Galatians 3:5 “Therefore He who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you, does He do it by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?”
Before we discuss God’s responsibilities in this section there is a fundamental truth that we need to reinforce, which is that the just shall live by faith (Romans 1:17). As we will see in this section there are numerous blessings that God has made available to His saints, but they can only be accessed when the saint exercises their faith to receive them. We can clearly see that truth demonstrated when we look at the born-again experience as an example. Christ has already paid the price for the sins of the world, but not everyone in the world is saved. So why is that? The reason is because not everyone believes it, for only those who believe the gospel message and confess Jesus as Lord, experience the miracle of the new birth. And so in the same manner we will see that Christ has paid the price for all of the blessings that we will discuss in this section. Nevertheless as we discuss the various blessings that God has made available to us, it will be clearly evident that not every Christian experiences the reality of these blessings in their lives. Sadly the reason for that is because not every Christian believes that God has made these blessings available to them, because of which they do not experience the reality of them. Only those who believe what God says about these various blessings, and confess and act on them, experience the reality of these various blessings. We can receive nothing from God except by faith, and so the completed work of our Lord Jesus can only be appropriated by faith. In the above quoted passage of scripture the apostle Paul teaches us that God supplies us His spirit and everything else, including His blessings, by faith and faith alone. And so we see that even though Jesus has provided for our blessings we can only receive them by faith. Therefore the degree of blessing that the believer walks in is directly linked to their walk of faith.
1 Peter 2:24 “who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness--by whose stripes you were healed.”
In the previous sections we introduced the concept of viewing our bodies as a house that we rent, which in effect makes God our Landlord, for we have seen that God in fact owns our bodies. In the light of that concept we examined what the bible has to say about our responsibilities in looking after our bodies, as God’s tenants. And so in this section we want to discuss what the bible has to say about the responsibilities that God has committed to as the Landlord of our bodies. A word of caution in this section however, is that we need to realise that if we do not meet our obligations as tenants, then we cannot expect God to fulfil the obligations that He has committed to as Landlord (Galatians 6:7-8). For example, if we refuse to give our body’s sufficient rest and exercise, or we either starve our bodies or eat excessively, or engage in various forms of substance abuse, then the believer cannot blame God when their bodies start to fail in certain areas due their chosen lifestyles. Nevertheless for the saint who acts responsibly in looking after their bodies there are certain blessings that God has committed to bestow on us. The first of which that we want to discuss in this section, is the fact that God has committed to keeping our bodies from all sickness and disease. It is God’s perfect will for His children that our bodies should be free from any form of sickness or disease, and He made provision for that when He sent His Son to the cross. In other words it is God’s perfect will for His saints that they should walk in divine health. In the above quoted passage of scripture the Holy Spirit reveals to us that our Lord Jesus has provided for our physical health when He suffered the Romans scourging of His body, for the scripture declares that we have been healed (past tense) by the stripes of the Lord Jesus. And so as far as heaven is concerned this is an accomplished work, because of which no sickness or disease has any right to affect the believer’s body.
Matthew 8:17 “that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Isaiah the prophet, saying: "He Himself took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses."
The scriptures teach us that by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word shall be established (2 Corinthians 13:1). And so in this section we want to establish the scriptural truth that God has committed to keeping the saints from all sickness and disease. In the previous passage we quoted the apostle Peter who confirmed this particular truth to us when he told us that by the stripes of the Lord Jesus that we were healed. In the passage of scripture quoted above the prophet Isaiah confirms this self-same truth to us, that not only did Christ take our sins but He also took our sicknesses. In other words when Christ went to the cross He took our sicknesses and infirmities from us so that we can walk free of both. This passage is also written in the past tense, thus showing us that as far as heaven is concerned this is an accomplished work that God has already blessed us with.
Galatians 3:13 “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree").”
The third witness that we will quote from scripture is the apostle Paul. In the above quoted passage of scripture Paul teaches the church that Christ has redeemed the saints from the curse of the law. The curse of the law that Paul is referring to is recorded in Deuteronomy chapter twenty-eight, and that passage declares that every sickness and disease forms part of the curse. So very clearly then we can see that Christ has redeemed the saints from all sickness and disease. This passage is also written in the past tense, thus showing us once again that as far as heaven is concerned this is an accomplished work that God has already blessed His saints with. And so we see that all three witnesses quoted from the New Testament have stated the same thing, i.e. that God has provided for His saints to walk free from all sickness and all disease. The work has already been done and therefore God has already blessed us with divine health.
Michael E.B. Maher
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