The Promise of Healing
Mike MacNeil · Tidal Church Moncton · May 4, 2025 · The Promises of God series
Mike MacNeil looks at Acts 3:1-10, where Peter and John heal a man at the Beautiful Gate, and shares recent healing stories from Honduras. He reminds us that Jesus still heals today, and that He always answers with either His power or His peace.
More from Mike MacNeil · The The Promises of God series
Transcript
[0:00] It's great to be with you today. And I am, my task this morning is to, is to talk about the promise of healing. And so I'm looking forward to sharing. It's always good to get to Moncton. I swing through about once a year, and it's always great to be with you at Tidal Church. And I have a, I have a new book that's coming out. It's a book that I kinda wrestle with some of the more challenging and hard things that Jesus said and did. And it'll be out really soon. I didn't quite get it done in time to have copies for today, but I do have one, what they call a galley copy that they send you so you can proof it and make sure everything's okay.
[0:51] And so I have a table outside and you can take a look at that if you would like. After service, I'll be out there and, and if you wanna pre-order one, what's gonna happen is, I will have them in a couple of weeks. I will have them shipped right to the church, and we'll have a list of anybody who pre-ordered, and you can just kind of pick 'em up here if you're interested in that. But today I wanna talk about the promise of healing. And in James 5:14-15, this is just a very, like, simple, direct, kind of instruction for the church. Are any 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.
[1:39] And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise them up. And so we're gonna circle kind of back to that at the end of the message today. But I want to talk about the promise of healing. And there's 51 healing accounts in the New Testament. Most of them are in the Gospels and in the Book of Acts, and obviously Jesus is the primary healer. We see all of these stories of Jesus healing people physically and emotionally and spiritually, just to kind of holistically in every area of life. And second would be the apostles and the disciples.
[2:29] And I would include Paul in that. I think I'm not sure, but I think they appointed somebody to, they drew lots and appointed somebody to replace Judas. But then you, he's mentioned, but then you never hear from him again in the Bible. And so I think Paul might've been the, might've been who God had in mind for the 12th. And we have Peter and John and Paul. We have Jesus healing through these disciples in the Book of Acts. And then the third is the 72 that Jesus sent out in the Gospels where He said, I've given you power and authority. Go and preach the gospel and heal the sick and and cast out demons.
[3:16] And so that's kind of the big picture of of healing in the New Testament. And as I've been studying this and kinda reading through, reading through like all the different accounts, there, there's no real cookie cutter approach that we can find in the New Testament to healing. But there are some elements that seem to be common. Like, there's always, when Jesus, or later on the disciples, when they prayed for healing, when there was healing that took place, there was always a really obvious and practical need. It wasn't just, it wasn't showy, it wasn't it wasn't parlor tricks, kind of thing.
[4:05] Like if you look in some of the not the books in the Bible, but some of the apocryphal books that were written, and include Jesus in them, you know, the the Jesus in those books, you know, when He's a kid, He's showing off, He's like making clay birds, and and then they fly away. He's doing, basically, you know, tricks for His friends. But you never find that in the Bible. In the Bible it's always to meet a real practical need. There's somebody who is suffering, and Jesus wants to relieve that suffering. And so He brings healing and restoration. Another common element is the presence of faith. Because the Bible says that without faith, it's impossible to please God.
[4:55] And it seems like, if you read through the Scriptures, it seems like nothing, nothing got Jesus' attention more than faith. Whenever Jesus saw somebody who had faith in Him, it drew Him to that person. And He touched them and brought healing and restoration. And then interesting. Interestingly, in the New Testament, we find a lot of bold proclamations or commands. We don't find so much people saying, you know, God, here is the problem. Would You do something about this problem? What we have more often is people talking to the to the problem about God, like in Jesus' name and with Jesus' authority, you know, I command you in the name of Jesus to come out or be healed or or whatever it is in the specific situation.
[5:56] And then often another common thing are acts of faith. Jesus would say to somebody like the man with the wounded hand, Jesus says, stretch out your hand. And as the man obeys in faith, as he stretches out his hand, it is healed, or like the man who the man who was blind. And Jesus says, you know, go and wash in the pool of Siloam. And when he goes, and he washes the mud out of his eyes, he can see. And so these are things that reoccur through the Scriptures as we look at the promise of healing.
[6:42] And these healings were, they were miraculous and widely known. Like Paul said later on, these things were not done in a corner. Everybody knew the stories. And they were happening in a public kinda way. The healings validate Jesus' message coming as the Messiah. People were were expecting something miraculous to happen. And so the miracles that we see in the New Testament and the healings, they kind of, they give, they validate Jesus' message about who He is. The healings always demonstrate the goodness of God.
[7:33] Like I said, they're very practical. Somebody is suffering. Somebody needs relief. And it's a demonstration of love and compassion, and often contrasted in the New Testament with being more important than the law. The Pharisees were upset whenever the law was what they perceived to be. The law was broken. And so they often get angry at Jesus, like, how could you heal on the Sabbath? That's work. You know, we're not supposed to work on the Sabbath. And Jesus kind of demonstrates that love and compassion is more important than following the letter of the law.
[8:20] When He sees somebody and they need help, He just reaches out and helps them. And healing is a foretaste of the coming kingdom, because in heaven, there'll be no sickness, no disease, no anxiety, all of the things that we struggle with in the coming kingdom of God. Those things will not exist at all. They'll only be the power and the presence of God. So for the main text today, I wanna read Acts 3:1 to 10, and we're gonna look at that. And I purposely chose this because it's easy for us sometimes to, when, when we read about Jesus in the New Testament, we go, well, yeah, that was Jesus.
[9:10] Like, no matter what happens, we go, well, of course He did that because He's Jesus. And this is the story of Peter and John. It says, one day, Peter and John were going up to the temple at the time of prayer at three in the afternoon. Now, a man who was lame from birth was being carried to the temple gate called Beautiful, where he would be put every day to beg for those going into the temple courts. And when he saw Peter and John about to enter, he asked them for money. Peter looked straight at him, as did John. Then Peter said, "Look at us." So the man gave them his attention, expecting to get something from them.
[9:57] Then Peter said, "Silver or gold I do not have, but what I do have, I give to you. In the name of Jesus of Nazareth, walk." Taking him by the right hand, he helped him up. And instantly the man's feet and ankles became strong. He jumped to his feet and began to walk. Then he went with them into the temple courts, walking and jumping and praising God. When all the people saw him walking in, praising God at the temple gate called Beautiful, they were filled with wonder and amazement about what had happened to him. So we've got this incredible story here. And it's a story of healing.
[10:42] Peter and John are doing what Jesus had shown them as they walked with Him and watched Him for three years. And they were also doing what He told them to do. And so, healing is a continuation of Jesus' ministry. Jesus has gone to heaven, sent the Holy Spirit to indwell us. He is the head, and we are now the body of Christ. And we are called to do the things that Jesus did when He was here in His earthly body. The man's need was evident to all, it was ongoing. It wasn't a minor thing.
[11:28] It wasn't something where you could go, "Well, maybe that was just psychological," or, or, you know, it wasn't a small thing. Everybody knew who he was, and it was a fairly serious need that he had. Peter and John were full of faith. Like something when they, there's a, there's an interesting part there in the scripture where it's like they stop and they, and they look at the man like something is going on there. I believe they were probably hearing through the Holy Spirit from God that God wanted to do something with this man. And they were like, "Focus, like, look at us. We've got something for you." And Peter made a bold proclamation. You've gotta love these kinda stories in the Bible.
[12:14] I don't know about you, but when I read these kinda stories, I get like fired up. He's like, "Silver or gold I don't have." Can anybody relate to that, silver or gold? Like, I don't have, but I've got something else. And I wanna give it to you. And so he says, "In Jesus' name, walk." And it's a very strong proclamation. And the man, often in the New Testament, we see people that have to cooperate with what God is doing. And the man, it says they helped him up. So the man was cooperating with what they were doing. And the healing brought a joyful response.
[13:01] The man is walking, jumping, he's praising, he's praising God. Like our sister was down front here earlier with enthusiasm. And it's not like a, it wasn't like a polite, like, golf clap, like, "Oh, that was very nice." The man is excited about what God has just done in his life. And the onlookers are amazed. It says that they're filled with wonder. And I don't think that it's an accident that it happened at a gate called Beautiful, a place called Beautiful, because restoration, when God, when God restores something, when God brings back something that has been lost, it is a beautiful thing.
[13:55] It is a beautiful thing to observe. And so I like to be very practical. It's very easy to be theoretical. Like we all agree that this is a story in the Bible and that this really happened. You're here Sunday morning, you're probably a believer. And so you're like, "Yes, I agree with that." The hard part for us is to transition from that to 2025 and, and to the idea that God still does things like this today. And so I brought a couple of friends with me who have recently experienced healing in their lives, like within the last month.
[14:43] And they go to our church at King's in Quispamsis. This is, coming up here is Mark and Shar Kennedy. And just to kind of set up the story that they're gonna tell you, they each have a testimony of how God has healed them in a pretty dramatic way. And so we were on a mission trip. There were 13 of us from King's Church on a mission trip in Honduras, back in the first week of March. And one of the men that we work with there, a translator, is named Joel. Joel is a pastor, but he makes a lot of his money. He lives in a very poor neighborhood, has a small church there.
[15:33] And so he makes a lot of his living translating for American and Canadian teams. I've known him for about eight years. He is a rock-solid Christian, the kind of guy that gets up at five in the morning way earlier than I do to pray. And he's a very humble man, not showy at all. And I've known him about eight years. And a few years ago, I began to realize when Joel prays for people, like, it seems like something happens. It seems like God uses him in a miraculous way more than when He uses other people. And I realized that he has a legitimate gift of healing. And so as he was translating for us, and we were praying for people, we saw, you know, various people get healed, especially physically of certain things.
[16:30] And that's where the story of Mark and Shar comes in. So I'm just gonna let you guys come on up and tell your story. Morning, Guys, the story of Mark and Shar. Anyway, so yeah, we both received healing in Honduras. Mine was more physical and Shar's was more spiritual and, and physical actually. So, I, I've always been into physical fitness, sports, and all that. And tried to maintain that most of my life. About four to five years ago, I started experiencing problems with my body, especially the left side. I lost the ability to run. I couldn't really get my legs to move in a fast motion, so it just was not possible.
[17:18] Couldn't even run across the street for that matter. That kind of went on for four or five years. And then last summer, I started to lose strength in one leg during certain motions. It dropped about 70% in very rapid fashion, and maintained the loss of 70 to 75% over the last year. My leg would shake violently in the mornings for, I mean, not a long time, but about 35 to 40 seconds, just like a seizure, just the one leg. I'm not a doctor guy, so I really wasn't interested in going to find out what it was. I figured it would go away at some point. I know, I'm a guy. So anyways, when we were getting ready to go to the Honduras trip about four weeks out, we had to get medication so that when we're there, we wouldn't get malaria and all that stuff.
[18:12] So we went to see the doctor, I casually mentioned the problem, and he said, I'll get an appointment next day. I was at a neurologist and they did a battery of tests. And then when he came back with the results, like, I was still there, and he said that I'm showing all the markers of MS. So, I mean, kind of a shock. You were expecting to take some Aleve and, you know, the nerves would calm down and everything would go away. This was about four weeks before the trip. We kind of talked about it, me and Shar. I just came to the acceptance that if this is what God wanted, I'd carry that cross and we'd just go forward with it. Whatever it came about, we'd deal with it.
[18:57] Two weeks before we went away, we went up with Mark, Mike and Colleen, Mike's wife. And we were telling them, they were one of the few couples that we told. And Colleen was very much, absolutely not, you're not accepting this. This is not what God has planned for you. Anyways, I was like, well, it's a disease, really, like, we'll go forward. So fast forward to Honduras trip, we arrived immediately, we start seeing stuff happening. You're in the presence of God 24/7. It's just amazing things are happening around you. Like Mike said, Joel was healing people left, right, and center around us, mostly not with our group, but a few from our group. So Mike and Colleen, uh, Shar, Sharon and Colleen cornered me and Joel and said, can you do something for Mark?
[19:45] So we went into a room and Mike came along with us, and he started to pray over it. And like Mike said, he prayed to the problem in the name of Jesus. He kept praying and obviously in Spanish. And after about four minutes, he said, okay, it's done. I've canceled that contract over your head with MS. It's done. I was like, okay, cool. Anyways, immediately got a knock on the door. We had to leave, so we had to run down the stairs, get into a truck. I was going three quarters of the way down the stairs, and I'm running down the stairs, and I couldn't go down the stairs before Shar looked at me. I looked at her and was like, that's weird. Anyways, next morning, wake up. No shaking of the leg for the first time in eight months.
[20:31] Fast forward to that afternoon, I'm, yeah, it gets weirder. That afternoon we're at a kid's soccer game, or they were playing soccer. I was there. The ball got kicked over to me. I kicked it back, and I just started playing soccer. I played soccer with them for about an hour and 15 minutes. Couldn't run across the street before. So it just, it's amazing, like, to see that. And then we got home, and my strength measurements on the areas that were down, 75% were in one week we're at 85% higher than they were, which other than God, there is no other, no other thing. I can't tell you why God picked me to be healed. It's just, I can tell you, it's my job now to go out and testify of His healing.
[21:20] He does amazing things when you believe in them. So, Good morning. Like Mark said, mine was more of a spiritual healing with a little side boost of the physical as well. When I was in my late teens, I went through a very traumatic experience, and with it, I carried a lot of guilt and shame and fear of others finding out. I struggled a lot. I had nightmares and crying bouts, and I'd worked myself up into, first they said it was hyperventilating, and, and I couldn't breathe. And eventually, within a year of this, they diagnosed me with asthma. And I had quite severe asthma. I had on three inhalers, and I'd been in and outta the hospital my whole life.
[22:07] Lots of times they'd call the family, say I was dying. But anyway, eventually I got a machine at home, but I was a Christian, and I a hundred percent believed the Bible and everything it says. And I believed, if you repent of your sins, that that Jesus will forgive you, and He remembers your sins no more. And I did all that. And I believed that what the Bible said, and I believed Jesus forgave me in my head, but in my heart, I still carried that guilt and that shame and that fear through my whole adult life. And everyone knows, they say Satan is the father of lies. And I felt like Satan was right there all the time, saying, could God really forgive you?
[22:54] Does God really love you? Do you think you deserve this forgiveness? And I'd be arguing back, you know, the Bible says it, I believe Jesus, I'm forgiven. But it was just a constant battle in my inside of myself that I just couldn't shake. Like I continued with nightmares and crying. And it went on for a long time. And Mark actually just, found the Lord about four years ago and became a Christian. And once he became a Christian, my faith got renewed. And we get really involved and, like, we want to serve more and do things, and I love the Lord. But I still carried this huge sense of guilt and shame and fear, and I couldn't shake it.
[23:43] And we pray and pray, but it was still there. But anyway, when we went to Honduras and I saw multiple physical healings, including Mark's, Colleen says to me, she was one of the few people I confided in to have these little crying spells with. And she said, let's talk to Joel about you. And I'm thinking, well, this is kind of crazy because I don't really have anything wrong with me. It's just something inside me that, but anyway, we went and we talked to Joel. So the four of us, we went in for a session and through a lot of prayers and crying, and about three hours when it was done for the first time, I felt that lifted. I didn't realize how much weight I carried, but it was gone, and I just felt so light and so free, and so at peace, like the peace that I read about in the Bible, I finally felt.
[24:35] And it was amazing. But after that, we noticed I wasn't taking my inhaler anymore. And I haven't had in like, I was taking three inhalers. I haven't used any inhalers since, since March when I was healed of my spiritual thing. Thanks, guys. Those awesome stories, right? It's amazing. It's amazing what God can do. Christianity is, it's supernatural. It's full of the miraculous. And I don't know about you, but for me, that's faith stretching. As somebody who's grown up in Canada, it stretches my faith to believe that God can do those kind of things.
[25:26] But in Acts 5:15 and 16, we have, you know, Jesus used Peter's shadow, just the shadow of Peter to heal. In Acts 8:4-8, we have Jesus using Philip to heal. And in Acts 19:11-12, we have even Paul's handkerchief, it says that like his handkerchief was anointed and they would take it to sick people. And Jesus would use that to bring healing and restoration to people. And I had a, on our last night in Honduras. I'm not sure, you know, what God was trying to show. I'm still processing this.
[26:13] But as we were, we had an altar call, and it seemed like, it seemed like the whole church came forward that night. And so we had different translators with us to translate so we could pray for people. And I was, Joel was my translator. And a man came forward and says, I'm experiencing chest pains, and I don't have any money, and I can't go to the doctor, and I'm really afraid. And Joel grabbed my hand, pressed it into the man's chest, and he prayed like, God, use Mike's hand to take the pain away. So this man has no more pain.
[26:59] And that was a new one for me. Like, that's not normal or usual for me. I was kinda like, I was playing it cool on the outside, but I was like, we're doing what, you know, like, and then Joel interviewed the man, and the man said, the moment you started praying, the pain went away. The pain was gone. And so I believe in healing, healing was a huge part of Jesus' earthly ministry. It seemed to happen daily. When we read the Scriptures, it was a huge part of the disciples' ministry and a huge part of the early church. And if you read through church history where whenever there's a resurgence of faith and revival, it seems like miraculous signs and wonders and healings kind of accompany that.
[28:00] And so I really believe that Jesus is still in the business of healing today. And as you heard through the testimonies and then even here in New Brunswick, down at King's Church outside of St. John, we've been seeing, it seems like God is doing more in the area of healing and restoration than we're used to. And I believe there is like a kind of a rising tide of revival that is coming to our churches. I do have one caveat, and that's Paul's thorn in the flesh. It says in 2 Corinthians 12:7-9, therefore, in order to keep me, this is Paul talking, from becoming conceited.
[28:49] I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me three times. I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But He said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in your weakness." And so there is a bit of a mystery to healing. Like there's a part of it that we can kinda read theologically and try to understand. But there's part of it that is also just the sovereignty of God, like what God wants to do in our lives. And I believe that God always answers our prayers in one of two ways. Like He either shows us His power through restoration and healing when we pray, He will show us His power, or He will give us His peace, sufficient grace that goes beyond our circumstances and understanding.
[29:47] And so those are the testimonies where, like, things didn't change, my circumstance didn't change, but for some reason, I feel the presence of God so strongly that I've got grace to handle this, and I'm not anxious and I'm not worried about it. I just have incredible peace in the middle of the storm. And I believe that God works in both of those ways. And so this kind of brings us back to full circle to James 5, verses 14 and 15, it would be so easy. You know, one of the temptations as you get older is to just play things safe.
[30:37] Like, just, you know, like do things in a way where there's not much risk. And so it would be like the safe thing for me to do right now is like, this was a nice teaching on healing. Let's just all sing a song and leave because we believe in healing in theory, that would be the easy thing to do. I'm gonna do something that's a little more awkward, okay? I'm going to, because what I've found with God is like, is often the awesome comes right after the awkward. Like you have to go through that moment where you take a risk. And I can't help but believe that there are probably some people in the room today where like, you've been struggling, whether it's with physical healing or something emotional, but like God wants to touch you in some way today and bring restoration and peace.
[31:45] And so, you know, is there any among us that are sick? If there is, the Bible, James has very strict kind of instructions about what we should do. It's very clear, we don't have to look it up in the Greek, it's just right there in black and white. And I believe that there's faith in the room. I believe that we have that faith ingredient. And I've checked with Pastor Jim, and some of the, we do have elders. We do have elders that are willing to pray. And so I think it would be wrong.
[32:33] I think it would be a tragedy today to just kind of send you out after talking about healing without opening up the opportunity, if you feel, if you feel the Lord pulling you to have prayer for healing and restoration, for whatever it is that you're going through in your life. So let's stand together and the band is gonna play a song called "God, I Look to You." And that's what we're, that's exactly what we're going to do today. We are going to, we're gonna just call out to God and ask Him to bring healing and restoration and peace into the situations of our lives.
[33:24] And so I'm just gonna, I'm gonna just like pray for us right now in this moment. But then after that, as the song plays, if you're really feeling like God wants to do something in your life today, I'm gonna call you to come up front and there will be some pastors and a prayer team, including Mark and Shar and my wife Colleen, who will pray today for healing and restoration. And so let me pray for us, and then you bring your needs forward to God, and we'll pray about those needs today. But God, I pray that You would give us grace right now and faith to believe that You are in the room with us, that You want to touch us, that You wanna bring healing and restoration into our lives, God, that You wanna bring peace to our hearts.
[34:23] And so God, today, would You just, would You just give us the courage and the faith to step out of the boat with You, Jesus, and bring those needs to You because we pray in the strong name of Jesus. Amen.