Paris Reidhead preaches about the importance of encountering God's character through faith and obedience, using the story of Abraham and Isaac in Genesis 22 as an example. He emphasizes the revelation of God as Jehovah-Jireh and El Shaddai, showing that God's promises are fulfilled when we trust and obey Him. Reidhead connects divine healing in the church to understanding God's character, highlighting the need for obedience and faith to experience God's provision and sufficiency in all circumstances.

El Shaddai, Divine Healing in the Church By Paris Reidhead* Will you turn, please, to the Old Testament. I was going to say, The Gospel according to Genesis. Hardly appropriate. Nevertheless, the Gospel is on every page in the Book of Genesis, and so if you will turn I am sure that we are going to find our hearts refreshed as we discover that all that God promises for His people is in relation to His character. I have asked you to turn to Genesis, Chapter 22, and I want you to see particularly verse 14. The occasion is Abraham’s obedience to the Lord in taking Isaac up to the top of the mountain to sacrifice him. I’ll begin reading with verse 5: And Abraham said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass; and I and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you. (I want you to notice that last clause. “We will go, and worship, and come again to you.” Now he knew that God had commanded him to take his son as a living sacrifice, or sacrifice.) 6The young man took the wood, and he took the fire, and the knife, and they went up both together. 7And Isaac spake unto Abraham, his father, and said, My father: and he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt-offering? 8And Abraham said, My son, Jehovah-Jirah, God will provide Himself the lamb for a burnt-offering: so they went both of them together. 9And they came to the place which God had told him of; and Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood. 10And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son. 11And the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I. 12And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me. Now I want you to look back to verse 5. “Abide ye here, and I and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again.” Abraham believed that when the knife plunged into the heart of his son, and the flame leaped up on the altar he had built and consumed his flesh that God would raise his son from the dead and he would come back, because God had said, “In Isaac shall thy seed be called.” (Gen. 21:12) Abraham had resurrection faith. And he said, “We will come. We will come again to you.” Now look, verse 13. “And Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son. And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-Jireh: as it is said to this day, in the mount of the Lord it shall be seen.” (Gen. 22:13,14) Now the word Jehovah-Jireh means, The Lord shall provide. Exactly what he said when Isaac asked him from whence the lamb should come. The Lord will provide. But in the eyes of the Father the provision had been made in this son that had been supernaturally born, this son that had been named before his birth, that had been anticipated for at least 25 years after God promised him a seed, and he heard God say, Take him, and he obeyed. The point that I wish to have made to you tonight is this that the revelation of God’s character as Jehovah-Jireh came in answer to Abraham’s faith and his obedience. Inevitably this is the pattern. God desires to reveal Himself. Now it is quite easy for you to read Genesis, Chapter 22. It is quite easy for you to familiarize yourself with the words spoken by Abraham and Isaac, and by God to them both. But it does not become yours until in the crisis of obedience you obey Him. God may not ask you, and I am sure He will not ask you to do literally what Abraham did, but I am equally certain that the pathway of obedience will be equally difficult and strenuous and costly in some respects at least, and thus be it understood to you that according to what I consider one of the primary hermeneutical principles of the Word, the first-mention principle, that when you find Jehovah-Jireh mentioned it is in relation to obedience and faith. Now obviously these two are inseparable. He only obeys who believes. The reason Abraham was prepared to sacrifice Isaac was because he believed God. He did not think it was any harder for God to raise his slain, pierced, burned son and restore him in health, and enable him to walk back to where the servants stood, than it had been for God to give him that son in the first place. And so, because he believed God, he obeyed. But you understand that, if he hadn’t obeyed, he wouldn’t have believed. Faith and obedience are utterly inseparable. You obey because you believe. You believe when you obey. And the two are inseparable. Inevitably the revelation of Jehovah as provider is going to come to you when you are brought to the place of test, when it is necessary for God to ask you to do that which you haven’t hitherto done, and in this obedience of faith comes the revelation of God’s character. God was waiting, sought, yea He even created a time, when He could show Abraham another aspect of His character. And so here was the situation that God developed. And He proved to him that He was Jehovah-Jireh. Now our theme this evening, El Shaddai, Divine Healing in the Church Today, must be postulated upon grand Biblical principles. And the one principle that I lay at the very outset of our consideration is this, that the revelation of God’s power, the revelation of God’s grace, can only come in the pathway of obedience and faith. Instruction, as good as it is, is only valid when it initiates action, and when it initiates faith and obedience. And we see it here. Now if you will turn to the portion that we were considering such a few hours ago in the morning service, we will discover in Genesis 35 the unfolding of this second name; the first of the Jehovah compound names is the one we have just considered, Jehovah-Jireh. Now this is to my knowledge the last of the names that are given. I do not recall, I have not checked, but I do not recall any additional name given to Isaac. But now as we saw this morning at length, God has arranged a situation in which He can give a further revelation of Himself in grace to Jacob. Now mind you when I felt led of the Lord to indicate that this would be the theme for this Sunday evening I had not had His guidance to speak on Jacob in the morning. That did not come until after agony and prayer yesterday afternoon. But it is more than coincidence that the last thing that should have been spoken over this pulpit in the morning hour was concerning the revelation of the name El Shaddai. Will you let me read the Scripture for you. Go back to the 1st verse. “God said unto Jacob, Arise, go up to Bethel and dwell there, and make there an altar unto God that appeared unto thee when thou fleddest from the face of Esau thy brother. And Jacob said unto his household and all that were with him, Put away the strange gods that are among you and be clean, and change your garments and let us arise and go up to Bethel; and I will make there an altar unto God who answered me in the day of my distress and was with me in the way which I went.” (Gen. 35:1-3) “So Jacob came to Luz which was the land of Canaan, that is Bethel, he and all the people that were with him, and he built there an altar, and called the place El Bethel, because there God had appeared unto him when he fled from the face of his brother.” (Gen. 35:6,7) And then verse 9, “And God appeared unto Jacob again when he came out of Padanaram, and blessed him. And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name: and he called his name Israel. And God said unto him, I am El Shaddai be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins;...”(Gen. 35:9-11) Now remember, the first occasion of the unfolding of the name of Jehovah-Jireh was on the foundation principle of obedience and faith. The second occasion of a further unfolding of the character of God is on the foundation of obedience and faith. It has been a long way that Jacob has come as we saw this morning. He has gone to Padanaram. He has served 20 years under Laban. He has come back, met God at Jabbok’s Brook and there had his thigh withered as God first changed his name, and then, like Jacob still, he went to Succoth near Schechem, and there awaited until his family had been injured and ruined, and the sons had turned into assassins and murderers. Now God still is pleading with him to come back, come back to the place of blessing, come back to the place of revelation, come back to the place of communion. But it required obedience and faith. Some years ago, I remember talking to a Pastor concerning the way of life in the normal Christian life, and he said to me, “You know if I were to accept what you have accepted, it would cost me as much or more than it cost you.” And he said, “It isn’t that I am not willing to pay the price. I am willing to pay the price if I just thought God would meet me.” He said, “It is as though there were a shoot, an open door, and God asked me to step out into the dark. I am willing to step and go down that slide if I am just sure that God is at the other end to catch me.” But he said, “You know I am not so sure He would be. I don’t know why.” And so he said, “I am going to stay right here with what I have got rather than plunge out into the dark.” And he stayed there through all these years since. He said, “I am willing to pay the price if I thought God would catch me, or if I thought God would honor me.” And so here is Jacob at Succoth, where he has great herds and flocks, and now God says, Leave all of this and go up to Bethel. And Bethel as you remember was an arid desert, filled with rocks, and wasn’t fertile, not at all. Here he was in one of the most fertile areas in Canaan, and God says, Go up into one of the most difficult areas where there is nothing but barrenness. And yet God was there, and God can turn the barrenness into blessing. And so, turning his back upon that which engaged him and seemed so intriguing and delightful, he buries these idols, takes all the earrings and the gold that the people have gathered and brought with them out of the land where they had been dwelling, and he buries them. And then he steps out in obedience, and makes his way back to Bethel. There he erects the altar, and he pours the offering and he worships God. We’ve told you about the nearly 30 years wasted, 30 years squandered, 30 years in which he served himself, sought to promote himself, sought to secure the things for himself that God had promised. And now he has to turn his back on all he has done for 30 years and come right back to the place be started. And it is there in obedience and faith, faith that moves him to step back upon the Word of God that he has the revelation that God is El Shaddai. Now the word El Shaddai means, The God who is enough. It comes from the Egyptian-Semitic word, shadad, a strong word, having to do with that kind of strength that becomes kings and monarchs. And so we would see here that he is speaking of that sufficiency of strength. And thus we have the word El Shaddai translated to God who is enough. Oh, I love that. He is enough, for every situation, for every problem, for every heartache. He is enough for everything that will be encountered. But you see, if you look back in Jacob’s experience, that Jacob did not know He was enough to protect him from Esau. Jacob didn’t know that God was enough to give him the wealth that he thought he should have. He didn’t know that God was enough to protect his family and satisfy them. And he had to take things into his own hands, and so after all these years now he has come to the place where God stripped him and broke him, and touched him and caused him to be a cripple for life. And he obeys God. And in obedience and faith is the revelation that God is enough. Now this is the reason why I have chosen this name, because I recognize that this movement that we are going to consider tonight has many extensions and ramifications that might be somewhat troubling. But I would have you know that a proper understanding of the subject of bodily healing comes from an understanding of the character of God. That He is Jehovah-Jireh, the provider. He is El Shaddai, that is enough. It was Perry Branson, my pastor friend in Chattanooga, Tennessee, that said one day to me, “You know I would have to preach healing and encourage sick people to trust the Lord if there was not another verse in all the Bible than Philippians 4:19. ‘My God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus.’” It is, therefore, based when properly understood upon the character of God. But always this revelation of God’s character is on two principles, faith and obedience. Do not let that disappear, as we engage in the consideration. Now it is a simple matter to understand that healing occupied a great portion in the life and ministry of our Lord. We cannot escape this. We find ourselves brought to it if for no other reason than what we read in Matthew 8:16 and 17. Now “when even was come, they brought unto Him many that were possessed with devils, and He cast out the spirits with His Word and healed all that were sick: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by (Esaias)Isaiah the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities and bear our sicknesses.” Our Lord’s ministry, therefore, was teaching and preaching, and healing the sick. For He recognized that the consequence of sin was two-fold. First it was the sentence of death, eternal separation from God. “The soul that sinneth it shall die.” (Eze. 18:4) But God not only pronounced a sentence for sin, but He also placed upon the sinner a curse, the curse being a foretaste of the sentence given during a period of somewhat of probation in order that the sinner under the sentence might get a taste of what it was going to be forever. And finding that he did not like it repent and return to the Lord that he might be forgiven and pardoned. And so we discover back in the Old Testament, in Deuteronomy 28, that God pronounced blessing for obedience, and a curse for disobedience. And the curse has to do with sickness of the body. And if you read Deuteronomy 28 tonight, you, I am sure will be appalled as you discover how completely God has identified sickness with the curse. You see? Let us understand it. The curse of the law is a suffering that is given just as the person under the sentence of death is held in the death row in prison until the sentence is executed, is carried out. So God has pronounced the curse. This is upon the body, upon the goods, upon the family, upon the beasts, upon all that pertains to the person. And our Lord thus identified sickness as one of the by-products of man’s sin. Every principle of the human body is that of restoration of strength to health. When you have become ill, your body rushes all the reserves and forces that it has. God has built the principle of healing into the human body. He has given sufficient in the proper foods that we find in order to keep our bodies well and strong. And then He has built into the body this principle of repair, of damage done, so that we could live well and strong. And you know from this fact that has been pointed out previously that every cell of your body is being replaced by another cell at periodic intervals. This principle alone is sufficient to demonstrate that God had intended the body to continue for a great length of time. But because of sin, God shortened the days and limited man’s years, brought us down to the place that sent us three score and ten, and perhaps four score, and we have reached the outer limits of our life. Now when you understand then that sickness of any kind, disease in all of its forms is in the world because of sin. Just as God did not create weeds as part of man’s diet, but as part of the curse that came upon man because of his sin and his rebellion. But weeds are to the field what disease and sickness is to the body, the product in a sense of the race, the sin of the first parents and of all of us down across the centuries. So when our Lord came to minister, He demonstrated here that He was concerned not only about saving people from the penalty of the law, death, but saving them from the curse of the law. And thus He identifies Himself with the sickness of the people by healing all that were sick in relation to the prophecy of Isaiah; “Himself took our infirmities and bear our sicknesses.” Now we understand from this same prophecy in Isaiah 53 that He said, “By His stripes we are healed.” (Isa. 53:5) May I remind you that the atonement for our sin did not come through the lashes that fell upon Him. The beating with the cat and nine tails, that horrible instrument of torture that the Romans invented wherein a leather thong had on it steel and glass and stone, sharp and jagged, bound to the thong, so that when it was brought down upon the flesh with the flick of the wrist, it would cut and it would hold, and it would tear. Now our Lord was beaten, He was scourged. And the Scripture says, “By His stripes we are healed.” Remember that His flesh was torn at least six hours before He died. And it was the shedding of His Blood, the pouring out of His Life, His death that atoned for our sin. For it says, “Without the shedding of blood there is no remission” of sin. (Heb. 9:22) But it was not the Blood that fell from His brow when the thorns pierced or from His back where the thongs had torn. It was the Blood that carried the Life with it. It was the gushing forth of His life and the pouring out of His soul unto death. Then the question is to be asked, Why did our Lord have to undergo these hours of agony? when His body was torn by the scourge, when men buffeted Him and bruised Him, and drew His beard from Him with patches of flesh, and the crown of thorns was pressed upon His brow so that for six hours He was undergoing this excruciating agony. And the answer, I say is this. He not only died to deliver us from the penalty of our sin, but He died to deliver us from the curse of the law. This is – “for cursed is everyone that hangeth upon a tree.” (Gal. 3:13) The purpose of crucifixion was to extend agony of death. Beheading was a simple, easy, quick means of death. There was the flash of the sword and life escaped. But with the cross they were known to linger for at least sometimes as long as two or three days before death would overtake them. And they were amazed when our Lord had died in such a short time. Now understand, therefore, that when He was buffeted, when He was bruised, when He was scourged, He was undergoing the curse of the law. The law said, “The soul that sinneth it shall die.” This is a prelude to it; this is a sample of it. And thus Isaiah said, “By His stripes we are healed. By His stripes we are healed.” He did not say, By His pouring out of His soul unto death, but by His stripes, By this which happened nine hours before His death, when the Lord Jesus, identified with you, accepting the sentence and penalty of death was willing to submit to this intermediate agony, this agony that came before the actual pouring forth of His soul unto death. Now understand this. This is a principle. And our Lord now is identifying Himself with the people all through these three years of ministry. He is teaching, He is preaching, and He is healing the sick, whereas it might be fulfilled, Himself took our infirmities and bear our sicknesses. Now the purpose, therefore, of our Lord’s sacrifice was to deliver us from the penalty of the law and from the curse of the law. I say, this is a principle. Come with me then to the Old Testament for just a moment. Back in the land of Egypt, you will remember that they took the lamb, slew it, and put it over the fire. Its flesh was roasted and was eaten by the family. The Blood was sprinkled on the doorpost. “When I see the Blood I will pass over you.” (Exo. 12:13) This was redemption from the penalty of sin. This was redemption from the sentence of death. Now they have gone through the Red Sea, and they have come to a place called Marah, bitter, and the waters apparently were poisonous, and they said, “Have we come out here into the wilderness to die, to drink of this water? Is this why we are here? And Moses inquired of the Lord and God told him to cut down a tree and put it in the water, and the water above the tree was poisonous, and the water below the tree could be used for drinking.” (Exo. 15:24,25) And our Lord was teaching us that when the cross was put into the stream of the human race, human family, then it would be possible for the poison to be taken out of it, and I would submit to you that just as you have the shedding of the blood of the lamb of the Passover, speaking of the deliverance from the penalty of the sin, so the tree, speaking of the cross, put into the water would teach our hearts that He has also died on the cross, (For remember, Cursed is everyone that hangeth upon the cross) that He might deliver us from the poison that is in the family of men. So we have Biblical principle. Now let us understand that our Lord used this ministry throughout all these years. But then the question is asked, What did the early church do? What did the early church do? And the answer that comes without any hesitation is, that the early Church did exactly as the Lord has done. They went everywhere preaching and teaching, just as God had commanded them. For you remember that the last words that He gave in the Book of Mark were that they should go everywhere, into all the world and preach the Gospel and these signs should follow them that believe, and in My Name shall they cast out devils. They shall speak with new tongues. They shall take up serpents. And you remember that Paul on one occasion lit the firewood, and the serpent bit him and he shook it off into the flame. They could drink any deadly thing poisoned by the opposition of their enemies, it shall not hurt them. And they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover. Then after the Lord had spoken unto them He was received up into Heaven and sat on the right hand of God, and they went forth and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them, and confirming the Word with signs following. And Paul, writing as we saw it the other day in Romans 15:18 and 19 said, “I will not speak of anything that the Lord hath not wrought by me to make the Gentiles obedient, by word and deed through mighty signs and wonders, I have fully preached the Gospel of Christ from Jerusalem around about to Elyricum.” I do not believe that there is any question or challenge from the reading of the Acts of the Apostles, but what this was part of the ministry that characterized the church. Oh, how many people have gotten comfort out of the fact that Epaphroditus was sick, and undoubtedly this has been a stumbling stone to many. But you understand of course that while Epaphroditus was sick there was undoubtedly reason for it. And Timothy took wine for his stomach’s sake. And we recognize that there was undoubtedly reason for this. And Paul’s thorn in the flesh has been the means of driving many into unbelief and vindicating it. The Scripture, however, does not say that Paul’s thorn was sickness. Every other place in the Bible where thorn in the flesh is used it is used of people that tormented and hindered. It was used of the Canaanites that would be thorns in the flesh. It was used of the enemies that would be thorns in the flesh. It was never in the Old Testament used of sickness. It was always used of people and of nations. And so to come down to the New Testament and say it means a sickness I have no objection to it— the only thing I would say, if you were to insist on it, is this, that Paul was so convinced that the Lord should deliver that three times he besought the Lord and forced the Lord to give a special revelation as to why He did not. And this would prove conclusively to me that this was the normal procedure. But then again, if you accept that it was this Judaizers that followed him everywhere that he went and that he had used every means given to him to see them stop, and God had not pleased to take them away, then you will understand why he would say, I will glory in my weakness, harassed and hindered by these that pursue me, that the power of Christ may rest upon them. And so I recognize that there are difficulties and problems, and I do not pretend to have all the answers. But I do know this, that when you come to 3rd John, and verse 2 in this one little chapter letter, you will find this marvelous prayer, “Beloved, my heart’s desire and prayed to God for you is that you prosper and be in health, even as your soul prospereth.” Soon in the Bookstore here will be another book to join two others that I mentioned. I would recommend that everyone here that is interested in this theme secure with all haste and without exception the splendid volume by Andrew Murray1. Andrew Murray, as you know, a great Dutch Bible teacher, (you may not know) was forced to leave his pastorate in South Africa because of an incurable disease of the throat. But when he returned to London there were those that believed the Lord answered prayer, that had been influenced by George Müeller2, and the consequence of it was, he was anointed and prayed for. God wonderfully touched his throat. He returned to his pastorate in South Africa for many years of ministry, and the result of this was that he wrote a little volume entitled, Diving Healing, that I consider to be the classic on this subject, and I urge all of you to secure it. Perhaps no book has so profoundly influenced the course of American history in the last 75 or 80 years than the little book by Dr. Simpson3, entitled The Gospel of Healing. This, probably more than any other, has been instrumental in changing for good or ill, as you may deem wise to judge, the course of American Church history since l850. 1 Andrew Murray (1828-1917) He has authored over 240 Books 2 George Müller (Born Johann Georg Ferdinand Müller) (1805-1898) Christian Evangelist and Director of the Ashley Down Orphanage 3 Albert Benjamin Simpson (1843-1919) founder of The Christian and Missionary Alliance Now I say there is a 3rd volume that I wish to commend to you. It will soon be available. It has been reprinted by Christian publications and will be available in the Bookstore shortly, I am confident. It is entitled, The Ministry of Healing by Dr. A. J. Gordon. Dr. Gordon was pastor of the great Clarendon Avenue Baptist Church in Boston. And this book documents the fact (and I have mentioned these books only in relation to this)... this book documents the fact that the ministry of healing continued through all of the centuries. You see there are those who have argued in respect to healing as the gifts of the Spirit that they all concluded with one or two places, the conclusion of the completion of the Canon, that is the Scripture, or the completion of the witness to Israel as a nation in 70 A.B. But the same argument prevails here that prevailed in regard to the other gifts of the Spirit, namely this, that it has been in the church without any cessation since the earliest times. And if you will go back I say to the mystics of the medieval period and on through the Moravians, the Wesleyans, the Reform movements, you will discover that there was no question on this point. In fact, the Church of England has had as part of its ritual all through the centuries a portion entitled, The Ordinance of the Laying on of Hands, for Healing. It has been neglected more in some centuries than others but it has been continuously recognized. If you study the Montanists and the Albigenses, The Waldenses, any of the movements that were outside of the Roman church, you will discover that this matter of bodily healing has been consistently maintained across the centuries. It is of interest to note that so much that we see today began with George Müeller. George Müeller undoubtedly was greatly taught and blessed of God, and he has had a tremendous influence on the history of the church since the time he lived and served. For you will understand it was George Müeller that so tremendously influenced J. Hudson Taylor. It was George Müeller that influenced Andrew Murray, and F. B. Meyer, and the great men of just the previous era whose names are remembered because of their delightful writings. So much began with him. But it remains for us in the beginning of this 81st year of church life to realize that the first man in American Church History that ever included healing as part of the message of the Gospel was A. B. Simpson. Up until that time it had been recognized, it had been held. But when God so wonderfully touched him after his series of break downs and incapacitations because of illness, he felt that this should be part of the ministry of the Gospel. Now may I remind you that in 1875 and ‘78 and ‘80, medical science was not too far out of the dark ages, and if you will go back and see some of the practices that were there you will discover that they were still fighting about such things as germs, whether they did actually exist, and sterilization, and some of the other things we take so for granted today. Well, let us recognize that much has happened in these years, and that in the last 50 years more progress than the previous 5 thousand. In the last 15 years probably more than the last 50. Tremendous strides of geometrical increase, year by year. But when Dr. Simpson announced the Gospel of Healing it was received by hungry hearts, weary bodied men and women, as the anchor of hope and the grounds of confidence. And so this work began 80 years ago, 81 now, with the testimony that Jesus Christ is our Savior, our Sanctifier, our Healer, and our Coming King. Then this became part of the message. All of the supernatural was included in this, just as all or victory and the fullness of the Spirit and power for fruit and for service was included in Dr. Simpson’s definition of Christ our Sanctifier, so all of the supernatural, the gifts of the Spirit and Healing was included in this, Christ our Healer. We need to acquaint ourselves with what motivated that movement. It was this, that already rationalism was beginning to spring up, and there was a tendency to intellectualize Christianity, and there was the first beginnings, probing of liberalism, and so at that time God set in motion a crystalized testimony that Jesus Christ is the same, today as He was yesterday, and I have told you how William Newell down in the home of Mr. and Mrs. Bill Sampson in Charlotte, North Carolina, after he had ministered in the Calvary Presbyterian Church where by the way Dr. Graham’s mother and father go, and where I have met them and known them for several years. And as they were in the Sampson home, Mr. Sampson and his wife entertaining a group from the church, and Mr. Newell who was having a conference,.. Someone was in the city and had been having a healing campaign. And they turned to him and said, “Now, Dr. Newell, what do you think about healing? Do you believe in it?” “Of course, I believe in it,” in his inimitable gruff way... “Why we are surprised at you.” They said, “How come you believe in it?” And then he told how he had been a pastor over in New Jersey when Dr. Simpson had begun ministry here on 44th Street and 8th Avenue. And Friday afternoon they would have a healing service when people were standing round the walls, in the side room, and then in those days it as open back into Fellowship Hall, I understand. And there was a great company of people here Friday afternoons, and they would come in response to the ministry, and Dr. Simpson and others would join in here in the front. And Mr. Newell said, “I of course...I believe in healing.” He said, “I saw one day a little girl, whose shriveled limb was in splints and was bound, and they prayed for her, and she cried out because of the pressure and they had to hurriedly cut the straps and take it off because God was lengthening her leg and filling it out right in front of our eyes.” And he said, “I have seen huge cancers disappear. We bowed our heads to pray and when we lifted our eyes they were gone.” He said, “I have seen goiters disappear in the front of that old church.” He said, “Anyone who was there knows in those days could never question for a moment the fact that God heals, that God answers prayer, that God delivers.” And so it was back there that it was crystalized. But I told you last Sunday night, or in one of the recent messages in this series, how that in 1904 the Pentecostal Church broke off from the Christian and Missionary Alliance, and some 400 churches formed the Assemblies of God. And they went out, and from them broke off the Four Square who took the fourfold Gospel, and made it their name, The Four Square. And then other groups went off, and off, and off, and off, until now I understand there are over 100 groups that have sprung out of that first company that left the Christian and Missionary Alliance back there in those years. And unquestionably there have been during the years many abuses and exaggerations and excesses, and very possibly we of this Society have been intimidated because of that. And there is some reason for thinking that whereas we have wanted to avoid the excess we may have moved somewhat too far to the right. But I submit to you that while this may be the case there has been this other phenomena of which I have spoken recently. And I refer it now particularly to the matter of healing. You realize that there is a circle that has been made like this, went out and on. But something even in the midst or that with which I cannot agree, I do not believe that it is right to have healing campaigns. I stand exactly where Dr. Simpson did. We preach Christ not healing. Christ, yes, as sufficient as Healer. But I have never had my heart at all enthusiastic about healing campaigns as such. Yet there have been those that have been able to do it, and those God has touched through it. And let us not in any desire to stand purely for the Word ignore the fact that God has condescended to use many of us, many of us in different ways before we knew all that God wanted to teach us. And so I am sure that there are many of these that in the past have had this ministry of healing, that have seen that there might have been other ways the Lord could have been glorified more perfectly. But nevertheless there have been people healed, wonderfully healed. And through that, there has been attention drawn to the subject so that the denominations couldn’t pass it any longer. And we find that just a few years ago, about 5 now, the Presbyterians facing this issue, began to say that there is a ministry of healing for the body, and to neglect this is to forfeit to our stewardship as the servants of God. And then of course the most significant thing that has happened is the order of St. Luke led by Alfred Price who was so greatly influenced by the Baptist, Pastor Roland Brown. If you have read Peter Marshall’s book, Mr. Jones Meet the Master, you may have in the first edition and in one of the subsequent editions seen his sermon entitled, Research Unlimited. In this sermon he makes reference to Pastor Roland Brown, an American Baptist pastor in Chicago, at the influential wealthy Parkside Baptist Church. Mr. Brown went down to Winona Lake, Indiana, where he heard a message on surrender and brokenness, Back to Bethel. He went up to the little garret bedroom where he was staying, knelt in prayer, let God search his heart, broke over everything God showed him, and received a gracious anointing of the Spirit. As he returned home he found that there was in his heart a strange sympathy for the sick. And so he found that when he went to call he did not just want to pray any longer in a haphazard way, but he had a desire to put his hands on their heads and to pray for them. And the strangest thing was that people began to say, You know, when you prayed for me something happened. God touched me, and I was made whole. And so he kept a case history, and I think the most complete case history, scientifically kept on the subject of healing, has been kept by Pastor Roland Brown at the Parkside Baptist Church. It numbered many hundreds of cases, their testimonies not only taken at the time they were healed, but six months later, a year later, two years later, for he kept it alive. And this I say is where Peter Marshall got his main thrust for the Sermon, Research Unlimited, in which he said, It behooves us to do research into the startling findings of Pastor Roland Brown of Chicago. Now Pastor Roland Brown influenced Alfred Price who is rector at St. Stephen’s in Philadelphia. And Alfred Price had a deep desire to see this ministry returned again into the church and so he was instrumental in establishing the Order of St. Luke. And I mention to you that there are now over a thousand Episcopal Churches in North America, that is, U. S. and Canada, that have a stated healing service. Now you will understand that there are great varieties of interpretation and presentation, but this we do know, that when more than a thousand churches in one Communion have stated healing services that you are certainly not going to accuse the Episcopalian people of being fanatics or indulging in wildfire or any of the other things that you might associate with some in the other extremes of the Protestant fellowship. And you will have to recognize that when the Episcopal Church gives way to these sessions that they have, these teaching ministries, these preaching missions, and the ministry of those who have the gift of healing among their people, that they have seen reality, glorious and wonderful. You may realize that Pastor Price, Rector of St. Stephen’s, has I understand from his writings a company of over 150 people that pray 24 hours a day, a continuous prayer chain, that they are given names and case histories of needs, and it is distributed among them and they are prayed for by this group which consists largely of doctors and nurses, and teachers, professional people, that in their extremity have come to the Lord through this ministry. It was my privilege to be there a year ago in February and attend one of the Thursday ministries, and see the altar, this extended square altar, filled twice as in great simplicity and dignity, with a profound sense of the Lord’s presence, with his Episcopalian priest’s robes, Pastor Price went from person to person in accord with the ordinance of the laying on of hands. Now, dear friends, we are coming to a day when we as a Society, and you as a friend of this church, are going to have to examine to what degree Jehovah-Jireh is real in your life, to what degree El Shaddai is real. And the great concern of my heart is that our candlestick should not be taken from us. I deeply grieve that we have been so far away from such movements, not that I want us to participate organically, but oh how I want our hearts to yearn and long for the Spirit of God to make us the instruments of blessing to the whole body of Christ. And so as we come back now having made this circuit, beginning back in the Old Testament, and through the ministry of our Lord, and down across the centuries, and into modern church history, we stand here as the heirs of a great inheritance. We stand here as the point where in American church history this ministry began. It began here. Now I ask you, Are we going to allow us to look and say, See what started? I believe this is not enough. I believe with all my heart it behooves us to recognize that our responsibility is because of our teaching and heritage here greater than any others. And it behooves us now in this crucial hour to dig and go again to the ancient landmarks which the fathers have set: To go again to the principles that have been established: To dig against at the wells that may have been covered with dirt until the pure flow of heavenly water can come in to assuage our thirst. And as I look at you, many of you that have come into this fellowship during the years of my ministry, and have only just a hearsay of the glorious presence of God, I am crying out to God for us all tonight that the Holy Ghost is going to burden our hearts as never before to see the Lord Jesus Christ glorified. You say, Are you asking God to show us healings. No. I am asking Him to show us Christ. Are you asking Him to show us miracles? I am asking to show us Christ. I want to see Him as Jehovah-Jireh, and I want you to see Him. I want you to see Him as El Shaddai. We are not asking for the exhibition. We are asking for the blessed Son. For when He is seen, and when He is released, when the Lord Jesus is released in the midst of His people, then you see these things coming to pass, but you know that your eyes are not going to be diverted to the phenomena, but they are going to look upon the Author and the Source of it. And it behooves us then to come back. Have you been willing to walk up that mountain and die? to bring the dearest that you have to the knife? Have you been willing to come to the stones and there to lay yourself back, crucified with Christ? You will only see Jehovah-Jireh when you come to the end of yourself. You can only see Him when you have gone into the place of death. It isn’t to stand here and pound the altar and say, O God, you’ve got to do for us what you did for our fathers. He’ll never do it. But if we are willing to walk the way of death to self and in obedience and faith then He will be pleased to show Himself to us as He showed Himself to the fathers. It isn’t that we want to see. I am not asking to see the supernatural. Things happen. I am asking to see the supernatural Son in all of His glory. I want Him to be released, to be all He wants to be, and to do all He wants to do. Not that men will say, Did you hear that so and so was healed. Oh, far be it from that. But, did you hear how glorious Jesus Christ is, that He might receive the reward of His suffering, and the praise that is His due. And thus it is as we are willing to leave Succoth where we have been, leave Schechem, leave any place we have been. Oh, you may have come to the Cross, but it is as we said this morning, It’s back to Bethel and it’s back to the place of communion and fellowship and brokenness and obedience, and there will be the revelation of El Shaddai, the God who is enough. And I believe that every generation has to see the risen Christ. As I speak to you, and I have spoken for this full hour, and have only begun to unburden my heart, I realize how impossible it is. It is not enough, If you are interested, you are not saying, Oh, he has kept us here. We are so weary. If something has touched your heart you are saying in your heart, Oh, I want to go on. I want to read. I want to study. I want to listen. I want to talk. I want to pray. That is the way it ought to be. That is the way it ought to be. Next Lord’s Day if He continues to lead as He has, as He is now, I am going to present to you the chart I gave last Sunday morning and certain questions and ask you to fill it in to find out when and how and where we may have opportunity to meet. And so I am trusting that in the days of this week to come that you are going to recognize that Jesus Christ hasn’t changed. It isn’t that His ear is heavy. It isn’t that His arm is shortened. He is still the same as He was yesterday. He is doing for others. He is blessing others. I believe that He wants to meet us and to bless. But remember you only see Jehovah-Jireh when you go up the mountain with your dearest son and you only can see EI Shaddai when you come back to Bethel, in brokenness. And this is what we must have as a people, not who want to see the phenomena, but want to see the Father of Glory and want to see Him glorified. May God draw this truth to our hearts, and may He put a hunger in your heart that you could do no better than to call the bookstore or come and get the books I have mentioned and give your heart to these things that God may speak. And if you are here tonight sick in body, I say to you, The Lord Jesus loves to meet His people’s needs. He is Jehovah-Jireh. He is El Shaddai. And if you are here tonight laden with the leprosy of sin, under the sentence of death, I say to you, The Lord Jesus died to make you clean. He shed His Blood to purge you. Oh, may the Holy Ghost so move upon your heart, dear sinner friend, that you open the door and invite Him in; and dear Christian friend, may you have the deepest desire, stronger tonight than ever before, to see Jehovah-Jireh, to see El Shaddai, the Lord Jesus, glorified in the midst of His people. Our Father, we thank and praise Thee for Thy presence. We know that this movement that is going on today in so many other areas challenges us where it all began to seek Thy face anew and a fresh. Great has been our heritage, and great our responsibility, and tonight, Lord, we plead for mercy, for Thy continued patience. Do not let us go, Lord. Do not take our candlestick from us. Do not pass us by. Bring us, Lord, from the childish things that have engaged us, the little playing of games, picking and fighting, and hurting and injuring. Bring us from the little foxes that tear down the vines and eat up the grapes. Save us, Lord. Save us from the enemy that robbed us of our heritage and blessing, and the revelation of Thy Son in our midst. Deliver us. Set us free. Set us free. Come upon us as a church. Come upon the elders. Come upon the deacons and deaconesses, the Sunday school teachers. O God, bring us back, bring us back to the mountain of sacrifice. Bring us back to Bethel, the place of communion to see Jehovah-Jireh, to see El Shaddai, and to allow Thee to be glorified in our midst. We pray for those among us that may have special needs that they may just sense that the Lord Jesus is here, that is passing by. May we touch the hem of His garment and take life from Him. Now, Lord, we need Thee so. Not just for our sake, not just to keep alive a church. If that is the only reason it is better that it be extinguished. But we need Thee so, Lord, because we are committed to Thy truth and testimony we long to see the Lord Jesus glorified. And so it is not for our sake. We have used these things, Lord, not in any wise to call attention to the movement or society, but simply to exhort and to entreat and to implore us as a people to seek Thy face that Thou mayst be glorified in our midst again, that the Lord Jesus may get the glory that is His due. So be please to honor Thy Word, to stir the hearts of this people with hunger, and that there might come a revelation of the Lord Jesus in all His wondrous splendor and glory and grace. Seal now to our hearts Thy Word and as the young people, the college and career group meet and consider their subject of the evening may it be to believe that the Lord Jesus Christ is gloriously able in days like these. So meet us and bless. For His Name’s sake. Shall we stand together. I will be standing here at the front to speak to any that might like to speak to me. If you are here with burden and need and heartache and hunger, and you’d like further help or prayer, please step this way. I would be so glad to talk and pray with you. Now may “the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God the Father, the communion and the fellowship of the Holy Ghost be and abide with each of you.” (II Cor. 13:14) Amen. * Reference such as: Delivered at The Gospel Tabernacle Church, New York City on Sunday Evening, January 21, 1962 by Paris W. Reidhead, Pastor. ©PRBTMI 1962