Lesson 7. Christ the Healer. F. F. Bosworth. A Classic on Divine Healing.
In the case of the bronze serpent that was lifted up—and this was a type that Christ embodied in Himself—the dying Israelites had to fulfill the condition given in the Book of Numbers (21:8) in order to be healed: “Everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live.”
If, as some teach, Christ’s plan of redemption did not include healing, then why were the dying Israelites required to look at the type of redemption in order to be healed? They received both forgiveness and healing at the moment they looked expectantly at the type of Calvary; why, then, can we not receive the same from Christ—the embodiment of that type? If this is impossible, then the type stands above Christ Himself, and that type is a false prophecy.
“Everyone who looks”
But notice that any of them could receive healing only on one condition: by looking.
TO LOOK means to be occupied with what we are looking at and to be under its influence. It is just as Abraham refused to consider his body and remained firm in faith, looking to the promises of God. To be occupied with our symptoms and feelings and to be under their influence means to reverse the conditions God requires.
TO LOOK means to focus one’s attention. After God gave His people the promise of healing and revealed Himself as the Healer in the redemptive name Jehovah-Rapha, He established the covenant condition: believers in Him must “pay attention and do everything.” This implies attention and concentration on His Word. In the Gospel of Mark (4:24), Jesus also teaches that we measure out His blessings to ourselves by the attention we give to His Word. “The Word of God is seed,” which, like any other seed, has the power to produce fruit when placed in good soil. By giving attention to the Word of God, we place it in “good soil” and leave it there.
Satan cannot prevent the seed from doing its work unless we allow him to pull the seed out of the soil. He can accomplish this by making you shift your attention from the Word to your symptoms. Jonah called symptoms “lying vanities” and, while still inside the fish, said, “I will LOOK AGAIN toward Your holy temple.” Then he offers a “sacrifice of thanksgiving.” This is what it means TO LOOK.
TO LOOK also implies expectation. To turn to God for salvation means to expect salvation from Him. He says to us all: “Look to Me, all you ends of the earth, and be saved.” Since God has prepared and promised healing for us, we must rid our minds of the slightest thought that healing is impossible.
The verb “LOOK” can also be translated as “CONSIDER.” We read that Sarah “considered Him faithful who had promised.” Instead of dwelling on her age, she believed, setting her mind on the Word of God.
The verb “LOOK” implies a process. This is not merely a fleeting glance, but a prolonged “gazing” until complete healing. It was precisely “steadfast faith” that brought the fulfillment of God’s promise to Abraham. The healing process continues for as long as we keep looking at the promise. We must think by faith, speak by faith, act in faith, and continue doing so until the promise is fulfilled. When we occupy ourselves with symptoms of illness or with our feelings, we violate the conditions that have been set and thereby disconnect His word.
The Ability of Faith to See
In Hebrews 11:23–27, we read that Moses “persevered because he saw Him who is invisible.” Speaking in scientific terms, “faith is confidence in what is invisible.” But when we speak of “the eyes of our understanding” being enlightened, faith is confidence in what is visible. To walk by faith means to have “better eyesight.” We must live our lives looking at things far better than those that can be seen with the optic nerve. “With the eyes of faith,” we see glorious things invisible to the natural eye. Ultimately, it is the mind that sees, not the optic nerve. You can only picture in your mind the money you have in the bank. When you receive a check, you see by faith, not with your eyes; you see it mentally.
Faith is the most rational thing in the world because it rests on the greatest facts and realities. It sees God; it sees Calvary, where sickness and sin were defeated. It sees God’s promises and His faithfulness, which are more secure than the foundations of the mountains. Faith sees the health and strength provided on the cross as already belonging to us; it accepts the words, “He Himself bore our weaknesses and carried our diseases,” and acts accordingly. What the eye of faith sees, the hand of faith receives through the words, “This is mine because God promised it.” Faith refuses to see anything except God and what He says.
The Glorious Reality of Faith
We make a tremendous mistake by assuming that something does not exist if it cannot be seen with the natural eye. Imagine that you entrusted me to lead you down the street while you were blindfolded. The pavement beneath your feet would be just as real as if you could see it. With every step, you act by faith, which is confidence in what your eyes cannot see. You see only what your mind sees, while I describe it to you. The great spiritual realities and facts that God sees and tells us about are just as real as if we saw them with our own eyes. Based on God, His faithfulness to us, and His promises, faith is the most reliable ground on which one can stand. Simply by believing the Word of God, millions of sinners have been transferred “from the kingdom of darkness into the Kingdom of God’s beloved Son.” Millions have passed from this world into heaven. God’s promise is something better than a stone staircase leading to heaven that could be seen with the natural eye.
Jesus said that He came so that those who cannot see their salvation with natural eyes might see it with the eyes of faith. After He was taken up into heaven, where He could no longer be seen with the natural eye, He advised us to anoint our spiritual eyes so that we could see Him. By doing so, Peter received far more joy from what he saw with his new spiritual sight than from anything he could ever have seen with his natural eyes. With this ability to see, we will live the happiest life possible because of the superiority of what we continually behold—the very best reality, one that brings joy. Supernatural joy is always the result of using our finest pair of eyes.
It is important to understand that genuine faith is directed more toward the power and mercy of God than toward human weakness. God offers us the opportunity to grasp His power. He says, “He gives power to the weak.” He also says, “Let the weak say, ‘I am strong.’” Depending on our obedience to Him and our faith that we have His power, standing on the authority of His Word—even when we feel weak—His power “is made perfect in our weaknesses.” We must believe what God tells us, regardless of how we feel.
One reason why some people do not receive healing is that they believe their five senses instead of believing the Word of God. We must understand that these five senses belong to the natural person and were given to us for use in this world. But what is connected with God cannot be discerned, acquired, or known through natural senses.
No physical sensation, such as pain, weakness, or feeling unwell, can be a basis for doubting the fulfillment of any of God’s promises. How foolish it would be for me to doubt Christ’s Second Coming because I feel weak or in pain. If pain cannot be a reason to doubt one promise, then it cannot be a reason to doubt any other promise. God is just as faithful in one promise as in another. Therefore, it is just as foolish to doubt God’s promise to heal because of pain or other sensations as it is to question Christ’s Second Coming because of these sensations.
The basis on which we claim forgiveness of sins is the fact that Christ bore them “in His own body on the tree” (1 Peter 2:24), and we must believe that our sins are forgiven before our feelings change. On this same basis, we receive physical healing from the Great Physician. The healing of both soul and body rests on the unchanging truth of Christ’s finished work, not on our feelings.
When God reveals to you His redemptive name, Jehovah-Rapha: “I am the Lord who heals you,” He wants you to respond to Him in faith: “Yes, Lord, You are my Healer.” He wants everything He says to become real in your life, and you will not go wrong by firmly believing what He says—that at this very moment He is truly healing you and will not stop until you are completely well. Faith means speaking and acting in accordance with what you believe. The blessings we receive by firmly believing God’s promises always become reality.
Our thoughts must not contradict one another
When receiving the healing given by Christ, we must not BE CONTRADICTORY in our thoughts. James says: “But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that person suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord” (James 1:6–7). We must, as it were, behead ourselves and put on “the mind of Christ,” which means seeing only what He says and acting in accordance with this vision. This is what it means to ask “IN FAITH.” Paul teaches us to “put off the old man with his old practices,” and this includes the old person’s habit of thinking only according to what is accessible to the five senses. To put on the new man and have the mind of Christ means that we believe what is written and speak as Jesus did: “It is written.” Remember that the new man is not guided by the evidence of the senses.
The Word of God Is Powerful
The Bible says that the Word of God is never powerless. “He sent His Word and healed them” (Psalm 107:20).
This is how He heals our bodies and souls. I know many who were healed when they read in the Book of Isaiah: “By His wounds we ARE HEALED.” They believed the words: “God says that I am healed, and I will believe God, not my feelings.” By repeating what God says and acting accordingly, we can cast out even cancer. When we firmly believe and act according to our faith in the Word of God, everything will be exactly as the Word says, and nothing will be able to restrain the power of God. All we need to do is firmly believe what the Word says and flatly refuse to see, believe, or think about things that contradict the Word. We must draw near to God and know that everything necessary for our spirit, soul, and body already belongs to us. God said to Abraham: “I WILL MAKE YOU the father of many nations,” and, accepting the new name “Abraham,” which means “father of many,” the patriarch of faith continually repeated the Words of God: “I am the father of many”; and when he called the nonexistent into existence and gave God glory for it in advance, what God had said was fulfilled exactly.
“When you believe that God has done and given you everything He says He has done and given, and you remain continually obedient to His Word, then God will cause everything old to leave you, and everything that is of Christ will appear in you” (C. Nuzum).
Second Peter (1:3) tells us that
God has already given us everything
we need for life and godliness. This includes everything necessary for our spirit, soul, and body in this life and in the life to come. Jesus acquired it all for us. Isaiah (53:5) and First Peter (2:24) tell us that He healed us. Colossians (1:13) affirms that God has delivered us from the power of darkness. In the Gospel of Luke (10:19), Jesus says: “Behold, I give you authority to trample on serpents and scorpions, and over all the power of the enemy, and nothing shall by any means hurt you.” Romans (6:18) says that we are free.
“For all this to become ours, God warns us, as in Peter’s case, never to pay attention to circumstances and feelings. The waves were just as high when Peter walked on them as they were when he began to sink. As long as he did not look at them, they could not hinder him; but as soon as he looked at them, he immediately doubted and began to sink. The wind was exactly the same when he walked on the water as it was when he began to sink. As long as he paid no attention to the wind, it could not hinder him. Here God teaches us that if we look around and occupy ourselves with our feelings instead of heeding Him and His Words, we will lose everything He offers us. However, by refusing to look at anything except God and what He tells us, we will receive and retain everything He says He has given us” (C. Nuzum).
Hold firmly to what you have received
“Satan tries to take away from us what we have received from God, and therefore God tells us: ‘Hold fast what you have’ (Rev. 3:11). Jesus gave Peter the power to walk on water, but the devil took it away from him by making him focus his attention on the wind (which represents what we feel) and the waves (which represent what we see). Peter had the power given to him by Jesus and used it, but lost it because of doubt” (C. Nuzum).
Many people also lose the manifestations of healing already at work in them by shifting their attention from Christ and His Word to their feelings. Before taking a step of faith toward healing, decide once and for all that after taking that step, you will see nothing but God and what He says. From that moment on, there can be no talk of doubt, because the foundation on which you have planted your feet is the Word of God. Watching your feelings and symptoms is like being a farmer who digs up his seed to make sure it is growing. This kills the seed. When a true farmer plants a seed in the ground, he says with satisfaction, “I am glad the work is done.” He believes that the seed will sprout even before the shoots appear. Why not have the same faith in the “Incorruptible Seed”—the Word of God—and believe that it is accomplishing its work without waiting for visible results.
To receive supernatural healing, the first thing you must learn is to stop worrying about the condition of your body, because you have dedicated it to the Lord, and He has taken responsibility for your healing. You can be happy and at peace in this regard because you know from His own Word that He takes responsibility for everything dedicated to Him. When you receive healing through faith, the body and all its sensations fade from view, and all you see is the Lord and His promises. You rejoice in faith and say, “It is written,” before you see physical changes. Jesus won His great victories by saying, “It is written,” and believing what was written. Every unfavorable sensation should be treated as a warning from above not to dwell on the body, but to meditate even more on the Lord’s promise. It is far better to be in unity with God and rejoice in His faithfulness than to be occupied with a sick body. We have observed many people experience great spiritual victories, while others lost sweet fellowship with God by focusing on their sensations and symptoms of illness.
How Our Faith Can Be Perfected
In the Gospel of Mark (9:24), we read about a father who asked for healing for his son and cried out with tears, “Lord, I believe; help my unbelief.” Turning to Christ for help, he received it, thus rising to the heights of authority and succeeding where the apostles had failed. In Greek, the Holy Spirit is called Paraklete, which means “Helper.” Thanks be to God! Christians can always receive His help when they need it. The Holy Spirit is always ready to work in us what pleases God, and this applies especially to faith, because without faith “it is impossible to please God.” Since faith especially pleases Him, He wants to cultivate it in our hearts through the Holy Spirit and His Word. The Holy Spirit is always ready to help every Christian strengthen their faith in any of the blessings the Lord has promised us in His Word. The Bible tells us that Christ is able to save us from everything, including unbelief and the sin of which the Holy Spirit convicts us. Therefore, having resolved to listen only to His Word, confess your unbelief to God and expect Him to deliver you from it just as He delivers you from any other sin. His grace is always sufficient for your faith to triumph and for you to receive the mercy He has given. The Holy Spirit is always ready to fulfill any promise given by God.
What Makes a Person Righteous?
So what makes a person righteous? Again and again we are told that righteousness was credited to Abraham. Yet the story of how he became righteous is very simple: HE BELIEVED GOD AND ACTED ACCORDINGLY. He believed and acted in accordance with his faith in order to receive the fulfillment of God’s promise. This is the very essence of righteousness. Nothing can be as important as this privilege, because only in this way can God’s glorious plan for an individual and for the Church be fulfilled. There is no other way for anyone to fulfill God’s will and works. When Christ was asked, “What must we do to do the works of God?” He answered, “This is the work of God: that we believe.” God can manifest Himself only where He finds living faith in the fulfillment of His promises. If we become righteous through faith in God, then unbelief, by contrast, makes us unrighteous. Unbelief is unrighteous and evil because it hinders the divine plan, which consists of everything God has promised us in response to our faith. No wonder God sent the Holy Spirit to convict the world of the sin of unbelief. Everything that prevents us from having living faith that God’s will and works will be fulfilled is unrighteous, even if we call it religion. Christ’s ability to save us completely consists in His ability to save us from unbelief, which is mortally dangerous to the glorious divine plan. The Holy Spirit has been given to us to lead us into all truth, so that we may believe it and so that God’s entire plan may be fulfilled. Many people believe in God but do not believe God as Abraham did. Firm faith in what God’s will is for us is our duty, but also our greatest privilege. How would God fill this world with His great power if all who profess His name firmly resolved to learn all divine truth, believe it with all-conquering faith, and act accordingly!
Faith in God has a much stronger foundation and a much stronger HELPER (the Holy Spirit) than doubt or sin. The Holy Spirit will free your mind from all doubts if you trust Him and pay close attention to the Word of God.
The glorious, imperishable reality that God has prepared for us to see with the eyes of our faith is always stronger than cancer or any other disease perceived by our optic nerve. Doubts, sin, and sickness can be destroyed if we properly use “the eyes of our understanding.” This is the unfailingly successful method by which we receive God’s blessings. All the glorious victories of faith recorded in Hebrews chapter 11 resulted from the proper and continual use of “better eyesight.”
The “law of the Spirit of life,” which heals our souls and bodies, is far stronger than the “law of sin and death.” If we do not hinder this law, it will suffer no defeats. Anyone who sets himself to attain all the benefits of redemption has a HELPER with unlimited abilities, whose power, when relied upon, always prevails. Just as God’s grace is stronger than sin, so Christ’s healing mercy is stronger than any disease. And the testimony God gives us for faith (His Word) is far stronger than any testimony of Satan that he uses to make us doubt.
What does it mean to exercise your faith?
Jesus said to the man with the withered hand, “Stretch out your hand.” First, Christ gives faith, and then He calls us to exercise it. This man stretched out his hand, relying on divine power, and his hand was restored. When we make an effort, relying on God to do something that is impossible without Him, He meets us with His divine power, and the work is accomplished regardless of natural limitations. Regarding what God calls us to do, “all things are possible not to everyone who feels capable of doing them, but to the one who believes.” We see this man’s ability not in himself, but in Christ, in whom all the components of salvation are found. “I can do all things through Jesus Christ who strengthens me.”
Because of our unity with Christ, the True Vine, the power is already ours, but we must learn to use it. The effort made by the man to stretch out his hand opened the way for a healing touch and for the flow of divine life. This act of faith, begun in the natural realm, became an entrance into the supernatural realm to meet the man’s need. It led to a completely supernatural work—the body could do what was impossible under ordinary conditions and depended entirely on God, not on the man’s own efforts.
The exercise of faith is not merely a physical action; it includes training the heart and mind in their relationship with God. Exercising faith means thinking by faith, speaking by faith, and acting by faith. This brings us the manifestation of everything faith can provide according to the promise of the Word. You may ask, “How can a person exercise faith for healing from blindness or from something else that does not require bodily movement?” Jesus told the blind man, “Go and wash in the pool of Siloam.” This gave the man an opportunity to exercise his faith not only in his heart and mind, but also in his body. The same thing happened with Naaman, the ten lepers, and the centurion. In each case, they went forward relying on the Word of God and believing that healing belonged to them even before it could be seen.
If you deposited a thousand dollars in a bank and told me that you were giving me that amount, and I believed you, I would act in faith and write a check as soon as I needed the money. I had not seen the money, but it belonged to me just as surely as if I were holding it in my hand. In the same way, the healing of our souls and bodies is found in Christ, whom God made the treasury of all that He Himself is. The sickness from which I have been redeemed does not belong to me; healing belongs to me. Therefore, I began writing checks for healing. How? By trying, in His name, to do what I cannot do without Him. This means acting in faith—writing checks for health and strength from God’s bank. It means counting on something we cannot see or feel, but which, as we know from the Word of God, belongs to us just as surely as money in the bank belongs to us, even though we cannot see it.
Ringed tree
Someone may ask: “How can I say that I am healed when I see the manifestation of disease in my body and feel pain?” Sometimes an example from nature can make the truth clearer. One way to kill a tree is to girdle it, and when we see a girdled tree, we already regard it as dead, although its foliage is green and fresh and all the signs of life are present. With natural sight, we see life. With the mind’s eye, whose knowledge reaches beyond what is visible, we see death. After some time, the leaves will wither and fall, and the death we first saw with the mind’s eye becomes evident to the senses as well. The same thing happens when we receive healing for the body. When we declare the Word of promise, the “sword of the Spirit” strikes a deadly blow against disease. For some time, the symptoms of disease may remain; the eyes of faith, looking at the Crucified One, see disease destroyed and health granted, “calling those things which do not exist as though they did”—and new life then manifests in the body. This is what the eyes of faith saw at first, and now the truth becomes evident to the senses as well. Faith sees God in His love and omnipotence, creating good from the word. (From “Pearls of Truth on Divine Healing.”)
To be guided only by natural sight is unscientific, because this approach does not take all the facts into account: it overlooks the greatest and best fact. Healing by natural means is also unscientific, because it leaves out essential components: the supernatural factor in disease, as well as the privilege of the supernatural in recovery.
We thank God for the thousands of people who have experienced great spiritual victories by receiving healing in this way. The process of acquiring faith that brings healing is a far greater blessing than healing itself. Many of those mentioned in Scripture became heroes of faith, but it was because they sought God in what we call temporary blessings. If we have learned faith while receiving healing, then we have learned to receive everything else promised in the Word of God. The Church could call millions into service for the Lord and make them warriors fighting “the good fight of faith” by offering them the healing Christ purchased for them. I desire that you, dear reader, having learned how to receive healing, would go on to a life of faith and service in the Kingdom of God.
Author: F. F. Bosworth
