As a clergyman my eyes were blinded to certain patent facts. I did not so intend, but I now know that I read into the Bible what was not there, and read out of it what was there.
In those days to me the word "preach" seemed to occur very often and to look very large, the word "heal" to occur very seldom and to look very small. I should have said that this word "heal" might have been found four or five times, and the word preach four or five hundred times. "Whereas I was blind, now I see." Now I see that for each of the one hundred and fifty times that the word preach or preacher is employed, the word heal or healer is to be found. Now I see that, with Christ Jesus, preaching, teaching, and healing belong together. If he be taken for the model, wherever the Gospel is truly preached, the sick are healed and wherever disease is cast out, sin is destroyed. Now I see that that system, whatever it be and whatever name it bears, which professes to heal the sick one but does not heal his sin, has no Christ in it, but that system which both heals the sick one and his sin has Christ's sanction, and is the religion of the Bible.
The first Bible record to be found of healing is in Genesis 20:17. Abimelech had sinned, and disease came upon him. Then we are told that "Abraham prayed unto God: and God healed Abimelech and his wife." Abimelech was the king of the Philistines, who lived 1897 years before Christ. One naturally asks: "If God, through the prayer of the first church member, healed a pagan 1897 years before Christ, why may he not, through prayer, heal Christians 1897 years after Christ. Perhaps the first promise made by Almighty God to the church is to be met with in Exodus 23:25, where God declares to those that obey Him, "I will take sickness away from the midst of thee." If God would promise to take away sickness from the faithful of the ancient church, is there any reason why he will not keep that promise with the faithful of the modern church? According to the Bible that promise was kept. In the Wilderness, through mind, Moses healed the Children of Israel. Elisha restored the widow's son to life. Isaiah, by prayer, restored King Hezekiah to health.
