Knowing the source of disease and infirmity is very helpful to receiving healing from God. As long as we believe that God has made us sick, it will be difficult in receiving supernatural healing. This scripture should help make it clear:
“Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned” (Romans 5:12; EVS).
When did death enter the world? When Adam sinned. When Adam sinned, it was obedience to Satan and disobedience to God. He became spiritually separated from God and spiritually connected to Satan. Satan became his God. This scripture now makes sense:
“But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the god of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them” (2 Corinthians 4:3–4).
Who is the god of this age? Satan. When did he become god? When Adam submitted to him. Satan is not God, but he’s god of this age. He rules over the unsaved. God gave Adam authority in the earth (Genesis 1:28). When Adam obeyed Satan, Satan became lord in Adam’s life: “Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness” (Romans 6:16).
Have you ever wondered why people are always falling for the same deceptions and sins? It’s because they’re spiritually connected to Satan — he’s their god. Satan rules through lies, deceptions, and fear. When we accept Jesus as Lord and Savior, we are born again spiritually and reconnected to God. We still have to renew our mind and the control the desires of the body, but now we have the spiritual where-with-all to do it. In Christ we can overcome the things of this world. We can fight the good fight of faith. What is a good fight? One that we win! We can grow and develop our spiritual “muscles” to resist the devil. We no longer belong to Satan, and are no longer under his lordship.
Sickness, disease, and infirmities are incipient death. They entered the world at the time of the fall. Satan is cursed. When he rebelled against God, he became an outcast from the Kingdom of God and God’s blessing. Satan has nothing good to offer. God’s blessing does not rest upon him. The curse on Satan came upon the human race when Adam sinned and became a child of the devil: “ Why do you not understand My speech? Because you are not able to listen to My word. You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own resources, for he is a liar and the father of it” (John 8:43–44).
Those that belong to Satan are his children. When we are born again, we become God’s children.
Sickness and disease originated with Satan, and he does all he can to spread it through the human race. Does that mean everyone that is sick has a demon? No, of course not. Anymore than everyone who gets the Wuhan virus has been to China. Once a disease is released, it’s in the earth, and people are subject to getting it. It’s a war, and just like being in a war zone, when you’re in one, you’re subject to consequences of battle. Being in this war zone called earth, we need to rely on God more than ever! Here’s where sickness and disease are.
Did you know that Satan has spirits assigned to bring infirmities upon people? “And behold, there was a woman who had a spirit of infirmity eighteen years, and was bent over and could in no way raise herself up” (Luke 13:11; emphasis mine). All the religious leaders got upset that Jesus healed the woman on Saturday, and Jesus responded, “The Lord then answered him and said, ‘Hypocrite! Does not each one of you on the Sabbath loose his ox or donkey from the stall, and lead it away to water it? So ought not this woman, being a daughter of Abraham, whom Satan has bound—think of it—for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath?’” (Luke 13:15–16; emphasis mine). Notice Jesus said it was Satan that bound the woman by a spirit of infirmity.
Note: not everyone that is sick and infirm has a spirit attached to them, sometimes they do, but only God can reveal when they do (see the teachings on the gifts of the Spirit). Of course, if God doesn’t reveal there’s a spirit directly causing the sickness, don’t worry about it, trust God’s word that Jesus took our infirmities and bore our diseases (Matthew 8:17). The point is that Satan is doing all he can to make people sick, and he has assigned spirits to cause sickness and disease to afflict people. Sickness equals death if the sickness can’t be overcome.
“How God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power, who went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him” (Acts 10:38). Notice sickness and infirmity is called oppression by the devil, and Jesus is anointed to break the oppression. Also note that Jesus didn’t cast out a demon from everyone that was sick. The root of all sickness is Satan. Sickness is in the earth because of Satan, and he oppresses people with it.
The Greek word for oppressed is: “καταδυναστεύω katadynasteuō; from 2596 and a derivative of 1413; to exercise dominion against, i.e. oppress: — oppress.” To exercise dominion against! Satan holds lordship and power against people by keeping them ill.
We don’t like to talk about this, but I’m going to mention it anyway. Habitually sinning will give an opportunity for the devil to get into our lives. He’s cursed. If we want to play in the curse, the curse will come upon us even though we’re redeemed from the curse (Galatians 3:13).
“Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree’)” (Galatians 3:13). The curse of the law included every sickness and disease: “Also every sickness and every plague, which is not written in this Book of the Law, will the LORD bring upon you until you are destroyed” (Deuteronomy 28:61). As a point of clarification, we know that God didn’t bring sickness into the earth, that it’s from Satan, but if we refuse to be obedient, we can have the curse.
I’ve heard people say that God’s trying to teach me something through this sickness. No He’s not. God’s primary way to instruct us is through His word. Just like we as parents instruct our children. But if we refuse to listen, we have no protection from the curse. If we’re in disobedience, we need to repent. If we don’t know we’re in disobedience, we’re probably not. Here’s a great scripture and will bring much comfort: “Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven” (James 5:14–15; emphasis mine). God has the sin issue taken care of. God doesn’t want us sick. If we’re missing it, and don’t even know that we are, God has a solution for our ignorance. His forgiving grace will heal us!
That’s what happened when Jesus healed the paralyzed man: “When Jesus saw their faith, He said to the paralytic, ‘Son, your sins are forgiven you’” (Mark 2:5). Again, all the religious leaders got upset that Jesus forgave the man his sins. So to prove that (1) sin can bring illness, and thus the root of illness is satanic oppression, and (2) the forgiveness of sins brings healing, Jesus said, “‘Why reason ye these things in your hearts? Whether is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and take up thy bed, and walk? But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (he saith to the sick of the palsy,) I say unto thee, Arise, and take up thy bed, and go thy way into thine house.’ And immediately he arose, took up the bed, and went forth before them all; insomuch that they were all amazed, and glorified God, saying, We never saw it on this fashion” (Mark 2:8–12).
Sickness is from the dark side — the satanic side. It’s a curse that came into the earth because of sin. We’re in the earth, so we have to take up our armor and fend it off. And we can fend it off, because Jesus took our infirmities and healed our diseases (Matthew 8:17). And if we have sinned and allowed the devil a place in our life, we can be forgiven and healed!
Much can be said, but this will give you a place to begin your study.
Stay strong and prepared!
A Journal of Edification and Exhortation 