Big Healing Book - Matthew 10:1

Matthew 10:1:

And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them power against unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal all manner of sickness and all manner of disease.

Notes on Matthew 10:1:

The anointing to heal the sick is transferable. In this case, Jesus gave His disciples the ability to do the works that He did when they preached in places where He was not going in person. This is similar in some ways to Paul’s use of cloth items in Acts 19:11-12.

You may also note that when a minister transfers the anointing to another individual to complete a task, that anointing does not necessarily stay permanently. If it did, the disciples would not have had to wait to receive the Holy Spirit to do the miracles they did in Acts – they could have gone out and done them based on this transfer of power described here. The anointing was on them to complete a particular task. For a modern example, a healing evangelist may lay hands on someone and ask him to lay hands on some sick people in a service. That does not mean that the other person will now have a similar healing ministry. (By the way, the term “healing evangelist” is actually redundant from a biblical perspective, because there is no record of the Lord calling anyone to be a non-healing evangelist. You would expect the “power gifts” – healings, miracles, special faith – to flow through a minister who stands in the evangelist’s office. Philip, the only one referred to as an evangelist by name in Scripture, flowed in signs and wonders. The others who were sent out with the “good news” were also called to heal the sick. I use the term healing evangelist in this book, but only because today some people call any preacher who isn’t a pastor an evangelist, biblically incorrect as this is, and I am making a distinction between all non-pastors and the non-pastors who actually stand in the office of evangelist and have healings following their ministries.)

You can see that Jesus did not do miracles just because He was the Son of God. The twelve disciples were not members of the Trinity, yet here they were given the power to do the same things Jesus did.

It should come as no surprise today that the Lord anoints preachers to minister to the sick because that was the pattern in Scripture.

Notice that Jesus never sent people out to “pray for” the sick. He sent them out to heal the sick by His authority. There’s a big difference, though sometimes healing ministers use the term “praying for the sick” to mean taking authority over sickness in people’s bodies. We know what they mean even though the words may not be technically correct. There are similar cases in everyday life. A sign between two toll booth lanes coming onto the Maine Turnpike told me, “Use Both Lanes” but I explained to the toll collector that I could not comply with the sign because I could only use one of the two lanes. (I did know what the sign meant; I was just trying to liven up the toll collector’s day. A toll collector once told me how boring his job was.) Likewise, “Violators will be towed” is barbaric compared to “Violators’ cars will be towed,” but again, you know what the sign means. So just because someone talks about “praying for” the sick doesn’t necessarily mean that they are doing something Jesus didn’t do.

Mark and Luke add a detail that Matthew omits – that the 12 were sent out to PREACH as well as HEAL. It is just as important to share the Word as it is to be willing to lay hands on the sick.

Jesus gave power to 12 men, not 11. That means that the thief Judas Iscariot was given the same authority over sicknesses and demons as the other 11 original apostles. So we see that being given this kind of authority comes from being with Jesus, not from living a perfect moral life. If God could use Judas Iscariot in signs and wonders, surely he can use you!