PENTECOSTAL APPROACHES TO FAITH AND

HEALING
ALLANANDERSON*

A personal testimony

Most Pentecostals, charismatics and members of Pentecostal-like indigenous

churches believe in divine healing (they usually prefer this term to “faith heal-
ing”),’ and a few will even admit to their doubts concerning it.* Pentecostal
belief in healing is often based on testimonies of people who have themselves
experienced healing, and they see this as a direct intervening act of God. I
share that perspective and offer a personal testimony to clarify my own pre-
suppositions and set the stage for what follows.
In 1975, during a preaching tour in the mosquito-infested Shire River Valley
in Malawi, I contracted cerebral malaria. I was unable to have medical atten-
tion for two days; I was delirious and felt as if I was dying. A Christian vil-
lager prayed for me until the fever broke. The next day I was well on the way
to recovery and was preaching again within three days. A medical doctor con-
firmed from a blood test that I had indeed contracted and recovered from the
disease, but I had an injection of chloroquine, just in case!
What seemed like an even greater act of divine intervention occurred ten years
later, when my wife Olwen and I were travelling in Zambia towards Malawi
with a van and trailer. A partial head-on collision with a large truck resulted in
us both being at death’s door. I lost a lot of blood from external injuries. A
Catholic priest gave me the rite of extreme unction and a Polish nun stayed at
my side in the small mission hospital, holding my hand, and imparting incred-
ible strength. The Australian doctor said that it would be “a miracle” if I were
still alive the next morning. Lutheran nuns from Darmstadt came to assist the
Catholics. We were flown to hospital in South Africa by air ambulance. I was
released from hospital within two weeks. Olwen, however, went into a coma
after two days, which was to last for seven weeks. People all over the world
prayed. I believe that I had received divine assurances that Olwen would
recover. One afternoon, after she had been comatose for four weeks, the
German healing evangelist Reinhard Bonnke (who lived in South Africa at
that time) came to pray for her and rebuke the “spirit of death” that gripped
her. She was in a deep coma with a “decerebral” response to stimuli. The neu-
rologist had pronounced his opinion that she would not recover from her veg-
etative state. The next day, the nurse reported that she had smiled, and three
weeks later she was beginning to talk. Everyone, the neurologist included,
admitted that this was an event that had exceeded all expectations. Although
Olwen’s injuries were extensive and she remained in hospital for six months,

* Dr Allan Anderson is former principal of Tshwane Theological College in Soshanguve, South

Africa. and is now senior lecturer in Pentecostal Studies at the University of Birmingham,
England.

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we are nbw the parents of two children, our oldest born eighteen months after
the accident that changed our lives. That is another miracle and another story.
I relate these stories because the issues that are discussed here have profound-
ly affected me and are taken very seriously. God used a Catholic priest,
Catholic and Lutheran nuns, medical professionals, a German evangelist, and
the prayers of many people to bring about our healing. I will not pretend that
everything has been perfect thereafter. Olwen and I continue to suffer physi-
cal consequences from our injuries, but we know that we are still alive because
of God’s miraculous intervention and answer to prayers. We know that God is
compassionate and powerful, and can do anything in his love-filled purposes.
Sometimes (but not always) these purposes are to heal and to relieve suffering
and affliction. I pray for people to be healed even when 1 seldom see it hap-
pening, and I gladly receive prayer for healing when I need it. Sometimes it
seems as if sickness overwhelms people, including my family and myself. But
we Pentecostals remain convinced that healing is part of the continuing min-
istry of Christ on earth through the Holy Spirit. Healing, furthermore, is com-
prehensive and relates to all of life, not just the “physical” part of it.3This has
been at the heart of the Pentecostal view of healing since its beginning.

The Pentecostal “full gospel”

The contemporary healing practices of the Pentecostal and charismatic move-
ments did not originate in early Pentecostalism. The doctrines of “divine heal-
ing” and “healing in the atonement” (explained below) were already wide-
spread in the North American Holiness movement in the 19th century, out of
which Pentecostalism emerged, and the idea also existed in early Methodism.
Holiness leaders like Charles Cullis, A.B. Simpson and Asa Mahan were
staunch proponents of divine healing through faith.4 The Holiness movement
stressed the four elements of a “full gospel”, viz. salvation, healing, holiness
and the second coming of Christ.s The distinctiveness added by early
Pentecostals was another element, viz. the baptism in the Holy Spirit, which
Pentecostals usually linked to speaking in tongues. Jesus Christ was declared
to be “Saviour, Healer, Baptizer and Soon Coming King”, to which the
Holiness Pentecostals added “Sanctifier”. Pentecostal belief in the “full
gospel” not only meant that Jesus was “Saviour” who saved people from sin,
but also “Healer” from sickness and deliverer of people from the power of
Satan. This was a soteriological emphasis, to which was added an eschato-
logical one: Christ was the “soon coming King” who was preparing his church
for his rule. The Pentecostals added a pneumatological and missiological
dimension before the eschatological one: Christ was the “Baptizer in the Holy
Spirit” who empowered ordinary people to witness to the ends of the earth.
Steven Land summarizes this “full gospel” as comprising “five theological
motifs”, characteristic of North American classical Pentecostals in particular:
(1) justification by faith in Christ; (2) sanctification by faith as a second defi-
nite work of grace (Land’s own Holiness Pentecostal position); (3) healing as
provided for all in the atonement; (4) the pre-millennia1 return of Christ (not

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all Pentecostals, however, are pre-millenialists); and (5) the baptism in the
Spirit evidenced by speaking in tongues.6
Although it is difficult to generalize about Pentecostal beliefs in such a multi-
faceted movement, it may be said that most believe that the coming of the
Spirit brings an ability to perform “signs and wonders” in the name of Jesus
Christ, to accompany and authenticate the Christian message. The role of
“signs and wonders”, particularly that of healing and miracles, has been
prominent in Pentecostal praxis and reflection all over the world since its
inception, and one of the most important emphases of its mission and out-
reach. Pentecostals see the role of healing as good news for the poor and
afflicted. Sickness, it was assumed, had its origins in the sin of humanity.
Early 20th century Pentecostal newsletters and periodicals abounded with tes-
timonies to physical healings, exorcisms and deliverances from evil spirits. At
the turn of the 20th century, there was an expectation that “signs and wonders”
would accompany an outpouring of the Spirit,’ and a belief that healing was
linked to the work of Christ on the cross. Healings demonstrated Christ’s vic-
tory over all forms of affliction; it was a holistic salvation that encompassed
all of life’s problems.’ The presence of these “signs and wonders” was the
realization of the coming of the kingdom of God.9
This Pentecostal understanding of the “full gospel” meant that these “signs
and wonders” should accompany the preaching of the Word, and divine heal-
ing in particular was an indispensable part of the Pentecostal evangelistic
methodology.’” Indeed, in many cultures of the world, healing has been a
major attraction for Pentecostalism. In these cultures, the religious specialist
or “woman/man of God” has power to heal the sick and ward off evil spirits
and sorcery. This holistic function, which does not separate the “physical”
from the “spiritual”, is restored in Pentecostalism, and people see it as a “pow-
erful” religion to meet human needs. For some Pentecostals, faith in God’s
power to heal directly through prayer resulted in a rejection of other methods
of healing. The numerous healings reported by Pentecostals confirmed that
God’s word was true, and his power was evidently on their evangelistic
efforts. The result was that many were persuaded to become Christians. This
emphasis on healing is so much part of Pentecostal evangelism, especially in
the third world, that large public campaigns and tent crusades preceded by
great publicity are frequently used in order to reach as many “unevangelized”
people as possible. Pentecostal mission historian Gary McGee notes that this
confident belief that God had at last poured out his Spirit with miraculous
power to empower Christians to bring closure to the Great Commission...has
forced the larger church world to reassess the work of the Holy Spirit in mis-
sion.“
A fundamental presupposition of all Pentecostal theology is the central
emphasis on the experience of the Holy Spirit. This experience includes “gifts
of the Spirit”, especially healing, exorcism, speaking in tongues and proph-
esying. These cfzurismuru of the Spirit are, for Pentecostals, the proof that the
gospel is true. In Pentecostalism, the “full gospel” is understood to contain
good news for all of life’s problems, and to be particularly relevant in those

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societies where disease is rife and access to adequate health care is a luxury.
Without decrying the wonderful advances in medical science, I do not share
the optimism of Christoffer Grundmann that medical healing today is readily
available “to a degree never before possible”.[* As Claudia Wfirisch-Oblau
has observed in China, the need for healings is in direct proportion to the
unavailability of medical resources and the breakdown of the public health
system there. Prayer for healing is “an act of desperation in circumstances
where they see few alternative options”.I3
“Salvation”, sometimes called “full salvation”, is an all-embracing term in
Pentecostalism, and usually means a sense of wellbeing evidenced in freedom
from sickness, poverty and misfortune, as well as in deliverance from sin and
evil. Healing from sickness and deliverance from evil powers are seen as part
of the essence of the gospel, reference being made to Old Testament prophets,
Christ himself and New Testament apostles who practised healing. In some
African initiated churches, the healing offered to people relies upon various
symbols, especially sprinkling by holy water, which is a sacrament providing
ritual purification and protection. The symbolic healing practices are justified
by the Bible, where Jesus used mud and spittle to heal a blind person, Peter
used cloths to heal, and Old Testament prophets used staffs, water, and vari-
ous other symbols to perform healing and mira~1es.I~In most other
Pentecostal churches the emphasis is on the laying on of hands with prayer,
sometimes with the addition of anointing with oil.
Early Pentecostals stressed that healing was part of the provision of Christ in
his atonement, again following a theme that had emerged in the Holiness
movement, based on such texts as Isaiah 53:4-5 and Matthew 8:16-17.Is
Dayton considers the “healing in the atonement” idea to emerge “largely as a
radicalization of the Holiness doctrine of instantaneous sanctification in which
the consequences of sin (i.e. disease) as well as sin itself are overcome in the
Atonement and vanquished during this life”.I6 British Pentecostal Harold
Horton represented the vast majority of early Pentecostals who rejected “mod-
em medicine”. In his classic publication The Gifts of the Spirit, which first
appeared in 1934, Horton speaks of “gifts” of healing “for the supernatural
healing of diseases and infirmities without natural means of any sort”.” He
says that “divine healing” is the “only way” of healing open to believers and
“authorized by the Scriptures”.lXMany Pentecostals and members of African
initiated churches have rejected the use of any medicine, traditional and mod-
em, because its use is viewed as evidence of “weak” faith.
The majority of people in the world today are underprivileged, state social
benefits like health insurance are absent, and efficient medical facilities are
scarce and expensive. Swedish bishop Bengt Sundkler, writing about Zionist
churches in South Africa, said that people receive their healing message as a
“gospel for the poor”.19Wahrisch-Oblau found that prayers for the sick, and
healing experiences were common to all the Chinese Protestant churches, and
that healings were considered “normal” there.20Michael Bergunder shows the
prominence of healing in the South Indian Pentecostal movement.21My own
work has demonstrated the central role of healing in most African initiated

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churches.22That people believe themselves to be healed means that for them,

the gospel is a potent remedy for their frequent experiences of affliction. The
“full gospel” proclaimed by Pentecostals seeks to be relevant to life’s totality
and to proclaim biblical deliverance from the very real fear of evil. Whatever
the source of them may be, evil, misfortune and affliction are the experiences
of people everywhere, and Pentecostals endeavour to provide a solution to
these compelling needs. This understanding of “salvation” has to do with
deliverance from people’s fearful experiences of evil forces that oppose their
sense of safety and security. The methods used to receive this deliverance and
the perceptions concerning the means of grace sometimes differ, but
Pentecostals believe in an omnipotent and compassionate God who is con-
cerned with all human troubles and willing to intervene to alleviate them.
Bishops, pastors, prophets, ministers, evangelists and ordinary church mem-
bers exercise the authority that they believe has been given them by the God
of the Bible. Reinforced by the power of the Spirit, they announce the good
news of deliverance from sin, sickness and oppression, and from every con-
ceivable form of evil, including social deprivation, unemployment, poverty
and sorcery. The emphasis on experiencing the power of the Spirit is a com-
mon characteristic of Pentecostal theology, where the Holy Spirit is the agent
of healing and deliverance.

The healing evangelists and the Word of Faith movement

Early Pentecostal preachers, and especially the mass healing evangelists,
expected miracles to accompany their evangelism and “prioritized seeking for
spectacular displays of celestial power - signs and wonders, healing, and
deliverance from sinful habits and satanic bondage”.23The “signs and won-
ders’’ promoted by independent evangelists have led to the rapid growth of
Pentecostal churches in many parts of the world, although they have seldom
been without contr~versy.~~ Sometimes the emphasis on the “miraculous” has
led to shameful showmanship and moral decadence, exaggerated and unsub-
stantiated claims of healing, and a triumphalism that betrays the humility of
the cross. But healing was part of the “foursquare” gospel, and healing evan-
gelists have always been part of the Pentecostal movement, from Maria
Woodworth-Etter, John G. Lake and Aimee Semple McPherson in the earlier
years of the movement, to Kathryn Kuhlman and Reinhard Bonnke more
recently. The healing campaigns of North American evangelists, that have
contributed to the growth of Western forms of Pentecostalism in many parts of
the world, developed after the second world war and peaked in the 1950s.
Leading independent healing evangelists at that time were William Branham
( 1909-65),2sKathryn Kuhlman ( 1907-1976),26T.L. Osborne (1923-), Oral
Roberts (19 18-).27and Tommy Hicks (1909-73),and remarkable healings and
miracles were reported in their campaigns. First Branham and then Roberts
were probably the best known and most widely travelled. Branham’s sensa-
tional healing services, which began in 1946, are well documented, and he
became the “pacesetter” for those that followed before he became involved in
doctrinal controversies.28Hicks was responsible for a revival in Argentina in

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1954 that resulted in accelerated growth among Pentecostal churches there.29

Kuhlman was one of the best known of the healing evangelists in the late six-
ties until her death in 1976. Osbome had large crowds at his crusades in
Central America, Indonesia and East Africa. By 1960, Oral Roberts had
become the leading healing evangelist in the USA. He was increasingly
accepted by “mainline” denominations, and was one of the most influential
Pentecostals in the beginnings of the charismatic movement.3o He was a
staunch proponent of “healing in the atonement”, and his oft repeated phrase
“God is a good God” was the basis for his belief in God’s desire to heal or
bring “wholeness” to people. In this he followed classical Pentecostal beliefs
that because healing was in the atonement of Christ, it was offered to all, and
therefore people could receive immediate healing just as they could confess
Christ and be %a~I&l“.~’ Bonnke was undoubtedly the most prominent
Pentecostal healing evangelist at the close of the 20th century.
In some continuity with the Pentecostal healing evangelists are the controver-
sial “Word of Faith” preachers of the USA’s “Bible Belt”. This is now one of
the most widely influential movements in world Pentecostalism and often char-
acteristic of new Pentecostal churches in Africa, Asia and Latin America. The
movement is also known as ”positive confession” and the “faith message”, and
by its detractors as the “prosperity gospel” and the “health and wealth gospel”.
It is widely regarded to have originated in the writings of Baptist pastor Essek
W. Kenyon (1867-1948), who taught “the positive confession of the Word of
God” and a “law of faith” working by predetermined divine principles. The
development of the movement was stimulated by the teachings of such evan-
gelists as Branham and Roberts, contemporary popular televangelists, and the
charismatic movement in North America.32Kenneth Hagin (19 17-), widely
regarded as the “father of the Faith Movement”, has imbibed many of
Kenyon’s ideas, and teaches that every Christian believer should be physically
healthy and materially prosperous and successful. This teaching is supported
by selective Bible quotations, and begins with a belief in guaranteed healing
through the atoning work of Christ. Hagin says that it is not enough to believe
what the Bible says; the Bible must also be confessed, and that what a person
says (confesses) is what will happen. A person should therefore confess heal-
ing even when the “symptoms” are still there.33Hagin emphasizes the impor-
tance of the “word of faith’, i.e. a positive confession of one’s faith in healing,
despite circumstances or symptoms. Hagin began the Rhema Bible Training
Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1974, since which time thousands of graduates
have propagated his “Word of Faith” message all over the world, and Hagin’s
books, videos and tapes have been sold in their millions.
Among Hagin’s disciples are Kenneth Copeland (19374 of Fort Worth, Texas
(whose ministry has since overshadowed Hagin’s), African American preach-
er Frederick Price (1932-) of Los Angeles and, among many others, Ray
McCauley (1949-), who is one of the most influential charismatic ministers in
South Africa.34This Word of Faith teaching has been part of Pentecostalism
since its beginnings, although in a less developed form. Healing evangelists,
especially Roberts and Osbome, but also the earlier Lake and Woodworth-

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Etter, are quoted by Hagin and his followers. The Word of Faith movement
teaches physical healing and material prosperity usually through special reve-
lation knowledge of a Bible passage (as distinct from “sense knowledge”) - a
“Rhema word” that is positively confessed as true. The teaching asserts that
when Christians believe and confess this “Rhema word” it becomes energiz-
ing and effective, with the result that it is received from God. When people do
not receive what they have confessed, it is usually because of a negative con-
fession, unbelief, or a failure to observe divine laws. Copeland developed
Hagin’s teaching with a greater emphasis on financial prosperity, and formu-
lated “laws of prosperity” to be observed by those seeking health and wealth.
Poverty is seen as a curse to be overcome through faith. Through “faith-
force”, believers regain their rightful divine authority over their circum-
stances. Some faith teachers reject the use of medicine as evidence of a weak
faith, and overlook the role of suffering, persecution and poverty in the pur-
poses of God. It must be said that many Pentecostals have rejected this move-
ment and distanced themselves from it.
In independent developments, teaching similar to the “Word of Faith” is also
part of the theology of the pastor of the world’s largest congregation, David
(Paul) Yonggi Cho of the Yoido Full Gospel Church in Seoul, Korea. He has
added to the fourfold “full gospel” of the early Pentecostals, the “five-fold
message of the Gospel”, which includes (1) renewal, (2) the fullness of the
Spirit, (3) healing, (4)blessing, and ( 5 ) the Second Coming. In addition, Cho
proclaims the “three-fold blessings of salvation” to include “soul prosperity”,
“prosperity in all things” and “a healthy life”.35Another prominent present-
day exponent of the “faith message” is Nigerian bishop David Oyedepo of the
Living Faith World Outreach, also known as “Winner’s Chapel”, with a vig-
orous church planting programme all over Africa.36The extent by which these
and other preachers have been influenced by the Hagin school is debatable,
but globalization has definitely affected Pentecostalism throughout the world.
Prominent “Faith” teachers like Robert Schuller and Oral Roberts write fore-
words to Cho’s books, and Roberts even suggests that Cho received his teach-
ing on prosperity from Robert’s own books and tapes.37Cho himself says that
in his search for a “God of the present in Korea” in 1958, he received a reve-
lation of “the truth of the threefold blessings of salvation, health and prosper-
ity written in 3 John 2”, and that this became the foundation of his preaching
and ministry from that time.’8
Apart from the fact that the Word of Faith teaching encourages the “American
dream” of capitalism and promotes the “success ethic”, among its even more
questionable features is the possibility that human faith is placed above the
sovereignty and grace of God. Faith becomes a condition for God’s action and
the strength of faith is measured by results. Material and financial prosperity
and health are sometimes seen as evidence of spirituality, and the positive and
necessary role of persecution and suffering is often ignored.3y Some critics
have tried to link the Word of Faith teaching with Norman Vincent Peale’s
Positive Thinking, with dualistic materialism, and even with the 19th century
New Thought of Phineas Quimby and the Christian Science of Mary Baker

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Eddy. However, these arguments remain unsubstantiated, and it is probably

more helpful to see this movement as a development of Pentecostalism and its
healing emphasis. Classical Pentecostals have joined in the accusations of
“cultism”; an Assemblies of God writer, Neuman, has charged Cho, Hagin and
Copeland with this error?O and the US Assemblies of God has taken an offi-
cial position against the teaching. Neuman concludes that the “health and
wealth gospel” has “cultic origins”, an “heretical Christology”, and has “dev-
astating effects on human lives and the false portrayal of Christianity it pres-
ents to the ~ o r l d ” . ~ ’
On the other hand, critics of the Word of Faith message have also to reckon
with the fact that the Bible is not silent on the question of material need.
Christ’s salvation is holistic, making provision for all human need and the
enjoyment of God and God’s gifts. Salvation means a restoration of wholeness
to human life, in which people have communion with God and enjoy the
divine gifts. God does desire to bless God’s children, and this blessing seems
to include provision for all their needs. But this is nowhere portrayed in the
Bible as an irreversible law of cause and effect, as some “prosperity” teachers
indicate. I have suggested that a “realized eschatology” which always sees the
“not yet” as “already” is no worse than one that sees the “not yet” always as
“not yet”.42 One of the reasons for the emergence of independent and
Pentecostal churches in the third world was that many people there saw exist-
ing Christian missions as being exclusively concerned with the “not yet”, i.e.
the salvation of the soul in the life hereafter, and that little was done for the
pressing needs of the present life, i.e. the “here and now” problems that were
addressed by Pentecostals and independent churches.
Access to modem communications and globalization has resulted in the pop-
ularizing of the Word of Faith message in many other parts of the world. North
American televangelists propagate this teaching in Africa; some make regular
visits and broadcast their own television programmes there. The strategies
employed by these televangelists have been subject to criticism, but have had
the effect of promoting a form of Christianity that has appealed especially to
the urbanized and significantly westernized new generation of Africans,
Theologically, the new Pentecostal churches that have arisen throughout
Africa since the 1980s are Christocentric, but they share an emphasis on the
power of the Spirit with other Pentecostals, including many older African ini-
tiated churches. Features such as a particular focus on personal encounter with
Christ (being “born again”), long periods of individual and communal prayer,
prayer for healing and for individualized problems like unemployment and
poverty, deliverance from demons and “the occult” (this term often means tra-
ditional beliefs and witchcraft), and the use of spiritual gifts like speaking in
tongues and (to a lesser extent) prophecy more or less characterize all these
churches, which are by no means limited to Africa but are also found in Asia,
Latin America and the Caribbean.
The new Pentecostal churches in Africa see themselves as the “born again”
people of God, with a strong sense of belonging to the community of God’s
people, those chosen from out of the world to witness to the new life they

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experience in the power of the Spirit. The cornerstone of their message is this
“born again” conversion experience through repentance of sin and submission
to Christ, and this is what identifies them, even to outsiders. Unlike the older
African Independent Churches, where there tends to be an emphasis on the
prophet figure or principal leader as the one who dispenses God’s gifts to his
or her followers, the new churches usually emphasize the availability and
encourage the practice of gifts of the Holy Spirit by all of their members. The
emergence of these churches at the end of the 20th century indicates that unre-
solved questions face the church, such as the role of “success” and “prosperi-
ty” in God’s economy, enjoying God and his gifts, including healing and
material provision, and the holistic dimension of “salvation” which is always
meaningful in an African context. Asamoah-Gyadu believes that the “greatest
virtue” of the “health and wealth” gospel of the new Pentecostal and charis-
matic churches lies in “the indomitable spirit that believers develop in the face
of life’s odds. ..In essence, misfortune becomes only temporary”.43 The “here-
and-now’’ problems being addressed by these churches in modem Africa are
not unlike those faced by the older churches decades before, and these prob-
lems still challenge the church as a whole today. They remind the church of
the age-old conviction of Africa that for any faith to be relevant and enduring,
it must also be experienced.4

Faith and healing in Pentecostalism today

The “Third Wave” in evangelicalism was a term coined by Fuller Theological

Seminary’s Peter Wagner, following the two “waves” of the classical
Pentecostal movement and the charismatic movement. Wagner identified the
Third Wave with John Wimber (1934-1997), who taught a “Signs and
Wonders” course at Fuller during the eighties and whose Vineyard Christian
Fellowship spearheaded a new emphasis on renewal in the established church-
es throughout the English-speaking world, The Third Wave moved away from
the idea of a “second blessing” experience of the Spirit to an emphasis on the
gifts of the Spirit in evangelism and as part of normal Christian life. Wimber’s
influence on the charismatic reqewal in Britain was enormous. His first visit
there in 1982 resulted in widespread acceptance of his message of “power
evangelism” among older churches, especially in evangelical Anglicanism.
The churches of Holy Trinity, Brompton in London and St Andrew’s,
Chorleywood became centres of the new renewal. Wimber’s particular contri-
bution was to demonstrate that healing is a ministry of the whole church and
not just of a particularly gifted individual such as a healing evangelist.
The question of healing in Pentecostal churches has been extensively debated,
among others by British charismatics Nigel Wright and Andrew Walker who
both believe in healing but say that the claims about healing and the miracu-
lous must be handled with care. Wright, with reference to Wimber, says that
“the rhetoric about miraculous healing far exceeds the reality”.45 Walker
reminds us that just as both dispensational fundamentalists and liberals, fol-
lowing Bultmann, rejected the possibility of miracles, so those who accept

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their present reality will need to be very careful that “nothing short of total
integrity in dealing with them will do”. He says that believing in miracles
“surely entails the moral imperative to protect them from fraudulence or from
frivolity and shoddiness”. This is ultimately a question of seeing the “miracu-
lous” as
Pentecostals today, particularly in the Western world, generally have greatly
modified views on faith and healing, compared to those of their predecessors.
They frequently resort to modem medicine and accept the validity of “grad-
ual” and “natural” healing. Rather than declare that divine healing is for all,
most prefer, as Keith Warrington observes, “to allow for the possibility of
healing rather than hold to an unconditionally promised gift of healing for all
believer^".^^ More credence is given to the idea that God sometimes chooses
not to heal, and that suffering is part of the divine economy. More reflection
on these and other issues has led to a more realistic and sensitive theology of
healing, including a more nuanced view of “healing in the at~nernent”.~~
Warrington also points out that the ministry of a healing evangelist has large-
ly given way to that of a corporate healing ministry of the church.49This too
is expressed in recent ecumenical consultations, where the church is seen as a
“community in healing”.s0
Healing and protection from evil are among the most prominent features of
Pentecostalism that have affected its evangelism and church recruitment
throughout the world. The central place given to healing is particularly rele-
vant in the third world, where the presence of disease and evil affects the
whole community and is not simply a private domain relegated to individual
pastoral care. As Harvey Cox observes in the African context, Pentecostals
“provide a setting in which the African conviction that spirituality and healing
belong together is dramatically ena~ted”.~’ Thlse communities were, to a large
extent, health-orientated communities and, in their traditional religions, rituals
for healing and protection are prominent. Pentecostals responded to what they
experienced as a void left by rationalistic Western forms of Christianity which
had unwittingly initiated what was tantamount to the destruction of ancient
spiritual values. Pentecostals declared a message that reclaimed the biblical
traditions of healing and protection from evil, demonstrated the practical
effects of these traditions and, by so doing, became heralds of a Christianity
that was more meaningful. Thus, Pentecostalism has gone a long way towards
meeting physical, emotional and spiritual needs, by offering solutions to life’s
problems and ways to cope in a threatening and hostile world.s2
All the widely differing Pentecostal movements have important common fea-
tures. Far from being “the expression of escapist b e h a v i o ~ r ”they
, ~ ~ proclaim
and celebrate a salvation that encompasses all of life’s experiences and afflic-
tions, and they offer an empowerment that provides a sense of dignity and a
coping mechanism for life, and that motivates their messengers. Thousands of
preachers have emphasized the manifestation of divine power through heal-
ing, prophecy, speaking in tongues and other Pentecostal phenomena. The
message proclaimed by these charismatic preachers of receiving the power of
the Spirit to meet human needs was welcome in societies where a lack of

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power was keenly felt on a daily basis.-The main attraction of Pentecostalism

in the third world is still the emphasis on healing. Preaching a message that
promises solutions for present felt needs, Pentecostal preachers are heeded
and their “full gospel” readily accepted. Pentecostals confront old views by
declaring what they are convinced is a more powerful protection against sor-
cery and a more effective healing from sickness than either the existing
churches or the traditional rituals had offered. Healing, guidance, protection
from evil, and success and prosperity are some of the practical benefits offered
to faithful members of Pentecostal churches. Although Pentecostals do not
have all the right answers or are to be emulated in all respects, the enormous
and unparalleled contribution made by Pentecostals to alter the face of world
Christianity must be acknowledged.

NOTES
I
In this essay, “Pentecostal” will refer to “Pentecostal”, “charismatic”, and indigenous
“Pentecostal-like” churches all over the world, unless the text makes clear that it refers to only
one of these categories.
E.g. Menzies, William W. & Menzies, Robert, P., Spirit and Power: Foundations of Pentecostal
Experience, Grand Rapids, Zondervan, 2000, pp. 159-160.
I
Wimber, John & Springer, Kevin, Power Healing, New York, Harper Collins, 1991, p. 37.
4
Dayton, Donald, W.. Theologic.ul Roots of Pentecostalism, Metuchen, NJ & London, The
Scarecrow Press, 1987. pp. 1 15-4I .
5
Ihid.. p. 22.
h
Land, Steven J., Pentecostal Spirituulity: A Passion for the Kingdom. Sheffield, Sheffield
Academic Press, 1993, p. 18.
7
McGee, Gary B., “‘Power from on High’: A Historical Perspective on the Radical Strategy in
Missions”, in Ma, Wonsuk & Menzies, Robert P., eds, Pentecostalism in context, Shefield.
Sheffield Academic Press, 1997, p. 324.
x Menzies & Menzies, op. (it.p. 168; Wimber & Springer, op. cit. p. 37.
)
In a more sophisticated form, this was also the position of the Tiibingen I ccmsultation. Benn,
Christoph and Senturias, Erlinda, “Health, Healing and Wholeness in the Ecumenical
Discussion”, I/rternational Heview of MBsion, XC:356/357, January/April 2001, p. 12.
I0
Saayman, Willem A., “Some reflections on the development of the Pentecostal mission model
in South Africa”, Missionulia 2 I :I ( 1 993), p. 46.
II
McGee, “Power from on High”, up. cit,,p. 278.
I?
Grundmann, Christoffer H., “Healing: A Challenge to Church and Theology”, International
Review ojMission, XC:356/357, January/April 2001, pp. 29, 39.
II
Wahrisch-Oblau, Claudia, “God Can Make us Healthy Through and Through: On Prayers for
the Sick and Healing Experiences in Christian Churches in China and African Immigrant
Congregations in Germany”, International Review of Mission, XC:356/357, January/April
2001, pp. 94, 99.
14
Anderson, Allan, Zion und Pentecost: The Spirituality and Experience of Pentei~ostaland
Zio~ii.s//Apo.stolic~ Churches’in South Africa. Tshwane, University of South Africa Press, 2000,
DD. 137-141.
, I
IS
Dayton, O / J . cit. pp. 127-130. The doctrine of “healing in the atodment” has reappeared in a
different (Anglican) form recently. See Maddocks, Morris, The Christian Healing Ministry,
London, SPCK, 1990, pp. 62-69.
l o Dayton, op. cit.. p. 174.
l 7 Horton, Harold, The Gifs ojthe Spirit. Nottingham, Assemblies of God Publishing House, 10th
Edition, 1976, p. 99.
I x Ihid., p. 101.
I’ Sundkler, Bengt G.M., Bantu Prophets in South Afiica, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1961,
p. 223.

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INTERNATIONAL REVIEW OF MISSION

2‘1 Wahrisch-Oblau, op. cit., pp. 87-88.

*I Bergunder, Michael, “Miracle Healing and Exorcism: The South Indian Pentecostal Movement
in the Context of Popular Hinduism”. International Review of Mission, XC:356/357,
January/Apri12001, pp. 103-112.
?? Anderson, Allen, African Reforniation: African Initiated Christianity in the 20th Century,
Trenton, NJ & Asmara, Eritrea, Africa World Press, 2001, pp. 233-234; Anderson, Zion a n d
Pentecost ..., op. cit.. pp. 290-304.
McGee, “Power from on High”, op. cit., p. 329.
24 McGee, Gary B., “Pentecostals and their Various Strategies for Global Mission: A Historical
Assessment”, in Dempster, M.A., Klaus, B.D. & Petersen, D., eds, <allcd and Empowred:
Global Mission in Pentecosral Perspective, Peabody, Hendrickson, 1991, p. 215.
25 Kydd, Ronald A.N., Healing Thraugh the Centuries: Models for Understanding, Peabody,
Hendrickson, 1998, pp. 167-180.
26 Ihid..pp. 181-197.
*’ Ibid.. pp. 202-21 I .
?“ Wilson, D.J., “Branham, William Marrion”, in Burgess, S.M. & McGee, G.M., eds, Dictiorrury
of Pentec.osta1 and Charisniaric Movements, Grand Rapids, Zondervan, 1988, pp. 95-97;
Chappell, P.G., “Healing Movements”, ibid., p. 372.
*’ Wagner, Peter, Look Out! The Pentec~ostu1.sare Coming, Carol Stream. Creation House, 1973,
p. 20.
Chappell, P.G., “Roberts, Granville Oral”. in Dictionary of Penrecostal and Charisniaric
Moivnients, op. cir., pp. 759-760.
I ’ Kydd, op. cit.. pp. 204-205.
32 Gifford, Paul, Christianity and Pol in Doe’s Liberia, Cambridge, Cambridge University
Press, 1993, p. 147.
” Neumann, H. Terris, “Cultic Origins of the Word-Faith Theology within the Charismatic
Movement”, Pneumu 12:I , 1990 (32-55), pp. 33-34.
j4 Anderson, Allan, “The Prosperity Message in the Eschatology of Some New Charismatic
Churches”, Missionulicr 15:2, 1987, p. 74.
3s Yoido Fidl Gosp~lChurch, Seoul, Yoido Full Gospel Church. 1993.
I6 Anderson, Afiican Reforniation, op. cit., p. 174.
” Foreword by Oral Roberts in David (Paul) Yonggi Cho, Salvation, Health and Prospetity,
Altamonte Springs, FL, Creation House, 1987, p. 8; c.f. Foreword by Robert H. Schuller in
David (Paul) Yonggi Cho, The Foiirth Dinlension, Seoul, Seoul Logos Co., 1979.
3n Cho, Salvation, Hrulth & Prosperity, up. cit., pp. 11-12.
3y Anderson, “Prosperity Message”,’pp. 78-79.
40 Neuman, in P n ~ u n i app., 49-5 I .
Ihid.,p. 54.
Anderson, “Prosperity Message”, pp. 80-8 I .
r.3 Asamoah-Gyadu, Kwabena J., “The Church in the African State: The Pentecostal/Charismatic
Experience in Ghana”, Journal of Ajkican Christian Thoughr, I:2 (1998), p. 55.
44 Anderson, Afiican Rc.forniation, op, cit., p. 167- 186.
“ Wright, Nigel. “The Theology and Methodology of ‘Signs and Wonders”’. Smail, T.. Walker,
A. & Wright, N., Charismatic Renewal: The Seorchfiw a Thc~ology,London, SPCK, 1995. p.
76.
46 Walker, Andrew, “Miracles, Strange Phenomena, and Holiness”, in Sinail, T., Walker, A. &
Wright, N., Charismatic Renewal., ., op, cit., pp. 1 29- 130.
Warrington, Keith, “Healing and Exorcism: The Path to Wholeness”, in Wamngton, Keith, ed.,
Pentecostal Perspec~ives,Carlisle. Paternoster, 1998, p. 149.
48 Menzies & Menzies, up. cit., pp. 159-168.
4’ Warrington, op. cit., p. 15 I .
Allen, E. Anthony, “ W b t is the Church’s Healing Ministry’?Biblical and Global Perspectives”,
Interriarionul Review of Mission, XC:356/357, January/April 2001, p. SO.
” Cox, Harvey, Fire fioni Heaven: The Rise of Pentecostal Spiritrtalit~and the Reshaping of
Religion in the Twenty-first Century, London, Cassell, 1996, p. 247.
52 Anderson, Zion and Pentecost, op. cit., p. 120-126.
s3 Grundmann, op. cit., p. 29.

534