God is sovereign and although He accepts prayer, He is not a vending machine to give healing on demand.
Oscarr,
I absolutely agree. But my question was not "should God always honor our prayers for healing." It was whether healing is always God's will. If it
is his will, we are conforming to it rather than demanding he conform to our will. If healing
is always God's will, he remains sovereign.
[Jesus] miracles did not cause people to believe, as we see through the response of the Pharisees; and those who believed in Him just because of the miracles were not taken seriously by Jesus. We need to learn from this in light of the modern charismatic emphasis on signs and wonders over and above the preaching of the gospel. The power of God is not in the signs and wonders, it is in the gospel of Christ. Paul said, "I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ because it is the power of God unto salvation to all those who believe."
Please forgive me. My response to this will be a long one.
When Paul described his preaching to the Corinthians (1 Corinthians 2:1-5), he wrote, "I did not come with eloquence or human wisdom." His message was simply "Jesus Christ and him crucified"--the gospel, as you so rightly pointed out. However, Paul also said that instead of aiming for "wise and persuasive words" he focused on making sure there was "a demonstration of the Spirit’s power," and he did this
with the explicit intention that the faith of the new believers would not "rest on human wisdom," but would rest "on God’s power." I think you may be wrong to separate signs and wonders from the gospel and say that one but not the other are the power of God.
Actually, I would suggest that the practice of emphasizing signs and wonders was Paul's normal approach to evangelism. In Romans 15:18-19, he said he had fulfilled the ministry of the gospel, a broader claim than just saying he had preached the message. The Greek (πεπληρωκέναι τὸ εὐαγγέλιον) more literally says he filled or fulfilled the gospel itself, and does not specify the manner in which he did this. But as that is confusing in English, most translations add a noun as the object for the verb. For example, the NIV has "fully
proclaimed", the NASB has "fully
preached", the ESV has "fulfilled
the ministry", and most other translations follow similar patterns. I like the ESV rendering because it avoids placing an emphasis on a verbal presentation of the gospel. The Greek word πεπληρωκέναι is perfect infinitive active form of πληρόω which, as I alluded to above, means to
make full, or to
complete. The same word in a different tense is used in Matthew 1:22 where it says, "All this took place to
fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet."
In fact, although Paul mentions both word and deed in Romans 15:18, he follows this immediately by emphasizing the deeds: "by the power of signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God" (ESV). The result is that while Paul says he both preached and demonstrated the message, his emphasis is on the miracles. For Paul it seems, miracles were necessary to the gospel presentation: without them, his evangelism would not have been complete.
Further more, it is not just Paul who emphasizes the value of miracles. Jesus also does this. You mentioned this, but you emphatically stated the miracles demonstrated that the kingdom was at hand. That is definitely true, but it doesn't seem to be the entire purpose of the miracles. When the Jews want to stone Jesus, he pointed to his miracles as the reason to believe he is "one with the Father" (John 10:37-38). Later on, he urges Philip to draw the same conclusion for the same reason (John 14:11). We also have Matthew 9:6, where Jesus presents a miracle as evidence that he can forgive sin. Furthermore, in Matthew 11:20-24, he denounces the towns in which most of his miracles had been performed because they did not respond with repentance. So will you suggest we need to learn from "the modern charismatic emphasis on signs and wonders over and above the preaching of the gospel," I would suggest we ought to expect an equality between signs, wonders, and proclamation. Jesus did not, after all, say "Woe to you Capernaum, you did not repent on account of my preaching."
Things are definitely a little less tidy when we consider Jesus decrying the demand for a sign (Matthew 12:38-42, Mark 8:12, and Luke 11:29), but that is in the context of people who are actively disbelieving. Those people don't just have doubts, they've already concluded Jesus is not from God and are flaunting that conclusion by demanding he prove them wrong. By contrast, in John 4:48 when Jesus says, "Unless you people see signs and wonders, you will never believe,” his point seems to be that we need miracles to help us understand who he is. He makes that statement in response to a desperate father's plea for help, and rather than saying "no sign will be given to you," as he did to the unbelieving group, he responds by answering the man's request and healing his child. If his statement to the man had been derogatory, he surely would not have performed the subsequent miracle.
Peter too saw the importance of miracles. After healing the paralytic at one of the entrances to the temple in Jerusalem, he says to the Jews there, "Jesus of Nazareth was a man accredited by God to you by miracles, wonders and signs, which God did among you through him, as you yourselves know" (Acts 2:22). I guess we could argue that Jesus was an exception, which is obviously true in regard to his divinity. But that argument doesn't really hold up in light of comments like Paul's when he wrote that he had persisted in demonstrating "the marks of a true apostle, including signs, wonders and miracles" (2 Corinthians 12:12). So miracles "marked" apostles, not just Jesus.
Given Paul's own testimony as to
why he did miracles, it seems fairly clear that miracles in the New Testament were expected to illicit a response of faith. More than this, it seems they were considered a primary tool to that end.
So, we have Jesus expecting repentance because of his miracles, and we have Peter describing Jesus' miracles as God's attestation, and we have Paul presenting them as necessary for a solid foundation in faith. In light of this, can we really say that simply preaching the gospel is really all that's needed? Is our preaching so much wiser, more eloquent, or more persuasive than Paul's? And I think I could ask that same question switching Paul's name out for that of Jesus. Jesus, the disciples, Philip, Stephen, and Paul all did miracles. Why are we so against the idea that we may need to do the same?
Now, I don't know about you, but I don't go around making the lame able to walk, giving sight to the blind, cleansing lepers, healing the deaf, or raising the dead. I
only proclaim the gospel. In light of the Scriptures though, I don't know that I can defend that behavior. Perhaps the reality is that I don't actually have any recourse but to pray, perhaps to repent and fast, and to entreat the Father to anoint me--or rather to anoint
us with the Holy Spirit and with Power so that we can go around "doing good and healing all who are under the power of the devil" (Acts 10:38)? And until that power comes, what option do we have but to be obedient to the examples we've been given and imitate what we can, even if it lays bare our impotence. I really don't think we have any other option.
How can we properly present a kingdom we cannot demonstrate? How can we represent a master we do not emulate? Are we, in fact, proclaiming a king we hesitate to obey? Let's not forget that Jesus expected us to do what he did. His words were, "whoever believes in me will do the works I have been doing, and they will do even greater things than these." He did not say we would be able to do those things if we felt like it.
Surely it's better to fail while trying than to fail by doing nothing. Besides, doesn't God “rewards those who earnestly seek him” (Hebrews 11:6)?