DON’T OPPRESS OTHERS: STAY HEALTHY AND LIVE LONG

From 1947 through 1958, there was a healing revival here in America. There were about 120 of us in the healing ministry who belonged to an organization of evangelists called The Voice of Healing. We held conventions, and Gordon Lindsay published many of the healing testimonies in his magazine, The Voice of Healing.

Brother Oral Roberts started coming to the forefront in ministry about 1948, and eventually he got a tent that would seat 20,000 people. There was one fellow in The Voice of Healing who got a larger tent than Roberts' tent. He put another section in it so he could seat 22,000 and occasionally he'd fill it up. This other fellow was also one of the leading healing evangelists in the days of The Voice of Healing. No one had a greater healing ministry at that time than he did. I saw some of the greatest miracles in this evangelist's ministry that I've ever seen. But the Lord told me, "You go tell him that he's not going to live much longer unless he judges himself." The man was only thirty-five years old at the time.

The Lord said to me, "The number-one thing he's to judge himself on is walking in love toward his fellow minister. Secondly, he needs to judge himself on money." The Lord said the third thing this evangelist needed to judge himself on was diet. I don't mean to be unkind about it, but this man was as big as a cow and ate like a horse. Well, we don't have to become health food nuts. That's not what the Lord was saying. But on the other hand, I remember something John Wesley said. He said, "I don't live to eat; I just eat to live." Was it scriptural for this minister to judge himself? Of course it was. The Lord was trying to warn him, because if he would have judged himself, the Lord wouldn't have had to judge him. That's what the Bible says. 1 CORINTHIANS 11:31,32 For IF WE WOULD JUDGE OURSELVES, WE SHOULD NOT BE JUDGED. But WHEN WE ARE JUDGED, WE ARE CHASTENED OF THE LORD, that we should not be condemned with the world.

I remember one time my wife and I were on our way to hold a meeting, and we stopped by to visit this fellow's tent meeting. In the city where he was holding this meeting, there was a state institution for deaf and mute people. They brought five men from that institute who were totally deaf and mute to this healing evangelist's service, and he laid hands on them. Just like you'd snap your fingers, all five of them were instantly healed. They were healed in front of thousands of people. This evangelist stopped the service right then and started taking up an offering. Then he announced to the audience, "Don't come down here unless you've got at least $50 to give in the offering." People were running over one another to get down there to give in the offering! Now you've got to understand that this was back in the early '50s. Money was worth a lot more back then than it is now in these days of inflation. But, you see, you can't take the things of God and use them to raise money.

And sooner or later, if people don't judge themselves, these things are going to catch up with them. Remember what the Bible says, "Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap" (Gal. 6:7). That applies to every area of people's lives. I saw another miraculous healing in this man's ministry that was confirmed by medical science. A woman came to one of his meetings on a stretcher. Her body was as stiff as a board, just like it was petrified. It was a very rare disease, and medical science couldn't do anything about it. If you touched her body, it felt like you just touched a piece of petrified lumber. They brought her into the service, and when this minister laid hands on her, she was instantly healed. This minister had a marvelous healing ministry. Blind people were instantly healed. Yet the Lord said to me, "You go tell him that he's not going to live much longer unless he judges himself." I went to talk to this healing evangelist, but he was busy talking to someone else at the time. By the time he finished talking to the other person, my natural mind had taken over, and I thought, He doesn't walk in love toward the brethren. If I tell him what the Lord told me, he's liable to slap my face. By then the evangelist had left, and I never had another opportunity to talk to him. Three years later my wife and I were in Los Angeles in Angelus Temple at a Voice of Healing convention. In those days, we had a Voice of Healing convention every year at Thanksgiving time. This man's wife called the convention for prayer because the doctors said that this evangelist was dying. He was only thirty-eight years old. Brother Lindsay announced this from the platform. He said it would hurt the healing ministry if this foremost healing minister in America died at this early age. So he invited all The Voice of Healing ministers to come up on the platform to join hands and pray for the man. I started up there to pray for him.

As I started to walk up the aisle to the platform, the Lord said to me, "Don't go up there." I stopped dead still, and asked, "Why not, Lord? He's only thirty-eight years old. He's not old enough to die." Three years and some months had gone by, and I'd momentarily forgotten what the Lord had told me about him. The Lord said to me, "He wouldn't judge himself and walk in love toward his fellow ministers, so I judged him and turned him over to Satan for the destruction of his flesh that his spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. You leave him alone because he's going to die." So I turned around and walked back up the aisle. My wife came from another part of the building and
met me as I got to the back of the auditorium. She asked, "What did the Lord say to you?" I said, "How do you know He said anything?" She said, "Well, you stopped dead still and turned as white as a sheet." So I told her what the Lord had said. That time, the Lord only mentioned the fact that this evangelist hadn't judged himself on not walking in love toward others. Well, dying prematurely at thirty-eight years old wasn't God's best for him, but it sure beats going to hell! You see, sometimes there's a reason folks are sick and die prematurely. And before you can get them healed, sometimes you'll have to get down to the root cause why they are sick, and they'll need to make some
adjustments. This minister would put his tent up and hold meetings for a local church in a particular city every year. The other churches in the city would come and cooperate with him, and thousands of people would come to the meetings and get saved and healed. They'd fill up the tent and run it over with people. But then he announced, "I'm going to build a revival center in this town," and he built it not very far from the local church that had helped him hold the meetings. Then one day he went to the pastor of that local church, and told him, "I'm going to start my church on your members and Brother So-and-so's members and Brother So-and-so's members." And that's exactly what he did.

Now there was nothing wrong with him starting a church in that town. But there was something wrong with him taking two hundred members from one pastor's church, two or three hundred members from another church, and several hundred members from the largest Full Gospel church in town! But do you know what? Before he could enjoy his new church "growth," he was dead. You see, this evangelist worked ill to his fellow pastors. He built his new church, but he built it on the
Other fellow's members. Love worketh no ill to his neighbors. A person like that is flirting with death! This man died at an early age because he didn't walk in love toward his brethren. And that's exactly the reason some believers die prematurely—they are shortening their days by not walking in love. We've got to learn to discern the Lord's Body—our brothers and sisters in Christ—and treat them like they are part of the Lord's Body.

The man wouldn't repent, so God had to judge him. That wasn't God's best, but if a person won't judge himself, he will fall under the penalty of God's judgment. That didn't have to happen to him. But he is the one who was responsible for it happening to him. It's a solemn thought to fall under the penalty of God's judgment, isn't it? Well, that's why we need to think soberly on the subject of walking in love.

The Lord waited for this minister to judge himself and put away sin. But the minister never did judge himself and walk in love toward his fellow brethren. So God finally had to judge him. Then some dear Christians who don't know the Bible say, That fellow had a great healing ministry, yet he died at thirty-eight. That proves that healing is not for everyone!" No, that doesn't prove healing is not for everyone! When you know the background, you just simply know that the man wouldn't judge himself, so God had to judge him. God chastened him so he wouldn't be condemned with the world.
(Kenneth E. Hagin)

I love Kenneth Hagin