John Wimber - How to Begin Healing the Sick (TBN 1984) - Key Insights and Quotes
Source: YouTube video transcript - John Wimber on TBN discussing healing ministry Date: 1984 Context: Pastor John Wimber, founding pastor of Vineyard Christian Fellowship in Anaheim, California, teaching about healing ministry and equipping the saints. Interview includes testimonies from laypeople who learned to heal.
Teaching Healing at Fuller Seminary
The Unlikely Academic
"I've been an adjunct now for 10 years this is my 10th year at Fuller and um every year I the uh see I'm not accredited I don't have any graduate degrees I have what is called a Bachelor of Arts in Bible uh I got converted you know later in life and I went back to school and I just really never finished I uh and how in the world I ever got teaching in the doctoral program there I don't know how that exactly how that worked out and they don't either because every year they they talk about that like what's he doing here you know"
Classroom Healing Demonstrations
"the difficulty is that uh um in our Western worlds we just don't grasp the implications of signs and wonders that we have a worldview that prohibits our really in believing in them we've uh pretty much screened it out through what we call Western materialism but on the other hand um one of the distinctives of the class is that I I lecture just like any other professor and uh at the end of the lectures I I do a clinic I say well if if if my theory is correct God will come he'll fill this room this classroom and and he'll heal people and they say all right let's see you do it and so we pray and God comes and he heals people and uh week right in the classroom people get healed week after week"
The Problem with Modern Church Training
Education vs. Equipping
"in our theological P perspective we perceive education as equipping in fact people will say to me I've come to Seminary to get trained equipped but all what they've gotten equipped in is good valid helpful you know I'm I'm not anti-education I'm very high on it I wish I had more um but I'm I'm very committed to the notion that education isn't an end in itself we must also learn to do the things that we're we're studying about"
The Frustration with Inactive Christianity
"parsing a Greek verb is helpful you know it does give you a new perception of what a text means and and the ability to execute and pull things out of the text so that you can understand them and I wish I I was better at that and speaking too sometimes I mumble words but U on the other hand if if I can't do the things that Jesus did now by that I mean heal the sick cast out demons uh minister to the poor um break the bondage and the power of captivity that's over so many today in terms of demonic control uh minister to the Lost um preach Proclaim teach counsel um train equip lay hands on you Jesus was a discipl he discipled the 12 the 12 discipled others and if I can't do those things I just don't want to play"
The Devil vs. The Church
"when I when I when I work for the devil he let me do his stuff but when I came into church they didn't they said we couldn't do it all we could do is study about it you know and and figure out how God they used to yeah they used to do it once how great God was once yes but uh the devil let me do his stuff you know when I worked for him so I figured that that the Lord would let me do his stuff"
Television Healing Testimony
Down Syndrome Child Healing
"the spirit of God showed me a picture of a woman turning the television set on and before I could that he had given me a word of knowledge and I'd given that before I could stop myself I began talking to her and I knew suddenly you know how this those word of knowledge works I knew that she had a child with um Down syndrome it was a new baby and her heart was broken just broken and I the lord gave me instruction and told me what to tell her how to pray to go in and not to turn the television off but to tell her husband and to go in and begin praying for that child and how to pray"
The Confirmation Months Later
"three months went by and last month I was in Phoenix Arizona ministering...a lady came up and she held a baby in her arms she said uh something the effect of uh do you recognize this baby...I looked at that child and except for the bridge of the nose I couldn't see one feature one visible indicator that this child had Down syndrome and she said we've been praying for it every day"
The Universal Call to Healing Ministry
Every Believer's Commission
"the big question is are all believers supposed to move in this Dimension absolutely not just you pastors or teachers or evangelists...God has said in the word that we are to do these things he's commanded us to do these things I mean it isn't an option we're all to heal the sick we're all to cast out Devils we're all to win the lost and we can learn to do these things"
Learning to Heal
"some people get really upset when I say you can learn to heal oh yes yes I sense the hackles going up in certain ecumenical circles well even even in the uh in the in the popular circles they get attention with what do you mean Only God Can Heal uh how are you going to heal well I can't heal I acknowledge that but God seems to want a partner in these things and he could work without us and he does sometimes he bypasses sure sovereignly but he prefers to work with us"
Layperson Testimony - Steve Zecher
First Healing - Brain Tumor
Steve, a magazine art director, shares his first healing experience:
"about four years ago I uh finally decided to take God at his word and I had a lady that uh worked in our office that called up one day said she had a brain tumor and they were going to operate her operate on her and uh she asked if I'd come and lay hands on her well I had never done that before and I thought gee I'm not a pastor I don't know if I could really do that"
"I walked into the room and I walked up and I laid hands on the brain tumor and I spoke to it and commanded it to go in the name of Jesus...the next day her husband called up and said the brain tumor was gone after they they operate on her cut her open and there was nothing there but a little uh blood blood clot"
Learning from Scripture
"I had been reading in uh uh at the last chapter in the in the gospel of Mark where it said these signs shall follow them that believe and it said that they shall lay hands on the sick and they shall be healed they cast out demons and I thought gee I'm not doing that in my life and uh you know it said these signs shall follow them that believe and I thought well I'm a Believer in Jesus Christ but there's no power in my life there's nothing like this happening"
Patient Testimony - Carmen (Cancer Healing)
Lymphoma and Bone Marrow Cancer
Carmen shares her healing from cancer:
"in October I was diagnosed as a cancer patient and I had lymphoma and it had also gone into the bone marrow...Steve came to my home and uh of course I I've heard the word lay hands but I had no idea what it was I didn't know what to expect"
The Healing Experience
"when the only thing that I can explain the power of the prayer was just it was like an earthquake inside of me and I knew and I knew prayer prayer it's the answer it it certainly is the answer and it was so beautiful and Steve came to my home many times and laid hands on me"
Medical Confirmation
"I was supposed to have nine series I only had five and um I was supposed to have a bone marrow in June and I had my bone marrow test in February and the doctor said Carmen uh now don't have your hopes up high because your condition we can't cure...he told me that my bone marrow test was you have semi- remission remission and complete remission complete remission is normal I'm as as normal as anyone walking around"
The Reality of Failure and Mystery
Personal Struggles with Healing
"we were experiencing utter failure week after week after week we're praying for the sick and we're getting sick praying for the sick and I want to quit you know and many times I I said out loud oh God I quit I'm not going to preach another sermon on this subject and he said you either preach what I say in my word or get out"
The Loss of David Watson
"I buried my closest friend this year David Watson an evangelist from from England I love David I prayed for him and watched his his stomach swell as cancer ate him up I I I hugged him cried with him uh loved him and watched watched him die and with the liver cancer and at the same time saw people with liver cancer healed and here's an internationally known evangelist one that's God's using all over the world and he dies and his best friend can't heal him it broke my heart"
The Paradox of Healing
"at the same time other people that that one man came to us that that was an unbeliever he had cancer of the throat I mean you could see that looked like a walnut it was so big he didn't believe he didn't love Jesus he wasn't full of Faith he didn't he didn't believe the word he gets healed he gets saved afterwards he's now all of those things but he wasn't when he started and so you explain it to me I can't explain it to you"
Worldview and Western Materialism
The Biblical vs. Western Worldview
"in the Bible from there's there's hardly a page where you don't see interaction between what we might call the Supernatural and the natural the material world and the non non-material World The Cosmic versus the empirical...but today um because of what we would call Western empirical materialistic worldview that's heavily what we might refer to as scientific in which we think in terms of the senses the things that we can measure see taste touch feel those um those perceptions are so entrenched in our thinking that we we we literally think anything that's not uh testable is not real"
The Control Mentality
"in our ego State we've come to a place we honestly believe I mean this is what prompts our our probing into space we believe we can control space if we can understand it we believe anything that we can measure and get and and and uh isolate and understand we can control"
Learning to Flow with God's Presence
Recognizing the Unction
"we know the iction of God now see in the early days when we prayed we didn't know when the unction was there what's the unction now the presence the Manifest presence of God coming upon us when you're just really aware oh when he's here...we didn't know what that was in the old days we didn't know what that was the presence of God would come but we didn't know what that was we just felt good we'd grin and say isn't this nice we're having a good time here aren't we and then suddenly we realized that's the Lord the Lord's here the Lord's with us and we learned to move with that"
Moving with the Spirit
"the power of God's here uh the presence of God here now what does he want to do oh they didn't know that they thought well he wants to evangelize I mean Southern Baptist he wants to he does want to evangelize and he did evangelize there were many new converts the three days we were there but at the same time he wants to heal and and drive out demons and break bondages and you know I mean the Lord sets a big table you know when you come to the Lord's table he's got all kinds of things on the table"
Overcoming Fear in Ministry
God's Encouragement to Pastors
"pastors that the fear of their faces the fear you lose your job the thought of not having any place to go the sense of uh you know of of insecurity that rises up the fear that you'll never become anything and you'll never have the success you want all of those fears are the main tools the enemy uses he told me I wouldn't have any friends he told me that I wouldn't have any place he told me that I would be labeled a fanatic"
The Reality vs. The Fear
"all of those things happened but they didn't happen to the degree that the enemy was telling me they would happen and for every one of those things the Lord has given me hundreds and thousands of friends all over the world I I was kicked out of my denomination and embraced by all the rest of them you know and I and I travel among all the denominations now all the time and the people that that that told me to leave love me we have a wonderful relationship"
Key Insight: This 1984 interview reveals Wimber's emphasis on practical training over theoretical knowledge, demonstrating that healing ministry is not reserved for clergy but is the calling of every believer. His vulnerability about failures and mysteries, combined with powerful testimonies of ordinary people seeing extraordinary healings, provides a balanced and compelling case for stepping out in faith despite fear and uncertainty.