Healing in Our Deep Parts

I recalled the understanding we gained years before about the makeup of our inner man. We are tripartite beings. There are three parts in each of us: our spirit, our soul, our body. Paul made reference to these three in I Thess 5:23. Considering Glenda's need for a miracle of healing, I began to see how the Spirit of God could reach into these inner parts of her to release His healing. We believed His work in her spirit and in her soul could result in a powerful flow of healing to her body.

Let me review a little of what we had learned about our inner man. Take, if you will, three concentric circles. The one at the core will represent the human spirit. The one immediately around it is the soul, to which we give four divisions. Then, the outer circle will represent the body. As I thought on this, I knew her healing could, and should, take its beginning in her spirit.

The roots of the soul reach into the human spirit for sustenance. If there is sickness in the spirit, it will infect the soul. On the other hand, if the spirit is healthy, it can release its health into the soul. From thence it can come into the body.

The soul has four parts: the mind, the emotions, the will, and the conscience. Jesus also spoke about the reins and hearts in Rev 2:23. The Old Testament has a great deal to say about both of these "organs" of the inner man. We'll take them up later. In a chart we place the mind at the top, the emotions and the will one on each side, and the conscience at the bottom.

The mind, which is the intelligent part of the soul, has all kinds of functions. It perceives, learns, remembers, knows, thinks, and has ideas. In close association with it, but working in the background to lend its strong influence, is the will. Basically, this is the part in us that wants, desires, and sometimes lusts. It can have a powerful influence on the mind.

Somewhat removed from the will, but closely connected with the mind while working from a different angle is emotion. Here all kinds of feelings reside, like good will and ill will, love and hate, happiness and remorse. Beneath all of these lies the conscience. It is here the Holy Spirit will carry on some of His greatest healing work as He proceeds to bring health to the whole person. Very probably, the unusual Scriptural references to the reins point to the conscience.

There is a great deal of mystery about the human spirit and the soul, but we do perceive they both are eternal. The body is not. We are coming to see that to be healed in spirit and soul is more important than to be healed in body. When the body ceases its function, these other parts go on and on. Yet, from a healed spirit, and a healed soul, healing can flow to the body as long as that person can have purpose on earth and in God's Kingdom.

My first concern for Glenda was that she would become whole in her inner man. At first, I didn't know if she would live or not. Too many of us have come to consider cancer as a death sentence. And, too, everyone who has ever lived has eventually died--with two or three exceptions like Enoch, Elijah, and maybe Moses. If it was time for Glenda to die, I wanted her wonderfully ready.

She didn't die. Eight years later she is wonderfully alive and ministering life to others.

WHAT WE LEARNED from one of Paul's Prison Epistle prayers helped immensely in our praying. In Ephesians 1:15-19 I saw how he prayed for the people under his care that the eyes of their understanding might be enlightened. These eyes and the understanding are certainly part of the inner man. The enlightenment for which we are learning to pray will come from a source of light more absolute and pure than any the outer world can know. It will come from the pure light of God, like that brought into effect when God said, Let there be light (Gen 1:3).

The enlightenment for which Paul prayed was that they might know three things. One, he wanted the people to know what is the hope of His (that is, God's) calling. Two, he wanted them to know what the riches of the glory of His inheritance in the saints. Three, he wanted them to know what is the exceeding greatness of His power to us-ward who believe.

For days--actually through an entire month for each part of Paul's prayer--Glenda and I held one another before the Lord. First came our request for enlightenment with regard to the hope of His calling. This certainly called for enlightenment in our inner man. Even though it was settled years before that God had a call upon both of us, in the light of what we were facing, it was time for our knowledge of this to be enhanced. Some of the words Paul used in Eph 1:18 when he prayed that ye may know what is the hope of his calling are significant and unusual. They will help us see the depth of that for which we are learning to pray. That ye may know is from eis to eidénai humas, a grammatical construction unlike any we use in English. Eis is a Preposition meaning "unto," or with a view toward. To is the Definite Article, "the." Eidénai is a Perfect Infinitive meaning "to know" in a way that is perfectly settled, leaving no room for doubt on any account. Humas means "you." Literally, it is "unto the to know, with reference to you." Paul meant, "I want you to know in a way that is settled so nothing that ever happens to you, in you, or around you can shake you from the knowledge that God has a calling upon your life."

What he wanted settled in their knowledge was the hope of God's calling upon them. In God's economy, hope means certainty. It is only in our economy that it takes on the meaning of uncertainty. "I hope you know what you're doing, but I don't think you do. I hope you won't get sick, but I'm afraid you may. I hope you will have a safe trip, but I fear you won't." And so on. When our lives enter the powerful realm of God's Kingdom, our hope changes. We have a hope that is an anchor of the soul, both sure and stedfast, and which entereth into that within the veil--Heb 6:19. It is this kind of hope that can come over on us with regard to God's calling--an unquestionable certainty, if you please, a confidence that cannot be shaken. We become sure of what He wants with us.

So I learned to pray that God would flood Glenda's understanding with light so she could know the certainty of what He wanted with her. I asked the same for myself, understanding that we were in the battle together. This was calling for a deep healing, maybe a little remote from the cancer, but it was reaching deep into her spirit--and into mine.

I SHOULD RELATE THAT, after being cancer-free for six years, because of pain that returned, her oncologist ran tests only to report that the cancer had come back with a vengeance. It had attacked her spine and lungs. The report we received in the doctor's office that day was so ludicrous, and hopeless, we broke into laughter as we drove home. Together we said, "We'll HAVE to see God work now!"

Several significant things took place. We asked everyone who knew how to pray to start praying. Our friend Brother Lew Halcomb from New Jersey said he felt we should deal with a demon of cancer. He prayed with Glenda over the phone and demanded the demon to leave in Jesus' Name. We believe it did.

He also suggested that we visit the "Pensacola revival." I hadn't wanted to do that because of the crowds, but then, the Lord "suggested" that we go. We went, with the admonition from the Him that we were not to be critical of anything that took place. We went simply to behold the Lord at work, to be with others of like faith, and with the idea that Glenda could receive further help.

In the first service we attended the Lord spoke to me that we were to move to New York, that He was going to move there by His Spirit and we were to be a part of what He would do. This was after we had completed building the beautiful conference center in Georgia. On two accounts it did not make sense to my mind--that Glenda was battling a life-threatening disease and that we had completed the conference center--but in that moment it was my heart that was strangely warmed. There, it made sense, even if not to my mind.

I told it to Glenda. Then, through several days in Pensacola we gave attention to the "revival" and to worshipping the Lord. On the first morning after our return home, Glenda awoke to say she felt we should go to New York and find where we were to live. My immediate response was, "Okay!"

Something was working in both our hearts that our minds could not fully comprehend. If we had depended on our mind or emotions at that point, we probably would have settled back into some kind of unbelief and weariness, and watched her die.

But, there came a light in our spirits that guided us on.

I REMEMBER THAT NEXT TRIP NORTH. We fixed her a bed in the back seat of the car and left home so tired we could only travel five hours into the thousand mile journey. After a numb stopover, we resumed the trip. About the middle of that second day, I became aware of the Holy Spirit with us. He began speaking to me that we were coming to where He would place us geographically for His Kingdom's purpose. This was some kind of speaking that came to my spirit, not to my intellect. I simply responded with worship.

When I told Glenda in the backseat, she began to worship too. I drove from 8:30 that morning till 12:30 that night without growing weary. We were moving in a miracle. We were giving our attention to what the Lord wanted and not to the impossibilities that had tried to overtake us. What our minds could not put together, our hearts made up for with worship.

We had come to see long ago that impossibilities in the path of God's will are simply challenges for faith and opportunities for miracles.

After we were settled in New York, the Lord spoke to Glenda that she was to begin ministering in "healing meetings." She laughingly asked Him, "Who will be healed?" It was then He reminded us of the principle of stepping out of our own circle of need into the circle of someone else's need. When we do that, strangely and wonderfully, there can come a release of healing power to the other person, as well as to ourselves.

Actually, this is what we believe takes place. When we step out of the circle of our trouble, sickness and need into the circle of another's trouble, sickness and need, the Lord Himself steps into our circle. What a powerful exchange!

This is a principle that will work for anyone. I believe it is founded on Luke 6:38. Give, and it shall be given unto you; good measure, pressed down, and shaken together and running over shall (men) give into your bosom... This is from the King James Version. We should note that the word men is not in the Original. Jesus included no Subject for the Verb shall give. It is left open. The giving can come from just about any source, even as a miraculous gift from God's hand or from someone upon whom He miraculously moves. It's just a simple principle that when we step out of our circle to help someone in their need, He steps into our circle to take on our need.

We're not laying all this out as a definite pattern for others to follow when attack comes from the enemy, but we simply are saying we are watching the Lord heal Glenda by walking in obedience to what we believe He wants. Along the way we are learning some powerful principles of truth and understanding in which we believe others can walk too.

AS WE CONTINUED PRAYING along the line of Eph 1:18, something difficult for my understanding came along. It was the part where Paul prayed for light that ye may know the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints. I prayed this for Glenda but I didn't know what I was requesting. I was simply quoting Scripture back to God. The words were lofty and beyond my grasp, even though I knew they were saying something powerful. After a while, I asked the Lord what I was requesting of Him. He said I was asking Him to show Glenda how valuable she was to Him.

This is an important prayer for all of us. It was especially so for Glenda. Although I saw her value in the Kingdom of God--at least some of it--and the immense wealth God had deposited in her, there remained in her a carry-over from the days when her life was filled with its early pain and rejection. She wasn't absolutely sure of her value, to either God or to me. She told me she battled feelings of inferiority and she couldn't be certain the Lord would always provide for her. It reflected the way of thinking, deep in the heart, that God will love me "if I'm good enough."

This way of thinking is resident in too many of us. It generally has its foundation in childhood when early values are imposed on the soul.

Deep down, Glenda felt any act of kindness coming from me was done out of a sense of responsibility, rather than because I loved and valued her. Most of the time, the feelings were kept buried, but sometimes they surfaced rather painfully. How she felt about herself made her insecure and uncertain as to whether any relationship was on a good footing. How she felt about herself hindered her faith in God. She didn't know if she was valuable enough for Him to care for her and heal her unless she did enough for Him to earn it.

I began to see how a healing in this hurting part of her soul would be necessary if faith was to do its unhindered work and healing could spread through her body.

As Glenda tells in her own testimony, she was born the tenth child to parents weary with having children. To help provide for the large family, her mother worked as a waitress at night, leaving the young child. Sometimes her mother was gone for days at a time. Those times were very frightening to her. No one told her where her mother was. Even while she was a little girl, she herself could stay away from home beyond normal hours and no one seemed to notice or care. On weekends there was so much drinking it was frightening. Not being able to comprehend fully what was happening in her family, she came to feel she held very little value to anyone.

Glenda developed a painful bone disease in her middle teens. This took her out of school and away from the normal activities of a young person. This said further to her, "You are losing what little value you have. Your life will have no meaning."

Marriage in her early twenties to an alcoholic and abusive husband and the close birthing of three children left her an emotional and physical wreck. Before the Lord saved her, she had come to a state of almost complete non-functioning.

A dramatic change came when Glenda accepted the Lord. Her testimony began touching many lives. There remained, however, the underlying conviction that she had no real value within herself. Subconsciously she felt she had value only if she proved it and produced reasons others could see and appreciate.

When God looked on Glenda, He must have said, "What a vessel she can become! Because she has been hurt emotionally and physically, she can become a valuable instrument for healing in My Kingdom." The pain, and the things that tried to ruin her, actually made her all the more valuable for the Lord. As her husband, He has drawn me to participate with Him in helping her know--so deep within her being that she can never forget it--the value she has in His Kingdom.

All the pains of all the years combine their energies to add to her value.

RECENTLY, AN OLD PASSAGE we've known and quoted for years has come newly alive to us and is helping in the ongoing healing process. It's Rom 8:28. And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to His purpose. Let me just break down some of this verse to share with you a little of what we see.

We know is from the Greek oídamen. Again, this is from that wonderful word that means to know in a way that is settled, perfected, without the minglement of doubt or fear. I think it was a kind of knowing that became settled in Paul's mind through years of beholding the faithfulness of God. Having been beaten many times, stoned, shipwrecked, lost at sea, having been in every dangerous situation imaginable, having suffered weariness, pain, cold and nakedness, he could say, "We know something about being in the call and purpose of God. Nothing happens but that it results in our good."

Move on in Rom 8:28 and see all things. You just can't get beyond all things. It is an absolute term. There is nothing outside its scope. Nothing, nothing, nothing!

Then see more: all things work together for good to them that love God. In the Greek, to them that love God comes before all things. It has a place of emphasis in the sentence. To them that love God, all things work together for good. What a simple qualification begins to emerge! Work together is from a single word that has taken my special attention. It is sunergéo and means to bring together a combination of energies to perform one work. We get our English word "synergy" from it.

All things have their energies. Everything that comes our way carries with it some kind of energy to leave its effect on us. So we are learning: to those who love God, and yield to His call and purpose, all things good, all things bad, and all things in between combine their energies to work for good. What a thing to know! Join with us now in a month of healing praying.