Objection: We Cannot Expect to Heal as Jesus Did Because We Are Not the Son of God

This objection assumes that Jesus healed people because He was God.  That is utterly false.  Jesus was, is, and always will be God, but He was required to walk the earth as a man anointed by the Holy Spirit, subject to every human limitation.  I will prove this to you from Scripture.

Jesus did no miracle before the Holy Spirit came upon Him in the river Jordan.  He was just as much God for the first three decades of His life, when he surely encountered a variety of human needs.  Yet he never did any miracle or healed anyone during that time.  His first miracle was at Cana of Galilee after he was anointed in the Jordan River (John 2:11).

Was it that He had no compassion until He was thirty years old?  No!  He was not able to do miracles until He was anointed with the Holy Spirit.

If Jesus healed as God, He could have healed anyone at any time.  But He could not heal the sick at Nazareth.  The Bible does not say that He would not, meaning that He chose not to.  It says that he could not, meaning that He was not able to!  Jesus was unable to heal more than a few sick folks at Nazareth.  Read Matthew 13:54-58, and Mark 6:1-6.  Unbelief and hostility toward His ministry were so rampant at Nazareth that the crowd tried to kill Him the first time He preached there!

It was not a power issue; it was a congregation issue.  In Luke 5:17-26, the power of the Lord was present to heal the religious leaders who were there.  Yet only a man let down through the roof received healing, even though the power was there to heal them all.  If Jesus ministered as God, He could have waved a wand (figuratively speaking) and made them get healed.  But He was limited to the same limitations that the rest of us have.  If the people reject the gospel message, they reject the power that goes with it.  People who could have been healed can miss out, and there is nothing we can do.  The servant is not above his master.  If Jesus couldn’t do anything about it, neither can we.

If Jesus healed as God, there were certain works He did during His ministry that no one else could ever do.  Yet He said plainly that we would do the same works He did (John 14:12-14), and even greater works!  Since we are not God, you must not have to be a member of the Trinity to do those works!  Therefore, Jesus did not have to do them as deity.

Ephesians 1:23 states that the Church is Jesus’ body, “the fulness of him that filleth all in all.”  If we cannot do the works that Jesus did in person, we are not His fullness.  We can only function in the fullness of Christ if we can do what He did.  Remember that Christ’s works on earth were only the beginning of “all that Jesus began both to do and teach” (Acts 1:1).  He continues to do and teach through His Church today, and we should be doing and teaching what He did and taught.  If we cannot heal the sick, we are the partiality of Him that filleth all in all, not the fullness.

Many who were healed in Jesus’ ministry were healed by their faith.  Given that faith has not passed away (you would not be born again without it), people can be healed today.  It is not an issue of who is doing the preaching.  God’s Word works the same no matter who preaches it.

Bear in mind that although Jesus walked on water, so did Peter, and Peter was not the Son of God!  He simply believed the words of the Son of God, as you can.

Proof That Jesus Ministered as a Man, Not as God

Jesus became strong in spirit (Luke 2:40).  Jesus grew in wisdom (Luke 2:52).  If He walked the earth as God, He would have been all-wise, and it would have been impossible for Him to “grow in wisdom,” and He would not have “become” strong in spirit.  God is already sufficiently strong in spirit.

This is consistent with Isaiah 7:14-16, where Immanuel, born of a virgin, would learn to refuse the evil and choose the good.  (“Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.  Butter and honey shall he eat, that he may know to refuse the evil, and choose the good.  For before the child shall know to refuse the evil, and choose the good, the land that thou abhorrest shall be forsaken of both her kings.”)  This would be impossible if He had been born omniscient.  He would not have needed the Spirit’s anointing if He ministered as an omnipotent God.  Yet in Luke 4:18-19, quoting Isaiah 61:1-2, Jesus said that the Spirit anointed Him.  This fulfilled Isaiah’s statement in Isaiah 11:2: “And the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him [the Branch], the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD.”

We know that Jesus was not omniscient as a man because He had to ask who touched His clothes in Mark 5:30 and He did not know when He was coming back in Mark 13:32.

Jesus was able to be tempted just as we are.  The devil tempted Him in the wilderness for forty days (see Matthew 4:1-11 and Luke 4:3-12) and after that, there were three specific temptations.  During His life, He was tempted in ALL possible ways (Hebrews 4:15).  That last Scripture should be a tremendous encouragement to you if you are struggling with an area of sin in your life!  Jesus, who now lives inside you, faced that temptation and overcame it.  He obviously knows how to overcome it, and He will help you overcome it.

Hebrews 2:16-17:
For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham.
Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people.

If Jesus ministered in ways that you never could, He was not made like unto His brethren in all things, but only in some things.

If Jesus ministered as God, there would have been no need for Him to pray!  Why pray to seek God’s will if you already know everything?  He would not have found a solitary place to pray (Mark 1:35), stayed up all night praying before choosing His disciples (Luke 6:12), or prayed in the garden of Gethsemane (Luke 22:41, Luke 22:44).  In particular, he would not have had to deal with His body that did not want to be tortured and crucified.

Philippians 2:7 says that Jesus “emptied Himself” (this is the basic meaning of the Greek word that is translated “made himself of no reputation” in the King James Version; most other translations, including Young’s Literal Translation, actually use the words “emptied Himself”) and took upon him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men.  He emptied Himself of any advantage He had as God.  He was still God when He walked the earth, but He was not allowed to take advantage of that fact during His walk here.  He had to be under our limitations.

Jesus said that the Son could do nothing of Himself (John 5:19, John 5:30), but what he saw the Father do (John 5:19).  That could not have been true if He ministered as the omnipotent God.

God had to anoint Jesus with the Holy Spirit and with power (Acts 10:38).  If He ministered as God, this would have been unnecessary.  He could have just done whatever He wanted anyway with His infinite power.

If He Did It, You Can Do It

Now that we have established that Jesus ministered as a man anointed by the Holy Spirit, we should consider that the same Holy Spirit who anointed Jesus is now in us.  That is why we can do the works of Jesus.

His Disciples Healed, but They Were Not the Son of God

The Twelve were not the Son of God, but they healed the sick everywhere.  Peter was not the Son of God, but people got healed when his very shadow passed over them (Acts 5:12-16).  Paul was not the Son of God, but when even handkerchiefs and aprons were taken from his body to the sick, they were healed (Acts 19:11-12).  Every sick person on the island of Melita was healed through Paul (Acts 28:8-9).  Philip was not the Son of God, but he got many lame people healed in Samaria (Acts 8:5-8).  Stephen was not the Son of God, but he did great wonders and miracles among the people (Acts 6:8).  The disciples whom Christ commissioned healed in His name, but they were not the Son of God themselves.  Therefore, it is not necessary to be the Son of God to perform healing miracles.  Therefore, Christ’s miracles did not have to be done on the basis of His being the Son of God.  He did what He did through the “finger of God” – the Holy Spirit, who is the same Holy Spirit who indwells believers today.

You Have the Same Faith That Jesus Had

God gives to every man the measure (a fixed portion) of faith (Romans 12:3).  Jesus had to play by our rules when He became a Man.  If God gave Jesus more faith than He gave the rest of us, God cheated and Jesus was not truly Man, so we could never hope to do what He did.  But the FACT that you have the SAME measure of faith that He had is yet another reason that you can do what He did.  Jesus may have USED His faith more than you have so far, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t start using it more now!

You Are a Son of God

You are not the Son of God, but you are a son of God if you’re a believer!  God is your Father too!  That is why Jesus can call you His brother (Hebrews 2:11) and why God can call Him the firstborn of many brethren (Romans 8:29)!  Jesus showed what was possible for a child of God to do, and now that you’re a child of God, you can do the works that He did!

He Said to Do It!

Jesus’ clear command was that we were to lay hands on the sick as He did.  Signs and wonders are to follow the preaching of the gospel.  The preaching of the gospel is still for today, so signs to confirm the gospel are still for today as well.

This is why Jesus said that it was expedient that He go away so that the Holy Spirit would come (John 16:7).  Now we can be everywhere doing the works that He did through the same Spirit.  If this were not so, it would not have been expedient for Him to go away, and the sick would have been better off if He were still on the earth!