When God Doesn't Heal Now

HThis honest, mature message affirms God's healing role while challenging the enduring myths many evangelical Christians harbor about healing. A myth, says Keefauver, usually has a kernel of truth from Scripture and personal experience but ""is rooted in the experience of some and then masquerades as truth for all."" One myth is that people are healed by their own faith. ""Your healing doesn't depend on your faith,"" Keefauver tells readers, ""but on the One in whom you place your faith."" He also challenges the myths that healing requires being touched by the right evangelist or preacher or that the perfect kind of prayer can move God into performing a healing. One of the book's most passionate chapters explores the basic theodicy question: Why would a loving God permit pain and suffering? Keefauver refutes the notion that disease is a punishment for sin (one of his congregants thought that her breast and cervical cancers were God's punishment for her teenage pregnancy and abortion decades before). The book contains some powerful stories of miraculous healings but also profiles those who come home from revivals dejected, ill and doubting God. Why does God heal some now and not others? Keefauver's title reflects his view that the ultimate healing is eternal salvation, not cure from physical disease, and that those who grow closer to God during their illnesses are also, in the eternal scheme of things, victorious. (Feb.)