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Healing in the Acts
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Peter said, by the Spirit of God through him, “It was by the name and faith in that name and God
has glorified his Son Jesus.”
When you read in the Gospels about how Jesus operated, does this sound familiar? They looked
at this man and said, “Rise and walk!” and he did. In Mark 2:11, Jesus said, “Arise, and take up
thy bed.” It sounds just like something Jesus would say. It looks just like something Jesus would
do. And yet, He was sitting at the right hand of the Father just like He is today. He wasn’t there
in the flesh. He wasn’t there on the street, in the flesh. Why does it sound just like something
Jesus would do? Because it was something Jesus did
through
His Church! And so, what He
began to do, He is still doing. After His death, burial, resurrection and ascension, He’s still doing
it.
Let’s look at more than one witness here. Acts 5:14 says, “And believers were the more added to
the Lord, multitudes both of men and women. Insomuch that they brought forth the sick into the
streets, and laid them on beds and couches…” I have read that exact same thing in the Gospel
accounts. They went through all the regions roundabout and brought all the people who were
sick and laid them in the streets. Jesus would come through, and people would be healed. But
He’s not there in the flesh. He’s been raised from the dead. He’s at the right hand of the Father.
But they “laid them on beds and couches, that at the least the shadow of Peter passing by might
overshadow some of them. There came also a multitude out of the cities round about unto
Jerusalem, bringing sick folks, and them which were vexed with unclean spirits: and they were
healed every one.” Does it say a handful were healed to prove that the Apostles still had power?
No. “They were healed every one.”
Why? It doesn’t take that many to prove that something is happening. One miracle proves
something can happen. A lot of people got healed here because it talks about multitudes coming
out from all the cities around about. This sounds exactly like something you’d read in Mark 6
and other places where they laid the sick in the streets, and everyone that touched Jesus got
healed. In this case, it happened to everyone over whom Peter’s shadow fell. Every one of them
got healed. This sounds exactly like something Jesus did and used to do. Why? Because it is
something Jesus is continuing to do. Everything we read about in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and
John is what He began.
Does He still heal today? Is it still His will to heal? How about every one? Every one of them.
There were no unlucky ones. There wasn’t even one for whom it wasn’t God’s timing. There
wasn’t even one who God was teaching, or working something out in their life and was going to
heal later. Not even one. Don’t say, “Well, it was Peter. He could do that,” because out of his
own mouth he said it wasn’t by his own power or holiness.
Acts 8:4 says, “Therefore they that were scattered abroad went everywhere preaching the word.”
Preaching the Word. “Then Philip went down to the city of Samaria, and preached Christ unto
them. And the people with one accord gave heed unto those things which Philip spake, hearing
and seeing the miracles which he did. For unclean spirits, crying with loud voice, came out of
many that were possessed with them: and many taken with palsies, and that were lame, were
healed. And there was great joy in that city.”