Knowing God, Pt. 3: The Resurrection & The Life
Take Communion
Leader: Begin your gathering by taking communion together, whether as a full meal together or some version of the bread and the cup before or after your meal. If you don’t already have a Communion liturgy, read these words from Paul to the church in Philippi.
In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death—even death on a cross! Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2v5-11
Read This Overview Aloud Together
When Jesus calls himself “The Resurrection & The Life,” he is making the claim that he holds the power of healing and salvation, which he wants to bring to all people. All through the Bible, we find God waging war against sickness and death. In fact, from the moment that sin and death enters the picture, the Scriptures are clear: God wants to heal. He wants to heal trauma, pain, sickness, injuries, and everything else that disconnects his creation from the fullness of life that he intended. And whether through an instantaneous miracle or a medical intervention like surgery, medicine, or therapy, all healing belongs to God.
Rightly understood, then, healing becomes a sign that points to salvation, which is the substance of the Kingdom. Remember that even after Lazarus was raised from the dead, he died again. All healing this side of resurrection is temporarily healing, but it is a gift of God to drag some of our future resurrection into the present. Salvation is the only kind of healing that lasts in this age and the age to come. Healing is the sign; salvation is the substance. Healing is the miraculous intervention of God in our world, making it a part of the church’s ministry, even though it doesn’t always happen in this lifetime. We are the people who carry the prophetic conviction that God wants to heal his world – more than that, that God wants us to be healed more than we want to be healed. We carry the prophetic message that one day our physical bodies will be resurrected into God’s restored and remade world.
Do This Practice Tonight
Tonight, we are going to lean into this Practice of asking God to heal people. As we do, let’s commit to keeping in mind that we are all bringing different past experiences to our time tonight. Some of us may have really positive experiences with it; some of us may have seen healing prayer misused; some of us may have deep pain or disappointment connected to asking God for healing; and some of us have no experience at all. Wherever we find ourselves, let’s commit to make room for each other and to practice following the invitations of the Spirit.
Healing prayer is complicated because it involves people’s pain and can have lifelong impacts on people’s faith, whether they are healed or not. But a simple prayer is all it takes. Jesus himself reminded us that we “will not be heard for [our] many words.” There is no formula in the Bible for healing prayer; it isn’t a magic trick where saying the right words unlock God’s healing power.
Healing, though, doesn’t always happen. But that’s true of a lot of things. When we preach, not everyone comes to faith. But we still do it. So when we pray for healing, not everyone will get healed – but we still ask. Because healing is simply a sign of the Kingdom, our ultimate hope is not resting on people being miraculously healed. We are freed, then, to ask freely of a Good Father who has good gifts for his children.
As we practice healing prayer tonight, we will do so using the following model:
1. Find someone who wants healing. Let’s take a moment to figure out who among us wants prayer. Who has some sort of injury, sickness, or pain that they would like our Community to ask God for healing for?
2. Pray a simple healing prayer. If appropriate and permission is given, someone can put a hand on the affected place on the body. Then simply say a short, simple healing prayer, like, “God, would you please heal Sam’s leg. We know you love him and we know that healing is your will, so we ask you to heal his leg even now. In Jesus’ name, Amen.” This part can take like 20 - 30 seconds.
3. Ask if it got better. Ask the person who was receiving prayer how they’re doing. Perhaps invite them to try something they couldn’t do before. Or have them rate the pain on a scale of 1 to 10.
4. Pray again. If there is still pain, we’ll just pray another simple prayer. Even Jesus had to pray more than once for someone to be healed in Mark 8.
5. Repeat Steps 3 - 4. If the person experienced healing, celebrate and thank God for it, reminding the person who experienced healing that it is a way that God is telling them he loves them. If they didn’t or didn’t fully, consider committing to ongoing prayer for their healing (and actually do it!).
When we have run out of time, we’ll pause and thank God for sharing his healing ministry with us, and ask him to let us see signs of his in-breaking Kingdom through physical healing in our life.
Read The Practice for the Week Ahead
This week, we want to continue practicing asking God for healing for people in our lives. So, be open to praying for healing for someone this week – at work, a family member, a stranger. Remember to always ask for permission – the person you want to pray for may not be ready yet to ask God for healing. That’s ok. Asking for God’s healing for someone doesn’t have to be weird.
When someone you pray for experiences healing, remind or tell them that it is a sign of God’s Kingdom, that he deeply loves them. And if someone isn’t healed, it doesn’t mean that you or they didn’t have enough faith or did something wrong. The Father deeply loves you and them and does want them to be healed. Then, if you mean it, commit to praying for their healing ongoingly.
End in Prayer
Close your time together asking for God to continue to reveal himself to you all as The Resurrection & The Life.