When Will Christ Heal My Body?
00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)
00:00:02.580 | - Now we have two remaining episodes this week,
00:00:06.400 | both devoted to physical healing.
00:00:08.280 | On Friday, we'll talk about healing ministries.
00:00:10.400 | Today, should we trust them or not?
00:00:12.400 | And if we don't, if we avoid them,
00:00:15.440 | are we doing so because we think
00:00:17.040 | such a ministry is fraudulent,
00:00:18.480 | or are we doing it because we are stopped
00:00:20.480 | by our own unbelief?
00:00:22.700 | Great question.
00:00:23.800 | But first up today, we talk about the timing of healing.
00:00:26.840 | When will God heal us of our pain in this life?
00:00:30.320 | And why did Christ seem to heal so few
00:00:32.280 | in his earthly ministry?
00:00:33.960 | At least it appears that way.
00:00:36.000 | To these questions come the following excerpts
00:00:37.600 | from John Piper's sermon titled, "Christ in Cancer."
00:00:41.560 | This is a sermon he preached very early in his pastorate.
00:00:44.120 | Already by then, Pastor John was only at it
00:00:47.240 | for about a month in his pastorate,
00:00:49.040 | and he was well acquainted already
00:00:50.880 | with death and cancer and sickness.
00:00:54.680 | I'll begin with his testimony.
00:00:57.280 | - Before I entered college,
00:01:00.280 | I scarcely gave any thought to cancer
00:01:05.280 | and terminal illness in general.
00:01:08.640 | Then I went away to school at Wheaton,
00:01:13.560 | and two of my very close acquaintances died
00:01:18.560 | before they were 22, one of leukemia
00:01:22.040 | and one of cancer of the lymph glands.
00:01:25.000 | Then I went to Fuller Seminary,
00:01:29.120 | and within one year, watched my systematics professor,
00:01:34.000 | Jim Morgan, shrivel up and die of cancer of the intestines.
00:01:39.000 | He was 36.
00:01:40.520 | Then I went to Germany to study for three years,
00:01:44.960 | and six months before I was finished,
00:01:46.720 | my mentor, Professor Goeppelt, dropped dead
00:01:50.720 | on the way to the subway of a massive coronary.
00:01:55.720 | And then I came to Bethel and taught for six years
00:01:59.560 | and watched administration and students and faculty
00:02:04.560 | die of cancer, Sue Port, Paul Greeley,
00:02:08.520 | Bob Bergerud, Ruth Ludeman, Graydon Held,
00:02:12.240 | Chet Lindsay, Mary Ellen Carlson,
00:02:15.200 | all Christians, all dead
00:02:17.520 | before their three score and 10 were up.
00:02:20.520 | And now I've come to Bethlehem and Harvey Ring is gone,
00:02:25.400 | and you could multiply the list tenfold.
00:02:28.720 | What shall we say to these things?
00:02:30.920 | - Sobering.
00:02:31.960 | And then I'm gonna fast forward into the message later
00:02:33.840 | in the sermon, Pastor John goes on into healing,
00:02:36.160 | God's promises for our healing
00:02:37.760 | and his timing for that healing.
00:02:40.040 | Here he is.
00:02:40.880 | - There is coming a day when every crutch will be carved
00:02:46.720 | and every wheelchair melted down
00:02:49.320 | into medallions of redemption.
00:02:52.280 | And Merlin and Reuben and Jim and Hazel and Ruth
00:02:56.600 | and all the others are gonna do cartwheels
00:02:58.440 | through the kingdom of heaven.
00:03:00.520 | And we will rejoice, but not yet.
00:03:04.360 | It may not be yet.
00:03:07.600 | The day is coming.
00:03:10.000 | And that's my second affirmation.
00:03:13.320 | Third, Jesus Christ came into the world to die,
00:03:18.320 | to purchase that redemption,
00:03:23.640 | demonstrate its character as both spiritual and physical
00:03:28.640 | and to give us a foretaste of it.
00:03:32.000 | Now listen very carefully here,
00:03:33.800 | because right here is where I think many healers
00:03:37.800 | in our day misunderstand God's purposes.
00:03:43.800 | And distort his intentions.
00:03:46.360 | The prophet Isaiah said in chapter 53, verses five through six,
00:03:51.880 | a text which Peter in chapter two of his epistle,
00:03:55.520 | verse 24, picks up and applies to Christians.
00:04:00.000 | He was wounded for our transgressions.
00:04:02.960 | He was bruised for our iniquities.
00:04:06.080 | The chastisement of our peace was upon him
00:04:09.920 | with his stripes, we are healed.
00:04:14.160 | All we like sheep have gone astray.
00:04:18.040 | We have turned everyone to his own way
00:04:20.000 | and the Lord has laid on him the iniquities of us all.
00:04:23.720 | The blessing of forgiveness and the blessing of healing
00:04:29.040 | were purchased in the death of Christ.
00:04:32.480 | And everyone who joins to Christ
00:04:37.160 | and lives for Christ will have both blessings.
00:04:42.160 | But when?
00:04:43.480 | When?
00:04:45.280 | That's the question of our day.
00:04:47.280 | When do those blessings come in full force?
00:04:50.760 | When will our bodies no longer be enslaved to corruption?
00:04:55.120 | The ministry of Jesus, as we read it in the Gospels,
00:04:59.360 | was a ministry of healing and a ministry of forgiveness.
00:05:03.960 | He said, for example, to those disciples of John the Baptist
00:05:07.640 | who were very perplexed, he said,
00:05:10.120 | "You go tell John what you see and hear.
00:05:12.840 | "The blind receive their sight, the lame walk,
00:05:15.880 | "the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear,
00:05:18.640 | "the dead are raised up,
00:05:20.160 | "the poor have good news preached to them,
00:05:22.160 | "and blessed is he who takes no offense at me."
00:05:26.000 | Offense?
00:05:27.920 | Why would anybody take offense?
00:05:30.480 | He raises the dead.
00:05:33.360 | He's bringing the kingdom, the long-awaited kingdom.
00:05:37.680 | Why would anybody take offense at someone who can do that?
00:05:41.840 | Easy.
00:05:44.120 | He raised three people and left thousands in the tombs.
00:05:48.280 | Why?
00:05:50.880 | Why did he only raise three if he came to raise the dead?
00:05:54.920 | Maybe because the relatives of all the others
00:05:56.920 | didn't have enough faith.
00:05:58.720 | Baloney.
00:06:00.240 | In Luke chapter seven, he raised the widow's son.
00:06:04.320 | She didn't know him from Adam.
00:06:10.040 | She didn't know who Jesus was.
00:06:11.560 | She hadn't even seen him.
00:06:12.960 | All the text says was he felt compassion on her
00:06:17.000 | as they were carrying the boy out of the town in his casket.
00:06:21.160 | Well, didn't he pity all the widows in Israel?
00:06:26.320 | Sure he did.
00:06:30.040 | The answer to why Jesus only raised a few people
00:06:34.040 | and not everybody
00:06:36.640 | is that contrary to Jewish expectation,
00:06:40.720 | the first coming of the Messiah
00:06:44.680 | was not the consummation of redemption
00:06:47.760 | nor the closing of this fallen age.
00:06:52.040 | The first coming of the Messiah was to purchase
00:06:56.360 | that redemption and to illustrate
00:06:59.800 | the nature of that redemption
00:07:02.280 | as physical and spiritual
00:07:04.280 | and to give us a foretaste of it.
00:07:07.040 | He is gonna come again
00:07:10.400 | and now we know from his illustrations
00:07:12.920 | that when he comes there will be resurrection
00:07:15.440 | for all his people
00:07:16.760 | and there will be healing for all his people.
00:07:21.200 | No more crying, no more pain at that day.
00:07:27.120 | But let me stress here lest there be a misunderstanding.
00:07:31.080 | We do have a foretaste.
00:07:33.000 | We do have a foretaste of that redemption.
00:07:37.920 | The benefits of forgiveness and the healing are real.
00:07:42.640 | God can and does heal the sick now
00:07:45.480 | in answer to our prayers.
00:07:49.400 | And nothing I say should be construed
00:07:52.720 | to imply that he doesn't.
00:07:56.040 | But he doesn't always, does he?
00:07:58.640 | The miracle mongers of our day
00:08:03.400 | who guarantee that Jesus wants you well now
00:08:07.000 | are guilty of a gross distortion of God's intention.
00:08:12.480 | And I think it's this,
00:08:14.440 | they have failed to understand the nature of God's purpose
00:08:17.920 | in this fallen age.
00:08:19.480 | They have minimized the depth of sin
00:08:22.720 | and the cruciality of the purgative nature of suffering
00:08:26.920 | and the value of faith that comes through suffering.
00:08:30.560 | And they're guilty of trying to force into this age
00:08:33.480 | what God has reserved for the age to come.
00:08:37.000 | Notice the flow of thought in Romans 8, verses 23 and 24.
00:08:42.120 | "We ourselves, having the firstfruits of the Spirit,
00:08:48.480 | "even we ourselves grown in ourselves,
00:08:52.600 | "waiting eagerly for adoption as sons,
00:08:56.080 | "the redemption of our bodies,
00:08:58.000 | "for in hope we have been saved."
00:09:00.760 | Because of Christ's purchase redemption,
00:09:04.680 | we already have the Spirit.
00:09:06.840 | But it's only a first fruit, it's only a down payment,
00:09:11.520 | it's only a foretaste of redemption.
00:09:14.920 | And you can't help but see that when Paul stresses this,
00:09:19.080 | "We ourselves, even we grown in ourselves,"
00:09:22.640 | that what he's doing by stressing "even we"
00:09:26.520 | is by warning the Romans and warning us
00:09:29.760 | against a false inference.
00:09:33.480 | The false inference would be, "I have the Holy Spirit,
00:09:37.360 | "Almighty God reigning in my life.
00:09:40.200 | "How then shall I remain subject to the bondage of this age?"
00:09:45.520 | And Paul's against that inference.
00:09:48.640 | He's against it.
00:09:49.640 | You can see it in the word "we."
00:09:52.280 | "Even we ourselves grown in ourselves,
00:09:55.600 | "waiting, waiting, waiting the redemption of our bodies."
00:09:59.680 | He's against those who want to bring into this age
00:10:03.960 | too much salvation.
00:10:05.560 | And here in this text,
00:10:08.000 | we wait also for the redemption of our bodies.
00:10:12.400 | And we groan waiting.
00:10:14.160 | Christ has purchased redemption.
00:10:18.360 | He has demonstrated and illustrated
00:10:20.800 | that it is both physical and both spiritual.
00:10:23.840 | And he has given us a glorious foretaste of it.
00:10:27.840 | - Amen.
00:10:29.640 | That was John Piper and his sermon titled
00:10:30.760 | "Christ in Cancer" preached a month into his pastorate,
00:10:33.800 | way back on August 17th, 1980.
00:10:37.200 | Sermon on Romans 8, verses 18 to 28.
00:10:40.640 | I found this clip while listening through his early sermons.
00:10:42.960 | And if you find the clip, email it to me.
00:10:44.640 | Give me your name, hometown, the sermon title,
00:10:46.520 | and timestamp of where the clip happens
00:10:48.040 | in the audio and make a note of what stands out to you.
00:10:51.640 | Put the word clip in the subject line of an email
00:10:53.320 | and send it to me at askpastorjohn@desiringgod.org.
00:10:56.680 | That's an email address, askpastorjohn@desiringgod.org.
00:11:00.800 | Well, God has promised to heal our bodies.
00:11:04.800 | He has a timeline for that healing.
00:11:07.240 | He could heal you today.
00:11:09.920 | So then should we put our trust in faith healers
00:11:12.640 | and healing ministries today?
00:11:14.440 | That's the topic we haven't addressed on the podcast
00:11:17.480 | until now.
00:11:18.520 | It's up on Friday when Pastor John returns
00:11:21.120 | in the studio with me.
00:11:21.960 | I'm your host, Tony Rehnke.
00:11:23.560 | We'll see you then.
00:11:24.520 | (upbeat music)
00:11:27.100 | (upbeat music)
00:11:29.680 | [BLANK_AUDIO]