Christ the Healer: An Analysis (part 8)

A study of the book, Christ the Healer, by F. F. Bosworth:

• Part 1 (Introduction)
• Part 2 (Interpreting the Scriptures)
• Part 3 (Where Sickness Comes From)
• Part 4 (Healing and the Will of God 1)
• Part 5 (Healing and the Will of God 2)
• Part 6 (Paul’s Thorn in the Flesh)
• Part 7 (Healing and the Atonement 1)

V. Healing and the Atonement 2

Of course, as with others who follow this extreme teaching, F. F. Bosworth makes liberal use of Isaiah 53, to prove that healing is available now, in the atonement (pages 23-30, etc.). The key phrases are found in verses 4-5, “Surely He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows… and by His stripes we are healed.” And if that were all the teaching we had on the matter, we might conclude with Bosworth that God means us all to have physical healing, at once.

However, even in Isaiah, this is inconclusive. The passage makes liberal use of figurative and symbolic language. (Christ is seen, in prophecy, as “a tender plant… and… a root out of dry ground”, Isaiah 53:2.) And the prophet has earlier used the picture language of physical illness to describe the condition of Israel as a whole (Isa. 1:4-9, noting the word “it” in verse 6. It is not an individual of whom he speaks, but the nation.).

But the New Testament use of the words in Isa. 53:4-5 leave us in further doubt as to whether he intends what the author claims. “He has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows” was fulfilled long before the cross. The words describe Christ’s compassionate ministry to those in need during the three years He lived and worked among the people. (See Matt. 8:16-17. As mentioned earlier, the writer tries to say that the Matthew passage “definitely states that Christ healed all diseases on the ground of the atonement”. But the passage does not say that at all. Matthew states that Jesus’ healing of the multitudes “fulfilled” the words of Isaiah —before the cross. It was Christ’s compassion for the sick and suffering and His reaching out to help them that fulfilled His bearing our griefs and carrying our sorrows. God’s Word plainly says so.

Then we have the statement, “by His stripes we are healed.” The “stripes” were certainly a prelude to the cross (Jn. 19:1), if not, technically, experienced at Calvary. But what use does the New Testament make of Isaiah’s words? I Pet. 2:24-25 is where they are found. And Peter applies the passage to spiritual healing, from sin. He uses it as describing the once and for all salvation of the sinner. Notice the context (comments and emphasis mine):

Who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree, that wek having died to sins [in Him] might live for righteousness–by whose stripes you [a general you, all Christians] were healed [“were” – a Greek tense describing a completed, one-time action]. For you were like sheep going astray, but have now returned [again, once-for-all] to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls [that is, Christ]. [The word “for” indicates that vs. 25 is describing, in other terms, the “healed” of vs. 24. We were like lost sheep, astray in the wilderness of sin, cut and bruised and helpless. But the Good Shepherd sought us and found us, and brought us home, pouring the oil of His redemptive love on the wounds that sin had made, healing and restoring us. It is a past experience for the Christian, as Peter’s verb tense indicates. There is absolutely nothing, here, about praying for healing in the physical sense.]

It should be added that, in the Old Testament, the word “healed” is not used exclusively of bodily healing from sickness, but is much more general. In I Kgs. 18:30, for example, the same word is used of repairing the altar. In Isaiah, the emphasis seems to be on spiritual restoration, in Isa. 6:10 and Isa. 67:17-18 and on help in a general sense, in passages such as Isa. 3:6-7 and Isa. 30:26.

As stated earlier, we are not denying that the cross made possible the eventual restoration of man in every sense. We are only saying that that does not mean deliverance from any and all sickness is to be the present experience of the child of God. Christ did not die for our sicknesses. Not a single verse makes that claim. “Christ… suffered once for sins, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God” (I Pet. 3:18). That is the gospel.

Note: The position described in this paragraph has always been that of the Associated Gospel Churches of Canada, with which my current church is affiliated. Articles of Faith and Doctrine, Article XIX (1983 edition):

We believe that Divine healing of the body is not in the Atonement in the sense that Salvation and forgiveness of sins are in the atonement. The suffering and death of Christ according to the New Testament was substitutionary, penal and vicarious. It is nowhere taught in Scripture that Christ died for the effects of sin but for sin, and sickness is directly or indirectly the effect of sin. Romans 4:25; I Cor.15:3; 2 Cor.5:21; I Peter 2:24; 3:18.

Before moving on, I shall deal briefly with some related comments of the author. Great stress is placed upon the title given to the Lord in Ex. 15:26, “I am The Lord Who Heals You –Jehovah Ropheka”. This is one of the compounds of the name Jehovah of which there are ten. (Bosworth speaks of seven, but he has missed three.) These names were a means of God revealing certain aspects of His character, as was needful at a particular time. The names speak of His character. And when a new name is introduced, we are not to suppose that God’s character has changed, but simply that He is unveiling some aspect of it in clearer detail. (Thus He tells Moses that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob knew Him as God Almighty, but not as Jehovah, Ex. 6:3)

The promise of Ex. 15:26 relates to the curses and blessings of Deut. 28 (discussed earlier). God is saying to Israel, if you will faithfully keep my Law, I will not need to chastise you as I did the Egyptians. “None of the diseases” may speak of physical illnesses, in a restrictive sense. Or, it could mean none of the plagues such as were visited upon the Egyptians. (The Hebrew root, khaw-law, is applied, broadly, to weakness, pain, etc.)

The point is that the promise was tied very specifically to keeping the Law. But Israel disobeyed, over and over, and forfeited the blessing. Since we are not now under the Law, it is not possible to apply such a promise. The only way the author can claim it is possible is by linking a number of texts and ideas that are widely separated and unrelated. For example:

God’s seven redemptive names, one of which is Jehovah Raphe, “I am the Lord that healeth thee,” shows us what lost possessions “every man” may return to during our dispensation. [He is speaking, again, of the law governing the Year of Jubilee, mentioned earlier. It has no connection to the name Jehovah Raphe. Nor can it be applied in the present dispensation, as we are not national tribes with territory to return to!] Bosworth goes on, “The two outstanding possessions to be restored during the Gospel are health for soul and body” (pges 17, 57, 84). [But, once more, the author leaps a great gulf to come to this conclusion from a once-only mentioned name, in Exodus.]

To comment on another idea expressed a number of times by the author, consider the following:

If, as some teach, healing is not in the Atonement, why were types of the Atonement given in connection with bodily healing throughout the Old Testament? … Why were the Israelites required to eat the flesh of the passover lamb for physical strength, unless we can receive physical life or strength from Christ (pages 15-16).

Bosworth makes similar statements concerning Num. 21:9 and the store of the brazen serpent (p. 20). If I understand him correctly, he is saying, since the Old Testament ceremonies and symbols of Calvary often relate to the healing of the body (as the brazen serpent certainly does) that must mean that healing is included in the actual work of the cross, in the same way.

But the author has failed to comprehend that we are dealing with two different things. Israel is God’s earthly people, with a pronounced emphasis on earthly blessings (a land of their own, etc.) whereas the Church is God’s heavenly people, given “every spiritual blessing” (Eph. 1:3), though often suffering physical privation and difficulties (Phil. 4:12-13). That the physical healing of those Israelites who looked at the brazen serpent is to be taken not as a promise to us of bodily healing, but as an illustration of spiritual restoration, in Christ, is made clear by Jesus’ use of the incident. “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life” (Jn. 3:14-15).

And one last quotation can be dismissed quickly:

If the body were not included in redemption, how can there be a resurrection? How can “corruption put on incorruption,” or “mortal put on immortality”? If we have not been redeemed from sickness, would we not be subject to disease in heaven?

p. 32

Rom. 8:23 gives us the answer. “We [are] waiting for the adoption, the redemption of the body”. There are some blessings of Christ’s work that we are waiting to enjoy. It is when we see Him, face to face, that we shall be like Him (I Jn. 3:2).