Faith Healers or ‘Fake’ Healers?
by Greg Gwin
So-called “faith healers” continue to claim great abilities for healing various ailments of the physical body. While we steadfastly believe in all the miracles of the Bible, including the many instances of miraculous divine healing, we are equally as strong in our denial that these modern “healers” have any God-given power in this realm. The Scriptures teach that the age of miracles has ended (I Corinthians 13:8-13).
A personal trip to a ‘faith healing revival’ served to illustrate the great discrepancy between the claims of a modern healer and the genuine healings recorded in the Bible. Some of the ailments that were ‘healed’ by this person included:
- “swimmer’s ear”
- a sore thumb
- a root-canal problem in the teeth
- anxiety attacks
- a pulled muscle in the leg
- a dry eye socket
Notice that all of these claimed ailments could not be verified or confirmed by those observing the supposed ‘healings.’
Please contrast these with a partial list of the healings performed by Jesus:
- raised the dead (John 11:1-54)
- gave sight to the blind (John 9)
- healed lepers (Luke 17:11-19)
- caused the lame to walk (Matthew 9:1-8)
- restored a severed ear (Luke 22:49-51)
The significant difference is that Jesus performed miracles that could be easily verified by any interested person. Even unbelievers were forced to admit his miracle-working ability (John 11:47). This is obviously not so in regard to the ‘fake’ healers in the religious world today.
