The Individuals Faith by Kenneth Hagin

And a certain woman, which had an issue of blood twelve years, And had suffered many things of many physicians, and had spent all that she had, and was nothing bettered, but rather grew worse, When she had heard of Jesus, came in the press behind, and touched his garment.

For she said, If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole.

And straightway the fountain of her blood was dried up; and she felt in her body that she was healed of that plague.

And Jesus, immediately knowing in himself that virtue (or power) had gone out of him, turned him about in the press, and said, Who touched my clothes?

And his disciples said unto him, Thou seest the multitude thronging thee, and sayest thou, Who touched me?

And he looked round about to see her that had done this thing.

But the woman fearing and trembling, knowing what was done in her, came and fell down before him, and told him all the truth.

And he said unto her, Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole; go in peace, and be whole of thy plague.

Mark 5:25-34

tJLsus said, "Thy faith hath made thee whole." It was not Jesus ' faith. It was not someone

e l se ' s faith. It was her faith. He was anointed with healing power and this power went out of Him, when she touched Him, and healed her . But He said, "Your faith did it ."

It is not Jesus ' faith that gives action to the healing power with which He is anointed. It is the faith of the individual who comes to receive healing which gives action to that power. And, though he is anointed with it, that healing power is inactive and is passive until faith is exercised.

I had quite a struggle with this verse of scr ipture (Mark 5:34) the first t ime I read it back in 1933. I was on the bed of affliction, given up to die by medical science. My body was practically totally paralyzed. I suffered with two serious organic heart t roubles , an incurable blood disease , and my body had wasted away until I only weighed 89 pounds.

As I read the scr ip tures I began to see a few glimpses of light here and there on faith and healing. But the struggle came because I had

been ra ised in a denomination which did not teach that these things were for us now. About the best teaching I had heard was that God could heal if He wanted to. But then every time I would get hold of a pretty good scripture which seemed to encourage me, the devil was there to remind me of what I'd been taught and heard preached all my life. He would whisper into my ear , "Well yes, but you are one of those that it is not His will to heal. After all, that has really been done away with for today. That 's just something God could do by a sovereign act of Hisif He wills."

One day, however, as I was meditating on the scr ip tures , the Spirit of God spoke to me. Down on the inside of me, in my spiri t , something ( rea l lysomeone, the Holy Spirit) said, "Did

you notice in Mark 5:34 concerning the woman with the issue of blood that Jesus said to her, 'Daughter thy faith has made thee whole,' and that it was her faith that healed her?"

Lying flat on my back on the bed, I answered right out loud because it s tar t led me, "No, I didn't notice that."

With difficulty, because my a rms and hands were partial ly paralyzed, I managed to thumb back a few pages in the Bible, which someone had opened and laid in front of me, to that place in the Gospel of Mark and I read the whole story again. When I got to the 34th verse , I read where Jesus said, "Daughter, thy faith has made thee whole. Go in peace and be whole of thy plague."

Right out loud I said, "That ' s right! I hadn't noticed that. Her faith made her whole."

Then on the inside of me this question was asked, "Did you ever hear anybody say that faith has been done away with?"

After a t ime of thinking and meditation I answered, "No, I have never heard anyone say that faith has been done away with."

Published by the Kenneth E. Hagin Evangelistic Ass'n. Post Office Box 50126, Tulsa, Oklahoma 74150

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And then that still small inward voice said, (I know now it was in my spi r i t and that the Holy-Spirit was speaking to me) "No, and you never will. For if faith has been done away with, then nobody is saved today because Ephesians 2:8 says , ' Fo r by grace a re ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God.' Therefore , if faith has been done away with, there is nobody saved, there is no church, and there a re no believers today."

"That ' s r ight. Faith could not have been done away with," I agreed.

Then that inward voice said, "If faith has not been done away with, and that woman's faith made her whole, then your faith can make you whole."

I was on my way! I didn't have to find some definite promise in the Bible that said, "Yes, it is God's will to heal you." I just knew then that God honored faith and if her faith could bring healing to her , my faith could bring healing to me!

Did you know that in most of the incidents of healing recorded in the New Testament , the faith of the individual is spoken of? There are some exceptions of special manifestations of God because God is a sovereign Being and as long as He does not make Himself out a l iar by violating His Word, He can do anything He wants to do. But most of the t ime, even in the four Gospels, the faith of the individual is spoken of.

There a re nineteen specific cases recorded in the four Gospels of Jesus healing individuals. Individuals such as the woman with the issue of blood, such as J a i rus ' daughter, such as the two blind men who followed Him as He went from Ja i rus ' house, such as the centurion who came on behalf of his servant , e tc . In twelve of the nineteen cases , the faith of the individual is spoken of. Like Jesus said he re , "Daughter, your faith did it."

In one set of surroundings, we have three outstanding cases of healing. And in every single case , the faith of the individual, or the faith of the one who came on the par t of another is spoken of. For instance, Ja i rus could believe for his daughter because she was in his household, a little daughter, about 12 yea r s of age; so it was his responsibili ty.

J a i ru s , a ru ler in the synagogue, came to Jesus when He landed at Capernaum and said, "My little daughter l ies at home sick, at the point of death. (Notice his faith in operation.) Come and lay thy hands on her , that she maybe healed; and she shall live."

Jesus was on His way to lay His hands on her when the woman interrupted, reached in through the crowd, touched His clothes and was healed.

Being momentarily detained, folks came from Ja i rus ' house and said, "Don't trouble the Master any longer, your little daughter is already dead." But even then, Jesus turned to Ja i rus and said, "Be not afraid, only believe" (Mark 5:36).

If you read between the lines He said to him, "You had faith to meet me when we landed, when you said, 'My little daughter is at the point of death. Come and lay your hands on her that she may be healed. ' Now don't fear. Just keep on believing." Isn't that what He is saying? Only believe. Only believe. Jesus is encouraging him to faith.

Jesus went on to J a i ru s ' house, took the little maiden by the hand and spoke to hershe came back from the dead and was healed!

As Jesus left J a i rus ' house, two blind men followed Him, crying and saying, "Thou son of David, have mercy on u s . " When He was come into the house, they came to him and He asked them a question, "Believe ye that I am able to do th is?" And they said, "Yes, Lord." Then He touched their eyes. (Yes, He laid hands upon them.) But when He did, He said to them, "According to your faith be it unto you." Their eyes were opened! (See Matthew 9:27-31.)

Here we see three outstanding healings which happened in a short period of t ime. One on the way to J a i r u s ' house, one at J a i ru s ' house, and the other on the way back from Ja i rus ' house.

One was nigh unto deathwho did actually die. One involved a disease of twelve years standing which doctors had given up on. The other was a case of blindness. But in all of these cases , faith prevailed!

You cannot simply lay down one method and say, "This is the method by which you are going to receive from God." But you can preach the Word of Godbecause God's Word always works!

I was holding a meetinjyjn Ea.st_T_Rxas several years ago and the pastor asked me to go with him to talk with a lady who was bedfast. She was born again, filled with the Spirit, a member of a Full Gospel church and she had internal cancer , a terminal case . The doctors had given her six months to live and most of that time was gone.

(I always endeavor to stay open to the Spirit of God because I ha^e had some remarkable manifestations along this line, as the Spirit wills; not as I will. I had come up against some cancer cases that were special manifestations. They were given up to die, terminal cases . Suddenly in ministering to them I was in the Spirit and I saw the spiri t that oppressed their body and commanded him to leave. Instantly they were wel 1 and went back to the same doctors who,

after running tes ts on them, could not find any t race of the cancer. The person I'm thinking of now, after nineteen yea r s , is still alive and healthy. But just because that person was healed that way is no sign every person could be successfully ministered to in that way. If the Lord doesn't give me a word, then I can't minister other than through the Word of God.)

I entered her room and began to talk to her about faith. "Well now, Brother Hagin, I know I am saved and filled with the Holy Ghost and if I die, I 'm ready for heaven so I'm not worried about it anyway. But just to be honest about it, I 'm looking for somebody to heal me."

"Some man?" "Yes." "No man is going to heal you. Jesus might

heal yorrthrough some man, but no man is going to heal you."

Those were the days of the great healing revivals . At the close of World War II and on through the 1950's there were great healing revivals and tent meetings going everywhere. I guess just about everybody had prayed for this woman, however, she was none the better but ra ther grew worse. She told me she had tr ied all these men and they had not healed her and now she wanted to t ry me .

"I don't mind telling you at all , I can' t heal you and I don't have any part icular leading or manifestations of the Spirit at the moment so the only thing I can do is tell you what the

Word of God says." "Oh well," she said, "if I 'm supposed to

believe something, you'd just as well forget it."

Of course, you know as well as I do, she died.

Not long afterwards I was preaching in the western par t of the state of Texas and I met another lady with terminal cancer . It was identically the same kind of case . Not only that, but this woman was born again, filled with the Spirit and a member of the same Full Gospel denomination as the other woman. She had been sent to the larger cities to cancer cl inics, but the doctors there had just sent her back home to die. I didn't have any special manifestations of the Spirit, God didn't tell me to do anything, so we began to talk about faith. I simply talked to her about the Word of God and faith in God's Word. Now the other woman had said, "If I 'm expected to be lieve anything, just forget i t ." But this woman began to take hold of it , p ra ise God, and was perfectly healed!

Six months later (I like to check up on some of these cases) the Full Gospel pastor corrobrated the fact that she had gone back to the large city to the cancer clinics where they had run tes t s on her and were absolutely amazed and even willing to sign an affidavit, when nobody asked them to, that she was in this condition. They weren ' t opposed to Divine healing. She told them what had happened and they were thril led that she was healed. They said, "One thing we know, you were there and now you a re well. Every tes t is negative."

Somebody who didn't know the details could have said, "These two women were members of the same denomination. They were born again, Spirit-filled people. I wonder why God healed one of them and God wouldn't heal the other?"

It i s not a mat ter of God healing one and "wouldn't" heal the other! Our text said, "Daught e r , your faith has made you whole."

One of them said, "If I 'm supposed to believe anything, forget it."

The other one began to take hold of God's Word and said, "Yes, I'll act on God's Word." She received it joyfully and that made the difference .

Once I took a Full Gospel church as pastor and my wife and I had been there only about three months when one of the ladies of our, congregation came to the parsonage and wanted to talk to me. She had some questions. She had just been saved in a meeting I'd held at the church before becoming pastor but her mother and some of her re la t ives had been in that church for a number of y e a r s .

She began, "Excluding me, because I'm just a new Christ ian, but I don't believe there are any more faithful Christ ians than Mama and some of the others in our family. There is no one more consecrated, dedicated and separated unto God. And I don't c a r e if she is my mother, there isn ' t anybody more spiritual than Mama."

I agreed with her . I considered her mother to be the most spiri tual person in that church. And to be honest with you even now I still consider her mother to be the most spiritual person I've ever met .

She went on, "My husband's family was exactly the opposite of my mother ' s family. They were saved and filled with the Spirit and belonged to the same Full Gospel Church, but they Oh, they were good people, good citizens. They wouldn't tell a lie for anything in the world. They would let you cut their heads off before they would tell a lie or commit a sin, that they knew of, of commission. But they a re full of sins of omission. (You know the Bible says to him that knoweth to

do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin (James 4:17). In all the 23 years they lived here they'd just come to church when they felt like i t . If they didn't feel like it, they wouldn't come. And other than my husband, they wouldn't support the church. If they felt like it they would put in something If they didn't they wouldn't. They may be out for three months and never even make a service .

"Now here is my question. Over a 23 year period if any of my mother ' s family, who are t rue to God, consecrated, dedicated and faithful in every wayif Mama or any of us ever got healed, I don't know it. We'd always wind up going to the hospital, being operated on or dying (a couple of them had died prematurely) . But now, my husband's family, if any of them ever failed to get healed over a 23 year period, I don't know it. They always got healed. They never failed to get healed."

The husband's family were not as good Christians as the other family. They were Christians, but not as good Christ ians. You don't get healed, however, because you a re a good Christian. And you surely don't get healed because you are a bad Christian. There is something else involved he re .

Her question was, "Why?How come?" I said to her, "Sister, I couldn't answer you

and definitely say 'this is the reason ' unless God revealed it to me. But, knowing the Bible I could give you a few general reasons.Without knowing your husband's family, other than knowing him, I would say that they had two outstanding charac te r i s t ics . One, they were quick to repent and forgive. And the other, they were quick to believe."

Believing has a par t . Jesus said, "Daughter, thy faith has made thee whole" (Mark 5:34).

Jesus said to the two blind men, "According to your faith be it unto you" (Matthew 9:29).

Jesus said to Ja i rus , "Be not afraid, only believe" (Mark 5:36).

Jesus said to the centurion who came to Him on behalf of his servant , "Go thy way, and as thou hast believed, so be it done unto you" (Matthew 8:13).

Jesus said to the man who met Him as He came down off the Mount of Transfiguration on behalf of his son, who was lunatic and suffered from seizures , "If thou canst believe all things are possible to him that believeth" (Mark 9:23).

So believing must play an important part! And secondly, in connection with prayer and

faith and believing, Jesus makes a very outstanding statement, "And when ye stand praying, forgive. .." (Mark 11:25).

He made this statement regarding forgiveness immediately after He said, "...What things soever ye desire , when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them" (Mark 11:24). He infers that prayer and faith won't w o r k if there is unforgivness in your life; if there is someone you won't forgive.

So you see, that 's why I knew that if these people always received healing , even though they weren ' t the best Christ ians in the world, they must measure up on these two points for it to work. And when I said that without knowing them I would say they had two outstanding charac te r i s t s (1) quick to repent and believe and (2) quick to forgive, that woman's eyes got almost as big as saucers . She said, "Brother Haginyou hit the nail right on the head."

(I hadn ' t , the Bible had. I had just told her what the Bible says and the Bible does hit the nail on the head.)

She went on, "I know you don't know any of my husband's family except him. But I believe they were the quickest people to repent of anybody I've ever seen. If they even thought, they wouldn't wait to be sure , that you had something against them or that they had offended you or hurt you or sinned against you in any way, and they thoroughly meant it, they were the quickest people you've ever seen to come and ask you to forgive them and to repent of it .

"I believe some of them could be out of church for months, in about a half-way backslidden condition and they could come and get in the altar and repent the fastest and believe God the quickest of anybody I've ever seen in my lifetime."

(There is something about that which pleases God. No, it did not please God the people had sinned or failed, but there is something about repenting when you see you have failed and something about believing God that does please Him.)

"But now," she continued, "you take Mama and us . We' re the type that if we thought somebody had done us wrong or sinned against us or offended us , we'd forgive them all right if they would sort of get down before us and lick our feet. But it would take us a little while to do it. We'd want to make them suffer a little and hold them in suspension before we did. And when it came to believingit would take us forever almost to believe anything."

She had the answer to her own question. Someone in the church might have said,

"I don't understand. Here is this fine outstanding Christian family and they don't ever get healed. And here is this other family, members of the

same church, who are Christ ians all right but not the finest and best as they should be and they always get healed. Why?"

A person might have some of the ' robes of r ighteousness ' to don on the outside, but on the inside he might be like a sepulcher full of dead man's bones. You can' t see that.

Someone might have seemed to be repentant when actually the only thing they were so r ry about was that they were caught. They were not real ly repenting because they had done wrong. There is a difference between the two. But God sees .

You can see people 's physical actions, but you cannot see the sp i r i t of man. And faith is of the heart and of the spir i t . It is sp i r i tua l -faith or heart-faith that counts. "For with the heart man believeth.. . ." (Romans 10:10).

Let me repeat this statement of Smith Wigglesworth's, "There is something about believing God that will cause Him to pass over a million people just to get to you."

Looking again at the woman with the issue of blood le t ' s examine her faith in action. Jesus said, "Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole" (Mark 5:34). But notice that she had said ear l ie r as recorded in the 28th verse , "If I may but touch His clothes I shall be whole."

What she said was her faith speaking. What you say is your faith speaking.

Let me repeat it again. I keep saying it and I 'm going to keep on saying it, "What you say is your faith speaking."

Your confessions of faith fix the landmarks of your life. You will never receive or rea l ize in your life beyond your faith.

Oh yes , you can be helped temporar i ly through someone e l s e ' s faith. Someone else can even get an answer* for you. Someone e lse , through faith, sometimes can even get healing for you. But sooner or later you a re going to be back on your own.

A number of yea r s ago, I was preaching in Oklahoma, and one church from about 35 miles away would bring a busload to the week-night se rv ices . From that congregation, a gentleman in his 70's who was totally deaf without a hearing aid and whom the doctors didn't give long to live due to a heart condition and another very ser ious condition, was instantly healed. Instantly, both of the man ' s e a r s were opened and he could hear a watch tick out of either ear . All other symptoms also left him.

We ran this meeting several weeks. That church kept coming but he didn't always make it. As I got up to preach one night, I looked out into the center section and right on the

second seat from the front sat this man, wearing his hearing aid. Well I knew that two weeks before and afterwards, for he had been in some services , the man was all right. Everybody talked to him in normal tones.

There is a reason things don't work and I like to find out why. Let ' s find the reason, cor rec t it and then we ' re al l r ight. This had worked for this man. He was healed. But yet, two weeks later he came right back to the same meeting wearing his hearing aid. He'd lost his healing.

Some little fellow who was about two inches narrow between his e a r s said, "Well no, he wasn't healed. If he'd been healed, he would have always been healed."

Well, for days people could talk to him and he heard everything. After hands were laid on him in the name of Jesus , he could hear a whisper, he could hear a watch tick out of either ear . Also previously, due to his balancing apparatus, he could not walk or stand up by himself. He had to have a cane' and much of the t ime somebody had to help him. All of those symptoms disappeared and they did not come back. He had no more trouble balancing even though doctors had said he would never be able to walk by himself. The heart trouble was gone. He didn't lose healing in those a r e a s . But he did lose healing in his e a r s and now he could not hear .

So, when I got up and saw him there, before I preached, I said, "Aren't you the fellow who came down from 35 miles away and was healed?"

He couldn't hear me even with his hearing aid. His daughter spoke up and said, "Yes, he ' s the one."

"What happened?" I asked. She said, "Well he lost his healing. That

is , he lost the healing of the e a r s , the hearing." "Bring him up here , I want to talk to him." He could not hear a word I was saying. She

had to turn and shake him to eet him up there . I shouted to him, "I thought you received

your healing?" He shouted back, "I thought I did too." "What happened?" "I can' t hardly hear now with a hearing

aid. I 'm worse than I ever was. But after you laid hands on me, my ea r s were opened. I heard a watch tick. In fact, for about ten days I was perfectly all r ight. Never heard any better in my life. My daughter tested me at home about four or five days after I was healed. She stood behind me and dropped an ordinary straight pin on a linoleum floor and I could hear it hit the floor."

That 's pretty keen hearing.

Then, as I said, some litt le old fellow about one-half inch narrow between his e a r s said, "Why you know if the man was ever healed, he would always have been healed. If God does it, i t ' s always done. He just didn't get healed."

Here was a man with deafness of seven years standing who couldn't hear it thunder without a hearing aid. After hands were laid on him in the name of Jesus , his e a r s were opened and he was hearing keenly. You know he was healed! How else could he have heard for ten days? I asked him if there was any t ime in the seven year period that he had ever been able to hear . He said that there was not.

"What happened?" I asked him. "Well," he said, "in our little town when they

put up the mail at the post office they close all the windows because they only have one or two c le rks . Some of us fellows know about when the mail comes in and we stand around there talking waiting for them to put it up. About ten days after I received my healing I was standing there and suddenly, like you had snapped your finger, m y hearing left me; as though I was wearing a hearing aid and you had turned it off. I couldn't hear a thing. It went off for about a minute or two. Then it came back on. All day that day there would be intervals every two or three hours that it would suddenly go off. Then it would come back. I didn't think much of jt, but the next day, in identically the same place in the post office, at about 10 o'clock in the morning, waiting for them to put up the mail , suddenly my hearing went off. And all day long for five to ten minute periods I couldn't hear a thing. But then it would come back. The third day, standing in the same place at the same t ime of day, my hearing left me for an hour. An hour later it came back on and stayed on until in the afternoon when it left and never did come back. So I dug out this old hearing aid and put it back on. Now then I can't even hear as well with it as I could before. I 'm worse then I ever was ."

"What do you suppose happened?" I shouted to him.

"I don't know. I thought the Lord healed me, but I guess he didn't."

"Of course you were healed. How could you have heard for ten days? Why are the other conditions still gone? Do you know what happened?"

"No, do you?" "I surely do." "Tell me then." "The very first t ime your- hearing left you,

you were healed by my faith and by the faith

of this congregation; a mutual faith, a general faith, a m a s s faith, as we all believed God. It is eas ie r in that kind of atmosphere to receive something. But then when you got back up there by yourself, you were on your own. Faith has got a par t to play in th is . The minute your hearing went off that f irst day you said, "I thought the Lord healed me . I guess He didn't!"

"You must be a fortune tel ler or a mind r eade r . That ' s exactly what I s a i d . "

"No, I 'm not telling your fortune or reading your mind. I don't even have a revelation on it. I just know you had to open the door for the devil to come back in. Iknow that from the Bible. When you said that, you opened the door and said, 'Come on back in Mr. Devil and put it back on me , ' and he obliged you. I 'm going to minister to you again."

The first night I ministered to him, immediately as I touched him, both e a r s were opened. He was instantly healed. This t ime, however, it took an hour before the ea r s were both opened and he could hear perfectly. Then I taught him for a little while about how that if you res i s t the devil he will flee from you (James 4:7). And that if this thing tr ied to come back, how to r e s i s t it.

I saw that same man ten yea r s later when I held a meeting in the same church. He was then 82 years old and he came to the service (I can prove this by hundreds of people) with no hearing aid, and no crutch or cane. I talked to him in normal tones. He had been healed all of those yea r s . He was sti l l well at 82. Still healed and not deaf at 82!

But do you know that would not have been so had he not come back to the service and received help and teaching as to what God's Word says. He found out he had a part to play! Jesus said, "Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole."

We can help people temporar i ly . Temporar ily, we had helped that fellow. But when he got home he was on his own. However, when we were able to talk to him and get faith into him, he stood his ground, pra ise God, and ten years later was still healed and no longer deafable to maintain that which he had r e -reived.

After you have received your healing, hold fast to i t . There is an enemy arrayed against you which will endeavor to rob you of that which God has done for you. If Satan t r ies to come back and take it away from you, don't let him do it. Hold your ground and say, "No, Satan, you can't put that back on me."