Divine Healing
DIVINE HEALING
99) classes could not be held, mainly due to lack of leaders. Some of the: areas (which could afford it) were meeting half the cost of the: books.
Lay: preachers were asked to take advantage of thesefacilities.
I urged that such study should be done with the heart as well as with the head.
The purpose of the course was not so much to acquire a certain amount of new knowledge as to grow in one's own spiritual life so that one could help others.
As we had only sixty ordained ministers these lay preachers were of immense help.
Some of them were later chosen for ordination.
There was a tendency on the part of some of the lay preachers in the town congregations to occupy the pulpit on Sunday mornings when the church was full, rather than go out to small congregations some miles away.
But many men chose the more difficult pastoral and evangelistic tasks and did them faithfully and well.
DIVINE HEALING
Some of our congregations took up whole-heartedly the work of praying for the sick.
I heard instance after instance of how the sick had been healed in response to such prayers.
One man told us how his father had dangerous haemorrhages and had to give up his work.
Now as a result of the people in his congregation praying earnestly, he was quite well and was able to go back to his work.
Another man reported that his child had whooping cough and was taken to a Mission Hospital for treatment.
The doctor said that there was no stock of the necessary drug and asked him to get it.
It was too expensive for him to buy.
He came home disappointed and also annoyed that a Mission Hospital had not helped him.
But he prayed and the child soon got well.
A pastor reported that when his grandchild fell ill, he asked the congregation to pray and they prayed, even the children, and the child recovered.
When these accounts of Divine Healing were given, I noticed that those who gave the reports were very particular to say 'we' and not 'I'.
The healing took place in response to the prayers
A. J. APPASAMY
of many ordinary folk, not in response to the prayer of an exceptionally gifted Divine Healer.
One of those engaged in this ministry was emphatic that the prayers for the sick are not heard if those who offer the prayers lead a life which is inconsistent with Christian ideals. me It was necessary to give careful instruction to the leaders of the prayer groups. There is always the danger, especially in a country like India, that the belief in Divine Healing might degenerate into 'supérstition and magic.
The presbyters and lay preachers in the diocese had come together in the Stanes High School in Coimbatore for a three-day
Convention from January 3rd to 6th, 1955.
It was a difficult time of the year, as most people engaged in Church work had been very busy during Christmas and New Year.
Yet about two hundred people attended.
There was much interest among several other laymen who wanted to come but we could not admit them for lack of room.
We thought it would be very useful if Bishop Pakenham-Walsh could give an address on Divine Healing.
As usual, he gladly accepted the invitation and came from his Ashram nearby.
He was held in great respect in the diocese.
Many of our people had asked him to pray for the sick and his prayers had been answered.
Bishop Pakenham-Walsh gave an address on Divine Healing.
He was eighty-three years of age. A tall man, his back was now quite bent.
He had a long, flowing beard, grey with age.
He was clad in a cotton cassock, originally purple in colour but now nearly white from constant washing.
He had a small wooden cross on the breast.
Too feeble to stand and give the address, he was seated.
He spoke in English and was rather inaudible; but what the interpreter said in Tamil could be heard by every one.
He was particular that the patients who asked for his prayers should be spiritually prepared.
Every day he wrote ten to twenty letters, giving clear directions as to how they should commit themselves entirely to Christ.
It was only in very serious cases that he took the Anointing Service after instructing the patients carefully.
During the last years of his ministry of intercession he prayed regularly for as many as one thousand patients, dividing them into batches and taking them on different days of the week.
In well-bound black note-books he wrote out their case histories.
DIVINE HEALING
10f He would spend five hours a day with a note book spread on the table before him. Then he would pray for each patient, remembering the important details.
The Coimbatore Diocesan Magazine for May 1956 gave af account of a remarkable instance of Divine Healing in the diocese.
Mr Verghese, Railway Guard, his wife and their four children, all members of the Podanur congregation, went to attend a wedding on 15th January 1956.
That was a festive occasion. The parents were busy meeting their relations and friends. The children played with other children and were quite happy.
Susan, aged six, went to sleep quite early.
The other children with whom she had been playing woke her up and said to her, 'What is this?
We are all having a jolly good time; we do not go to a wedding every day; you want to leave us and go to sleep; get up and play with us.' They pulled her legs roughly and made her get up.
The next day the parents saw that Susan was limping.
They had her examined in a hospital and arranged for an X-ray photograph.
It was found that Susan's hip joint had been dislocated and that one leg had become slightly longer than the other. This was very serious.
Susan was a pretty girl.
It looked as if she would have to be lame for the rest of her life.
The parents and their friends were filled with anxiety.
They decided that the best medical treatment should be given to the child.
She was kept in a hospital for twenty-three days and was not allowed to leave her bed.
Her legs were put in plaster cast with heavy weights attached to them and she was asked not to move even an inch this way or that way.
On the twenty-fourth day the doctor took off the cast of plaster.
The mother who was a devout woman, was in continuous prayer that the child's legs might become normal.
In Jericho a blind man kept crying: 'Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me' (Mark
10:46-51).
In the same way this mother kept crying silently but earnestly, 'Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on my child.'
But even after the prolonged treatment in the hospital, Susan was the same as before.
She had become so weak: that she could not even stand and when she attempted to walk the bad limp was. still there.
The doctor urged the parents to take the child for further treatment to Madras.
A. J. APPASAMY
The Pastor of the Podanur Church, the Rev. R. Devasirvatham, asked his Congregation as well as the Women's Fellowship to pray for the child.
He urged the mother: 'God can do everything.
He can certainly heal your child.
You should spend three days in fasting and prayer for her.
I shall also fast and "pray with you during those days.'
The mother wrote about Susan to Bishop Pakenham-Walsh in the Tadagam Ashram nearby and asked for his prayers.
She also wrote to two of her triends to_pray for the child.
On March 31st the mother saw a vision of Jesus.
He was an effulgent figure and came through the open heavens swiftly in response to the prayers of those who had called on Him for His help.
He stopped where Susan was and touched her where the hip joint had been dislocated.
He then disappeared.
The child now became quite well. Her limp was gone. Her legs were normal.
This was certainly the work of God and the parents and their friends were filled with gratitude to Him for the miracle which He had wrought.
When I visited the Podanur Church some time later I saw Susan and her parents after a service.
She came to me walking normally and well.
The people in the Church spoke to me with wonder and astonishment about God's remarkable answer to their prayers.
When we started in 1951 to pray for a spiritual awakening in the diocese, we did not know at all how God would answer the prayer.
But now we realize that Divine Healing was certainly one of the many channels through which He sent His blessings to us.
In this land of thousands of villages it is often impossible for rural folk to reach the hospitals with their trained doctors and their modern equipment.
Millions of people are too poor even to travel to the hospitals and to pay the small charges which are expected of them.
In all these cases belief in Divine Healing is of immense help.
Even the poorest of villagers have access to the infinite resources of God.
The various happenings in the Coimbatore Diocese have convinced us that there is a remarkable faith in God among our humblest folk.
We have been amazed again and again by the persistent belief of people who are willing to come' together in
DIVINE HEALING
groups and to pray until the sick are healed.
Often in our regular services in Church the names of the sick are mentioned and prayer is offered for them.
But we do not know what they are suffering from.
We do not know what medical treatment has been given to them.
We do not even hear the names properly.
How can there be intensive prayer unless we know something about the people for whom the prayer is offered?
We need to encourage the formation of prayer groups and the holding of Healing Services in every congregation or at least in every congregation in which there are men and women who believe in prayer and are ready to come to them.
There is a real danger that people may be interested only in their physical health.
It cannot be emphasised too often or too clearly that genuine well-being must include body, mind and spirit.
Careful instruction about the need for penitence, surrender _to Christ and the acceptance of God's forgiveness is absolutely essential.
I was invited to give the address on the College Day of the Vellore Medical College on August 27, 1951.
This was a particularly exacting demand.
As I remember now, there were in Vellore at that time one hundred and fifty doctors, two hundred and fifty men and women training to become doctors and four hundred women in training as nurses.
Many of them were spending years of toil on study and research.
What did they think of Divine Healing?
Had I anything useful to say to them as a tesult of the many remarkable healings which were taking place in the Coimbatore Diocese?
Here is the substance of what I said to them:
Medical science has made immense strides.
Numerous powerful drugs have been discovered.
Surgeons perform wonders.
We need to remember that all this growth of medical knowledge is from God and that the fullest use must be made of it. But even the cleverest physicians and surgeons fail at times.
There is a limit to all human ability.
But the resources of God are unlimited.
His wisdom, truth, power, beauty, goodness, love are beyond all description, beyond all calculation.
We have no measure with which to measure them.
The brightest light which man can invent pales into insignificance when the sun comes up.
Prayer, meditation, Holy Communion, Bible study,
A. J. APPASAMY
spiritual reading, contact with nature—these are the means by which we draw from the infinite resources of God.
'They all need energy, application, patience, time.
There is no shortcut to reach God any more than there is to complete your medical education.
We now realize clearly that body, mind and spirit are closely knit together.
There are three levels on which healing has to be wrought—bodily, mental, spiritual.
Recovery, to be complete, must be spiritual as well as physical.
The body is the temple of the living God.
Do not merely repair the ravages in the physical structure; clean the temple, as it is the abode of the living God.
In our congregations there are keen people who believe in the power of prayer as an essential factor in the healing of the sick.
But they need someone to bring them together and to help them to make their prayer intelligent, regular and earnest.
That someone could be you.
Be the life and soul of a praying group.
This is good for the doctor.
This is good for our church people.
Take especially hard cases.
The soul of each of your patients is precious in the sight of God; let it be precious in your sight too.
Dr Somervell, the famous missionary surgeon, told me that in his personal experience he had come across patients who had not responded to surgical treatment but had been healed by prayer.
A man had been operated on but did not improve.
His friends rallied round him and prayed earnestly for him.
He also prayed, full of faith.
Dr Somervell was clear in his mind that the patient became well after the prayer though he did not show any signs of recovery after the operation.