Gregory Dickow - Healing Is Here
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I want to talk to you about healing today. I want to talk to you about how healing is here. Healing is here, and many people have limited what God can do in their lives when it comes to healing. We think God can, you know, grow out a foot a little bit or God can heal a headache or God can heal somebody of this small thing or that thing. But God is the healer of spirit, soul and body. He heals our spirit by causing us to be born again. He heals our soul through the renewing of our mind, being transformed by the renewing of our mind. And he heals our body by the Holy Spirit in dwelling in us or by the various methods that God has given in the Bible to bring healing.
So if you look through the scripture, someone said, well, what is the right way to receive God's healing? Is it through the laying on of hands? Because the Bible says they'll lay hands on the sick and they'll recover? Is it through the anointing of oil because the Bible says they'll anoint the sick with oil and you can and and the and the power of the Lord will heal them? Or is it through the prayer of agreement where two of you shall agree about anything they ask? It shall be done for them. Somebody said, is it which one is it? Or should you have to do all of them? Do you push all these levers in order to be healed? And the answer is any of the above. The answer is God is so generous, he's so good and he's so generous that he's provided all these these touch points are all of these of these these these these points of touch or these these points of contact that bring healing in our lives.
You know, you can receive healing by just asking God to release the gift of healing in your life. You can receive healing by saying, thank you, Lord, that I'm healed by your stripes. You can receive healing by the laying on hands. You can receive the healing through the prayer program. You can receive healing through taking communion. You can receive healing just as you're singing and worshiping and praising God. In other words, there's no limit to what way God can heal you, because God's provided all healing. All healing comes from God, because Jesus is our healer and God is a healing God. One of his names in the Old Testament is Jehovah Rapha, the Lord, our healer, the Lord, our healer.
Now, someone might need to be healed of cancer tonight. Someone might need to be healed of a headache tonight. Somebody might need to be healed of of a bad marriage situation. Somebody might need to be healed of depression. Somebody might need to be healed of an addiction. You know, there is no limit to how God heals and there's no limit to what God heals. But healing is here. I don't know if you heard me tonight because healing is here. You need healing in your body. You need healing in your soul. Somebody might need some healing in your checkbook. Somebody might need some healing in your bank account. Lay hands on that. I've laid hands on cars that were sick and they got healed. The Bible doesn't limit what he will heal. He just says lay hands on the sick and they shall recover.
So I've laid hands on sick animals. People have said, would you pray for my animals? Oh, it's little sad. OK, let's pray for your animal because I don't like your tears. Let's pray right now. I don't really care about the animal, but I don't want you crying anymore. So let's believe God is playing around a little bit. Don't get too offended. But I've laid hands on cars that wouldn't start and they started. I've laid hands on sick people with cancer and they've been healed. I've laid hands on people that couldn't hear and they were healed. I've laid hands on people that were that were emotionally distraught and and in panic mode. And the Lord has healed them so God can heal anything. And he is he is the healer and healing is here. I want you to say that healing is here.
Now, the reason I want to talk about this today is because not only are we people that God loves so much that he wants us well, but God loves the world so much that he wants us to go and heal the hurting, too, because we're not just people that are supposed to receive from God, but we're people that are called to give out whatever we've received and whatever God has provided. And he has provided healing. And you know that healing is one of the marks of God's love, right. In other words, the Bible says and move with compassion. I'll just read it to you. What is it, Matthew? Chapter 14, verse 14, it says, and moved with compassion. Jesus healed. He went ashore. He saw a large crowd and felt compassion for them and healed their sick. Do you know that it's God's character to heal the sick?
You know, that's God's character. You know, even hospitals are God's idea. The first hospital that we have recorded in the Bible is found in Luke Chapter 10. I believe it is. Where there's a man who has been robbed and beaten half to death and the Bible says that a priest passed by and wouldn't and he wouldn't help them, and then a Pharisee passed by and wouldn't help them, the religious people wouldn't help the sick. But then the Good Samaritan came along and he picked up the person who was sick and he'd bind it up his wounds and put them on is his own donkey and took him to the local in. And they're at that in told the innkeeper to take care of that sick man and gave him two coins, two two days wage and said, if I don't return, if I if I take longer than two days, I'll make sure to pay you more. And he really formed the first hospital that day.
That's why so many hospitals are named Good Samaritan Hospital or Good Shepherd Hospital or the Lord Redeemer Hospital or you name it St. Alexian Saint, this saint that all these hospitals were where they were. They were formed because people that started them knew that healing was God's gift, whether it came through a doctor, whether it came through medicine, whether it came through a touch from heaven. Healing is the children's bread. Healing is the children's bread. I love this verse. It says in Matthew 14:14, I read it to you again. When he came ashore, he saw a large crowd and felt compassion for them. And what did he do when he felt compassion for them? He healed their sick. If you go through the scriptures, you see that it's God's character, it's Jesus nature to heal. The disciples never witnessed Jesus saying no to healing anybody.
Nowhere in the Bible do we see God took healing from somebody, but he always gave healing to somebody, that's his nature and that's what he did on the cross. See, a lot of people, most Christians or I mean, you can't be a Christian if you don't believe what I'm about to say, that Jesus took our sins on the cross. How many here believe that? OK, you're going to heaven. How many didn't raise your hand? Ouch. If you didn't raise your hand to that, you need to raise your hand and accept Jesus as your savior and Lord, all you got to do is just say, Jesus, I accept you as your as my savior and Lord. I believe you died for my sins and rose from the dead. Jesus died on the cross for our sins. Nobody would doubt that. Nobody here would debate that. Nobody here would question that. But what people question all the time is. But did he die for our sickness and disease to. And we only have to look at the Bible to find out if that's true.
So in Isaiah, chapter 53, verse... in Isaiah chapter, let's go through some verses here, Isaiah, chapter fifty three. I want you not only to know how to receive your healing, but I want to equip you to bring healing to others. Is that is that fair? Because everyone you come in contact with is sick in some way. And we need to realize we're on this earth as healers, we're healers. We're made in the image of God, we're the body of Christ. How is Jesus going to touch anybody if he doesn't touch them with his hands, with his eyes, with his you know, with his you know, with like I'm I don't know what you are in the body of Christ, but I'm like the saliva. I spit on a lot of people. But you know what? When Jesus spit on people, they got healed. So I don't mind being associated with that. I call it Holy Spirit, you know what I'm saying? But but but if we do, I tell you to go. Thank you, Isaiah. Fifty three just to stay in the spirit here.
Now, verse 4. Surely he himself bore our griefs and carried our sorrows. And we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. But it says in verse five. But he was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement for our peace was upon him. And by his stripes we are healed. I'm making a case for you to be able to easily receive and easily give healing of any kind to anybody that you come in contact with. And to be equipped with this gift is to be equipped with God's love, because Jesus moved with compassion, healed the sick move with compassion, fed the multitudes, move with compassion, touch the coffin of the boy whose mother was in grief and raised the boy up from the dead and gave him back to his mother. And he healed all who were sick.
Now, notice if Isaiah was referring to spiritual healing, then why did Jesus use this verse in Isaiah to bring healing physically? Because it says that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by the prophet. He himself took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses. Jesus himself used Isaiah and the quote from Isaiah about him to heal the sick because Jesus knew who he was and Jesus knew he was the healer. But he used the scripture to prove to the Jewish people who believed in Isaiah but didn't necessarily believe in him, that he is still the healer. And in case you're wondering, well, that was back then two thousand years ago in Jesus Earthly Ministry.
Let's just deal with that argument that will go in your head and that religious people might try to talk you out of healing with that with that theological argument. And let's look at Hebrews, chapter 13, verse eight, Hebrews Chapter 13, verse eight, and notice what he says here. Hebrews Chapter 13, verse eight. Jesus Christ, is this the same Jesus Christ that healed the sick, the same Jesus Christ that went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil? Is that the Jesus Christ you think he's talking about? Do you think this is the same Jesus Christ that saved your soul? Do you think this is the same Jesus Christ that is seated at the right hand of the father and has seated you and me with him in heavenly places? Do you think this is the same Jesus Christ died for our sins on the cross and was buried on the third day rose from the dead. Do you believe that this scripture is talking about that same Jesus Christ? I do to Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever.
So the same Jesus that saved two thousand years ago is the same Jesus that saves today, the same the Jesus that that healed two thousand years ago is the same Jesus that heals today. But people say the argument is, well, OK, God heals some people, but he doesn't, but he picks and chooses who to heal for his glory and who to leave sick. But healing isn't something that is out there in the future. Look at look at Peter quoting Isaiah and Peter the apostle that Jesus said upon this rock, I'll build my church and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. The same guy that doubted Jesus and denied him three times, but then came around. Right. That same guy is the one that in Chapter five, people tried to get in his shadow just to be healed, Peter says in first Peter chapter two, verse twenty four. Let's look there. And so he says, and he himself bore our sins in his body on the cross so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. For by his stripes you were healed.
So Isaiah said it different. Isaiah said, by whose stripes you are healed. But Peter see, Isaiah was prophesying as if Jesus was coming right then by his stripes, you are healed. But Peter is declaring it as a past tense experience so that you would never be able to make the argument, and so that the devil would never be able to lie to you and say, well, Jesus isn't going to heal. You see, he already did. By his stripes, you were healed. We're simply learning how to receive what Jesus already paid for, just like by his stripes. You were forgiven. He says he himself bore our sins in his body on the tree. Why did he bear our sins in his body on the tree? Because. Because by him bearing our sins in his own body on the tree. We were forgiven. We were forgiven. Then we. We don't get forgiven. We were forgiven. We receive the gift of forgiveness.
I know this might sound like why you just kind of just aren't you just being a little just, you know, sort of anal about were and are and was and is and, you know, what is to come and all of that. No, but because you need to understand that healing was already provided for you in the same way that salvation was already provided for you, because you the only time. So you received salvation as soon as you believed Jesus died on the cross. You know, every one of us falls somewhere on the spectrum of of, you know, does God heal as it is? Does he heal? If you if you ask him to heal, if you get holy, does he heal? If you get the sin out of your life to heal, if you stop smoking, does he heal?
If you stop cussing, you know, you're all sunk. If that's the case, I mean, I'm sorry, you know, but we all we're all in different places in the spectrum. But what we have to come to to understand is either we have to understand is everybody, no matter where they are in the spectrum, when they have a loved one that's sick, they call the church. When they have a loved one that's sick, they ask for prayer. When they have a loved one that's sick, they believe in God. Everybody seems to believe in God in the hospital. I mean, you got people that have that haven't been to church in forty fifty years, but when their loved one is sick, they start doing this. They forget which side they you know, they go start going, what is it.
This is that, you know, they start doing, you know, the sign of the cross and they're trying to figure it out which is it left or is it right first? Is it you know, but they're like all of a sudden people become believers when they need healing. Why? Because every one of us knows in our heart of hearts that healing comes from God. Every one of us really knows that. We just don't think we qualify. And I'm here to share with you how everybody qualifies because everybody that Jesus healed, not one of them deserved it. Not one of them earned it. Healing is the life of Jesus. And putting this all together, there are several things that I want to say. First of all, there's two words.
Well, there's several words that that that healing is defined by in Greek language or words that in English are heal, healing or healed. But in the Greek or Hebrew language, they're different. The one word for healing in March 16, 16 and Luke seven fifty and and ex for twelve and Romans ten nine. And and that word is SOZO. I don't want to bog down with Greek words, but I want you to know that in those scriptures it's talking about salvation and the word the Greek word for salvation is SOZO. But in Mark 5:23, Luke 8:36. Acts 49. Matthew 9:21. Matthew 9:22, Mark 6:56, Mark 10:52. Luke 8:50. Luke 17:19. Acts 4:9.
All of those versus that I just listed for you in our places where the word is healing or he healed them and the same Greek word is SOZO. So some places God uses that word Jesus uses or the writers use that word for salvation. And then other places he uses that word for healing. How is that possible that God uses the same word for salvation as he uses for healing? In many places it's because that when Jesus died for our salvation simultaneously, he died for our healing to. That's why the same word is used in saving us, healing is a part of our salvation. See, you're not trying to get healed now. This I please don't take this as Christian Science or or what's the Scientology or any of those kinds of erroneous theologies and erroneous doctrines.
But hear what I'm saying, that in the same way that salvation is already done when Jesus died on the cross and our responsibility is simply to receive it if we so choose in the same way healing is already done by his stripes. We were healed. It's already provided for us. It's up to us whether we're going to accept the gift. It's a gift and Jesus paid for it. But there's so much religion that has been peppered into the churches of America and around the world that they don't people don't associate Jesus death on the cross with healing. They only associate it with salvation. But God used the same word for salvation is used for healing in many places in scripture to show us that salvation and healing were both purchased at the same time by the same person through the same blood, so that you can now walk out of here and say by his stripes, I was healed and since I was healed, then I receive my healing.