Healing - Is There Another Way?
Scriptural Methods for Healing

Reiki, Therapeutic Touch and Healing Touch all offer alternative ways to experience healing. What does the Bible say are God's method's for healing?

It has been noticed, in relation to other spiritual experiences, that God is a God of variety. His methods are not stereotyped by any means. This is true also in relation to the manner in which Divine Healing is administered. The following are six different ways in which people receive healing from the Lord.

A. Pray for Yourself.
James 5:13 says: “Is any among you afflicted, let him pray.” Apparently, it is scriptural to pray for yourself when afflicted.

B. Ask Someone Else to Pray for you.
James 5:16 instructs: “… pray one for another that ye may be healed.” Any sincere Christian who believes can pray for another. No ministerial credentials nor special gifts of the Spirit are necessary.

C. Call for the Elders of the Church. James 5:14-16 has often been called the New Testament Healing Covenant.
Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: and the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him. Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for an other, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

This should be the regular procedure for those in fellowship with a local church. These verses clearly teach that God is no respecter of persons, but that all may be healed. The promise stipulates “Is any sick among you?” There is no discrimination whatever. It is God's Will to heal any and all who will call. “The prayer of faith” would be that prayer offered by the elders. There is a responsibility resting upon them. The sick exercises his faith when he calls for the elders. The elders pray the prayer of faith. Some have gone so far as to say that the elders were supposed to “massage” the sick person with oil, and this was the cause of his recovery. There certainly is no oil known to medical science which can guarantee healing, regardless of what the affliction is.

The text does not say that the oil healed the sick; it was “the prayer of faith,” “and the Lord will raise him.” We believe the oil is a symbol of the Holy Spirit, Who quickens our mortal body (Rom 8:11). Some associate the oil, as the means of healing, with Hezekiah's poultice of figs (2 Kings 20:7). It is amazing how people can have more faith in a little oil, or in a bunch of figs, than they do in the Power of God!

D. By Laying On of Hands.
“These signs shall follow them that believe; In my name … they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover” (Mark 16:17,18). It should be carefully noted here, that no mention is made of anointing with oil, or of praying for the sick. All that is said is that those who believe shall lay their hands on the sick in the name of Jesus. This is the method which Jesus used on a number of occasions. In the following scriptures Jesus is said to have touched the sick, or laid His hand or hands upon them: Matt 8:15; Mark 6:5; 8:23,25; Luke 4:40; 5:13; 13:13. Today, when the believing one lays his hands on the sick in the name of Jesus, it is as though the hands of Jesus were laid thereon.

E. Special Miracles Through Handkerchiefs and Aprons.
“And God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul: so that from his body were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs or aprons, and the diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out of them” (Acts 19:11,12). These were “special miracles” in that there were no scriptural instructions concerning them. Paul must have simply been guided by the Holy Spirit in this matter. Many churches have followed a similar pattern and have given out small pieces of cloth, over which prayer has been made, and sometimes they have been anointed with oil. Some most remarkable miracles have been reported from the use of this method. It is understood that the “prayer cloth” has no virtue in itself, but provides an act of faith by which one's attention is directed to the Lord Who is the Great Physician.

F. Spiritual Gifts of Healing.
“For to one is given by the Spirit … to another the gifts of healing …” (1 Cor 12:9). “God hath set some in the church … then gifts of healings …” (1 Cor 12:28). Inasmuch as this subject is covered thoroughly under the Gifts of the Spirit, it will not be elaborated on here. Two things are of special interest. First, this is the only gift of the Spirit which is in the plural. Suggested reasons for this are given in the study of the gifts. Second, in the list of healings wrought through the Apostles as recorded in the book of Acts, previously listed in this chapter, it is of interest that in no case did the apostles pray for the sick to be healed. In several cases, there was prayer about the sick person; but, the healing seemed to be administered by the power which had been given them for this ministry. They probably had the “gifts of healing.”