Back in 1998, when I first got Rheumatoid Arthritis, I was in extreme pain and getting deformities. Two old and close friends, who had been Pentecostal, told me that if I wasn't healed, I didn't have enough faith. So they prayed for me, and when I was not healed, they told me I was somehow blocking the will of God.
That started one of the worst times in my life. I love Jesus with all my heart, soul, body and mind, but instead of the comfort and joy of the Lord, I had a horrible burden I could not bear with RA, and judgement and condemnation by two people thoroughly immersed in this evil heresy. I did not read my Bible or pray for 2 years, I was so depressed from the pain, and feeling totally abandoned by God.
Then, the one woman, who was an evangelist, and ordained by Kenneth Copeland and had a huge church on Vancouver Island, got breast cancer. She refuses chemo and radiation. But her whole church claimed healing according to the tenets of the Word Faith movement. She spent all her time in praying, and "praying" the Word over herself. The doctors begged her to take treatment, but she told them she was healed.
Ten months later, she died, after the cancer metastasized, and drove her insane when it entered her brain. Very sad to lose a friend, who might not have had to die, had she not been in this terrible heretical cult.
The second friend started having prostate problems, which he was prayed for. He was not healed, and he was in such pain he finally got someone to drive him to the ER, where he was immediately taken for surgery. He has not had another problem, probably 15 years later, although he does have to do regular check ups. That sort of turned him away from WF, although he remains a Pentecostal.
So there you have it - Word Faith doctrine, discouraging me, killing one friend, and another realizing how wrong it is.
I have an excellent pamphlet written by one of the top Greek scholars in the world, Gordan Fee, who is a Pentecostal, who remains committed to divine healing, but never on command. He is of course, totally against the prosperity gospel. The pamphlet goes through both Prosperity and Word of Faith healing, and takes them apart. Healing is NOT included in the atonement, a very wrong reading of Isaiah 53. Prosperity is just wrong, although God does provide for our needs.
I will say, that despite the on-going health issues, that God has always provided for my husband and I and our children in marvelous ways. I praise him for that! But, I have never claimed it, just thanked God for his daily provision.
As far as healing, I know people are healed. But I was not, and I grew more from having RA, than in the 20 years of my Christian walk when I was healthy.
"More than that, we rejoice in our suffering, knowing that suffering produces endurance, endurance produces character and character produces hope. And hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured out by the Holy Spirit who has been given to us." Romans 5:3-5
That is my life verse, and it has shown me that character, which is eternal, is so much more important than physical healing. I would love to be healed, but if I never am, I will rejoice in the blessings God has given me, the most important of which is knowing Christ.
Sorry to all of you who have heard this story over and over. If you want to actually discuss the false doctrine, and why the Word of Faith is wrong, deceiving, and not Biblical I would be happy to argue Scripture. I don't see that happening at all in this thread, so I won't get into it, unless someone wants to know the truth about what the Bible actually says.
