My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power.
1 Corinthians 2:4–5
I had to decide if I had the faith to speak what I heard God saying. What I heard Him saying was that He was present to heal every person in the room. It was a Sunday morning, and I was on the platform ready to move the service from our time of worship through music into the sermon I had spent the week preparing. There was a message of tongues from the congregation, and we all sensed that God had other plans for the service. As we waited for the interpretation, I felt the Spirit prompt me to speak.
When I stepped to the microphone and began to interpret, I didn’t know all that God was going to say. As I spoke, the Spirit led me to conclude with the words, “I am present to heal.” I understood that God was offering to heal every person in the room. I paused and wondered if I had the faith to say it.
Finally, I explained to the congregation, “You folks know how much I love you, and at times I can speak out of that love and my desire for God to do good things in your life. Sometimes I may speak my desire and not God’s. In this instance, I think God is telling me that He wants to heal every person in this room.”
I invited anyone who needed healing to come forward. I felt the Lord impress upon me to pray individually for every person who came. I was supposed to lay my hands on every one of them according to Scripture (see James 5:14). I watched as the congregation began to move to the altars. They sensed the same stirring of the Spirit I had. I began laying my hands on and praying for each one.
As I prayed, rows of people began to flood the floor and up onto the platform. Some fell under the power of the Spirit, others wept, and some shouted out the healing they were receiving. We heard countless stories of healing from that day, but a specific one stuck with me.
A young woman came forward with her husband. She looked pregnant. I asked how I could pray, and she explained that although she looked pregnant, she was not. She had been experiencing rapid abdominal growth, and she had no idea what was causing it. She began to weep. With her permission, I put my hand on her stomach to pray. In that moment, the Spirit rushed over her, and the growth collapsed under my hand. Her stomach went flat in a moment. Her husband and the prayer team praying with me all witnessed it. It was gone. She was healed.
I had read in the Bible perhaps more than a hundred times the story of the paralytic who was healed by Jesus (see Luke 5:17–26). Along with that story is Luke’s explanation that the power of the Lord had been present for Jesus to heal the sick. I had seen God heal before. But on that day, we all experienced it. We experienced His presence to heal anyone who needed it. God was present to heal us.
That service reminded me of the power of healing and the importance of making space for it. We need an altar, a place where we pray for the miraculous. It has never been more important. God uses miracles to validate His Gospel and, as pastors, we are given the responsibility of administering healing through the authority of our position. God, by His grace, allows us to be participants in it, but we must make the space.
The early Church was relentless in preaching the Gospel, but not by words alone. They did not depend on clever catchphrases or marketing slogans. The Gospel was validated by signs and wonders, by the miraculous. When Paul could not get to the sick, he blessed pieces of cloth, causing them to possess the power to heal (see Acts 19:11–12). Peter’s preaching was affirmed by the miraculous power of even his shadow (see Acts 5:15). The disciples did as Jesus had done. They found the lame and the blind along the roads and pools and offered the power of the Spirit for their healing. Even dramatic events like the death of Ananias and Sapphira made the truth that God’s power was alive and active obvious (see Acts 5:1–11). His truth was on public display.
The miracles came not only as blessings to those in need, but also so that the message would be credible. The world in which the early Church preached the Gospel was awash with philosophies and theological ideas. Every city had its teachers and religious authorities. The Roman Empire had become a melting pot of ideas that were sourced from all over the known world. It was not unlike our own day in which truth is left for every individual to decide, and every individual has access to countless truths from which they can choose.
When we preach the Gospel, our hearers are forced to weigh its validity against all the other messages they are receiving from social media, news organizations, and their friends and family. It is a confusing and difficult time for people to be able to recognize truth. Perhaps this challenge is made even more difficult by a world that considers the Gospel either offensive or foolish. Our darkened hearts and minds are not predisposed to recognize what is true. So it is that God often does miracles, not only to heal our physical blindness, but also to heal our spiritual blindness. God does the miraculous to validate His truth that the world fights desperately to cover up.
It wasn’t just Jesus’ preaching that was validated by the miraculous. The intervention of divine miracles is a consistent theme of God’s presence, from Genesis to Revelation. Moses was given credibility by the miracles of God, as were Elijah, Elisha, Peter, Stephen, Paul, and countless more. The signs and wonders they performed by the power of the Spirit forced the world to hear the prophetic words of their witness.
Like them, we still bear the heavenly mandate to proclaim the Good News of God’s salvation, and like their time, the powers and principalities of this world are working to silence and obscure that truth. So, why should we expect God’s miracles to have ceased? Wherever His truth is proclaimed, He is present to heal. He is present to affirm our preaching through the power of miracles. If His Gospel is for today, then His miraculous power is for today as well.
We are what has changed. It is our faith and expectations that have ceased—not His gifts. We fear that we will look foolish. We fear that we might be wrong. We would rather appear wise and weak by the world’s standards than foolish and full of the Spirit’s power; therefore, we hold back and depend on our cleverness and charisma. We trust our enticing speech to lead people to Christ instead of the powerful hand of God. We trust our words more than His Spirit. We are trying to do with words what God wants to do through miracles.
When Jesus promised that the Holy Spirit would come to us in power, was He predicting clever and well-articulated sermons? I think He had a lot more in mind. I think He was predicting powerful preaching made more powerful by the confirmation of signs and wonders. The apostle Paul reminded the Corinthians that this was also his approach. “My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on human wisdom, but on God’s power” (1 Corinthians 2:4–5).
The bottom line is that God does miracles. He always has. He just needs a people and a place—an altar—where He can put them on display.
How do we go about building an altar for the miraculous? Jesus often gave specific instructions for healing. To one He commanded, “go wash.” To another He mixed mud and placed it over his eyes. Jesus told some to go home where their miracle would be waiting for them. Often the miraculous took an intentional act of faith from the recipient. But we aren’t left wondering what steps we should take. Scripture gives us very specific instructions about how to pray for healing. Jesus promised we would place our hands on the sick and they would get well. James took Jesus’ words seriously and gave us the instruction:
Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up.
James 5:14–15
One of the themes found throughout Scripture to which I often find myself returning has been one of the central threads of this book. As a pastor, you carry a special spiritual authority. Your prayers have an impact on the church you lead. Your spiritual life sets the pace for the congregation. And your faithfulness to be obedient to this command of Scripture has an impact on the healing your people will experience. God calls the leaders of the church to pray for healing. Healing flows through authority. Why do we see so few healed in the church today? Often it is because we don’t practice what Jesus commanded.
The laying on of hands is a symbol of conferring power. The elders of the church are those who have been entrusted with the message of the Gospel. They bear spiritual responsibility for the congregation and with it the authority vested in them by Christ Himself. So, God has designed the power of the Spirit to work through the preaching of His Word and the authority of those entrusted with it.
We have this authority not because we possess some secret prayer or because we have a special power. Scripture is clear that the power to heal has been bought by the blood of Christ. It is by His stripes we are healed. Healing is a part of the atonement and a part of the Gospel’s promise. Elders are called to place their hands on the sick as a conduit of authority, as a sign of Christ’s Church distributing what Christ purchased.
How many times have I demonstrated a new believer’s proclamation of faith by practicing the symbol of baptism: lowering them into the water and bringing them up into that new resurrected life? How many times have I blessed and distributed the symbolic body and blood of Christ that teaches us to anticipate His return? How many weddings have I performed in which I stood and pronounced the new union of a couple, two flesh becoming one? How many new ministers have I placed my hands on and confirmed their ordination to ministry? I do all these things by the power and authority God has given me as a minister. And so, I am also called to lay my hands on the sick, and by that same authority, offer healing.
What do we communicate to Christ’s Church if we know He has bought our healing by His own blood but we are reluctant to say it, to offer it? Christ has offered us this great gift, and He commanded us as His representatives to distribute it to the Church. Yet we often find ourselves reluctant and afraid to do it. We risk undermining the Gospel and weakening the faith of others.
When you neglect this specific work commanded in Scripture, you sever God’s power as He intended it to flow. Perhaps we do not see miracles or healing because we do not pray for them as God instructed us to pray.
Ask yourself a simple question: Are you creating an opportunity for your people to receive their healing? Are you building this altar where the elders of your church, in obedience to God’s Word, meet with people to lay their hands on them and anoint them with oil?
When I was a young youth pastor, I had a great pastoral mentor who operated in the gifts of the Spirit and truly understood the power of God’s authority rightly administered by a pastor. One Sunday, I was standing in the altar with him praying for the sick. As Scripture commanded, he was placing his hands on each, anointing them with oil, and speaking a prayer of healing over them by faith. I watched as an old man who appeared to be very sick stepped forward for his turn.
I was shocked when my pastor asked him, “Where do you pay your tithes?” The old man explained that he paid tithes to a ministry he liked to watch on television. The pastor explained, “Well then you need to have that ministry lay hands on you and pray for your healing.” He went on to explain that this old man was not living under the authority of our church. He would be happy to pray for him and for his healing, but if he really wanted what Scripture had promised, then he needed to be faithful to the submission God had also asked of him.
I listened and thought, I have never heard anything like this, not in an altar of prayer for the sick. At our next staff meeting, I brought it up. My pastor kindly explained, “Son, you don’t understand the flow of God. I’m submitted to God, and each person in this church must submit to Him, too. God works through authority and our submission to it.” He understood the significance of laying on hands, and he had the faith to really practice it.
Two weeks later, the old man showed back up. He explained to us, “I’ve been paying my tithes here. You are my pastor and I want to submit to the elders of this church.” We laid hands on him, and that morning God healed him as well as taught me a valuable lesson.
Authority and submission matter. Each of us must ask ourselves a simple question: Are we willing to submit to what God has asked of us? For the sick, it is submission to the church and its elders. And to you as the pastor, it is submission to the work of laying on hands, anointing with oil, and praying for God’s healing.
If you are a pastor, God has given you authority, and He has asked you to submit to His way of working through the laying on of hands. Are you willing to submit to what God has asked you to do? Sure, there are times you might be afraid. There are times you may have your doubts. But it isn’t your power that heals people, it is your obedience. It is your willingness, by faith, to submit to the call on your life and to operate in the authority God has given you.
So, do it by faith. Do it expecting God to act. Do it with the confidence of the Spirit at work within you. Do it by the promise of God over you. Do it believing that God’s authority flows through you, because that is exactly what Scripture commands and promises. Build the altar. Find an intentional place to lay your hands on the sick and anoint them with oil. Offer that prayer by faith and believe God will do what He said He will do.
There will be times when the presence of God will be overwhelming and your faith will be supernaturally emboldened. But there will also be times when you will pray for people when you have nothing more than your authority and the promises of God to stand on. Pray for them both times. Do it by passion and do it by duty. Keep creating opportunities for your people to experience the power of God and to be healed.
But I must also offer you a warning and a few important considerations. First, elders who do not have their own regular place of prayer will be no more effective than those nine disciples who could not cast out the evil spirit from the possessed boy (see Matthew 17:14–20). Your position only gives you so much authority. You must be living a life of submission as well. You must be praying and building all the personal altars we have previously discussed. It is a hard truth, but it is one I believe to be critically true. Your spiritual life has an impact on the health and wellness of the people you lead. When you have a place of prayer and your church has a place of prayer, the authority that flows through you will be even greater.
Second, there are often elements of God’s timing that have an impact on the way that He moves. How long had the blind man sat by that road without sight? Scripture tells us it had been his whole life (see John 9:1–3). Jesus’ disciples debated if his blindness had been the consequence of his parents’ sins or his own, but Jesus explained he had suffered with blindness so that when he was healed, Jesus’ glory would be made even greater. All those years that the man had suffered made his healing an even more compelling witness of Jesus’ power.
In another story, one of the greatest moments of evangelism recorded in Scripture came after the healing of a lame man who had suffered from his lameness for years (see Acts 3:1–8). God often uses time—not to deny healing, but to intensify its power and witness.
That means that sometimes we carry our sickness for longer than we would like. We must remember, we are never healed for exclusively physical reasons. God by His wisdom heals so that we might grow in faith and so that His message might be declared to the world. We trust His timing, believing that any time spent waiting serves only to increase the power of our healing and the demonstration of His glory.
Do you remember Isaiah’s promise that those who wait on the Lord will renew their strength? Isaiah described waiting with three images. “They will soar on wings like eagles; they will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not be faint” (Isaiah 40:31).
Sometimes waiting looks like soaring. Sometimes it looks like running. Sometimes it looks like walking. At times, God gives us things in an instant, as the eagle soars and glides effortlessly on the rising currents of air. But at other times, God asks us to run. Do not worry—He promises we won’t grow weary doing it, but it will take more time. God often uses our sickness to place us on a track and move us to a position we would not be in without that suffering. We often encounter people that God touches and ministers to through our endurance.
Still, some of us are asked to walk. We are asked to endure for a season, but we do not faint from it. God walks with us. He uses that season to shape us and to take us deeper into our relationship with Him. Sometimes God is doing something bigger than healing. Sometimes He is doing something bigger than our sickness.
It is not failure if you pray for a person’s healing and God chooses to wait; however, it is failure if you stop praying for healing out of fear that people might not get healed. You have not been asked to make those decisions nor give an account for how God chooses to move. You have been asked to lay hands on and pray for those who are sick. Do it by faith. That faith never comes back void. Whether it is an instant moment of healing or the stamina and endurance that allows a believer to shine with brilliant grace through suffering, God is always at work.
You need only to build the altar. Find the place. Show up. Lay hands on people and anoint them with oil as an act of submission to God. Operate in the authority you’ve been given. Pray. And watch as God’s power is put on display for all to see. God is present to heal. We need only to make the space for Him to do it.
The Holy Spirit’s gift of healing can pour through any Spirit-filled believer at any time. The ministry of the Holy Spirit is not only given to the leadership of the church, but He is also offered to the whole church. He can flow in His gift of healing through any of the Lord’s followers anywhere, not just at a church building or during a church service. He can heal at work, school, or the grocery store. But if we do not have a miracle altar at church, how will those in attendance know how or have the faith to build one in the world outside of their church? Leaders establish an example and an expectation for their followers. If leaders build a miracle altar, so will their members!
“Jesus replied, ‘What is impossible with man is possible with God’” (Luke 18:27).
Lay hands on the sick. When it comes to healing, there are few biblical directives clearer than the command to lay hands on those who are sick, anoint them with oil, and offer a prayer for their healing by faith. Do not neglect this work. Perhaps we do not see more miracles simply because we do not do what God has instructed us to do. Find a place to regularly practice the laying on of hands in prayer.
Make room in your life and in your services for the miraculous. Most of us need structure and order in our daily routines. We need calendars and schedules that keep us on track. But our plans can distract from what God wants to do. We need to be just as intentional about making space for the Spirit to move. We need to learn to wait and give space for the miraculous. We do this by being intentional. Carve out time in your life to wait upon the Lord. Make space in your services for God to move and demonstrate His power. Never let your plans get in the way of what God wants to do.
Build your faith on the promises of Scripture. Our expectation of the miraculous is not based on wishing. God has promised to do signs and wonders. He has promised to pour out His Spirit. Make a list of the promises God has made. Find them in the Bible and write them down. Call upon the promises of God when you pray. Allow His promises to build your faith and expectations.
Share testimonials of how God is at work. I love hearing stories of God’s miracles. They move me to pray and believe for more. Testimonials have long been a part of the church’s life, and that practice needs to be recovered. When God does something, don’t be afraid to talk about it. Invite church members to share their testimonies of the miraculous work of God in their lives. These stories will build the faith of your church and move you to pray for even greater miracles.