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TOPIC: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks About the Healing Christ (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: 00.3. Preface
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Preface
Some Principles of Healing as taught in God's Word, directly and indirectly:
1. It is God's first will that men be pure in heart, clear in mind, strong in purpose, gentle and content in spirit, poised in judgment, happy in circumstances, and strong and well in body.
2. God does not send disease. It comes through some disobedience of the natural laws of the body, conscious or unconscious, though rarely traceable in full It may come from the Devil, or, because of the break of sin affecting all life. But always through that open door of disobedience to the laws of the body.
3. Christ heals men's bodies today by His own direct supernatural touch, sometimes through the physician and the use of means, some times without means, sometimes when means are confessedly powerless, and sometimes overcoming the unwise use of means. The Holy Spirit's leading is the touchstone.
4. In healing Christ is always reaching in for the far greater thing, the healing of the spirit, the life.
5. There is sometimes a waiting time, after the conditions are met, before the full healing comes. There is a disciplinary side in bodily suffering, but the healing comes as quickly as the lesson is learned.
6. The Devil heals men's bodies, within sharply defined limits, under disguise, that he may get and tighten his hold of man. He bitterly opposes healing through Christ's supernatural touch. This is particularly true regarding those that have the gift of leadership.
7. The conditions for Christ's healing are the same as for being saved. Trust him fully as your Saviour and Master. Then go to Him for whatever you need, always seeking the Holy Spirit's guidance.
Christ will meet every need of a man's life. And He will meet it eagerly and to the full.
If we don't have all we need the trouble isn't with the hand that gives but the hand that takes.
No man's hand has ever yet reached up to take as much as Pierced Hand is reaching down to give.
But giving is a fine art, so as not to hurt in trying to help. And the taking needs skill, too, though the simplest may take all he needs. Skill in taking is chiefly skill of the heart.
Teaching is rare. Matured rounded-out teaching is yet more rare. And the chief need today, in the bustle and dust of much stirring about, is teaching, simple, clear, full, poised teaching.
Healing is one of the tangled subjects. Two others keep it close company, so far as being tangled is concerned, namely, holiness, and the return of Christ.
It is easy to get warped unmatured partial statements, quite honestly made, on these subjects.
The direct preparation of this little book has taken eleven years, the indirect runs further back. I didn't set out to write a book.
I felt the need of getting my own feet on a difficult bit of pavement. I read and watched and prayed to understand for myself.
And now the substance of it is given to others, with a prayer that it may, possibly, help them a little as it has helped me.
Two books have been constantly studied: the Book of God, and the Book of Life. These two go together.
The Book of God is written out of life, under the Holy Spirit's touch and control. The Book of Life is still being written.
It takes a simple skill of habitual reading to understand the first. It takes a careful trained reading habit to read understandingly the second.
The Book of God is the teaching book, written out of human experience, and full of illustrations out of life.
The Book of Life is the illustration book. There are countless illustrations on every hand of all the teachings of the other book.
One wants to read both. They fit together. And the conditions for understanding both are the same, a bent will, an open mind, a prayerful spirit, a keenly observing eye, and the constant practised reading.
So there comes the discernment of our Father's purposes and plans, and of how things are working out in actual life.
The instances of healing given here are all known to me personally, with four exceptions. In each case I took pains to get the exact facts of what actually took place. Else, of course, I would not tell these incidents in this open positive way. These are clear. These are a few out of many.
The four exceptions are, the two from my personal friend, Mr. James More Hickson of London, the one from my German deaconess friend. These four instances are known personally to these friends, who told me.
And I have full confidence, not merely in their sincerity, but what is more important here because of not so common, in their trained accuracy in observation of actual facts, and in their careful detailed description of what they saw and know.
And so, after these years of study, the little messenger is sent out in Christ's name. And the one conscious purpose is that it may help some to reach up and take all the Pierced Hand is now reaching down to give.