Some benefits of the Church's Ministry of Healing

In June 2000 the Church of England House of Bishops published a report with the provocative title 'A Time to Heal'.

Why should we accept this call for the 'recovery of a gospel imperative'?  What benefits are on offer through this ministry?  Is it really 'A Time to Heal'?

Here are six evident benefits of the Church's Ministry of Healing that we can recognise:

1. It gives Courage

As a mission and renewal adviser I am more aware than most of the need for more courage to witness.  Courage is a matter of the heart.  When we 'haven't got the heart' to do something we lack courage.  It has been my experience that people can gain heart through seeking healing ministry. The heart is the source of the hidden springs of our personal life.  If our hearts are right the health there spills into body and mind, emotions and thoughts as well as outwards towards other people.

2. It helps Self-possession

We gain courage, heart, and energy from the Holy Spirit.  We also gain it by coming to terms with ourselves, by increased detachment from inner hurts and regrets, anxiety and fears.  We have to possess ourselves before we can give ourselves.  Scrutiny of our hearts, time taken in self-examination and inner healing, rewards us with a sort of 'deconstricting' of the heart. The ministry of healing is an invitation to possess ourselves more fully so that we have more to give to God and other people.

3. It shuns Manipulation

The word 'manipulate' refers to the way people get 'handled' by one another.  In the healing ministry within the mainstream Churches the ministers look supremely to be instruments of the hand of God and not man.  This is something that frees, the eternal perspective employed.  Many reservations about the healing ministry come back sadly to a perceived experience of manipulation.  They can be countered by countless testimonies from people who have experienced a new freedom and a drawing closer to Jesus Christ through prayer ministry welcomed in his name.

4. It grants Discernment

While spiritual awareness is apparently on the increase, there is little evidence, however, of a commensurate increase in spiritual discernment comments the new Report.  Yet the Church's Healing Ministry is inseparable from her ministry of Spiritual Direction. Those who seek Christ and his Church at a point of need are invited to reconsider priorities and to discern the best way ahead in life.  Many discover what Jesus meant for them when he said I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. John 10:10

5. It serves Cohesion

We live in a 'postmodern' world with immense, growing diversity. Yet the Christian principle of cohesion insists on seeing every part of life in relation to the whole, looking towards the perfect balance of love, truth and power to be found in the Risen Christ. Healing is seen in relation to the overall plan of God drawing all things together in Christ  Ephesians 1:10. 
To reduce healing to physical cure is to make Christianity parochial - falling short of the whole. 
To separate the miraculous intervention of God from his ordinary working is also to lose the necessary balance - helpfulness is linked to healing. Even joy and suffering can be seen to cohere in Christ.

6. It lets God be God

The Church's Ministry of Healing affirms that God is God and one cannot make him less than he is or wants to be or do, e.g. in healing people physically by supernatural intervention. The healing ministry is not an 'add on' to the Church's ministry but just one draw and pointer towards the fuller life and vision and dynamic of life growing ever closer to God: And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being changed into his likeness from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit. 2 Cor 3:18

The Revd. Dr. John F. Twisleton, Chichester Diocesan mission and renewal adviser