Healing & a Fifteen Character Minimum

Theology
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Some people go to the Lord and get healed. Others try to heal themselves.

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So… using your definition your opening statement would be worded thus:

Some people humble themselves to the Lord and let him heal them from all their problems. Others turn their back on the Lord and attempt to heal all of their problems themselves.

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Bob, by your personal redefinition, your statement could be more honestly translated like this:

“Some people go to the Lord and get healed from all of their problems. Others try to heal all of their problems themselves.”

Notice how much heavier that lands when you actually say what you mean?

Now, here’s the thing: it’s becoming increasingly obvious that you’re operating with a private dictionary—a sort of “Bob Standard Version” of the English language. Problem is, the rest of us are still using good old American English. You know, the one where “healing” typically refers to restoration from sickness or brokenness, not instant perfection and the erasure of every earthly struggle.

And it’s not just this thread. Skimming through your posts feels like touring a linguistic theme park where words wear funny hats and mean whatever you want them to mean. That might fly in Wonderland, but not in serious conversation, and certainly not when handling matters of eternal truth. Words matter. Definitions matter. Otherwise, we’re all just building Babel towers out of babble.

Proverbs 18:13 says it plain:

“He who answers a matter before he hears it, it is folly and shame to him.”

You might want to add: he who redefines the matter before he answers it does double the damage.

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Well, yes. They might not be aware they are turning their backs on the Lord, but that would seem to be what they are doing.

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You are adding words to what I said.

Yes, the Lord will heal us of all our problems, if we continue to walk with him. Others try to heal themselves of all their problems by themselves, it would seem to me. Now that I think of it, many might do some of both.

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Bob, I’m not adding words—you’re just meeting your own words face-to-face and realizing they look a little different in the bright light of day.

You said the Lord will heal us of all our problems if we continue to walk with Him. That’s not a minor clarification—that’s a condition strapped onto a blanket promise that Scripture never hands out so carelessly.

If that’s really what you’re preaching, then Paul must’ve somehow missed the memo when he said:

“Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’” (2 Corinthians 12:8-9)

Apparently, even the apostle Paul didn’t get the “heal-all-your-problems” package you’re advertising. He got grace to endure—not a magic eraser for every thorn.

And saying that some people “do a little of both”—trust God and try to fix things themselves—doesn’t fix the problem with your claim. It just muddies the water even more. If your original definition of “healing” is accurate, then either you’re fully healed by walking with God… or you’re not. Partial healing wasn’t even on your menu until now.

Bottom line: If your theology needs that many edits on the fly, maybe it’s not the Word that’s unclear—maybe it’s the definition you started with that’s limping.

Psalm 119:160 reminds us:

“The sum of Your word is truth, and every one of Your righteous rules endures forever.”

Not the sum of our good intentions. Not the sum of personal dictionaries. The sum of His Word.

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So the apostle Paul with his thorn in the flesh didn’t continue to walk with God?
Or there is the example of Christian Marters who must have died because they didn’t co tinue to walk with the Lord!
Was Jim Elliot and friends walkingwith God or not?
What about John Patons wife, or William Carey’s wife ( baptist missionary to india )
What about Christians being perscuted today?

The real life examples of Christians who suffer show that your theory is nonsence.

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If God doesn’t heal us, then what is the point?

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And he went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every infirmity among the people. Matt 4:23 RSV

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Are you saying that Christians worship and xerve God b3cause they see him as a cosmic sugar daddy, or is it because they recognise that he is worthy of worship regardless of whether we are healthy, wealthy etc.

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I say the Lord heals us. He is quite capable of doing that, and he loves us.

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Romans 8: 28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him and have been called according to his purpose.

Do you really believe this?
Are you willing to acept misfortune from God as well as fortune?

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Bob, respectfully—but firmly—that question is soaked in self-centered expectation and wrung out like a wet rag over the gospel.

“If God doesn’t heal us, then what is the point?”
The point is this: He is the point.
Not the healing. Not the fixing. Not the feel-goods. Him.

God is not a cosmic Tylenol dispenser. He’s not here to manage your symptoms—He’s here to make you holy. You want healing? Great. But He wants sanctification (1 Thess. 4:3). And sometimes that sanctification walks hand-in-hand with suffering, not in spite of it.

Let’s check the receipts:

“Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted.” – 2 Timothy 3:12
“Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God.” – Acts 14:22
“Though outwardly we are wasting away, yet inwardly we are being renewed day by day.” – 2 Corinthians 4:16

Healing is not promised in full this side of glory. You know what is? Grace. Presence. Perseverance. And a resurrection body that doesn’t creak, groan, or get COVID. That’s the endgame.

If your faith folds when healing doesn’t show up on cue, then what you had wasn’t faith in Christ—it was faith in comfort dressed up in church clothes.

Let me remind you of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who stared down the furnace and said,

“Our God is able to deliver us… but even if He does not, we will not bow.” (Daniel 3:17–18)

That’s faith. That’s the point.

So if your theology only works when the miracle shows up, it’s not Christianity—it’s spiritual consumerism. And it needs to be traded in for a cross.

1 Like
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An abriviated account of Jim Elliot:-

Do read it and answer the question.

Why did God permit  this to happen?
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I believe the verse and I believe it is necessary for the Lord to discipline us when we aren’t doing his will.

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If we don’t believe the Lord can heal us, or if we believe the Lord is unwilling to heal us, then I think we don’t understand the Lord. Of course, we must understand that the Lord will give us the instructions - it’s up to us to obey.

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Bob, no one here said God can’t heal.
No one said God won’t heal.
What’s being corrected is your assumption that healing is always God’s immediate will if we just punch the right obedience buttons.

That’s not faith—that’s vending machine theology.
Insert obedience → expect instant blessing → shake fist if it jams.

Here’s the biblical reality:
God absolutely can heal.
God sometimes chooses to heal.
And sometimes, for His greater glory and our deeper good, He chooses not to—at least not until the final resurrection.

You say, “If we believe the Lord is unwilling to heal us, we don’t understand the Lord.”
Tell that to Job, scraping his boils with pottery shards. (Job 2:7–8)
Tell that to Paul, who pleaded three times for healing and was told, “My grace is sufficient for you.” (2 Cor. 12:8–9)
Tell that to every martyr who bled out without a miracle in sight, but still held onto Christ.

Obedience is crucial.
Faith is crucial.
But so is submitting to God’s sovereign will—even when it doesn’t match our wishlist.

Because real faith says:
“Even if He doesn’t…” (Daniel 3:18)
Not:
“He owes me if I’m good enough.”

The God of Scripture is not a formula to master—He’s a King to trust.
Even when the healing doesn’t come on our timetable.

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I don’t think I said healing was the Lord’s immediate will, but the Lord is teaching us how to live a life without pain.

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Bob, shifting the phrasing doesn’t change the foundation problem.
You’re still packaging Christianity like it’s a “pain-free living seminar”—and that’s not the gospel.
Not even close.

Nowhere—and I mean nowhere—does Scripture teach that the Christian life will be one without pain.
In fact, Jesus guarantees the opposite:

“In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)

Paul didn’t write from a luxury spa.
The apostles didn’t retire into pain-free prosperity.
They were shipwrecked, beaten, imprisoned, and martyred.
That’s not the life of “no pain”—that’s a life of faithfulness through pain.

The Lord is teaching us—yes.
Teaching us to endure.
Teaching us to trust.
Teaching us to hope beyond this broken world.
Not teaching us how to craft a pain-free earthly existence.

Romans 8:17 hits the nail right on the head:

“Now if we are children, then we are heirs—heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ, if indeed we share in his sufferings in order that we may also share in his glory.”

Suffering now. Glory later.
Not “no suffering now if you obey hard enough.”

This isn’t me “disbelieving healing,” Bob.
This is me believing the Bible over wishful thinking.

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The Lord is teaching us how to live a life without pain.