Garwood Presbyterian Church

Loving Brings Healing

God's Way to Health, Healing, and Wholeness

"May God Himself sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless." I Thes. 5:23

1. The 10 Lepers Healed In Luke 17:11-19
   1. Jesus did nothing to heal them.
      1. He simply told them to go show themselves to the priests.
      2. They had to decide whether to obey Him and go as lepers with no healing.
      3. They had faith and obeyed Jesus, and as they went they were healed.
   2. The same choice is given to us.
      1. We have learned a new model for receiving healing where more than faith and prayer are involved.
      2. We have learned that we also need to deal with our sin that causes a lot of disease.
         1. Anger, bitterness and retaliation need to be renounced, removed, and replaced with forgiveness.
         2. Fear, anxiety and worry need to be renounced, removed, and replaced with trust in God and His Word, and resting in His love for us.
         3. Not liking ourself needs to be renounced, removed, and replaced with love for our-self like God has for us.
      3. The only question is will we obey this truth of God and act on it before our healing takes place, like the 10 lepers did.
         1. Our answer needs to be "Yes".
   3. A similar situation took place with Naaman in II Kings 5:1-17.
   4. Obedience and removing our sin brings healing because the Bible also teaches that right-eousness produces better health.
      1. Jesus said in Mark 2:17, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners."
      2. Proverbs 11:28 says, "The righteous will thrive like a green leaf."
      3. Psalm 92:12-14 says, "The righteous will flourish like a palm tree, they will grow like a cedar of Lebanon; planted in the house of the Lord, they will flourish in the courts of our God. They will still bear fruit in old age, they will stay fresh and green."
2. Loving Brings Healing
   1. When we are:
      1. Afraid, but trust God, we are loving God.
      2. Angry, but forgive the perpetrators, we are loving others.
      3. Down on ourself, but forgive ourself, we are loving ourself.
   2. What we are doing is carrying out what Jesus said to do in Mat. 22:34-40, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself."
      1. When we love God, we trust Him.
      2. When we love others, we forgive them.
      3. When we love ourself, we forgive ourself.
      4. And when we do these things, it brings healing and better health to our body.
      5. So we see that loving God, others, and ourself brings healing and health to us.
   3. The opposite is also true.
      1. When we don't love, it is detrimental to our health.
      2. In fact, at Pleasant Valley Church in Georgia they teach that the main basis for sick-ness and disease is separation! Separation from God, separation from others, and separation from ourself, because separation is when we are not loving.
3. What Also Brings Healing and Better Health to Us Is the Power and Truth of God's Word
   1. Joshua 1:8 says, "Do not let this Book of the Law depart from your mouth; meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do everything written in it. Then you will be prosperous and successful."
      1. Prosperous and successful would include our health.
      2. Psalm 1:1-3 says that a person is blessed when their delight is in the law of the Lord, the Word of God, and when they meditate on it day and night. Then they are like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. And that whatever they do prospers.
   2. So, if we have any ungodly thoughts, we need to take them captive, like II Cor. 10:5 says, and replace them with godly thoughts that are obedient to Christ.
   3. We need to fill ourself with the Word of God from the Bible.
      1. Ephesians 5:26 says that we can be cleansed through the washing of God's word.
      2. Jesus said in John 17:17 that we can be sanctified by the truth, and that God's word is the truth.
      3. Romans 12:2 says that we can be transformed by the renewing of our mind.
      4. Col. 3:10 says "to put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge in the im-age of its Creator."
      5. Jesus said in John 8:32, "You will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."
      6. We need to do what Phil. 4:8 says, "whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable - if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things.", instead of spending so much time in front of our television sets.
   4. We must get into the Word of God - until it gets into us, and becomes part of us, and who we are.
      1. Then we will experience "God's Way to Health, Healing, and Wholeness" - spiritually, emotionally, and physically.