New Agers and Christians alike love to throw out the verse from the Gospels where Jesus Christ says, “If ye have faith, and doubt not. . . ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done. And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive.”

A preacher I know in Tennessee, Pastor David Dowell, says when he confronts Christians about the reality of claiming that verse he’s often told, “I don’t have enough faith or this would be this way or that and so on and so on. They want to tell me how a person’s faith is weak and that’s why they’re not getting healed, etc.”

Another favorite verse of the New Ager-Christian Casual crowd is in Matthew 17 where Christ says, “If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you.”

Dowell reasons, “You need to look up just how small a mustard seed is, folks. If a person had enough faith to ask for healing, then they had enough faith to be healed. Notice there’s a comma there, too, and then you read that ‘nothing shall be impossible to you.’ ”

Yet another verse snatched out of context is James 4:3: “Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.”

Dowell says, “It’s another excuse they use for why you didn’t get what you asked for; you’re asking for something that’s selfish is what they want to tell you.”

The Book of James was written for the “little flock” of Jewish believers who will carry on God’s work during the tribulation period. As for the verses by Christ, Dowell explains, “You have to understand, folks, at that dispensation in that time those people were given power to do those things because that’s what God was doing. He was dealing with the nation Israel and, as I Cor. 1:22 says, ‘a Jew requires a sign,’ and guess who Christ came to? He came unto His own. So, what do you have? A sign ministry.

“Christ’s showing who He is, and not only that, it’s a foretaste of the kingdom. He’s sending His apostles out, not to preach the gospel of the grace of God, but the gospel of the kingdom.”

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My pastor, Richard Jordan, tells how he recently heard a preacher on the radio in Chicago try to explain away people’s failures in applying the “faith as a grain of mustard seed” concept:

“He was trying to explain how there’s certain things you do in life that you can just pray about and God’ll give you the answer, but then there are other things that come against you in life where it takes more than just you praying—you’ve got to go out and fast and prove to God how sincere you are and how much you’re willing to do. And until you pray and fast, there will be these (evil) strongholds in your life.

“I thought, ‘What kind of a nitwit. . .’ and then I thought, ‘No, that’s pretty much what everybody thinks! That’s that performance stuff!’ But it doesn’t work. Think about it: if you prayed, ‘In the name of Jesus,’ and commanded the devil to come out and he didn’t come out, what would be the problem? Oh, you didn’t fast? To me to say that is so contrary to common sense.

“I mean, what devil in the world’s ever going to be able to stand against the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. If Christ tells him to come out, he’s going to then say, ‘No, you got to go fast first’?!

“Well, then what’s He talking about? They’ll tell you the problem is in verse 20: ‘Because of your unbelief.’ But when I read that my question is what is it that they didn’t believe? You see, ‘faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.’ If faith is a positive volition toward sound doctrine, believing what God says, what’s unbelief? It’s not believing what God said. You see that? You can be ignorant and have no faith but unbelief is more than just not knowing what to believe. Unbelief is refusing or failing to believe what God did say to you.”

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Mark 16 is a great chapter for demonstrating the harm in being scriptural (believing the Bible and quoting the Bible) but refusing to rightly divide it according to its dispensational setting.

Christ says to His 11 apostles as they sit in the upper room after His resurrection, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.” (Mark 16:15)

Jordan explains, “That passage is used all over America today—and all over the world—

as the passage that demonstrates missionary commitment and zeal: ‘Let’s go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature!’

“Who doesn’t believe in that; how could you be against that? That’s kind of a no-brainer. Everybody believes in what verse 15 says when you just take it out of its context but you know the problem is if you start teaching that at a missionary conference and you start saying, ‘That’s what we need to do,’ some dummy’s gonna come along and read the next verse and then you’re going to have problems. You know what causes problems for these brothers? People do read the other verses around the verses their preachers use.”

Mark 16:16 says, “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.”

Jordan says, “Wow, wait a minute, I thought it ought to have been, ‘He that believeth and is saved should be baptized’? Isn’t that what they tell you? But that isn’t what it said? You come to verse 16 and you’ve got to be a Campbellite, an Apostolic, a Lutheran or a Catholic to square that away.

“Then you’re going to have to go down to the hills of Tennessee to find verse 17 and 18 in action: ‘And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name shall they cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; They shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.’

“Now, look carefully, does it say these signs might follow the guy who believes and is baptized and gets saved? Is that what it said? No, these signs ‘SHALL follow they that believe.’ No question about it, something’s wrong when it doesn’t happen. And that’s not just talking about them following the apostles; it’s talking about those signs following the Believers in verse 16. It says, ‘In my name they shall cast out devils and shall recover.’

“That’s always been a fascinating verse. ‘If they drink any deadly thing it shall not hurt them.’ If I reach down here this morning and pull out a bottle of Drano would you want to claim that passage in faith, believing?

“We sang the song a moment ago called, ‘Faith is the Victory.’ Somebody like to come get the victory—stand on the Word of God and say, ‘I’m gonna trust God’? No takers? Well, you better have a reason for not taking it other than you’re just scared to trust God to do it.

“Because if God said to do it, you know what, there isn’t any option involved in it if it’s what God wants done. And it wouldn’t be any more difficult to do that than it would anything else. You know you all love the verse, ‘Children obey your parents.’ You all love the verse, ‘Husbands love your wives.’ We all love the verse, ‘Wives be in subjection to your husband.’ We all love the verse that says, ‘My God will supply all your needs according to his riches in glory by Christ.’ But what about this one?! Little difficult, huh? You need an answer.

“If you don’t know how to rightly divide the word of God you can be scriptural and it cost you your life or the life of your children!

“Do you see there’s a healing program in that commission to Israel? It’s an (earthly kingdom) program that talks about healing people as in Revelation 8 when they go out and drink some deadly stuff and it doesn’t hurt them—they drink the wormwood but it doesn’t kill them because they have supernatural protection in the realm of their health. There’s illustration after illustration in the Bible about that kind of a thing.

“Well, what about that? Is that passage something we ought to be relying on and trusting in today, and if not, why not? And if they are, why do you sit there with rheumatism and gout, cancer and heart conditions? I mean, I look at a crowd like this and there are all kinds of physical infirmities. Why aren’t Brother Alex and I going around laying hands on people?

“You realize it’s considered the professional duty of many clergies to visit the hospitals and anoint the sick with oil. There are classes of church people to do those things because they’re trying to obey that verse!

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Matthew 8:17 (‘That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses.’) is probably the favorite passage of the healing crowd. For certain, it is THE passage used to prove and teach the doctrine that physical healing for your body is in the atonement on the Cross.

Jordan explains, “In verse 16, Christ casts out the evil spirits and heals all that are sick and these are the two major signs of the kingdom. This is the earthly kingdom program promised to the nation Israel and the two major signs of that kingdom are going to be casting out devils—casting the evil spirits out of the land (Zech. 13)—and healing the sick; physical rejuvenation.

“In Isaiah 33:24, He says, ‘The inhabitants of that kingdom will no more say I am sick.’ Isaiah 35 says that, ‘Behold, your God comes with a vengeance, and when He comes the deaf will hear, and the lame will walk, and the blind will see, and the dumb will speak, and when you see those things happening you’ll know it’s because your God showed up. And sorrow and sighing are going to flee away.’

“Again, the two signs in the kingdom are No. 1, He cast out all the evil spirits, or the satanic policy of evil that’s designed to corrupt the land and people of Israel, and then, No. 2, the curse against physical creation is taken away.

“Jesus Christ didn’t just preach the ‘good news’ of the kingdom, He physically demonstrated it with these two great signs that said, ‘Your God’s here!’

“Now, if you watch TV or go to these type of ‘healing’ churches, you’re familiar with the (false) teaching that says, ‘By His stripes we are healed and that when Jesus Christ died at Calvary He provided physical healing for your body right now,’ and their justification for that is verse 16 and 17 in Matthew 8.

“Verse 17 says, ‘He healed all that were sick that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Himself took our infirmities, and bare our sicknesses.’ Now, you know that’s a quote out of Isaiah 53, a chapter that’s looking toward the Cross.

“But what I want you notice is that this is really a very hard passage to use to teach that healing is in the atonement. Where does the atonement take place? At the Cross. Is the Cross found in Matthew 8? No. When did the healing here take place? Matthew 8.

“Well, folks, if the healing took place in Matthew 8, and verse 17 says He healed them that it might be fulfilled—not that it might parallel, or that it might be like, but that it might fulfill and bring to the end and finality the thing that was said—He’s going to bear our sickness and He’s going to take our infirmities.

“The passage is saying He came in there and touched Peter’s mother-in-law and she got up and was well and then all the multitudes came around. Folks, He cast out evil spirits, touches them, and sends away their disease, and they’re all healed; physically rejuvenated.

“By the way, they didn’t need eyeglasses anymore. You see these dudes on the TV and every one of those guys wears glasses. Craziest thing I ever saw. Common sense tells you something ain’t right if that’s what’s going on! If what this passage is talking about is what’s happening in life around you today. . .what I’m telling you is that it isn’t.

“The great burden of many ministries today is to go around and try to convince people that by Christ’s stripes we’re healed and He took our infirmities and bear our sickness and, folks, that hasn’t anything to do with Calvary. It was in His coming; the healing was in the coming of the Messiah. Go back and read Isaiah 35.

“It says, ‘When your God comes to you then He’s going to bring healing; He’s going to get rid of the curse, and the sorrow and the sighing, and all the diseases are going to flee away.’ And when it says He bore our infirmities and He bears our sickness, He’s talking about the healing ministry that He has when He comes to them. The passage is fulfilled as Christ goes around on earth healing people! It’s got nothing to do with the Cross at all!”

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If healing is in the atonement, as preachers like to say, II Corinthian 12 is just one of many passages in Paul’s epistles that present a real conundrum.

Paul writes, “And lest I should be exalted above measure through the abundance of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, the messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I should be exalted above measure.
[8] For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me.
[9] And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
[10] Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in necessities, in persecutions, in distresses for Christ's sake: for when I am weak, then am I strong.”

“Paul’s saying, ‘Listen, I’ll glory in my infirmities; I’ll glory in my sicknesses,’ ” explains Jordan. “Folks, if Christ bore the infirmities and the sicknesses on the Cross and the atonement’s in the Cross—the healing’s in the atonement on the Cross—then Paul’s a terrible guy. He’s a wicked man, glorying in the very thing God through Calvary took away! That’d be awful! You wouldn’t go around and say “Whoo-hoo, I’m saved and sin’s put away through the Cross; I think I’ll just go out and commit a little adultery and then come brag about it!’ You wouldn’t do that I hope?

“You wouldn’t go out and rob a bank and say, ‘Oh, I’m saved, bless God, Hallelujah! Here, I’ll put some money into the collection plate this morning; I just robbed a bank!’ You wouldn’t glory in that would you? No.

“Listen, folks, anybody who’s honest knows that these things in Mark 16 don’t work. You know you aren’t going to get broken arms, or broken legs or paralytics healed at a healing meeting. You know that. You know it doesn’t work. You’re not going to ‘theological-gimmick’ your way around a passage like that!”