God’s Will and Healing

John W. Robbins

Since I was diagnosed with Stage IV metastatic colon cancer in September 2005, some strangers, friends, and acquaintances have given me different opinions on the topic of God’s will and healing. All of the opinions are offered by sincere people, but most sincere people are sincerely wrong. Only one opinion is Biblical. This should not be surprising, for there is an indefinite number of ways to go wrong, but only one way to go right. There is only one right answer to the question, “How much is 2 plus 2?” and an infinite number of wrong answers. That is why the Bible in general and Jesus in particular stress the importance of finding the narrow way and repeatedly warn against the broad way.

The many opinions on healing I have received distill to three. The first is that it is not God’s will that anyone – or at least any Christian – be sick. Being sick is being “outside God’s will.” By not getting well, a Christian is showing his rebellion against God’s will that everyone be well. In this opinion, every Christian who is sick for any length of time (I suppose they make exceptions for colds), is not “submitting to God’s will that he be well.”

The second opinion seems to be the opposite. It is that a Christian must “submit himself to God’s will,” and if he is not getting better, God’s will is that he remain sick, and perhaps die from the affliction. He also is told to “submit himself to the will of God,” but to an opposite end, not to get well, but perhaps to die.

The third opinion does not speak of “submitting to the will of God,” but tells us to seek and pray for the desires of our hearts. It certainly sounds like the least pious of the three opinions, doesn’t it? But it is the Biblical position. The Bible is not a very religious book, as men count religion.

Let us examine each of these three opinions.