reason.cck.org.uk

This is a question made popular by YouTube videos, which dismiss the existence of God as they claim He doesn’t heal amputees. Their logic is as follows:

1) The Bible says God heals
2) Amputees don’t get healed
3) Therefore the Bible isn’t true

In my opening I would like to make it very clear that I believe God does heal amputees. In fact, there is even a man in the Bible that Jesus heals after his ear has been chopped off. (Matt 26:51-54)

As to why God does not heal everyone in this life, including obviously some amputees is a different question. Christians believe that they are in a stage between the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus (2000 years ago) and his returning again to bring his work into completion, to make the earth and all that is in it renewed.

This means that God has given Christians the privilege to pray in Jesus’ name with the power of the Holy Spirit for healing, which God will often do, but we are still not yet in a perfect world and will not be until Jesus returns. As a natural consequence not all people are healed and this is most obviously shown in the ultimate ‘illness’ which comes to everyone: death. Death is something no one can avoid and is what the Bible refers to as ‘the last enemy’ to be overcome. However, because of Jesus’ death and resurrection, he has conquered death and enables those who trust in Him completely to live eternally.

Christians also believe that, after they die, they will receive renewed perfect bodies without any faults and which will last forever. Amputees will be a thing of the past!

Another question often linked with the one asked is that of ‘Don’t you need faith to get healed? Maybe amputees don’t have enough faith…’.

We are in no place to judge who has more faith than another. Only God can see the heart of someone and so I could never say with confidence that anyone has enough faith for healing except for those in which healing has occurred. The faith in question is mentioned in the Bible, in Matt 21:22. Many people assume that this is simply having a very strong will to be healed or the belief that God can heal them, but instead it is intrinsically linked with God’s will. I believe that the faith mentioned in the passage is the knowledge that it is God’s will to heal them; true faith, true depth of understanding about the will of God. This is something that I definitely do not claim to have.

My challenge to the questioner would be as follows: Is this really a question you personally struggle with or is it a sort of smoke screen/challenge and if God healed an amputee in front of you or if it was proven that God does heal amputees beyond reasonable doubt would you then trust in Him and follow Him, trusting Him with your life and choices or instead would you find another question to challenge him and the Christian?

Nobody is perfect. Not you, nor me and suprise, suprise, not even your Alpha table leader!

But there is hope! In the Bible, Paul writes, ” And we, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord’s glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit.” (2 Cor 3:18) And what a glorious hope too! We are being transformed into the likeness of the Only Perfect Man ever to have walked this earth. Seems impossible? Yes it is, and that’s why the Spirit of Jesus, Himself, is transforming us! We are destined for perfection – You, me and your Alpha table leader!

But the very word ‘transformation’ implies we are not there yet!

When a building is being constructed, we don’t really look at the scaffolding and the plain cement walls and base our opinions on it. That would be a bit silly! But we look forward to what it is about to become. And when you got the world’s greatest architect on the case, you know something magnificent is bound to be unveiled!

When we are cynical towards others or looking at them with contempt, we discount the transforming work that Jesus is doing in their lives. You are literally mockingly pointing out to Jesus the bits He hasn’t worked on yet. And I don’t think He needs your help. So spend your time focusing on the mighty work that Jesus achieved on the cross – the restoration of your relationship to God through the forgiveness of your sins and then on the transformation work that He is doing in your life as well as in the lives of those who’ve put their faith in Him.

If you want to understand more about God’s grace towards imperfect people, I recommend you do a study on 1 Corinthians or read C. J. Mahaney’s “Humility”.

So many things could be said in response to this question. Firstly, I am far from sure that the church does leave doctors to ‘deal’ with the mentally ill. But for the purpose of this answer I will assume that the question is concerned with healing. The Bible tells us that if anyone is sick that we should pray for their healing in faith and expect them to be healed (James 5:15.) I want to use this opportunity to speak about the nature and purpose of healing in the over-arching plan of God.

Jesus the Healer
In the Gospels we see Christ going from place to place not only preaching that His Kingdom had come but also backing this up by healing all of the sick (Matthew 4:23 & 9:35) From this we can deduce that the Kingdom (or ‘rulership’) that He describes is one in which all things that were corrupted by mankind’s rejection of God at the Fall will be set aright. This obviously includes the end of sickness and ultimately, death. On top of this, Jesus told us (in John 14:12) that his followers would do even ‘greater things’ than he himself had been doing.

The Problem
Although today we pray for people to be healed as Jesus did, we don’t always see this happen. What does that mean? Should we quit praying for the sick to be healed? Does God want some people to be sick and others not? As Jesus described His miraculous activities as examples of the ‘Kingdom of God’, we need to take a closer look at what He meant by this term.

The Kingdom
What is a kingdom? What is the ‘Kingdom of God’? Jesus himself told us that every time we pray to God we are to pray “your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” (Matthew 6:10) It rolls off of the tongue easily enough but I wonder if you have ever considered what you are asking God when you pray that? The clue is in the second clause ‘your will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven’. What we are asking is that God effect His sovereign rulership over the Earth in increasing measure, day by day. This rule is brought in by God’s people co-working with the Spirit of Christ in prayer and action. When we pray for someone’s healing, we are asking God’s Kingdom to come in a particular way.

Now and Not Yet
So why do we only see partial evidence of God’s rulership in the earth at the moment? Surely, Christ has already died, risen and ascended to Heaven: Should it not be the case that everything is now in submission to Him as king and head over everything? Hebrews 2:8-9 describes well the situation we find ourselves in at present: The Kingdom is already here but the Kingdom is also yet to come. As the text says, “at present we do not see everything subject to him. But we see Jesus… now crowned with glory and honor because he suffered death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone.” In saying this, the writer shows us that, despite the fact that we don’t currently see the full extent of Christ’s victory, we can be completely assured that the fullness of the Kingdom will come because the King has already been crowned. Ephesians 1:10 reveals to us the profound truth that God’s ultimate purpose in the Earth is to bring all things “under one head, even Christ”. Could God heal anyone of any sickness? I have no problem believing that at all. After all, if He is all-powerful then it is no more trouble for Him to heal the mentally ill than the physically ill. Why does He not heal everyone every time? It can only be that a greater purpose, one that will ultimately bring more glory to Him, takes precedence over even the temporal individual health of His people.

Agents of God’s Blessing
So, having looked at how healing functioned in Jesus earthly ministry and how it functions for Christians today, what of the original question regarding the care of the mentally ill being the charge of doctors? Well Romans 13:1, speaking with regards to obeying earthly authorities, tells us that God gives leaders who are not necessarily Christians as a ‘Common Grace’ (a gift from God that is for all people and not only for the Christian – other examples are that He keeps us breathing, sustains the earth etc.) It is part of God’s providence that He restrains evil and causes people to have compassion upon their fellow men and other creatures and not be totally selfish. It could be said that God’s provision for the seriously ill includes the use of people who may not even obey Him to bless others. Many times in Scripture, God will do this. A striking example would be the way God uses the Assyrians to discipline His people, Israel (Isaiah 10:5-7,) despite the fact the Assyrians motivations have nothing to do with the purposes God will achieve through them.

The Death of Death in the Death of Christ
Because of the atoning death of Christ, we can be assured that there will be a day where every sickness and even death will be completely done away with (Revelation 7:17 & Rev 21:4.) We already know that in the mind of God (who dwells outside of time and indeed, created time,) the Kingdom has already come on Earth: The Bible describes Christ as ‘the Lamb slain from the creation of the World” (Revelation 13:8) pointing to the fact that the work that mankind has seen Christ doing in time and space (on the cross,) is a perpetual reality in the mind of God.

So What do We do?
In light of all we’ve seen, should we keep on praying for the sick? Undoubtedly! The Bible tells us that we are to do this. Isaiah 53:4-5 reveals to us that Christ died for our sins and that “by his wounds we are healed” – God sees our healing as already a done deal: Whether it plays out completely this side of eternity is in His hands but, ultimately, we will be absolutely, eternally healed and restored. It is not for us to decide who God will heal and when, it is according to His purpose alone. Our role is to offer prayers in faith and ask that God would bring about His increasing Kingdom rule through us as He has promised He will.

Resource
For some helpful further listening check out the Christian Professor John Lennox in this excerpt from a debate. Especially worth listening to between 2:50 and 5:00 http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=5v5KZYTKNE8

Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.”So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”
(Genesis 1:26-28)

The image of God

Out of all the creatures God made, only one creature, man is said to be made “in the image of God.” To understand what this means, we may use the following definition: The fact that man is in the image of God means that man is like God and represents God.

The words “image” and “likeness” are used to refer to something that is similar but not identical to the thing it represents or is an “image” of. There’s a sense of distinction involved.

Various characteristics of man serve as examples in which the image of God is primarily seen – man’s intellectual ability, his power to make moral decisions and willing choices, his ability to socially relate, or his exercise of dominion over the earth.

But the passage does not list these characteristics out, because no such list could do justice to the subject: the text only needs to affirm that man is like God, and the rest of the Bible fills in more details to explain this.

As we read more of the Bible, we realize that a full understanding of man’s likeness to God would require a full understanding of who God is in His being and in His actions and a full understanding of who man is and what he does.

The more we know about God and man, the more similarities we will recognize, and the more fully we will understand what scripture means when it says that man is in the image of God.

Sin and the distortion of the image of God

Imagine you are an artist, the very best at what you do. You’ve just put in hours, days, weeks, even months into painting the most beautiful picture your mind has ever conceived. You take great delight in your master piece. This is a one of a kind. Never have you nor will you create something as beautiful. You want to show it to the world. Your heart flutters with anticipation! This is the moment you’ve lived your life for. You can’t contain your pride in your work. And then someone walks up to your creation and vomits all over it.

That is what man did to God when he sinned.

Sin is our failure to conform to the moral law of God in act, attitude or manner.

The question that then arises is whether man could still be thought to be like God after he sinned.

The question is answered quite early in Genesis where God gives Noah the authority to establish the death penalty for murder among human beings just after the flood: God says

“Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man.”

Even though men are sinful, there is still enough likeness to God remaining in them that to murder another person is to attack the part of creation that most resembles God. Man is still in God’s image.

However, since man has sinned, he is certainly not fully like God as he was before. His moral purity has been lost and his sinful character certainly does not reflect God’s holiness. Though man is still in the image of God, in every aspect of life, some parts of that image have been distorted or lost.

To return to my earlier illustration, though the painting has been defaced, it has not lost its original image. God makes a wonderful provision to have the mess removed and His precious creation restored to its original beauty – He sent His only Son to die on a cross for the forgiveness of sin. (Rom 5:1; John 3:16)

The recovery of the image – becoming more like God

It is encouraging to read then that because of the forgiveness that comes from Jesus, we can progressively grow into more and more likeness to God. Paul says that as Christians we have a new nature that is “being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator.” (Col 3:10)

As we gain in true understanding of God, His Word, and His World, we begin to think more and more of the thoughts that God Himself thinks. In this way we are “renewed in knowledge” and we become more like God. (2 Cor 3:18)

In fact, the goal for which God has saved us is that we might be “conformed to the image of His Son” (Rom 8:29) and thus be exactly like Christ in our moral character.

It is the Holy Spirit who produces in us those character traits that cause us to resemble Jesus more – love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. (Gal 5:22-23)

The beauty of this is that God works in you to recover His image in you. Paul writes, “It is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose.” (Phil 2:13), thus indicating something of the way God transforms us – both by causing us to want His will and by giving us the power to do it.