But they are a “gift from God!” This is a frequent objection by Christians when presented with God’s truth about allopathic medical practitioners who routinely prescribe poisonous drugs to promote better health, disease prevention, quick healing, and greater longevity. This article will present the scriptural, historical, and scientific evidence to dispel the lie which too many Christians have regrettably come to believe.
9 Prior to that time, a man named Simon had practiced sorcery in the city and astounded the people of Samaria. He claimed to be someone great, 10 and all the people, from the least to the greatest, heeded his words and said, “This man is the divine power called the Great Power.” 11 They paid close attention to him because he had astounded them for a long time with his sorcery. Acts 8:9-11 Berean Study Bible (BSB)
Notice how Simon the Sorcerer was praised by “all the people” as they “heeded his words.” They believed he had divine power because he amazed them with his wisdom and actions that, in their minds, could only come from God. Whatever signs and wonders he was performing to astound the audiences for many years; the people were enchanted enough to confer on him a godly status. The reader must know Simon the ma’gos was not sent from God – nor was he a god.
While most translators use the English word “sorcerer” for Simon’s profession, they might have best used magician. Magicians generally charm or trick their audience with either a sleight of hand or sleight of word. (Satan used “sleight of words on Eve in the garden) What is important to glean from verses 9-11 is that many people are easily deceived by men or women who display confidence. Simon proclaimed himself to be someone great. Backing that claim up with certain physical posturing (body language) and enchanting words – appearing to be very wise and charming – the charmed people heeded his words. The Greek word ma’gos meant Simon could have been a seer, an interpreter of dreams, an auger, soothsayer, sorcerer (pharmakos), or astrologer (oriental wiseman). [uses of the word as described in Vines’s and NAS lexicons]. Most people believe physicians in this century are “great” – but by considering them a “gift from God” – only Christians, Jews, and Messianic Jews elevate their merely human status to having a divine power. Look now at how Simon the Magician also compares with today’s physicians.
18 When Simon saw that the Spirit was given through the laying on of the apostles’ hands, he offered them money. 19 “Give me this power as well,” he said, “so that everyone on whom I lay my hands may receive the Holy Spirit.”
20 But Peter replied, “May your silver perish with you, because you thought you could buy the gift of God with money! 21 You have no part or share in our ministry, because your heart is not right before God. 22 Repent, therefore, of your wickedness, and pray to the Lord. Perhaps He will forgive you for the intent of your heart. 23 For I see that you are poisoned by bitterness and captive to iniquity.” Acts 8:18-22 BSB
When Peter told Simon the Sorcerer that gifts from God cannot be bought, he was also teaching every Christian that those gifts are from God only when the Holy Spirit wills to give them. Paul reveals how, and to whom, gifts of healing come on Christians in the body of Christ.
7 Now to each one the manifestation of the Spirit is given for the common good. 8 To one there is given through the Spirit the message of wisdom, to another the message of knowledge by the same Spirit, 9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by that one Spirit, 10 to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another distinguishing between spirits, to another speaking in various tongues, and to still another the interpretation of tongues.11 All these are the work of one and the same Spirit, who apportions them to each one as He determines. (1 Corinthians 12:7-11) BSB
ALLOPATHIC MEDICAL PRACTITIONERS (MD’s) BUY THEIR KNOWLEDGE
I am certain everyone knows practicing physicians do possess above average intelligence. That was the blessing or talent they were born with. Everyone has some innate talent or gift. They could have chosen to use their superior intelligence to pursue knowledge in several areas, but for various reasons (sometimes altruistic) they chose the study of medicine. At age 22, I chose to use my intelligence to, like Simon the magician, buy “gifts of healing” at Johns Hopkins School of Health Sciences. There was no “divine power” to heal given to either me or my medical colleagues. The medical theories (not knowledge) of health, disease and injury came from thousands of hours of memorizing books and experiential learning. Had it been a true gift from God, I would not have had to purchase new textbooks and journals, attend continuing medical education classes, or spend extra hours each week learning what had recently changed in theories of diseases. Every MD and PA spends an annual time and money budget of 100 hours and $2000+ for “continuing medical education (CME). Why would licensing professional boards require CME credits if God gave us the skill and knowledge?
IMPERFECT GIFTS CAN NOT BE FROM ABOVE
Medicines and their licensed prescribers are far from perfect! Christians err when they claim that they are a gift from God. Consider what James wrote in 1:17,
Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, with whom there is no change or shifting shadow.
Gifts from God must be perfect. God’s manna was such a gift. However, licensed medical providers (including PA’s and NP’s), and the treatments they prescribe, are not just imperfect, many have been and still are harmful – if not deadly. Consider the harsh reality that medical error has been shown to be the third leading cause of death in the US. That statistic was known in the 1990’s but nothing can be done to change or correct human weaknesses. Even the smartest humans can’t thwart God’s plan! Modern medical practitioners, with their ever-changing-theories of sickness and disease, deny God has authority and power over all life on earth. Job knew God’s power!
“Since his days are determined, The number of his months is with You [in Your control], And You have made his limits so he cannot pass [his allotted time].(Job 14:5) AMP
You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. Ps 139:16 NLT
Would God use fallible humans with their imperfect medicines to “practice medicine” on those He loves? Of course not. They only appear to add days to God’s children. False signs and wonders! That is why God inspired James to write verses 13-20 in Chapter V of his book. The Christian must trust – have faith in – all of God’s written promises. How can born-again Christians trust the promise of John 3:16 if they can’t trust in James 5:13-20?
A PARABLE THAT ISN’T A PARABLE – OR TRUE!
Many Christians hold a belief that God provides ‘means’, namely physicians and medicines, for when they are sick or unwell. To support that belief, they often repeat the following allegory – wrongly considered by some to be a Biblical parable.
A storm descends on a small town, and the downpour soon turns into a flood. As the waters rise, the local preacher kneels in prayer on the church porch, surrounded by water. By and by, one of the townsfolk comes up the street in a canoe.
“Better get in, Preacher. The waters are rising fast.”
“No,” says the preacher. “I have faith in the Lord. He will save me.”
Still the waters rise. Now the preacher is up on the balcony, wringing his hands in supplication, when another guy zips up in a motorboat.
“Come on, Preacher. We need to get you out of here. The levee’s gonna break any minute.”
Once again, the preacher is unmoved. “I shall remain. The Lord will see me through.”
After a while the levee breaks, and the flood rushes over the church until only the steeple remains above water. The preacher is up there, clinging to the cross, when a helicopter descends out of the clouds, and a state trooper calls down to him through a megaphone.
“Grab the ladder, Preacher. This is your last chance.”
Once again, the preacher insists the Lord will deliver him.
And, predictably, he drowns.
A pious man, the preacher goes to heaven. After a while he gets an interview with God, and he asks the Almighty, “Lord, I had unwavering faith in you. Why didn’t you deliver me from that flood?”
God shakes his head. “What did you want from me? I sent you two boats and a helicopter.”
The response I have to professed Christians who repeat this story is threefold. First, placing a preacher and a church in the story – instead of a Christian housewife in her home – doesn’t make the story more Biblical. If anything, it diminishes the credibility of all preachers, mocking those who should know God could very well have sent a person with a canoe. It makes him out to be a false preacher as well as a fool. It is a purely secular fairy tale disguised as Godly wisdom, but the false parable does not work as it mocks preachers, the church, and God. A person using a story, which was originally designed to joke about God’s miracles, to support their false belief in God’s means, is not a Christian.
Secondly, the fact that I have heard this many times to justify a sadly mistaken belief – that God sent both physicians and medicines so those He loves don’t suffer – shows that the Christian is as unaware of scriptural truths as the fictitious preacher in the story. The Christian who uses a fictional story, that cunningly resembles a scriptural parable, to support their misled belief in a myth, are using a lie to support a lie. Scripture already provides Christians with God’s detailed plan of rescue (saving) from sickness. God has also provided the ‘means’ for healthy living and longevity throughout Scripture. When sick and needing healing, James wrote out God’s prescription for Christians to “take as directed.”
14 Is anyone among you sick? Then he must call for the elders of the church and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. 15 And the prayer offered in faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him. James 5:14-15 Legacy Standard Bible
If God had sent mankind physicians and medicines, it would have been ‘means’ out of His abundant mercy – but only for the unbelievers who have no true god to heal them. In His mercy, foreknowing most will never choose Jesus as their savior and healer, God could have allowed pagan mankind, who are fully under Satan’s power, to establish a system of healing to make their self-limited lives on earth more bearable. This serves Satan’s purpose well because unbelievers think they don’t need God. We know from His word that the unbelievers, “and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.” (Rev 21:8 KJV)
But sadly, the nominal Christian unbelievers have actually denied Jesus’s power to also forgive their sins, by which they could spend eternity with Him and God the Father. God’s chosen people who are born-again choose to demonstrate their love of God by obeying His commands. (1 John 5:3) In demonstrating that love and faith the true Christian knows that calling for the Elders when sick is one of those commands. Not calling the elders, but consulting physicians instead, is doing what the pagans do – thereby heaping sin upon sin upon sin!
Thirdly, I ask born-again Christians if they could do without their medicines and physicians and turn – depend on Jesus alone for the rest of their lives. I tell them it is the only way to avoid dying in sin – committing the sin of idolatry. Their usual response may not surprise most of my readers. They ask me indignantly, “Do you want me to die?” Sadly, their question reveals their belief in the false parable is too great. They have greater faith in modern medicine than Jesus. Or worse, they never accepted the truth that would have saved them. (2 Thessalonians 2:10) They will not enter the Kingdom!
Judgment of Pretenders
21 “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter into the kingdom of heaven – only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven. 22 On that day, many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, didn’t we prophesy in your name, and in your name cast out demons and do many powerful deeds?’ 23 Then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you. Go away from me, you lawbreakers!’
Hearing and Doing
24“Everyone who hears these words of mine and does them is like a wise man who built his house on rock. 25 The rain fell, the flood came, and the winds beat against that house, but it did not collapse because it had been founded on rock. 26 Everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. 27 The rain fell, the flood came, and the winds beat against that house, and it collapsed; it was utterly destroyed!”
These verses (Mt 7:21-27) were copied from the NET Bible on Biblehub.com. What I found most enlightening in this version was the subheadings. Christians who do not “hear and do” are just pretenders. Pretenders are “lawbreakers.” Disobeying God’s commands that were revealed by Moses, the Prophets, and the Apostles for their benefit. Sadly, there are too many nominal Christians (and nominal Churches) not obeying God’s commands in James 5:14-16. Jesus states clearly, not only may the pretenders not enter the kingdom of heaven, but they could be utterly destroyed in His final judgement.
CONCLUSION
God provided every Christian with “a good and perfect gift.” Faith in Jesus! Obediently using God’s prescription when sick is evidence of that faith. More importantly, He made “calling for the elders when sick” commands because there is no other way to truly be healed both physically and spiritually!
It was Satan, not God, that provided the allopathic medical practitioners – alternatives we can rightly call “antichrists” because they are used “instead of Christ.” Satan even used English Bible translators to make “medicine” appear to be good and fulfill the His plan to deceive all the nations. The medicine deception as a gift fully explored here.
So, Christians who disobey God’s commands because of their false belief are no better than unbelievers and pretenders. The purposeful acts of consulting physicians and taking their poisonous medicines is forbidden by God. Paul and John use the Greek term pharmakeia. English Bible translators call it sorcery, witchcraft, or magic arts. Paul made the need to avoid it very clear in Galatians 5:19-21;
19 Now the works of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity, depravity, 20 idolatry, sorcery, hostilities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish rivalries, dissensions, factions, 21 envying, murder, drunkenness, carousing, and similar things. I am warning you, as I had warned you before: Those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God! NET
Christians believe that faith in God is a gift. It can’t be bought. Then why is it Christians think God expects them to work hard to pay for the gift of healing? Some Christians pay more each month for health care and insurance than they tithe. God’s gifts must be free, or it isn’t from God. Don’t be deceived!
Satan the deceiver has deceived “all the nations” by sorceries [allopathic medical practitioners prescribing drugs that can’t heal or save]. (Rev 18:23)
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