondage instead of liberty. They preach the Word, but in the wrong spirit! The Pharisees were prime examples of this. Jesus said to beware of their doctrines (Matthew 16:12)!

Fourth, your pastor may know more than you do about the particular ministry and he may have either have recommended that people go if they can or warned people to stay away. Your pastor can’t control your life, but God gives pastors for the protection of the sheep. Beware of going to a meeting that your pastor does not support. Many sheep come back embarrassed or hurt after disregarding warnings about a certain ministry. For a time, they think that the pastor is just an old coot who is not into the brand-new sensational thing that God is doing today. They are sure that they know more than the pastor does, and besides, he just might be jealous that God is not using him in this wonderful new way. Then they find out that the sensational preacher wasn’t genuine (or was off his rocker) and that the pastor was right all along. The pastor may have known some bad things about the minister but for love’s sake and for the sake of respecting ministry in general, he did not share the specifics publicly.

I’m not saying that your pastor couldn’t be wrong, because he could be. Some local pastors have gotten quite upset at genuine moves of God and they’ve tried to warn people away from really anointed services. I'm just telling you that a warning light should go on if he does not approve of the meetings.

Fifth, in most cases, if the man does not have the support of any local church for his ministry, you should avoid him. Beware of “Lone Ranger” ministers who don’t think they need support from pastors! Ideally, he will have the support of one or more churches in the immediate area where the meeting is being held. There is no excuse not to have that in MANY places today, because God has raised up a lot of good churches. Having said that, there still ARE places where if God wants to do anything, He’ll have to go around all the established churches in the area because they’re all closed to teaching faith properly and letting the Holy Spirit move freely. However, a problem with such an “unsponsored meeting” is that the people who get saved at the services will need a church to attend. If there are no churches ready to receive the new converts, they may just go back into the world again. If they do go to church, the pastor might undo all the good you did teaching them faith. The meeting will bear no lasting fruit. As a preacher I know said, “The harvest isn’t the harvest until it’s gathered into the barn!” So if the preacher is not working through any local churches, and there is no good church within a reasonable drive, he must be prepared to plant a church in that location. (Such a man would typically stand in the office of apostle, as apostles plant churches.) Otherwise, it would be like doctors delivering babies at the hospital and then throwing them outside the front door to fend for themselves.

Sixth, if the minister himself does not have a home church, stay away. God will not give authority to those who do not operate under authority themselves. Avoid any man who claims, “The Body of Christ is my church” (as I heard one idiot “minister” declare). Also, a minister should have a good report from his home church, not just be someone who attends and never serves and it turns out that the pastor doesn’t even know the guy personally even though it’s a good church.

Seventh, if the meetings are of God, Jesus will be glorified. The gifts of the Spirit will exalt Jesus. The testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy (Revelation 19:10). So if man, rather than Jesus, is exalted, the meeting is being done in the wrong spirit. Some of the worst cases of this are when the minister has some grandiose word that the recipient of the word will be the greatest revival leader ever on the earth or that his ministry will be the epicenter of the entire end-time move of God. Watch out for words like that! There are “prophets” who make a living saying that everywhere they go is “ground zero” for a final outpouring on the earth. People’s flesh likes to receive words like that.

Eighth, the minister will point you to Jesus and to the Word of God, not to his anointing, his ministry, or even the gifts of the Spirit. He will present Jesus and God’s promises as the answer to every need. Ministries based on the gifts of the Spirit are top-heavy. Ministries based on the Word are on solid ground. You cannot always get a need met through the gifts of the Spirit, but you can always get every need met through God’s Word. (However, there is such a thing as false humility; see YOU Can Do Miracles for an example.)

Ninth, the man’s personal lifestyle (as far as is publicly known) should be consistent with New Testament teaching. If it is common knowledge that the man is involved in any practice that is against biblical standards, avoid him. (However, you shouldn’t hold someone accountable for the things he did before he got saved, or things he did after he got saved but repented of.) Note that I am not saying that you should go around gossiping and trying to dig up dirt like some tabloid. However, some people with genuine anointings are really messed up! The reason to avoid their ministry is not because they aren’t anointed, but because you don’t want to pick up their attitudes! Some very anointed people are the most humble, wonderful people you would ever want to meet. Other very anointed people are ones you wouldn’t even want to have a meal with – because you did have a meal with them and you found out how rude and self-centered they really were. God’s gifts are based on grace; they are not rewards for being the best Christian around. Some people seem to think that the fact that God continues to use them means that God is OK with the way they conduct themselves when it’s really His mercy in action. Sooner or later, if their love walk or their integrity is askew, it will catch up with them.

Tenth, the man will have a godly approach to the offering. Impostors usually give themselves away when it comes to money, since that's why they’re there. Some men have tried to prophesy money out of people, which is never right. (In some cases, the man may have a supernatural knowledge about money or possessions someone has and try to tell the person that God says to give it away. Watch out! Not all supernatural knowledge comes from God. Demons know some things, too – see Acts 16:16.) Assume that the man is not of God if he spends a disproportionate amount of time on the offering or tries to put undue pressure on people to give. And give what you can give cheerfully, not reluctantly or under compulsion (2 Corinthians 9:7). Don’t give just because he had a “word” that there were businessmen in the congregation who were supposed to give $1,000 each. (I don’t know what it is about businessmen and $1,000, but I have heard this a disproportionate number of times over the years. Thus far, “God” has not even indexed that number for inflation yet, but if inflation gets bad enough, I’m sure the number will increase.) I’m not saying that God would never have someone say such a thing, but make sure that your giving is based on your convictions, not pressure from the minister, because there are some manipulators out there, some of whom really do have anointings despite their ungodly high-pressure offering tactics. Especially beware of anyone who claims to have a special “debt-breaking” anointing whereby if you give a lot right now, you will be assured of getting out of debt almost overnight. The only one who might get out of debt overnight as a result is the minister himself. The warning also applies to any “if you don’t give right now, the deal’s off” tactics. God Word concerning finances always works when you follow it; there is no “one night only” time limit on it.

Eleventh, if the man has a “word” for you, it will be something helpful, not just showing off that the minister has supernatural knowledge. A friend went to one of these prophesy-to-everyone-who-lines-up-for-a-prophecy meetings, which are unbiblical because 2 Peter 1:21 says, “For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.” My friend commented that some things the minister said were accurate, but not helpful. He felt as if he were getting his fortune told. Because “prophecy on demand” is unbiblical, some of those who claim to be able to prophesy to anyone at any time and line up people to get “words” can start listening to “familiar spirits” that are not of God instead of the Holy Spirit, even if they don’t do it deliberately.

I saw a minister do a series of nightly meetings and some nights he gave people words with head-spinning detail and accuracy. People were helped and set free. But other nights he would try to give out words and he just plain missed God and looked silly. Word had gotten out that he had a gift for “reading people’s mail” and I think he felt obligated to give the many new people who were coming what they were expecting. But, as 2 Peter 1:21 cited above says, you can’t just prophesy because “you” want to do it. Ministry is not a show where you give people what they want! You can get in big trouble trying the “open your mouth and God will fill it” routine. You have to follow the Holy Spirit, and if He’s not moving a certain way, you don’t move that way either no matter what the people want. (“Yeah,” some would say, “but Smith Wigglesworth said that if the Spirit wasn’t moving, he moved the Spirit.” I can assure you that presumptuously trying to step out in something God hasn’t moved you to do is not what Brother Wigglesworth meant by that.)

What If the Minister Tries to Push You Down?

I’ve been pushed by some famous people over the years, so I know that some preachers, even though they are legitimately very anointed, just like to try to push people down. Some do it rather subtly, but it’s not so subtle when you’re the one being pushed – and exhorted, “Yield to the Holy Spirit!”

However, there are times when it’s the Holy Spirit and not the minister pushing you hard. In decades of ministry, I have never as of this writing ever pushed anyone down or even attempted to do so. In fact, I used to try to prop people up until the Holy Spirit told me to stop doing that. Yet I have been accused of shoving people hard when the people around could testify that I never even touched them! God picked up one lady and threw her about 10 feet before I could touch her! At least anyone could tell I wasn’t strong enough to do that myself. She was motionless for over half an hour and the devil started lying to me that I had killed her and no one would ever want me or my “killer anointing” again because she really was “SLAIN in the Spirit.” Much to my relief, she suddenly got up completely healed.

There was one man that I couldn’t have shoved over because he had a build like an American football player and I’m short. But the Holy Spirit told me to hit him! So I gave him a respectful little whack. Nothing happened. I whacked him slightly harder and nothing happened. The Holy Spirit said, “I told you to HIT him, not pat him!” So I unloaded on him. The power of God hit that man and God healed him. Now don’t do that unless God tells you to do it! I remember reading that the Lord told Kenneth Hagin to hit someone, and I said at the time, “Lord, please don’t ever tell me to do that!” I’ve also been on the receiving end of that and gone through the air myself by the power of the Holy Spirit, and God did some necessary things in me that night. I wasn’t hurt in the least though at least one person was worried that the minister’s punch had injured me!

The Holy Spirit does not hurt people. The main reason we need “catchers” today is that some people expect to fall whether it’s God or not and we don’t want them to get hurt. I remember a meeting in New Hampshire when I was a young believer. I had just gotten baptized that afternoon in a lake. Someone laid hands on me and I felt myself start to go down. The only problem was that there were no catchers and there was nothing behind me but a hard concrete floor! Ka-boom, I went down when I couldn’t keep myself up anymore, straight backward onto that floor. I didn’t feel a thing! And that’s not because I was knocked unconscious; that floor might as well have made of feathers for all I felt. The Holy Spirit can certainly do some interesting things. I watched a pastor’s wife whirl, twirl and dance with her eyes closed in a room where people were all over the floor all across the room. Her feet landed inside people’s elbows, knees, whatever – she never touched anyone, so no one was hurt. It was the Holy Spirit demonstrating Himself in a “wonder.”

If the minister is pushy, it is not necessarily your job to demonstrate his pushiness to the world. The main thing is to come expecting to receive your healing when hands are laid on you. The following experiences I had may help or at least amuse you. A famous healing minister came to the church I was part of many years ago. I had an ailment so I went up for prayer. The minister proceeded to push me hard! I did not appreciate being pushed hard and thought it smacked of fakery, so I locked my legs and would not even give this minister a “courtesy drop” (as it is sometimes called in ministry circles). The minister literally pushed me halfway across the whole stage, and I would still not go down. I left the service that night quite upset – and still with the ailment I had when I walked in!

Some months later, I had a serious issue where one of the staff ministers at church saw me and urged me to go to the emergency room. I told him, “No, I’m going to go to the (name of minister) service tonight and receive my healing!” It was the same anointed but pushy healing minister who was at another church in another city. I went up to have hands laid on me, and because this was a fairly serious issue, I had already made up my mind that the minister could push me as hard as possible and I’d just fall and not care because I really needed to be healed! Sure enough, I got a good shove, and I dropped to the floor rather than fighting with the minister again. I was decked out there with the REAL power of God on me for almost an hour lying next to the feet of the host pastor and his wife who were sitting in the front row. And when I got up, I knew that I had my healing. I felt a lot better, and that condition was gone within a day or two! I never did have to go to the hospital.

What Should My Attitude Be When I Go?

You should be prepared to receive from God. This is critical. What you receive in such a service is more up to you than it is up to God or the minister. To some degree, what the congregation as a whole expects determines how much happens, as I am about to prove.

Do not go with the attitude that you want to “see what kind of anointing the preacher has.” You will miss it. The preacher could be the most anointed preacher who ever lived, but if the people are cynical and not open to receive from him, or just sit judging him, little will happen.

I can prove this from the Bible, where the most anointed preacher who ever lived (Jesus), attempted to minister in Nazareth, where He was met with hostility and skepticism. In Matthew 13:54-58 and Mark 6:1-6, Jesus could not have anything resembling revival in His hometown of Nazareth because of the people’s unbelief.

A servant is not above his Master. If Jesus could do no mighty work at Nazareth, where people would not receive His ministry but got preoccupied with His human side, no minister today can fare any better under similar circumstances. This was the same Jesus who healed multitudes everywhere else. The difference was solely in the congregation! Note that Jesus could do no mighty work. He wasn’t unwilling, He simply couldn’t. This may surprise people who assume that as the Son of God, Jesus could do anything. But Jesus limited Himself to what was available to man, emptying Himself of His divine privileges (Philippians 2:5-8, Hebrews 2:17). No minister can force healings and miracles to take place where people are not open to receive them. Jesus told His disciples to heal in the cities that received them, not in the cities that did not receive them. (This is expounded upon in an objection reply elsewhere.)

Recall the Scriptures where Jesus told the sick that it was their faith, not His, that healed them. (See the discussion According to YOUR FAITH Be It Done unto You! for these passages.) It is still the same today. God’s power is limited only by what you can believe! See Mark 9:17-29.

Do not yawn your way through praise and worship or the preaching of the Word, thinking to yourself, “Come on, get on with it! I want to see the good stuff – healings and miracles!” If you don’t want to praise or worship God, you probably have your eyes in the wrong place to begin with. His power works the healings through the minister. Praise Him in advance for what He is going to do! Spending time honoring God, conscious of His presence, certainly will not hurt you. People have been known to get healed in this part of the service without even having hands laid on them! Pay attention to the preaching of the Word. While an unwise or inept minister might just spend time fiddle-diddling waiting for the anointing to manifest, a minister with any sense will teach you what the Bible says about healing, faith, or other related topics, to help you receive from God.

Some People Get Healed Without Exercising Much Faith at All!

How can this be? Like the man in John 5:2-19, some people who seem to be in unbelief get healed at healing services. However, God doesn’t promise anyone anything in a healing service without the exercise of faith. Recall that the other people at the Pool of Bethesda were sick when Jesus got there and sick when Jesus left! But didn’t Jesus heal all who were oppressed of the devil? He healed all who came to Him. There is no record that anyone else at the Pool of Bethesda approached Him for healing. And in the man’s case, Jesus did not say that his faith had healed him. This man was healed by a manifestation of the Holy Spirit.

We have no reason to suspect that the soldier whose ear Peter hacked off had any faith. Yet Jesus healed his ear. The man came to help arrest Jesus and Jesus healed him anyway! (See Luke 22:50-51.) Jesus did not tell this man that his faith had made him whole!

So why does God pick certain individuals at certain times and heal them in spite of their lack of faith? We don’t know. The manifestations of the Spirit are given as He wills. He surely has a reason behind it, but He is not obligated to share the reason with us.

One thing is for sure: The fact that God in His mercy may heal a person who has no faith at all does not mean that He does not want to heal others. God is fair. He has made provision for the healing of the whole world through Christ’s atonement. Anyone could be healed at that meeting (or anywhere else for that matter) by believing that he was healed by Jesus’ stripes (1 Peter 2:24). Anyone who is properly instructed can be healed if he acts on the Word.

Beware lest you get the prodigal son’s brother’s attitude. The backslider comes back and gets the red carpet treatment. God heals him and shows him great mercy and favor. Meanwhile, there you sit, mad because you think God didn’t do anything for you when you never backslid like that. However, all that God has, including healing, was yours all along. (See Healing and the Prodigal Son.)

When You’re in a Healing Line

If you choose to go up during the part of the service where hands are being laid on the sick, here are some practical suggestions.

First, determine that you will receive your healing when hands are laid on you. Do not just assume that the anointing will do all the work. Remember the woman with the issue of blood! Her faith made a demand on the anointing that was on Jesus. If you go up with the idea that you doubt anything will happen anyway, you are wasting the minister’s time as well as yours, and you should not get in line in the first place. Don’t go up with the attitude that you “dare” God to heal you through that minister or that you “dare” the minister to prove that he really has anything.

I’m not saying that to be harsh. When multiple people believe they will receive something, a real “flow” gets going. If the minister is forced to deal with groups of people who don’t expect anything to happen, it will be harder for the gifts of the Spirit to manifest and for there to be a “flow” in the service.

As much as possible, keep your mind on the Lord and His Word. Unless you are specifically told to sing or do something else, I would suggest being quiet and staying in the mood to receive. There is no point in trying to get “hyper” and unleash a barrage of tongues as some people do. In fact, the more you do mentally or physically to try to hook up with God’s power, the harder it will be for you to do so. That is because you receive healing from God with your spirit, not your mind. Thus, it is generally better to have your mind quiet so that it won’t get in the way. Sometimes a minister has to stay with a person for a little while because the person is so wrought up that he is no condition to receive anything from God! It is not time to pray for Jerusalem or the armed forces or the lady with lots of tattoos and piercings who lives next door. It is time for you to receive what you need.

It is tempting to get nervous when the minister gets near you, especially if people are falling all over the place. Keep in mind that it is the Lord who is doing the healing. The anointing of the Holy Spirit is being transmitted through the minister’s hands. Don’t worry what the people around you will think of you. They are probably too busy thinking about what other people will think of them to be thinking of you, anyway.

Don’t worry about falling and/or getting up. This idea is to get healed, and whether you fall over or not is irrelevant. Jesus said that hands would be laid on the sick and they would recover. He did not promise that they would fall over like tenpins.

There is no need to contort yourself (mentally or physically) in an attempt to “suck” the anointing out of the minister. Just stand there and receive it. Let it go into you. If you’re sick, the healing anointing is there for your benefit, and God knows that. You don’t have to enter into some kind of mega-worship, either. RELAX and let God minister to you!

Don’t get in the healing line unless you need a physical or emotional healing or healing of a mental illness. See the discussion Beware: Wrong Motives for Getting into Healing Lines for some exhortations and warnings about this. Healing lines are serious business. Don’t play games with the anointing. If the healing line is for a specific condition only, don’t get in that line unless you have that condition. Otherwise, you will grieve the Holy Spirit and make it harder for everyone else to receive.

What You Can Do to Enhance the Service

Contrary to popular opinion, the results are up to the congregation as well as the minister. We have discussed expectations earlier. Go expecting God to move supernaturally. It is easier for everyone to receive in an atmosphere of mass faith.

Never act in a way that would distract others from the service. Do not pass notes, trade text messages, check your email, tell jokes, make late-night snack plans, or do anything else that shows irreverence for God and His workings. Do not make comments to your neighbors about other people going up for healing. If there are specific instructions from the platform (sing, pray, etc.), follow them. If there are no explicit instructions, worship the Lord quietly, pray for the people in line, or do something else that keeps you hooked up with what is going on.

You do not have to get into some deep kind of prayer for the people being prayed over. The time for that was before the service, and the minister and others involved have surely prayed. It is amusing (for at least the first five seconds or so) to watch people who want to “help” the minister by stretching out their hands toward the sick and making a big commotion. If you really sense the need to pray, do so in a way that calls no attention to yourself.

Preachers sometimes make analogies between sporting events and church. “If you can hoot and holler at the ball game, why do you stand there like statues in church?” However, a Christian service is not a sporting event and it is not entertainment. (At least it is not supposed to be, even though some churches use an “entertainment” model to draw people.) The type of wild shouting and cheering that might be in order at the ballpark may not be in order. There is a time and a place for cheering and even clapping, but the end of a prophetic word from the minister (or worse, the middle of it) is not the place for such. Be sensitive to the flow of the service and let the minister direct it. If the mood is not one of hooting and hollering, it is out of order for you to hoot and holler. On the other hand, if the ministry team is running the aisles screaming, go ahead and join them if you want.

Do not get up, leave, and come back in unless there is a dire emergency. If you are absolutely going to have an accident if you don’t get to a bathroom, go out and back in as discreetly as possible. Of course, you should arrive at the service in time to take care of such matters beforehand. Do not be like some folks who make “potty runs” just because they’re bored and want a break.

Jesus is the one doing the healing, so you should act as if Jesus were on the platform. Let that be your guide for conduct. Jesus is not a pickle-puss; you can rejoice in His presence. Be free, but don’t be disrespectful.

Aren’t the Gifts of the Spirit Solely up to the Will of God?

It is an error to assume that if God wants to do something through the gifts of the Spirit, He will just do them anyway. God commands us to desire spiritual gifts (1 Corinthians 14:1, 1 Corinthians 14:39) and covet earnestly these gifts (1 Corinthians 12:31). If we have nothing to do with it, these commands are a meaningless waste of space.

We cannot dictate to God that He move in a certain way or do something spectacular for a certain individual. We can ask God to manifest Himself through the gifts of the Spirit in a general sense, leaving the details to Him.

It is possible to grieve the Holy Spirit so that He stops moving. For example, if the minister is prophesying and people are not paying attention, the Holy Spirit may stop speaking. God won’t waste people’s time if they won’t listen to Him. If people act as if they’re bored and want to go home, He may stop healing people through the gifts of healings. It is possible for the conduct of the crowd to rob people who still need to receive a blessing.

God will overlook the goofiness of a few individuals in the crowd. A few nut cases typically come out of the woodwork for this kind of meeting. Don’t worry about them. But if the majority of the crowd is “tuning out,” you can expect the anointing to stop manifesting.

We cannot make God move in a particular way through the gifts of the Spirit, but we can certainly stop Him!

God can overlook some quirks on the minister’s part, too. That minister is not perfect any more than you are. Some things may be a matter of preference where he likes something that you don’t like. Perhaps he wants an opera singer to sing to an orchestrated background CD before he speaks when you would rather have heard something by a certain Christian rock group that tries to sound like a Christian version of a certain secular rock group. Whatever helps the speaker is good for the service! Go with the flow! Perhaps the color of his suit screams “Hollywood!” to you but it is just his personal preference. Get over it! Perhaps he has a penchant for rhyming prophecies that you think that you could finish before he does, e.g., “God will do a work in your heart and He will give you a brand new _____. You will go forth in power in this final ____.” Some even have prophecies for every new year, though I’m not convinced from Scripture that God does something new every year. If it were true that He did, it could still be a little arrogant to think that He is so America-centric that He always uses the American calendar as opposed to the Jewish calendar or the Chinese calendar. I can tell you confidently that God isn’t going to do anything new that you need for your life this year. That’s because He’s already given you all things, every spiritual blessing (Ephesians 1:3) and everything that pertains to life and godliness (2 Peter 1:3-4), so there’s nothing crucial left to “get” in any new year! He isn’t holding back anything we need in ANY year waiting for a special “Kairos moment” in some future year (Romans 8:32)! Still, you can bet that there will be some rhyming “new year prophecies” that can be predicted in advance by those of us who have been around a few decades, e.g., “Things will be fun in xxx1. God will do something new in xxx2. We will get free in xxx3. There will be more in xxx4. The church will come alive in xxx5. Our problems He’ll fix in xxx6. It will be like heaven in xxx7. Things will be great in xxx8. It will be divine in xxx9.” The ministers are usually doing a lot of good otherwise and I can put up with a few predictable prophecies. (Because some churches shrink instead of grow for various reasons in a given year, I wonder to myself if any prophet prone to rhyming “new year prophecies” has ever visited such a church just before the new year and correctly predicted, “The sheep will run in xxx1. Your folks will be few in xxx2. People will flee in xxx3. They’ll head for the door in xxx4. Attendance will dive in xxx5. Your vision they’ll nix in xxx6. To other churches they’re revvin’ in xxx7. They’ll run out the gate in xxx8. Your staff will resign in xxx9.” I’ve never heard of such a case and I wouldn’t hold my breath waiting for such a prophecy.)

The message is inevitably colored by the vessel. One minister might say, “Thus saith the Lord: I love thee” while another might say, “The Lord says He loves y’all!” while another might say, “These are the words of the Lord above, All of you I deeply ____.” (You can finish it.) Look past the delivery to the message. You probably have a few quirks of your own, after all. You’ve probably figured out already that I do!

The minister may like a certain song and instruct the band to play that same song non-stop for an hour until you’re tired of it. (I’ve been asked to do that when I’ve been on the piano.) If that helps him, it’s fine, whether you like the song or not. God isn’t nit-picky about such things. One well-known faith preacher wanted his singers and band to do Southern Gospel songs. One of the band members told me privately that he would personally prefer music that sounded more like Led Zeppelin, but he understood that his job as a helps minister was to help that preacher flow, and so Southern Gospel it was, every night! If you’re a smart musician, you’ll play what the preacher wants too, regardless of your personal preferences.

What if You Don’t Feel Anything, or Aren’t Instantly Healed?

Remember that it was a healing line, not a feeling line.

In some cases, you will feel something like an electric current going into you when hands are laid on you. It is possible that you will feel nothing at all. On the other hand, you may end up on the floor wondering what just happened to you. There’s no way to tell in advance.

One of the biggest mistakes people make in healing lines is to assume that because they do not get an instant manifestation of healing or a massive “power shower,” they must have missed it, or perhaps the minister just wasn’t anointed that time. Like the ten lepers, you may be one of those who was “healed as they went” (Luke 17:12-19). The proper attitude is to believe that the anointing went into you (which you may or may not have felt) and to believe that God’s power is continuing to work in your body.

I can picture some people saying, “Oh, come on, that’s just a cop-out to get the healing minister off the hook. That way, when there’s nothing there, you can pretend that something is there, as in that story about the Emperor’s new clothes.” Object if you wish, but I have been healed marvelously in cases where I noticed no change when I was prayed over! In a couple of cases, I got worse physically before I got an instant manifestation of healing later. But I still got it, and it was still God. If you go around affirming that you didn’t get anything, you have dug up the seed that you had planted for your healing.

It is always proper to “believe that you received when you prayed” despite adverse circumstances after you pray. God says that we receive the promises through faith and patience (Hebrews 6:12) and that we have need of patience after we have done the will of God (Hebrews 10:35-36). If all healings were instantaneous, you would only need faith. There would be no need for patience.

Why should you believe that anything will change when you didn’t notice any change when hands were laid on you? Because you should believe your Lord! He said that believers would lay hands on the sick and they would recover (Mark 16:18). If hands were laid on you, you should expect to recover because that is what Jesus Himself said you can expect! Jesus did not promise that each person would recover immediately. He said they would recover.

There will always be people who are unwilling to learn about faith from the Bible. Such people will live sad lives, going from healing service to healing service without getting healed. After they see no change when hands are laid on them, they will say, “See, it didn’t work!” They expect the minister to do it all for them, and he can’t. (He would if he could!)

It is the minister’s responsibility to come to the meeting ready to flow in the Spirit, and to preach and teach accurately to help the people. It is his responsibility to be willing to make the anointing available to the sick through the laying on of hands.

It is your responsibility to believe for your healing when hands are laid on you. It is your responsibility to exercise faith and patience and receive God’s promise. That is not the minister’s responsibility! If only more people could see that!

Healing Flows in Regular Services

Sometimes the gifts of healings can start operating in a service at your church that was not designated as a healing service. When this happens, the comments made about healing services in this discussion apply to the part of the service that has become a “healing service.” The service will sometimes go into a healing “flow” and then go into something else. It is important to respond right away if you need healing. This will help the service keep flowing. I have yet to figure out why so many people wait for someone else to go up first, knowing fully well that they need healing. Be bold, go down there and receive!

I have found in practical experience that communion services are a good time for people to receive healing, since people are commemorating the fact that Jesus’ body was broken in their place so that their bodies do not have to endure the Law-stipulated physical punishment for sin.

The Best Way to be Healed

Thank God for healing services, but the best way to be healed is on your own with no help from anyone else. You don’t have to wait for a healing service to receive your healing any more than a sinner needs to wait for an evangelistic crusade to get saved. Thank God for both kinds of services. But the best thing you can do is to build your faith for healing before you get sick! In case you haven’t noticed, it’s harder to study and pray when you have a temperature of 103° and you ache all over. It’s also harder to get healed when you’re already sick as a dog than it is to get healed when you sense the first symptom coming on you.

Healing is available to you anywhere, at any time, whenever you need it. God’s ultimate best is for you to stay healthy so that you don’t need to go to a healing service.