I was asked to pray for someone who had cancer and as I went to bring it to the LORD, I was told not to pray for a sin unto death. It won’t work.
1 John 5:16 – If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it.
Huh? But Jesus healed ALL sickness and ALL disease! Cancer is part of ALL! How am I supposed to tell a grieving family a message like that???
Romans 6:23 – For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
It’s true that God heals, but what did THEY DO to obtain the healing?
Matthew 14:36 – And besought him that THEY might only touch the HEM of his garment: and as many as touched were made perfectly whole.
What is so significant about the HEM? Why didn’t they touch his shoulder (authority)? Or his belt (truth) or his shoes (faith, gospel of peace)?
Numbers 15:37-40 – 37 Again the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 38 “Speak to the children of Israel: Tell them to make tassels on the corners of their garments throughout their generations, and to put a blue thread in the tassels of the corners. 39 And you shall have the tassel, that you may look upon it and remember all the commandments of the LORD and do them, and that you may not follow the harlotry to which your own heart and your own eyes are inclined, 40 and that you may remember and do all My commandments, and be holy for your God.
Now go back to dig back in 1 John 5:16. What is this “sin unto death”? The answer comes right before the hem unpacking verse in the same chapter, showing they are connected in the same ream of thought.
Num 15:28-31 (NKJV) – 28 So the priest shall make atonement for the person who sins unintentionally, when he sins unintentionally before the LORD, to make atonement for him; and it shall be forgiven him. 29 You shall have one law for him who sins unintentionally, for him who is native-born among the children of Israel and for the stranger who dwells among them. 30 ‘But the person who does anything presumptuously, whether he is native-born or a stranger, that one brings reproach on the LORD, and he shall be cut off from among his people. 31 Because he has despised the word of the LORD, and has broken His commandment, that person shall be completely cut off; his guilt shall be upon him.’ ”
That word “Presumptuously” is rendered as “defiantly” in other translations.
Jer 7:8-16 – 8 “Behold, you trust in lying words that cannot profit. 9 Will you steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, burn incense to Baal, and walk after other gods whom you do not know, 10 and then come and stand before Me in this house which is called by My name, and say, ‘We are delivered to do all these abominations’? 11 Has this house, which is called by My name, become a den of thieves in your eyes? Behold, I, even I, have seen it,” says the LORD. 12 “But go now to My place which was in Shiloh, where I set My name at the first, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of My people Israel. 13 And now, because you have done all these works,” says the LORD, “and I spoke to you, rising up early and speaking, but you did not hear, and I called you, but you did not answer, 14 therefore I will do to the house which is called by My name, in which you trust, and to this place which I gave to you and your fathers, as I have done to Shiloh. 15 And I will cast you out of My sight, as I have cast out all your brethren—the whole posterity of Ephraim. 16 “Therefore do not pray for this people, nor lift up a cry or prayer for them, nor make intercession to Me; for I will not hear you.
Jeremiah 11:7-14 – 7 For I earnestly exhorted your fathers in the day I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, until this day, rising early and exhorting, saying, “Obey My voice.” 8 Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but everyone [b]followed the dictates of his evil heart; therefore I will bring upon them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do, but which they have not done.’ ” 9 And the Lord said to me, “A conspiracy has been found among the men of Judah and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 10 They have turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers who refused to hear My words, and they have gone after other gods to serve them; the house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken My covenant which I made with their fathers.” 11 Therefore thus says the Lord: “Behold, I will surely bring calamity on them which they will not be able to [c]escape; and though they cry out to Me, I will not listen to them. 12 Then the cities of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem will go and cry out to the gods to whom they offer incense, but they will not save them at all in the time of their trouble. 13 For according to the number of your cities were your gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem you have set up altars to that shameful thing, altars to burn incense to Baal. 14 “So do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or prayer for them; for I will not hear them in the time that they cry out to Me because of their trouble.
Why won’t God listen to them in their time of calamity when they are “faithful” to cry out to Him? Doesn’t the Bible says that when we call out to Him, He will answer us? The thief on the cross got to repent last minute, so where is the disconnect? The issue at hand that causes God to turn his face away from these who commit the sin unto death is their knowing defiance against His commandments while still thinking they get to have salvation. God is a God of Justice. Wickedness must be purged from the camp so that it doesn’t spread under the notion of passive tolerance of its presence and restore the pure Fear of the LORD. He will quickly forgive those who are willing to part with their sin and return to the Laws of God.
Jeremiah 33:1-9 – Moreover the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah a second time, while he was still shut up in the court of the prison, saying, 2 “Thus says the LORD who made it, the LORD who formed it to establish it (the[a] LORD is His name): 3 ‘Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and [b]mighty things, which you do not know.’ 4 “For thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, concerning the houses of this city and the houses of the kings of Judah, which have been pulled down to fortify against the siege mounds and the sword: 5 ‘They come to fight with the Chaldeans, but only to fill their places with the dead bodies of men whom I will slay in My anger and My fury, all for whose wickedness I have hidden My face from this city. 6 Behold, I will bring it health and healing; I will heal them and reveal to them the abundance of peace and truth. 7 And I will cause the captives of Judah and the captives of Israel to return, and will rebuild those places as at the first. 8 I will cleanse them from all their iniquity by which they have sinned against Me, and I will pardon all their iniquities by which they have sinned and by which they have transgressed against Me. 9 Then it shall be to Me a name of joy, a praise, and an honor before all nations of the earth, who shall hear all the good that I do to them; they shall fear and tremble for all the goodness and all the prosperity that I provide for it.’
Nehemiah 9:1-3 – Now on the twenty-fourth day of this month the children of Israel were assembled with fasting, in sackcloth, and with dust on their heads. 2 Then those of Israelite lineage separated themselves from all foreigners; and they stood and confessed their sins and the iniquities of their fathers. 3 And they stood up in their place and read from the Book of the Law of the LORD their God for one-fourth of the day; and for another fourth they confessed and worshiped the LORD their God.
Isaiah 59:1-4 – Behold, the LORD’s hand is not shortened, That it cannot save; Nor His ear heavy, That it cannot hear. 2 But your INIQUITIES have separated you from your God; And your sins have hidden His face from you, So that He will not hear. 3 For your hands are defiled with blood, And your fingers with iniquity; Your lips have spoken lies, Your tongue has muttered perversity. 4 No one calls for justice, Nor does any plead for truth. They trust in empty words and speak lies; They conceive [b]evil and bring forth iniquity.
They fail to plead for Truth. So how do we know if we have Truth?
1 John 2:3-4 – 3 Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. 4 He who says, “I know Him,” and does not keep His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
To put that into layman’s terms, if Jesus is the Truth and those who are not obeying His commandments don’t have truth in them, then we do not have Jesus in our hearts if we are ignorant of or rebellious to His commandments, nor do we know Him. If this causes you to get offended, chances are you have been swindled by the “another Jesus, another gospel, another spirit” that Paul warns about. Evidence of power is not the sign of intimate relationship with the LORD…lawfulness is.
Matt 7:21-23 – 21 “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. 22 Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?’ 23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never KNEW you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
We cannot automatically expect the pleasures of healing while still defiantly spiritually fornicating with our idols and keeping our sin, for it will come back to bite us by being cast into a sick bed and our children with death. (Rev 2:22) Yes, God is merciful but we must NOT trample upon His spirit of grace or the blood of His covenant thinking we can “ask for forgiveness” and then continue to sin! (Heb 10:26-31)
Jesus healed the man at the pool of Bethesda first time in His mercy but warned him to go and sin no more lest something worse come upon him. (Jn 5:14) What was his sin? We don’t know for sure but based on his physical limitations of being trapped on his sick bed, it likely wasn’t the “major” sins we often think of first – murder, adultery, stealing that require a physical action to commit. Was it possible that his sin was a sin of the heart? That was the problems of the Pharisees that were cursed with “woe” (judgment) because although they tithed even their mint and cumin for all to see, they forgot the weightier unseen issues of the heart like justice, mercy, and faithfulness. (Matt 23:23)
Deuteronomy 28:27 shows us that cancer (aka tumors) that cannot be cured is a curse upon those who do not listen to and obey the voice of the LORD to observe all His commandments.
Deut 28:15,20, 27 – 15 “But it shall come to pass, if you do not obey the voice of the LORD your God, to observe carefully all His commandments and His statutes which I command you today, that all these curses will come upon you and overtake you:…. 20 “The LORD will send on you cursing, confusion, and rebuke in all that you set your hand to do, until you are destroyed and until you perish quickly, because of the wickedness of your doings in which you have forsaken Me.27 The LORD will strike you with the boils of Egypt, with tumors, with the scab, and with the itch, from which you cannot be healed.
So, if a FAILURE to listen to and obey God’s voice to observe His commandments, then the CURE for Cancer is stop our wickedness, stop forsaking the LORD and turn to LISTEN and OBEY His commandments before it’s too late! Can we find this solution confirmed anywhere else?
Matthew 13:15 – For this people’s heart is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.
Ps 19:7 – The law of the LORD is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the LORD is sure, making wise the simple.
3 John 1:2 – Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health, even as thy soul prospereth.
Ps 103:2-4 – 2 Bless the LORD, O my soul, And forget not all His benefits: 3 Who forgives all your iniquities, Who heals all your diseases, 4 Who redeems your life from destruction, Who crowns you with lovingkindness and tender mercies,
So the next time someone with cancer or other sickness that leads to death comes asking for healing prayer, redirect them to repentance instead. It could save them valuable time that could be wasted barking up the wrong tree and growing even more bitter because “God isn’t listening!” Although it wasn’t cancer in our case, we took our daughter to the altar for prayer for 5 years without any results, watching her life being robbed from her as she was in agony. Finally, someone had enough guts to confront us in our sin and lead US to repentance and through casting out demons because it was OUR sin that was causing our daughter to be cursed by our iniquity. Our daughter walked out of that meeting completely whole, which scared us spitless because it just threw all our church’s impotent theology out the window and we discovered we had built a foundation on the church’s sand instead of the solid rock of Jesus Christ, the Word.
Who can YOU lead to wholeness by exposing sin for what it is and showing them the true cure for so many sicknesses and curses listed in Deuteronomy 28 by introducing them to the voice of the Most High God and His commandments? Jesus came not to condemn but to save, if we will only reach out for Him. It is the sick who need the Great physician. But he WILL condemn those who refuse the free gift of His life as the penalty of the curse for our life because He is a Just God.
John 3:16-21 – -16 For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. 17 For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. 18 “He who believes in Him is not condemned; but he who does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God. 19 And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. 21 But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”
Mark 2:17 – 17 When Jesus heard it, He said to them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners, [d]to repentance.”
Deut 7:11-12,15 – 11 Therefore you shall keep the commandment, the statutes, and the judgments which I command you today, to observe them.12 “Then it shall come to pass, because you listen to these judgments, and keep and do them, that the LORD your God will keep with you the covenant and the mercy which He swore to your fathers. … 15 And the LORD will take away from you all sickness, and will afflict you with none of the terrible diseases of Egypt which you have known, but will lay them on all those who hate you. Notice Jesus isn’t saying, “You dirty rotten sinner, you better repent or I’m going to burn you in HELL!” That may have been an angry preacher’s ploy to terrorize and shame people into a false salvation, but that is not the nature nor character of the Most High God. Rather, He says, “You’re sick. I have the solution. Change your thinking and start obeying My commandments because they will bring you life and I want you to have life more abundantly! I want you to be whole, healthy, full of peace and joy in the Holy Ghost that brings freedom as you manifest the Kingdom of Heaven on earth as it is in heaven so others can be set free, too!”
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