Prayer And Healing | Pastor John Greiner

Pastor John focuses to the practical side of healing, breaking down the many different ways God has made His healing power available to believers. Drawing from James 5 and key New Testament passages, he explains why there's a big difference between praying for someone and praying over them, and why believers never need to beg God for what He's already provided. From anointing with oil, to laying on of hands, to the gifts of the Spirit, to intercession, to the raw power of the corporate anointing in a church service, Pastor John walks through each avenue with real-life stories that bring the teaching to life, including a dramatic hospital room encounter with his own aunt and a remarkable testimony about a man pulled back from the brink of death by persistent intercession in a hospital hallway. He also addresses those tender moments when someone goes to heaven despite everyone's best efforts, offering a perspective rooted in peace rather than defeat. If you've ever wondered why prayer for healing doesn't always look the same, this is the episode for you.

Transcript

Opening Confession And Hunger

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Lift our Bibles up, wave them around, make Jesus glad the devil may. I almost skip that. I shouldn't skip that. Let's say this together. Say, Heavenly Father, it's Sunday night, and I'm so hungry, I'm back for more. Lord, you said those are hungry, those that are hungry and thirsty shall be gorged. I want to gorge on the word tonight. Filled of overflowing with the Holy Ghost. My faith is being built. I have victory on every side. In Jesus' name. Amen. James chapter 5, please. James is an end-time book. Talks about the end time harvest, talks about the patience of the Lord, how he desires the early and the latter rain to come for the great harvest. In James chapter 5, verse 13. James is the Lord's brother. You know, he was not an early adopter. He was a doubter at first, but he came around. He was in the upper room on the day of Pentecost. James chapter 5, verse 13. He says, Is any among you afflicted? Let him call the prayer line. No, let him pray. Let him pray. I mean, if you're afflicted, let him pray. No, what's afflicted? Well, you know, persecuted, under the gun. Let him pray. Is any merry? Let somebody to sing for him. Get somebody to sing for you when you're happy. No, we don't do that, do we? If it is any merry, let him sing songs. So he's kind of laying a case for us to do something. So if you're sick, if you're afflicted, let him pray. Is any merry? Let him sing songs. Is there any sick among you? That's a curious question because the whole church is set against sickness and disease, and yet there are people that are sick. So in the rare case in the early church, if there was anybody sick, it meant that they didn't know how to access God's healing power. So in that case, they need a little help. You know, baby Christians need a little help to get everything that they have coming to them. Is any sick among you? You hadn't been able to get it on your own, you hadn't been able to access God's healing power through your faith. Is any sick among you? Let that person call for the elders of the church. And let them pray over him. Notice it's a hymn and not a hearse. See, women just know how to get healed. I'm telling you. It just assumed it was a hymn. Let him grow, you know, let the elder pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord or in the name of Jesus. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick. And the word save means healed. So it means everything that's in the covenant: healing, deliverance, provision, protection, everything. And so the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up, and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him. So tonight, prayer and healing. And so clearly the church has been set against all sickness and disease. I mean, healing and health, and we made the case this morning. If you weren't here, just be sure and get the uh the podcast, get, you know, get the media on it. Health and healing is in our DNA. And uh we made the case this morning. The legal fact is that Jesus has already took, he took our sicknesses, he carried our pains, and by his stripes we are healed. We were healed, we are healed, so that's just a finished fact in the mind of God. There's nothing left for him to do. There's not, and there's God, God's not going to come down here again. He already sent Jesus to do everything necessary for our healing, everything necessary for us to go to heaven, everything necessary for us to walk in freedom, everything necessary for us to have a supply, told us how to navigate in the area of finances by guiding us on giving and receiving, being generous. There are certain rules that we have to employ when we're dealing in the kingdom, but basically everything's been provided already. And so God has given believers, though, a number of ways to access healing, all of which are different. And I get tickled because sometimes we just throw all healing in one sack, throw it out on the table, and we try to we try to go from one to the other. It's kind of like trying to play golf with a tennis racket. Or try to play tennis with a golf club. I mean, it's not going to work too well. We've got to get, we've got to get what the approach that we have toward healing, we've got to get the right process involved. We've got to get the right way to get what God wants us to get. And so we often say, praying for the sick. Well, we prayed for the sick. We're praying for the sick. Well, you know, I went and prayed for their healing. And so we need to get some of that straightened out because words mean something. And I want to help you. This is kind of me tonight, help you uh glean from my experience praying for people, praying over people. Really, it doesn't say that the elders pray for that person. It says that the elders are going to pray over him. Pray over him. See, praying over somebody is not the same as praying for somebody. Praying for somebody means that you're praying and asking God to do something for this person. But praying over somebody is not about asking God to do anything, because why? He's already done it. So praying, pray the prayer of faith, then, is praying the prayer that calleth the things that be not as though it were. Praying the word, saying, you know, you know, so we're we'll get into that. So, what is the relationship between prayer and healing? So, if you're ill-treated, if you're afflicted, pray. If you're happy, sing praises. And if you're still confessing that you're sick and sickness is keeping you out of church, and sickness has sent you to the hospital, and sickness is, well, then it's time to call for the elders of the church. Get somebody involved. Quit trying to do it yourself. It's not working, how's it working for you, honey? So, I mean, if you're a beginner and if you you're not, if you're new to this word of faith, your mood of this type of ministry, I mean, you're gonna need a little people to come alongside you. It doesn't have to necessarily be a part of my staff or me, but a lot of folks right here in this church are able to come alongside you and help you get your healing. Or not get it, but receive it. Amen. So uh so you call for the pastor or his representative, an elder, it's just somebody that knows the ropes. And what is that, what happens next? They the elder anoints that person who's sick with oil in Jesus' name. The elder prays over them in Jesus' name. So, what what about the person being ministered to? Well, they feel the oil, they feel the minister's thumb. I usually use my thumb. I've got a little thing here, it's not here now, but it used to be in the other pulpit, but I have it someplace. It's a little thing, it's got some oil in it, and I take it, flip it open, dip my big old fat thumb in there, and I just anoint people on occasion. I don't do it very often. Because why why do you use this method? You use it for people that don't have enough faith to claim their own healing. I just rather lay hands on people. I don't I don't necessarily have to anoint everybody with oil to get them healed. I just lay hands on people. But on occasion, if the Holy Ghost prompts me, it's something for some people they they feel that touch on their head, they smell the fragrance of the oil, they hear the prayer praying over them, and it helps them. And uh, and so then they will be healed and they will be forgiven. If a lot of times they've gotten something in their life that's wrong and they haven't really confessed it. Again, they're new. They they, you know, a lot of new people, you know, they might relapse into what their old life was and then they feel shame and guilt instead of getting it under the blood, you know, they walk around all uh bowed over and trying to do penance and trying to make up for the no, you got to help people. So my bottom line is even the baby Christian has access through the church to God's healing power. And so I just have an example. I mean, if if if I'm called on to anoint somebody with oil, I'll just say, Well, I anoint you, you know, with oil in the name of Jesus. Father, I thank you. The Bible says that my brother has been healed by the stripes of Jesus. I now pronounce them healed and well because you took this infirmity. And uh, and Joe and I just give praise for his healing. We call it done right now in the face of all symptoms. We're not gonna forget this. Joe, are you gonna forget this? You're not ever gonna forget this. Even when the symptoms don't leave today or tomorrow, you're gonna still say, I'm healed. You see, that's how I would pray over Joe. I would not say, God, oh God, you know Joe's a baby Christian. He doesn't know any better, God. Just healing, what you please. I beg you to heal it. I mean, really, I've heard people beg, God, are you kidding? You don't even know the Bible. You don't have to beg. We're king's kids. We have a right to our covenant. Amen. So, um, and so then, you know, really, you can carry some folks on your faith. Sometimes a little while, especially, you know, your family members, people that don't know what you know, you can get them healed, you can get them in the blessing even when they don't know much. Even when they're lost, you can kind of get them blessed. But I don't recommend just trying to, you know, I had a we had a prophet come to Lakewood one time and and he caused a stir because he prophesied on Sunday morning. And he said, you know, the reason why God hadn't been able to uh save some of your unsaved children is because you keep praying the blessing of God on them. And he rebuked the parents for not praying properly. They were always trying to, you know, and I had her, I had a sibling that was always big on that. She always just, she never would pray, devil, take your hands off. I break your power over my children. I demand you to loose your hold on them. See, she wouldn't pray that way. She'd say, Oh, God, just help him get that job, help him get that raise, help him get that. I mean, golly, when are they gonna need God if you give them all the blessing? Are y'all with me now? There's a right way and a wrong way. So you can carry people and help them get their healing, but at some point they're gonna have to stand on their own two feet. And so Jesus didn't really pray for the sick. You can't find a place in the Bible where he ever prayed for the sick. And so, you know, a long, long time ago, I just decided I'm gonna model my ministry as best I can after Jesus because his successful. I mean, he healed them all. There was never a time when he had to pray and say, God, is it your will for this one to be prayed? It didn't matter who it was, it didn't matter. He healed them all. So God wants everybody healed. Even if they're lost, he wants them healed. If you've got an opportunity to lay your hands on a lost person, he definitely wants that lost person healed. And then it becomes a witness to that lost person how much good love God has for him, and that lost person knows he's unworthy. You know, healing is God's dinner bell. You start ringing the dinner bell, and lost people come running because we've got something they need. So Jesus didn't pray for the sick, he healed the sick. He'd say, Go show yourself to the priest. In other words, the lepers, go show yourself. What was that? Go act like you're healed. And as they went, they were cleansed. They had to go first. See, they weren't cleansed right then. When he said, Go show yourself to the priest, see, the lepers came to him. Oh, you can cleanse. What do you want? I need to be cleansed. He said, Go show yourself to the priest. And as they went, they were healed. Ten of them. And they got down the road and realized they were cleansed. Well, only one came back. He happened to be a Samaritan. He fell at Jesus' feet, thanking Jesus. Oh, Jesus, I thank you. And Jesus didn't even accept his praise. He just said, weren't ten cleansed? Where are the nine? You know. Where are the nine? The nine Jews didn't come back. Just this Samaritan. Samaritan didn't even get credit. Guess what? He was made whole. Yes, he did. He was made whole. I mean, his nose grew back, his ears, his fingers grew back. I mean, he wasn't missing any body parts from leprosy. Oh my. Come on, lift your hands right now. Hallelujah. It's good to praise God. Go show yourself to the priest. Woman, thou art loosed. Be thou whole. Go wash in the pool of Siloam. Time he's he spit in the dirt and made clay and anointed that blind man's eyes. I mean, he was wild. He did all kinds of crazy things. Spit on his finger and put it on the tongue of the dumb man. I haven't done that one yet. Anybody dumb here tonight? Let me loose the string of your tongue. I'll spit on my finger. The front row gets spit on all the time. Is that why y'all sit there? You just anyway. So rise, take up your bed and walk. See, Jesus rebuked the fever and it left. He rebuked the fever. I mean, he didn't pray for Peter's mother. Oh, Father. Oh, this is Peter's mother-in-law. She's so important. We don't even have any hot food here tonight. We've got to have her heal. You know. No, he just rebuked the fever and it left her. And so he never prayed for the sick. So, you know, there's other ways to get healed, and, you know, they work by different ways than anointing with oil. Mark 16, the laying on of hands, which is common, laying on of hands in Jesus' name. This is pretty much what we do every service in some form or another. And not only for healing, but for any need. Because the anointing is transferred by contact and transmission. 1 Corinthians chapter 12, the gifts of healings, the working of miracles. Those are in effect. I've been in meetings where they were in effect. I witnessed healings that were instant. I witnessed words of knowledge. I remember a minister that was calling out people, and he would say, This person is sitting in this section, big old Houston Coliseum downtown, before they tore it down. Exceeded 5,000. It was a Catholic meeting, by the way. And it was one of the ways God reached me as a Catholic because he had to show me that miracles were for now, not for in the past. You know, Catholics believe in miracles, they just don't believe in them today, you know. But there are some. And he had this Catholic priest whose ministry was kind of like Catherine Kuhlman. He had the word of knowledge, he had words of wisdom, he had gifts of healings. He was an amazing minister. And he pointed up here, there's a man sitting up here. You've got uh a brown shirt, you've got gray trousers, you've got this wrong with you, come on down to the front. And he would call, tell people about where they were sitting, what they were wearing, and what their infirmity was. And I saw people healed that night. I mean, we we had the we saw people healed. And uh, and God made himself real to me that night, I thank God for the gifts of the Spirit. But when you get healed that way, you're gonna have to protect that that God gave you independent of your own faith. You need to grow your faith now. God expects you now to get right with him. He expects you to serve him, he expects you to get in a good, strong local church that believes that. Don't be going back to the dead church that didn't give it to you. That's what we saw in the charismatic revival. In the charismatic revival, we saw lots of people get filled with the Holy Ghost and saved in denominational churches. And what did they do? They went right back to the dead church they came from. How stupid. That's not smart. They didn't give you that. You came outside the church and got it. See, I had to come out of my Catholic church to get what I got. When I did, I didn't go back. Are you with me now? Mark 11, 23, you can claim your healing. Jesus said, You can have what you say. You speak to the mountain, speak to the symptom, speak to the infirmity. So you can get your own. You can claim your own. And then there's of course Proverbs chapter 4. My son, my daughter, attend to my words, incline thine ear unto my sayings. Let them not depart from my eyes, but keep them in the midst of thine heart, for my words are life unto those that find them in medicine, health or medicine to all their flesh. That's how Doty got healed of uh metastatic cancer of the liver. She just took the word as medicine. No, you know, Brother Hagin offered to come and lay hands on her, Copeland offered to come lay hands on her, Norville offered. No, God told Brother Osteen, no, she that's not how she's gonna get her healing. She's gonna get her healing. She knows Bible truth. Now she was given the sentence of death. I mean, there was no hope for her, there was no treatment for her. And we watched it. We were we were we were there on the front row watching the whole thing happen and unfold. I saw her at 89 pounds, and I saw her two years later totally transformed, totally just uh glowing from the uh, you know, shoulders up and just uh put all her weight back on and just uh what what a ministry that was birthed out of that warfare that she waged. I mean, she would not give in to infirmity. Are you with me now? So um interceding for the sick. There's a place in intercession. There was another testimony we had from years ago. In fact, it predated my attending there. I got to know this man's widow. She was a good friend of ours. But he was fighting, there's a young man that was fighting cancer in the church. He was a husband and a father. His wife was on staff at Lakewood. And uh it was back in the 70s, kind of the early days of the word of faith, the early days of charismatic and all that. And uh he just didn't really know how to get his healing. And and uh, but you know, back then, you know, just well, get it, get it yourself, you know, confess it yourself. Well, that's just one way to get it. I mean, you need to get it any way that God has provided. There's lots of ways for you to get your healing. I mean, don't don't limit God as to how he's gonna do it. And so a prophet, again, was in the in the church and and he and was a lady, a prophetess, and she stood up and pointed to this man and said, This man is gonna die if the if the people in this church don't start interceding for him. Interceding. What is intercession? It's putting yourself between the devil and that person. You you stand in the gap. And what are you doing? Begging God to heal him? No, you're you're praying in the Spirit. Romans 8 26. The Spirit helpeth our infirmities, for we know not what to pray for as we ought. But the Spirit Himself maketh intercession with groanings which cannot be uttered. So when we get into intercessory prayer for the sick, what are we doing? We're holding their arms up, we're paving the way for God's power to make its way into this person because we don't know what state of faith that person is in. Maybe that person is doubting, maybe that person is in fear, they're guaranteed to die. Then you've got to hang your hat on God's word. There's something that's got to happen. Or when you're praying, you might wind up praying and interceding for a gift of the Spirit to come to the church, a gift of healing. You don't, we don't know what we're praying for when we pray in intercession. We're not praying our English words, we're praying in the Holy Spirit. Holy Ghost. And we're not praying for healing. We're standing in the gap between the sick one and the and the devil that's trying to kill them. Are you is this helping you now? So I've got this uh talking about prayer and and healing. Brother Hagin was a pastor for 12 years, and he had a really good church. They had a booming Sunday school, and the director of the Sunday school was a really great guy, and he got injured on the job. I think he was in the oil field, I think a pipe hit him or something in the head, mortally. I mean, he was gravely injured. And this is way back before you had the kind of care we have nowadays for that type of injury, and so they took him to the hospital. Wasn't any ICU or anything like that. And he was just near death. And so Brother Hagin pled his case. It looked like he was gonna die. The doctor said, We I don't think there's any way he's gonna recover from this trauma on his brain. He's just it's just too hot too big. So, family, you better get ready. So he had a wife and four kids. Young family. He's a young man, prime of life. So Brother Hagin started making his case, pleading his case. And he said, Now, father, this man, I need him. And his family needs him. He's got a wife and four kids. I mean, they're not, I mean, he's so young and they're so young, it's gonna be a terrible shock for that family. I'm uh we need him healed. Now notice he's not praying for healing, he's just telling God what they need. He needs to be healed. This wasn't sickness, this was an injury. Are y'all getting this now? But he's pleading his case. And he said, you know, besides that, if he dies, the care of that family is gonna fall on this church and it's gonna be a strain on our budget to help her. So back then the women didn't work. She doesn't have a job, she's at home, probably living on a farm or something. Who knows? But uh, so he's making the case. And he said, besides that, Lord, you know that we've got the best church we've ever had, and this is the best Sunday school we've ever had, and he's the best Sunday school uh superintendent we've ever had, and I need him, and if I need him, you need him. If I need him, you need him. Are y'all getting this now? See, this is intercession. I pled the case of lots of people in this church over 30 some odd years. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. But my job is to plead that case, to stand in the gap. And so uh he'd go down and pray in the Holy Ghost outside of his hospital room, walk up and down the hall and speak in the word. He'll live and not die and declare the works of the Lord. By his stripes, he was healed and just preached the, you know, he'd speak the word and he'd pray in the Holy Ghost. And it seemed like when he would get tired, he'd have to go home and rest. And it seemed like, you know, when he went tired, was tired and went home and got rest, the man started going down. And every time he came to the hospital and prayed out in the hallway, he'd get he'd rally. And that went on for a week. And finally he woke up and eventually he was completely restored. He didn't have any loss of anything. I mean, he went back to work. And his first Sunday back in church, he stood up to give testimony. He said, You know, I was in heaven and I was talking to Jesus, and I tell you, I can't, I can't even tell you what I saw, but it was wonderful. And Jesus held up his hand and says, You're gonna have to go back. And he said, Jesus, I don't want to go back. And Jesus said, No, you're gonna have to go back, and he let him see Brother Hagin walking up and down the hallway in the hospital, pleading his case, standing in the gap. You're gonna have to go back. Oh God, come on. I mean, we have such a standing with God. We have such a standing with God. If you get a hold of this, so uh it was quite a testimony, I mean to tell you. So years later, a few years later, Brother Rooker, uh Retha's Aretha Hagen, Brother Hagen's wife, is her dad, was in a hospital and he's under an oxygen tent. Does anybody remember oxygen tents? None of you do. You're too young, see. But they used to not have the little plastic thing in your nose for oxygen. They used to have a tent that's placed over your head and shoulder, and it would, you know, be oxygen under the tent. Well, he was near death, and he was very sick, and he was in an oxygen tent and unconscious, and the doctors were basically tall the family in, say your goodbyes, and he's unconscious. He can't hear anybody. And O'Retha's sitting at the foot of the bed weeping and crying, you know. That's her daddy. And so Brother Hagin went out in the hall, walks up and down the hall, and he began to plead Brother Rooker's case. He said, Now, you know, uh, Father, you know, Brother Rooker, you know, he's Aretha's daddy, and he said, wait just a minute, hold up right there. Don't say anything else. God stopped him. He said, Let me, let me plead the case to bring him to heaven. Now, you know, if you're honest, brother Rooker's not always served me like he should. Well, that's right. He's been kind of loose around the edges. He hadn't always been faithful. He's been a backslider a number of times. He said, but he's serving me now. He's never served me in his life like he's been serving me. Well, that's right, that's right. He's sitting there, God talking to Brother Hagin. He said, There's never going to be another time better than now for him to come to heaven. He will have an abundant entrance. But if I were to not allow him to come to heaven now, we don't have any guarantees. He might backslide again, and then he wouldn't have, he wouldn't say he would go to hell, but he just wouldn't have an abundant entrance. They're talking about an abundant entrance. You think you can make an abundant entrance or you can barely get there by the skin of your teeth. I don't know about you, but I want, yeah, I do know about you. You wouldn't be here on Sunday night if you were like that. Just barely get in there. Just do the minimum. No, we're not going to do the minimum. So Brother Hagin says, Okay, Lord, I agree on this condition and this condition only. I mean, can you talk to God like that? I'll agree, but on this condition and this condition only, that you wake him up and let him say goodbye to his kids. And right at that moment, Brother Rooker's eyes went wide open, and he was able to say goodbye, and I love you to his daughters and to his son. And Brother Hagan went over to the bedside, grabbed him by the hand, and he said, Ken, I'm ready to go. And he said, Well, let her rip. And he went to heaven right there. Glory to God. I'm talking about interceding. There's a place where we can get involved in people's lives, you know, and it's powerful. Glory to God. Years ago, I was called uh about my aunt uh Eunice. She was my uncle, uh Uncle Eddie's wife. Eddie was my dad's brother. My dad had already gone to heaven, so he wasn't on the earth then, but I had a good relationship with the three other brothers, Uncle Eddie too. And uh his wife, Eunice, was in the hospital and she had uh double pneumonia, and uh the pneumonia was so bad her oxygen levels fell that she started having organ failure. She had kidney failure, and so they had to put her in dialysis, and the dialysis would filter out the medicine, the antibiotics they were giving her for the uh pneumonia, and so it was a losing battle. And uh, and so I went to see her before she got that far down. She was still conscious when I heard about it. So it was a Sunday afternoon, so we all went after Lakewood. We, my sister and brother-in-law and Gladys and I went by the hospital to see her. And so Uncle Eddie and we wanted to go in and pray for her, or I did, because she's an ICU, only one person could go in, so they elected me. And I said, Yeah, I'd just like to lay hands on her and pray for her, healing. He said, Well, let me go check. And he came back out. He says, Well, she doesn't want you to see her like this. I said, Oh, okay. I was so disappointed. She wouldn't let me pray. She's so worried about how she looks. And so uh I said, okay, well, we just let her know we're praying. And so that's all we could do. So then the next day, uh, I heard that she was in a coma. So I went down of my own accord. Then I didn't care about invitations. I went down there and I said, Uncle, she's in a coma. She's not gonna know. I need to go in there and pray for her. The families met and they're planning her funeral. I'm going down the hall listening to their, well, you know, Sunday would be good Thursday. Well, I can't be in town. And they're planning the woman's funeral, and I'm going in there in the midst of all this unbelief to lay hands on my aunt. And the reason I wanted to is because I wasn't sure that she was saved. I would not, I said, God, I can't let her die until and unless I know that she's saved. I mean, I'm not gonna let her go to hell. I'm not. I don't know. I've known her all my little life, and I've never known them to be church people. There's no reason for me to believe she's saved at all. Kind of a grouchy old lady, to be honest. But anyway, I loved her though. Love does whatever it takes. So anyway, he let me in, and her oldest daughter went in there with me. I think she was Episcopalian. And so I started praying in tongues on my way over to the hospital bed. She was yellow with jaundice. She had tubes everywhere. I couldn't find a place to put my hands. I had to put my hand on her thigh. It's kind of uncomfortable. And uh and so I put my hand on her thigh, and I leaned over and I said, uh, Aunt Eunice, this is John Walter. Is that part of the family always called by both names? John Walter. I said John Walter. I said, Aunt Eunice, this is John Walter. I'm gonna lay hands on you in Jesus' name, and you're gonna heal. The healing power of God's gonna mend your body. You're gonna live and not die. Well, she didn't respond. She's unconscious, but I knew her spirit heard me. And so I started praying in other tongues, and my cousin said, What are you doing? Is that tongues? I said, Yeah, I pray it in tongues. She said, Oh. And so, you know, I just kind of building myself up, and then when I laid my hand on her thigh, it was just like the crash cart came out. I mean, she went whoop like that. I mean, she she she she came up out of the bed almost. And I thought my cousin was gonna dive out the window. She goes, Woo! I said, it's done, it's done. Praise God. I got my got it, got it done. And so I encouraged my uncle. He was so sad and so hurt, and he didn't believe at all. He didn't believe anything happened. But she was trying to tell him. I mean, she saw what happened, you know. So the next morning, my uncle calls me and said, the doctor said, Whatever you're doing, keep on doing, I want you to come down here and pray for her again. Well, I couldn't go down there and pray for her again. I prayed for her. I mean, I prayed over her. I can't pray over her again. So I said, okay, but then I thought, God, how can I do this? I he said, Well, he just called for one of the elders of the church to go down there and anoint her with oil. So that's what I did. I went over there and anointed her with oil in the name of Jesus, and I prayed over her. And I mean, you know, she eventually left that hospital and she lived another eight years. A total miracle, a miracle of God. Talking about prayer and healing. Did I pray that God, did I beg God, did I pray God? Oh God, it's my head. Anyway, no. So the corporate anointing is another aspect. I like the corporate anointing in this atmosphere when people come down to this altar and I lay hands on them, or blath team lays hands on them. There's a there's a it's been set up by the praise and worship. There's there's there's an anointing here. We are all worshiping God, and the corporate, what we call the corporate anointing, or we could call it the glory, is bigger and more powerful than one-on-one. When you're praying, it's just you. But when we're in here together, it's all of us together. I mean, if one will put a thousand to flight, two will put ten thousand to flight, how many would a couple of hundred put to flight? It's it's immeasurable. It's it's uh it's gotten to where when people want me to pray for them, I just say, well, I'll meet you at the altar. I just don't even fool with, I mean, it's not even worth uh doing. I mean, when we've got this available right here, this is so, this is so powerful right here. This is one of the most power, powerful places on this planet, is right here. Well you're bragging. No, I'm not bragging, I'm just bragging on God. I've seen what happens. And so uh when you have love and unity, you have miracles. There's just something about a church service. And uh that that miracle power is birthed through all the prayer that we have during the week. We have Thursday night prayer, we have prayer before the service, Sunday morning. We there's a lot of prayer, and of course, my individual praying and and all of that, it's birth. I mean, things are birthed in prayer. And it's so powerful to be able to experience the corporate anointing in the area of healing. You provide a place where the whole church bears one another's burden. There's something about that. It's when somebody comes up and everybody knows what they're facing, we all get in there together with that person. See, I still have people that are so shy and so private that they don't want anybody to know. Well, wake up. What is wrong with you? That's not God. Stop it right now. I think the next person calls the office and says that. I mean, they're gonna put me on the phone and let me kind of chew on them a little while. I mean, that's not right. Come on, read your Bible. I mean, we're in this together. You're you're bypassing the greatest thing that you're a church member for. You're you're here because all these other people can bear your burdens with you and help you. You're not in it by yourself. Because if you're in it by yourself, I mean, I've seen people just wouldn't ever let anybody know and they just will go ahead and go to heaven. Well, all right, then that's what you wanted, I guess. Nobody got an agreement with you. I mean, I tried privately. Well, you know, how about right here in public? Jesus did everything public. He didn't have any dark corners that he would meet. Yeah, Mark, meet me over here around the corner. Yeah, let's just get over here in this dark corner and I'll talk to you. No, he just did it out in front of everybody. So, um, praise God. Come on, let's lift our hands. Father, we thank you right now. Glory to God. So the corporate anointing and praise and worship enhances the atmosphere for healing. Now, when someone goes to heaven, despite or in spite of our intercession, I mean it happens to everybody. I mean, we'll pray and pray and pray. Over 31 years, we've seen people go to heaven, and it it's never easy when we're standing with them against infirmity. It's better not to get infirmity, it's better to stay healthy. I mean, you know, because sometimes when you get something that you've got just stage four cancer, or you've got some kind of terminal disease, and you don't find out about it until it's too late. It's not that you don't have any faith, but faith works in time. It's like a seed, it has to have time to grow. And sometimes you just don't have time for that to happen. You the disease is overtaking you faster than your faith can stop it. So uh the answer is to walk in health as much as possible. That's another reason why I'm preaching this uh series of messages. I want to give you a booster shot because it just seems like there's such infirmity, such sickness going around in this nation. The devil is going stark raving crazy. And we this this is the best antidote. So uh there's no failure, though, when someone goes to heaven. I I remember, I won't mention their name, but I I had uh a case where I really, really, really pled their case. And I really, really, really wanted them to be healed. And I I did everything I knew to do, and it just never did turn, and this wonderful person went to heaven, and it was just really hard for me emotionally. I mean, I just had to had to preach to myself because you feel responsible. The devil will try to hang stuff on you and make you feel like you're I'm not responsible, but but yet, you know, I I I know I know the anointing that I walk in. I know that that there's power, and yet somehow, somehow, she went to heaven anyway. And so I I just I just I didn't say anything out of my mouth. I just dealt with my own emotions. I would rejoice about them going to heaven. That's what I do when people go to heaven. I just rejoice they're going to heaven. Praise God. I did that with my brother. I hate I hated to lose him on one side, I miss him even today, but guess what? When I think about him, I think about where he's at. And I don't, I'm not sad. Because I know what he's what he's got. I'm happy for him. So there's no failures. It's not a failure. In fact, Paul said, for me to live is Christ and to die is gain. So we have to have the right perspective in church when people do go to heaven in the midst of our intercession. What have we done? We have held their hand until Jesus' hand takes theirs. That's all we've done. We held their hand all the way to the moment that Jesus takes their hand. And now we can we can just have peace and we can have joy, we can rejoice. We don't have to be sad, we don't have to be, you know, lost and undone and all of that kind of thing. I mean, that's just the devil. The devil brings grief, joy comes from the Lord. Amen. So there's no failure when someone goes to heaven. On the contrary, to live is Christ and to die is gained. Prayer and healing. Come on, let's lift our hands and receive tonight. Glory to God. Did you get anything out of this? Praise the Lord.