I am sorry to read that you are sick and that you are obviously angry with God for not healing you. It is true that when Jesus Christ was here He did heal. In Matthew 4:23 we read, “And Jesus went about all Galilee….HEALING ALL KINDS OF SICKNESS and ALL KINDS OF DISEASE among the people.” But there was a very special reason for healing all who were sick at that time. Jesus was using miracles as SIGNS to confirm that He was indeed Israel’s promised King/Messiah. Jesus had just been preaching, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” The “kingdom of heaven” was at hand BECAUSE their King, the Lord Jesus, was among them! The prophet Isaiah had foretold that the Messiah would perform miracles of healing in Isaiah 35:5-6, “Then the eyes of the blind shall be opened, and the ears of the deaf shall be unstopped. Then the lame shall leap like a deer, and the tongue of the dumb sing.” As you read through the four gospels you see these very miracles of healing being performed by Jesus Christ. Did this cause the nation of Israel to REPENT and to acknowledge Him as their long-awaited Messiah? No! In fact, instead of accepting Him they REJECTED Him. We read of this in John 1:11, “He came to His own, and His own did not receive Him.” The Apostle Paul alluded to their rejection of Him in spite of the many miracles He performed in Hebrews 2:3-4, “How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation, which at first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed to us by those who heard Him, God also BEARING WITNESS WITH SIGNS AND WONDERS, WITH VARIOUS MIRACLES, and gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to His own will?”

When the nation of Israel rejected Christ as their Messiah and the continued testimony by the Apostles, the miracles of healing became less and less (you can see this as you read through the book of Acts). There came a point where Israel was completely set aside and the “message of the kingdom” was replaced by the “message of the cross” (see 1^st Corinthians 1:18) and miracles of healing were no longer used as SIGNS. This doesn’t mean that “God doesn’t heal anymore,” but it does mean that God isn’t using healing as a sign like He did when Jesus was here and during the early years when the Apostles were preaching the Word of God.

What I’m trying to point out is that WE CAN’T EXPECT TO BE HEALED PHYSICALLY. God “may” or He “may not” choose to heal us. In 1^st Timothy 5:23 Paul told young Timothy, “No longer drink only water, but use a little wine for your STOMACH’S SAKE and your FREQUENT INFIRMITES.” In 2^nd Timothy 4:20 Paul wrote, “Erastus stayed in Corinth, but Trophimus I have left in Miletus SICK.” And Paul himself was afflicted with a disease as we see in Galatians 4:13-14, “You know that because of PHYSICAL INFIRMITY I preached the gospel to you at the first. And my TRIAL WHICH WAS IN MY FLESH you did not despise or reject, but you received me as an angel of God, even as Christ Jesus.” We see in these examples that no one became angry with God for not healing them; they accepted it as His will. To their credit the Galatians never accused Paul of being “weak in faith” for having a physical affliction; instead they “received him as an angel of God”; in other words, they realized he was “God’s messenger” in spite of being sick! We do learn that Paul asked the Lord three times to remove this affliction (see 2^nd Corinthians 12:8) but the Lord’s response to Paul was, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness” (verse 9). Paul learned that God’s grace was indeed sufficient and his response is to that grace is beautifully described in verses 9b-10, “There most gladly I will rather BOAST IN MY INFIRMITIES, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I TAKE PLEASURE IN INFIRMITIES…for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

Paul’s example is the lesson we all need to learn. God has a PURPOSE in allowing us to be sick or afflicted. He wants us to learn more of His GRACE and to see that even though we are WEAK PHYSICALLY His grace can give us POWER SPIRITUALLY to serve Him and to glorify Him as we serve Him. There are also other reasons for God allowing us to be sick and thus other lessons to be learned. I will end here by giving you some passages to look up that illustrate these reasons and lessons. See Philippians 2:25-27; 1^st Corinthians 11:17-22, 27-32; John 11:1-4 (where this man was eventually healed) and John 9:1-3 (where this man later received his “physical sight” AND his “spiritual sight”…verses 6-11 and 35-38).  (450.3)  (DO)