God as... Healer

[Mr Dave]

But for you who revere my name the sun of righteousness shall rise, with healing in its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall.

Malachi 4:2

Then the angel showed me the river of the water of life, bright as crystal, flowing from the throne of God and of the Lamb through the middle of the street of the city. On either side of the river is the tree of life with its twelve kinds of fruit, producing its fruit each month

Revelation 22:1-3

When I came to do this one, as usual I opened up the concordance section of my Bible, but before I did, those two verses had already appeared in my head, so thought I'd open with those and see where this takes us.


The first of the two above verses is probably most well known through it's [Wesleyan] Christmas use as the third verse of Hark the Herald Angels Sing;

Hail the heav'n-born Prince of Peace!
Hail the Son of Righteousness!
Light and life to all He brings
Ris'n with healing in His wings
Mild He lays His glory by
Born that man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of earth
Born to give them second birth
Hark! The herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!"

It's just struck about these two verses is that neither references God, which is probably odd on a thread about God as healer. Both verses have commonly been aligned to God though, both as the person of Jesus.

The verse from Malachi has been aligned to Jesus as a prophetic verse regarding our Saviour's birth, that one of things brought to us in the person of Christ is healing. We commonly associate Christ's coming with salvation (which is of course true) as we believe that we need salvation as we cannot on our be blameless before God. This raises the question as to what we need healing for. Malachi says that this healing will allow us to go leaping like calves from the stall. In some way, Christ rejuvenates us to youthly vigour, so that like the Son who rises, we may also renew our strength and mount up with wings like eagles (Isa. 40:28-31). The God who heals, does so because he does not grow weary.

The verse from Malachi speaks in the future, but to us if interpreted as Christ is applicable in the present. The verse from Revelation refers to the future. God has healed and will continue to do so. Revelation is full of imagery, and it is easy to see how the Tree of Life with leaves which heal has been interpreted to refer to Christ (with 12 kinds of fruit, being present in Eden etc...)

I feel I'm drifting a bit now and not sure where this is going (sorry you're getting a running commentary of my thought train).

God promises throughout the Bible to heal, sometimes our understandings of God come from how others have perceived God, but here, God himself designates himself as healer;

He said, ‘If you will listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God, and do what is right in his sight, and give heed to his commandments and keep all his statutes, I will not bring upon you any of the diseases that I brought upon the Egyptians; for I am the Lord who heals you.’

Exodus 15:26

Here God says Himself that he heals us. This is a verse that can comfort and reassure but also one which troubles. We can see how God promises to heal and find hope and we recognise how like the creator God, we have a God who cares for us, we are not insignificant in his plans. When we know the terminally ill though, it can trouble as we have a God who has made promises to heal, yet seemingly fails to do so. In these situations do we feel we can be like the Psalmist and "Bless the Lord, who heals all your diseases so that your youth is renewed like the eagle's" (Psalm 103:1-5). I'm not going to attempt any glib responses to what is a difficult question we can face, it deserves its own thread, and could cause more damage than good in inadvertantly making false claims.

Healing is a gift from God, which He may work miraculously, but more often than not healing comes from God through his creation.

Honour physicians for their services, for the Lord created them, for their gift of healing comes from the Most High...The Lord created medicines out of the earth... God's works will never be finished; and from him health spreads over all the earth.

Sirach 38:1-8


Another strand of thought on God as Healer concerns healing non-medical things. Jeremiah and Hosea speak of this;

Return, O faithless children,
I will heal your faithlessness.

Jer. 3:22

I will heal their disloyalty;
I will love them freely,
for my anger has turned from them.

Hosea 14:4

A lack of faith and loyalty are seen as things similar to health problems which are in need of Healing. More telling though is in the second of these verses, God's healing is entwined with God's love. The two things come from god simultaneously. God's love permeates all aspects of His nature, He created all things through His love, he comforts all things by his love, and He heals with his love.

 

[JCFantasy23]

Beautiful post.
God is the ultimate healer. I like to think that from birth we are slowly being healed spiritually to our rightful state as Christians.

Because of the sacrifice of Jesus to
redeem you, healing is already yours.
He paid the price for you to have it —
now you must receive it by faith.
1 PETER 2:24 NKJ

God is a Healer. It is His nature to
heal. He has revealed Himself as “I am
the Lord Who Heals” (Exodus 15:26)

 

[Maid Marie]

My favorite passage on the subject - Luke 8:42b - 48

As Jesus was on his way, the crowds almost crushed him. 43 And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for twelve years, [fn4] but no one could heal her. 44 She came up behind him and touched the edge of his cloak, and immediately her bleeding stopped.
45 “Who touched me?” Jesus asked.
When they all denied it, Peter said, “Master, the people are crowding and pressing against you.”
46 But Jesus said, “Someone touched me; I know that power has gone out from me.”
47 Then the woman, seeing that she could not go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his feet. In the presence of all the people, she told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed. 48 Then he said to her, “Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace.”

 

[Mr Dave]

Those three would have been much better passages to post