How did Peter Heal Aeneas?

Tom: In this our Understanding the Scripture segment, we’re in the Book of Acts:9:32And it came to pass, as Peter passed throughout all quarters, he came down also to the saints which dwelt at Lydda.
See All...—let’s start right off here, okay: “And it came to pass, as Peter passed throughout all quarters, he came down also to the saints which dwelt at Lydda. And there he found a certain man named Aeneas, which had kept his bed eight years, and was sick of the palsy. And Peter said unto him, Aeneas, Jesus Christ maketh thee whole: rise, and make thy bed. And he arose immediately. And all that dwelt at Lydda and Saron saw him, and turned to the Lord.”

Dave: Well, that’s quite a miracle. It’s comparable to what Jesus did, and that would be what Jesus would have done had He been there. And it’s a fulfillment, of course, of Christ’s promise that they would lay hands on the sick and they would recover—one of the signs that these are the apostles of Christ, and that Christ really and truly was who they claim He is, and that He’s alive, and now He’s living His life through them.The Acts of the apostles is really the continuing acts of Jesus through the apostles, and it was something that everyone knew was true; it wasn’t a set-up. He didn’t bring in his own man sick of the palsy like some of these faith healers, so-called, have done. He didn’t bring in his own wheelchairs like some of these so-called faith healers on TV have done, then they get healthy people to sit in these wheelchairs and they don’t realize it. If I were—for example, I have two artificial hips. I really don’t limp badly—I limped worse when we were in Rome and made A Woman Rides the Beast…

Tom: Dave, you didn’t limp, you waddled! You were an Oregon Duck over in…[unintelligible] Basilica.

Dave: Okay. So in some of these healing campaigns, they would have seen me waddling in at the door, and maybe I get there late, and they would have said, “Oh, there are really no good seats except way up in the balcony. Would you like to sit down in front?” the usher said. And I say, “Yeah.” So they put me in a wheelchair, and I make a mild protest, and they say, “Well, this is the only way you are going to get a good seat up in front. You might as well do it.” Okay! Well, the faith healer—and Tom, I’m not making this up; this is a valid scenario—the faith healer knows which ones are his wheelchairs, and he calls me up and touches me, or whatever—blows on me, knocks me down, or whatever—and then says, “Are you okay? Can you walk?” 

“Well, yes, I can walk.” Then he gets in the wheelchair and I get behind him and he has me pushing him around the stage—wow! And the audience is cheering, and I know that I can’t walk any better than I could before, but I don’t want to raise questions. Maybe I am feeling better; maybe I really have been healed and I can begin to believe that.So, Tom, this is the way some of these things work, but that was not the case with Aeneas. This was a genuine miracle, and the people—well, it says, “All that dwelt at Lydda and Saron saw him and turned to the Lord,” so they recognized this man. He was well known, he had been in bed with palsy for eight years, and suddenly now he’s healed.

Tom: Dave, I know many people wonder—you know, true believers—why the Lord isn’t working in the same way today as He did then. Some have even created a methodology saying they’re cessationists, they don’t believe that miracles happen today, or at least the sign gifts; and there are others who, like a John Wimber before he died, you know, was so drawn to the power that he read about in the New Testament, the Book of Acts for example, and he wanted to see that take place today. Why doesn’t it take place as we read in the Book of Acts? Why don’t we see that happening on that kind of regular basis—not regular but, you know, more often than not?

Dave: Well, it was regular in those days. If Peter’s shadow just fell across people who were lying there—they put them in beds in the street, and if his shadow fell across them they were healed instantly. The Bible does talk about special miracles that were wrought with handkerchiefs, or aprons, or whatever that had been in contact with Paul, and people were healed through that. So of course you have preachers today that bless a handkerchief and send it out or whatever—bless a whole bunch of handkerchiefs and send them out. Paul didn’t bless handkerchiefs. It was just something special at that time. I think the Scripture indicates that. On the other hand…

Tom: Why special at that time?

Dave: Well, I think to help the church get started, to help the apostles in their testimony. This was quite a shocking declaration they were making to this world: that this Jesus that had been crucified and laid in the grave had risen from the dead and was alive. So I think that God gave some special miracles to attest to that fact.On the other hand, God has not changed. He is the same. He can do miracles today just as He did then. Now, why don’t we see all of this today like it happened then? Well, there are a number of reasons I think. Number one, miracles do not accomplish what John Wimber thought. He wrote his book Power Evangelism, and he said if we could just do miracles, we would really see people come to Christ. Not true, because as we’ve pointed out many times, no one saw miracles like the children of Israel. I mean, the Red Sea opens up. You walk through on dry land and your enemies are drowned. You’re led by a pillar of cloud by day, a pillar of fire by night. It tells you where to camp. You get manna every morning except on the Sabbath. You get water out of a rock. I mean, God speaks with an audible voice on Mt. Sinai. What could be more powerful than that? And the people disobey the first commandment before Moses even gets down from the mountain!
So it’s not that miracles—if we had miracles then we would believe it, it’s a matter of the heart, okay? So I think that these happened to attest to the fact these were proof and evidence.
But secondly, Tom, God doesn’t do these things for wicked people, and the church is in apostasy. It happened with Israel. You can see the example in Israel. After that incident there at the base of Mt. Sinai, God said, “I can’t be in your midst anymore. I would consume you.” They had the tabernacle—had been in the midst of the tribes; they were all camped around it. Now God said, “You’re going to have to move that tabernacle outside, because you are such a wicked, disobedient, rebellious people I would consume you.”
Now, the same thing happened in the church. Remember Ananias and Sapphira? One of the big popular deals—Benny Hinn does it all the time, Kathryn Kulhman did it, other people do it—is called “slaying in the spirit.” Now, I never heard of any “slaying in the spirit” in the Bible except Ananias and Sapphira, and they just exaggerated their testimony. They didn’t have to give all the money, but they said they had given all of it for which they had sold this property. And because they lied against the Holy Spirit, they were struck dead instantly. Now, do we want that sort of thing to happen? You see, people would like to see miracles, but I don’t think they want God striking people dead because they exaggerate their testimony.
Furthermore, some of these televangelists are living in sin—homosexuals and adultery and so forth. God is not going to honor that. So the problem is the church is in an apostate condition. If God is going to do miracles like He did in the early days, people are going to be falling dead all over the place. So it’s God’s mercy that it doesn’t happen.
So, Tom, there are some reasons for this. On the other hand, I have been instantly healed. I have seen others instantly healed that I laid my hands on them and prayed, and they were instantly healed. No gimmicks. But I can’t command this to happen any time I want it to. The gift of healing is not a gift that then I possess and I can walk through hospitals and heal everybody. It’s a gift that God gave through a person who prayed at a particular time, but it doesn’t mean that that can happen every time.

Tom: People say, “Well, these gifts ended when the Canon was completed.” That is, when the last jot and tittle of the New Testament was finished, God began a new thing—or not a new thing, He just directed people to His word, not to signs and wonders.

Dave: Yeah, well, Tom, that’s not biblical, and we don’t have time to deal with it. But you have to say, “Well, blind Bartimaeus, he qualified to be healed by Jesus because he didn’t have the Bible, the whole Scriptures. But his great-great-great-great grandson, he doesn’t qualify for a healing of his blindness, because he has the complete Bible now in Braille.” I don’t think that makes sense. It has not ceased and it will not cease until…“Now we see through a glass darkly, then face to face. Now I know in part, then I will know as I am known.” And we still need miracles on this earth. God is not just doing them as He did at that time because of the apostasy and condition of our lives, in my opinion. People can search the Scriptures for themselves, but I still believe in miracles, and God can do them right now.