“And He did not do many miracles there because of their unbelief.” (Matt. 13:58)
I was reading an article by a woman who had been involved in healing ministry around the world for over 40 years. As a minister of healing and deliverance, she wrote something that struck me concerning what she called the three biggest roadblocks to people receiving healing. I noticed these three were also on the hit parade concerning why people failed to be delivered from demonic oppression. I now call them “The Three Big-Uns.” They are unconfessed sin, unforgiveness, and unbelief:
Un–confessed sin: James 5:16 states, “Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another so that you may be healed.” God could heal people aside from confession, but He won’t, because He sent His Son to this earth, not only to save us from sin but to flesh out love and show us the ultimate expression of how He wants the world to know both Him and us. As discussed in my book, The Kingdom Election, that way is Christian community and one reason is it is there we find healing, from spiritual to emotional to physical. He wants us to be transparent about our struggles, not only with Him in prayer but with one another in confession. That is how deep loving relationships are formed and apart from transparency relationships can’t get past superficial.
David says of bottling up our sin, “When I kept silent about my sin, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long, for day and night Your hand was heavy upon me. My vitality was drained away…” (Psalm 32). In the first book I published many years ago, The Lost Supper, I discuss the divinely inspired tool God gave His people for the revealing, uprooting, and removal of sin in our lives: Holy Communion. Only, as with all things, religion has neutered the power it. We have so watered the Lord’s Table down with our 10 minute mercy-without-consequence messages it has completely lost its intended power to confront sin head-on and heal people from the consequences of covering it up.
Communion services today excuse disobedience rather than challenging it, which has caused much of the “weakness, sickness, sleep [“death” in the Greek – see 1 Cor. 11:30] and demonic oppression of God’s people we witness today in the body. I could dive deeply into this but suffice it to say if believers had an environment that was established specifically to root out, confess, pray, and deal with covered up sin patterns there would be a whole lot more healing going on. God has given us such an environment but we’re just not taking advantage of it. If you want a powerful Communion experience for your small group [where it is intended to be served], I hope you will get The Lost Supper and try it out. Bottom line: if you have unconfessed areas of sin in your life, end the cover-up now! At least find some close fellowship where you can expose the sin that now thrives in the darkness and expose it to the light where it cannot survive!
Un–forgiveness: There is perhaps no bigger impediment to God’s involvement in our lives than harboring unforgiveness in our hearts towards others or ourselves. The parable of the unforgiving servant in Matthew 18 says that servant was “handed over to torturers” until he could repay his debt to his master because he wouldn’t forgive debts others owed him. How could one possibly be able to go out and work or raise money when he was in the hands of torturers? This story ends with, “My heavenly Father will also do the same to you, if each of you does not forgive his brother from your heart.” Ouch! The number one source of permissions granted to the demonic realm is this one. HMMM, could we call demons “torturers?” They would call themselves that.
On the contrary, Jesus says of those who are merciful and forgive, “But love your enemies and do good…your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High” (Luke 6). The difference between being handed over to torture or great reward is in the power of forgiveness. In our modern society, so full of family dysfunction, unforgiveness runs rampant for the hardest people of all to forgive are those closest to us.
Beyond forgiving others, forgiving ourselves is the perfect segue to the final “Un,” because if we cannot forgive ourselves, we display little faith in the power of God to forgive us. Saying we cannot forgive ourselves is admitting Christ died for nothing. “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Since He first showed up, Jesus has been proactive about grace and mercy! He lives to forgive, pick us up when we stumble, and put us back on track again but He can’t if we’re not willing to believe we are truly forgiven and thus forgive ourselves! Show true faith in the miraculous gift God gave you at the cross and respond by forgiving yourself and others as Christ forgave you (Eph. 4:32). Refuse to live with the torturers of your body or your soul.
Un-belief: As the verse that opened this article conveys, Jesus cannot do many miracles where there is no faith. For 42 years of a life spent for the most part intentionally and passionately following Jesus, I never really embraced healing and knew little of deliverance. Oh yes, I joined others praying over a lot of people, but with little conviction and even less faith. Consequently, over all those years I witnessed only one healing and one deliverance.
But then through my studies of the kingdom of heaven come to earth, I came across this passage where Jesus was ordaining and sending out His disciples: “And as you go preach, saying, ‘The kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons” (Matt. 10), and this one: “Jesus was going throughout all Galilee…proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness among the people” (Matt. 4).
Suddenly I had to rethink all my former positions on healing and deliverance, for God was telling me if I was serious about preaching the gospel of His kingdom come these would be the signs that would follow me. So, I began to put that to the test by dropping my former perceptions and truly believing I was sent to proclaim God’s second great arising of His kingdom, and that these ministries would truly bear witness I was not a poser. Praise God, I now see people being healed and delivered through me because I finally began to believe what was there for me all along! It’s there for you too, but you must come to a point where you forsake your fears of unbelief and embrace faith in what He has promised He will do. Don’t be that temple where Jesus can do few miracles because of unbelief.
Godly people can come to us, pray over us, and minister to us. But as it is with all things God does, there must be cooperation on our part to complete the equation. Where do you fall concerning the Three Big-Uns? Hopefully the score is you 3 and the Big-Uns 0. If it’s not, both healing and deliverance will be hindered. But remember, with God today is always a great day to begin to change the score!
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