The Healing Word

Guest (Male): Sometimes I truly believe this: God will allow sickness, trouble, financial problems to come to get our attention. When we're well and happy, we don't feel like we need God. I suppose that's it, I don't know what it is, but sometimes when we get in a tight place we think, "Hey, I need the Lord."

Guest (Male): You needed Him before you got into that tight place. But He'll even be there with you even in that tight place if you have been ignoring Him. Come back to Him, love Him, serve Him, and tell Him, "Lord, I haven't been really letting Your word abide in me and I haven't really been abiding in Your word." He will bless that kind of honesty and bring glory and blessing into your life.

Guest (Male): Welcome to The Healing Word, a ministry dedicated to offering strength and encouragement through God's word for anyone facing life's challenges. As believers, we want to serve God and walk in His will, though the path isn't always easy. Today's message is here to meet you at your point of need, bringing hope and renewing your faith. Now, here is Pastor Jack Morris.

Pastor Jack Morris: The Lord Jesus Christ is alive today. He is with us. The scripture says He's the same yesterday, today, and forever. He has all power and He wants to give that blessing to us—the blessing of power over sin, over trouble, over sickness. The Lord Jesus Christ is alive and well, and He wants His church to be alive and well.

He wants you to be alive and well. He wants to answer your prayers, and He's going to answer your prayers. He's already done that, and He's going to continue to answer prayer. Do you believe in prayer? Do you believe in answer to prayer? Do you believe Jesus is here to do great and mighty things?

For four weeks now, the Holy Spirit has been speaking to my heart about the service today. I have gradually, slowly, but with real focus, prepared, being convinced that the Holy Spirit was leading me to do what I'm going to do, and that is to anoint and pray for the sick in just a few minutes.

I don't know that I've ever done that before here in the church as a congregation in a Sunday morning worship service, but the Holy Spirit wants to bless His people. You're His people and He wants to bless. He wants to help. He wants to be with you and encourage you and lift you and minister to you and help you to live the good life, the overcoming abundant life in Him.

The book of James is a faith-building book and as you read it, your faith will increase. I pray that the message today that you hear—the Word of God—will bring increased faith to your heart. James became a follower of the Lord Jesus. He was not always a follower. None of us were always a follower of the Lord Jesus.

James was one of the biological brothers of the Lord Jesus. James's mother and father were Mary and Joseph. Jesus was the firstborn. Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary, and after Jesus was born, Joseph and Mary had other children and James was one of those children.

James did not believe in Jesus while Jesus was here on Earth doing the ministry that He was doing. He didn't believe that He was the Messiah, the Son of God. Actually, he chided with Him at times: "You're the Christ, you're the Son of God. Go on up to Jerusalem, show your power." He lived with him, he grew up with him. Jesus was his older brother.

For Jesus to say, "I'm the Christ, the Son of God," James was saying, "Hey, you're my flesh and blood." But after Jesus was crucified, dead and buried, and then Jesus arose from the dead, the scripture says Jesus specifically appeared to James, the one who wrote this book. James became a convert.

He knew then that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God. Jesus desires to move in on your life today and appear to you in some way, in some fashion, where you have a need that He might convince you. There are too many Christians who still are not convinced that Jesus is alive and present and answers prayer.

Too many. If you're one of them today, God help you not to be just a churchgoer or a professing Christian, but a Christian who believes in Jesus, His resurrection, His power, and His presence, alive and well right here to do something for you today. He'll do that. Jesus will. He desires to do that.

He's more willing to bless us and to give to us and to minister to us than we are to receive what He has to give and minister to us. But Jesus is here to do a great and mighty work. James then later became the first pastor of the first Christian congregation in Jerusalem.

When James was converted, he was really converted. When he was not converted, he really was not converted. But when he became a follower of Jesus, he gave his heart, his whole body, soul, and spirit to the Lord and became a pillar in the church at Jerusalem. Healing was a large part of the ministry of Jesus Christ.

Jesus gave that ministry to the church. He passed it on to the believers. He said, "The works that I do shall you do also and greater works than these shall you do because I'm going to the Father and now it's up to you to carry on the work that I started to do."

Today that power, the power of Jesus, is resident in the body of Christ and we have to believe. As we believe, we will experience that mighty power and the very presence of Jesus just like it was experienced in the Gospels. When Jesus went away—I'm going to turn to Mark chapter 16—this is what He said to His disciples, His very last words to those who followed Him.

Mark 16, beginning at verse 15. Jesus has risen from the dead, He's now about to go back to heaven, He's going to leave the church, but He's going to leave His ministry of preaching and teaching and healing and comfort and service. He's going to leave what He started. He's going to leave it now to the church.

The first thing we're to do is to preach the good news to all creation that Jesus is alive. That's what I'm telling you today: He is alive. He is present to bless and to do great and mighty things. That's the good news, is it not?

Then the scripture goes on to say, "Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned." The secret today is believing on Him. Really with your heart, with your soul, with your mind, to believe that He is the Christ, that the good news of resurrection is indeed good news, that He is alive and present to do great and mighty things.

He's making an effort to help people to believe on Him. He wants to deal with your doubts, with your sins, with your unbelief, with your broken lives, your broken hearts, your broken emotions. He wants to deal with that first. Then verse 17: "And these signs will accompany those who believe."

If you become a believer, these are going to be the signs. You have to decide whether or not you're a believer. If you're a believer, these are going to be some of the things that Jesus does for you and through you. You decide now. Listen to the scripture and you decide whether or not you're a believer.

He said, "These signs shall follow them that believe: In my name, in His power, by His authority, they will drive out demons, they will speak in new tongues, they will pick up snakes." There was an illustration where Paul picked up some wood to put on a fire and the snake fastened onto him.

He shook the snake off into the fire. The people who saw it happening thought he was going to swell up and die, but he didn't die. Accidentally, inadvertently, these things will happen to the people who believe God. They will be blessed and they will be protected.

If they drink any deadly thing, it will not hurt them, and they will place their hands on the sick and the sick will get well. God is healing sick people even to this day, just as He did in the days when Jesus was here healing. Jesus has now bequeathed that ministry of healing to the church, to you and me.

Here are three important directives. Number one: call the elders. Here at the Largo Community Church, for the most part, the people who do the anointing and prayer are the four ministers. We will anoint with oil, we will pray.

When it says elders, it's simply saying those men who have been ordained by the church, set apart by the church because of their spirituality. Men of God, men of faith, men who love the Lord, who are walking in obedience with the Lord.

It's not talking about just old men in their chronological age, but men who have a relationship with Jesus Christ and love Him and serve Him and are being called to that holy office. The initiative lies with the sick person. I don't know how many people through the years—and I've been pastoring a long time—will call and say, "I was sick and nobody called on me."

Friend, you've got it backwards. You're to do the calling. Is that right? Doesn't it say for the sick person to do the calling? "I've missed church and nobody called on me." Hey, you're to do the calling. You're to say, "Pastor, I don't know whether you've noticed or not, but I want you to look at all these people here."

Sometimes I miss people. It's just inevitable. There's another congregation coming in after this congregation. So it is incumbent upon the individual to say, "I've missed church, I've been down, I've been discouraged, I've been sick, I've had a financial problem."

You're to tell the pastor what's going on so that the church and the pastor can love you and pray for you and support you in that situation. We are the body of Christ. Don't keep your problem a secret and then complain about it when nobody contacts you. Hallelujah.

Somebody told me one time, "You preach like you sometimes—not all the time—just came from the Baptist Convention." John told me one time, "Pastor, I think you've got a little Baptist in you." Maybe I do. But I pray that I have a whole lot of Jesus in me. That's the main thing.

Then the elder is to do what? The second thing: pray over him. These spiritual men, men of God, men of faith, are to pray over that person. Not only is the elder to do that, but the church is also to pray over that person and the sick person is to also pray.

The sick person prays, the congregation prays, and the elder prays. The scripture says in John chapter 15, verse 7, "If my word abides in you and you abide in my word, then you can ask what you will and it shall be done unto you."

By abiding, it means if my word abides in you, if you're listening to what you read, you're letting it come into your heart, you're now letting it be behaved out in your life. If my word abides in you and you abide in it. If we're not abiding in the Word of God—I have a friend of mine, every time he gets in trouble, he'll ask me, "Would you pray for me?"

"Have you been to church lately?" "No, I don't go anymore, but I'm in trouble. I need you to pray." He'll sometimes stand and I'll pray with him and he'll pray with me, but he's not abiding in the word. He's not serving the Lord. He's not going to church.

He's ignoring God and the only time that God comes to his attention is when he gets in trouble. Sometimes I truly believe this: God will allow sickness, trouble, financial problems to come to get our attention. When we're well and happy, we don't feel like we need God.

I suppose that's it, I don't know what it is, but sometimes when we get in a tight place we think, "Hey, I need the Lord." You needed Him before you got into that tight place. But He'll even be there with you even in that tight place if you have been ignoring Him.

Come back to Him, love Him, serve Him, and tell Him, "Lord, I haven't been really letting Your word abide in me and I haven't really been abiding in Your word." He will bless that kind of honesty and bring glory and blessing into your life.

The sick person is to exercise faith and when the sick person calls for the elders, that means that person is exercising faith. They're doing according to the Word of God, and when they confess their sins, they're also doing according to the Word of God.

It goes on to say, "The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous person avails much." The effectual fervent prayer, that means a prayer that is prayed in earnest, a prayer that is prayed from the heart, from a believing heart, a prayer that is prayed with energy.

You put some energy and time into it. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous person. Listen to me: a person who is right with God. Don't expect anything if we're not living according to the Word of God.

If you are right with God, it plainly says the effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man—that means a woman also. If you are right with God, God will move heaven and earth to bless you and to help you and to bring victory into your life.

Then it says the third thing: anointing him with oil. When Jesus sent out the 12 disciples, He blessed them and anointed them so that they could go out and anoint and bless others. It says this in Mark chapter 6, verse 13, and then James refers to it here in James chapter 5.

We're going to anoint with oil in just a few moments and oil is to do two things. Number one, it is to symbolize the presence of the Holy Spirit. In the Old Testament, there was the anointing of oil. One of the symbols or emblems of the Holy Spirit is oil.

We will anoint with oil this morning according to this ancient custom, according to this New Testament custom. It is a symbol of the Holy Spirit and secondly, it is to aid faith. It is something that is tangible. We're going to make a little cross on the forehead of the person who is sick and put our hands upon that person and pray over them.

The Holy Spirit is going to be present when the oil is put on the forehead and it's going to help you to aid you in faith that He is there with you to bless you. This will be a blessing from the Lord. We are to call for the elders of the church.

God uses various means to bring about healing. This is only one of the means. God also uses medicine and physicians. Actually, Luke, who wrote the Gospel of Luke, was a physician. He was an MD in his time and God called him into the ministry.

There are medical terms and phrases that Luke uses as students of the scripture we can read it and see the terminology that he used that a medical doctor would have used in that day. Jesus called him.

Also, oil and wine were used as medicine to bless and to help people who were ill. Remember the story of the Good Samaritan? The oil and the wine were poured in. That thought that it had medicinal purposes—this is what the belief was at that time.

Even when Jesus spit on the ground and made spittle, the belief at that time was that the saliva of a wise man would bring about blessing and healing, and so He made that. Jesus moved where the people were. Jesus came to where we are.

Jesus did everything within the culture to help people. He loves people. He loves His people who are redeemed by Him and He will do whatever is necessary within the bounds of the Word of God to bless and to bring healing to God's people.

Isn't He a wonderful Jesus? Hallelujah. What a wonderful Savior He is. Point C in your outline, here are three important results. I'm going to ask you to turn to James chapter 5, verse 15. Look up at the screen.

Here's the word, I want you to read it in unison: "And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up, and if he has sinned, he will be forgiven." The prayer of faith, meaning the prayer that comes from an obedient heart, a person that truly is living for the Lord Jesus Christ.

Their behavior reflects what they say with their words. The scripture says the Lord will raise him up or will make the sick person well. Then it also says, "If he has committed sins." If the sickness is a result of sin, then the person needs to confess that sin in all honesty and openness because God already knows.

Not all sickness is a result of sin. We are living in mortal physical bodies that are going to go back to dust someday. Sickness and disease is here and will be here until Jesus comes. So not all sickness is a result of sin.

But some sickness is a result of sin and if God has used this sickness to bring the sinner to the Lord, to get the sinner's attention, then the sinner needs to repent, confess the sin. Even Christians who are being prayed for need to examine their hearts clearly before we go to that altar for the anointing.

We need to look within and ask, "Lord, am I a righteous person? Am I right with You? Am I walking with You? Is there anything that I need to confess and repent of? Please show it to me." When He will show it and when He does, then turn to the Lord, asking Him to forgive you, then go forward and be blessed and be anointed.

Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever. His word is true. He will bless. To Him be praise, honor, and glory now and forever. Let's bow before the Lord, please.

Guest (Male): Thank you for joining us today for the message "The Prayer of Healing." I pray you were blessed and encouraged to reach out to God for your healing miracle. Friend, would you prayerfully consider supporting The Healing Word ministry?

Your partnership helps us continue sharing the life-changing truth of God's word across the airwaves and around the world. Every gift, large or small, makes a difference in reaching those who need to know that Jesus still heals, restores, and saves.

You can give safely and easily by visiting thehealingword.com and clicking the donate tab. Thank you for standing with Pastor Jack Morris and The Healing Word ministry. Together, we're spreading the message of hope, faith, and transforming power of God's love.

Join us tomorrow for another Healing Word message. Until then, blessings on you.