Menyoal Konsep Kesembuhan Tubuh: Suatu Kajian Teologis

The Bible records many texts dealing with the subject of healing the body. This study uses a literature approach by digging sources from journal articles and books and then analyzing them using the Bible to produce in-depth and comprehensive theological conclusions. The conclusion of this study shows that healing of the body can occur through natural healing, medical healing, and divine healing miracles or miracles. The implication is theological; Christians may believe that miracle healing still exists and can pray to God so that healing that comes from Him can be experienced now. And the practical implication is that Christians must still be responsible for taking care of their bodies' health proportionally because their bodies are the temple of God.

SPIRIT POSSESSION IN EVANGELISM

Spirit possession is associated with good and bad Spirits. The good spirits comes in loving relationship while the bad is to be cast out. There has been confusion concerning the manner of casting out or healing in the churches. Those who practice it, want to link their practices to the ministry of Jesus. There are frequent testimonies to divine healing at evangelism campaigns, however, there are small number of definite miracles of healing compared to the great numbers who were prayed for. The healing may be termed ‘miraculous’ in the sense of being a wonderful sign of God’s activity. The findings from the research, was that the healing was real. Some miracles were instantaneous, others take some time to manifest. The miracles lead to conversion of the individual. The method adopted in the research is critical analysis and socio-religious.

Do Persons with Disability Need Healing?

Much has been written on disability care and support from human rights, cultural, and religious perspectives around the world. However, there is still a paucity of information on the experiences of Persons with Disability (pwd) in their divine healing and deliverance encounter with the African Pentecostal Churches (apc) in Zimbabwe. This qualitative phenomenological study seeks to establish the lived experiences of 28 pwd s within the selected four apc s operating in the Harare province of Zimbabwe. The central questions underpinning this study were whether pwd need divine healing, and are they getting healed? The study used the religious model of disability and the Pentecostal ‘hermeneutic of healing’ as theoretical frameworks. While healing is essential to physical life, the findings show that pwd need dignity, recognition, and compassion more than the uncertain promises of divine healing. In the premises of the preceding, the study concludes and recommends that pwd receive holistic material and psychosocial support and that they stop endlessly chasing after a physical healing.

Plague, Pentecostalism, and Pastoral Guidance

Plagues and pandemics are nothing new for the Christian church. Throughout its history, believers have been forced to grapple with outbreaks, the latest being the COVID-19 crisis of 2020. As a relatively young branch of the Christian faith, Pentecostalism itself does not have a great deal of experience with this subject compared to many older traditions. In addition, with its emphasis on divine healing, a triumphalist attitude has unfortunately hindered some segments of the movement from developing a robust response to sickness and suffering at all. Martin Luther’s sixteenth-century response to the Black Death outbreak in Germany, however, might offer a prime example for contemporary Pentecostals to emulate. His pastoral wisdom, approach to suffering, and distinctive theology of the cross together compose a prudent yet ultimately optimistic take on how Christians should behave in such instances, making his voice an invaluable one for the contemporary church to learn from.

Pentecostalism in America

American Pentecostalism is a Christian movement that takes its name from the ecstatic empowerment of early Christians on the Jewish feast of Pentecost, described in Acts 2:1–4 of the New Testament. Known for its enthusiastic worship, the movement holds that the supernatural gifts and manifestations described in the Bible are still available to Christians who have been “filled with the Spirit” through an experience known as “baptism in (or with) the Holy Spirit (or Holy Ghost).” These gifts and manifestations include divine healing, prophecy, and—most notably—glossolalia, also known as “speaking in tongues,” a form of ecstatic vocalization that Pentecostals equate with the spiritual phenomenon of that description found in the New Testament. The origins of Pentecostalism trace to the Wesleyan-inspired Holiness movement of the 19th century, which pursued Christian perfection through “entire sanctification,” an experience subsequent to salvation said to enable Christians to live a sinless life. Most adherents equated sanctification with baptism in the Holy Ghost. By the late 19th century, Holiness had broadened into an ecumenical, multiracial movement whose most zealous advocates sought to recover the power and practices of 1st-century “Apostolic” Christianity, expected the imminent Second Coming of Christ, and embraced uninhibited worship. In 1901, Holiness evangelist and Bible school teacher Charles Fox Parham identified glossolalia as the telltale sign of Holy Ghost baptism in the New Testament, and a revival featuring that manifestation erupted at his school in Topeka, Kansas. Parham promoted the new teaching throughout the lower Midwest, founding a string of “Apostolic Faith” missions. In 1906, an African American Holiness preacher who had briefly affiliated with Parham, William Joseph Seymour, carried the Apostolic Faith message to Los Angeles, where he founded a mission on Azusa Street and led an epochal revival that drew many into the new “Pentecostal” movement. Early Pentecostalism had no hierarchy or authoritative structures and quickly succumbed to doctrinal controversies. First, a dispute over entire sanctification separated “Holiness Pentecostals,” who adhered to the original Wesleyan teaching, from “Reformed” adherents who viewed sanctification as a process realized progressively over a lifetime. Shortly thereafter, a “Oneness” or “Jesus Name” branch emerged among Pentecostals who rejected the doctrine of the Trinity. Formal denominations developed within each of these three branches, although many Pentecostals remained independent of formal affiliation. The middle decades of the 20th century witnessed rapid growth and institutional proliferation within Pentecostalism amid two parallel trends: professionalization and bureaucratization on the one side, and revitalization currents like the divine healing or “Deliverance” movement on the other. Meanwhile, Pentecostal beliefs and practices spread through mainline Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Orthodox churches, giving rise to the Charismatic Movement. These various strains overlapped and converged in a variety of “neo-Pentecostal” forms over succeeding decades, inspiring creative and controversial expressions such as the Prosperity Gospel, entrepreneurial networks of apostles, and new denominations like Vineyard USA. Pentecostalism in the 21st century reflects the entirety of this historical legacy and thus forms a manifold tapestry of extraordinary range and complexity.

Greening Faith and Herbology in Pentecostalism in Zimbabwe

The role of religion in ecological discourse has gained ground in the quest to improve people’s lives in society. Herbal medicine is known to treat complex diseases. However, there are complexities in protecting the environment since herbal medicine entails having an in-depth understanding of traditional knowledge systems, beliefs, and practices. Pentecostal churches in Zimbabwe such as the Apostolic Faith Mission (AFM) have remained impervious to the widespread campaign promoting the use of herbs as an effective healing treatment. Divine healing is central to the AFM, and thus they view traditional herbal medicines as originating from evil spirits, despite scriptures referring to herbs as both food and medicine. Accordingly, developing a theology of ‘greening faith’ in the AFM will foster a constructive attitude toward the use of traditional herbal medicines. This article examines the position of the AFM on traditional herbal medicine and utilises ecotheology as its theoretical framework together with data gathered through in-depth interviews. The article concludes that the AFM should consciously use faith to protect the environment and promote the health and well-being of its believers.

Innovation or Competition? A Critical Analysis of Contemporary Divine Healing Practices of Pentecostal Africans in Africa and the Diaspora

This article examines current practices of divine healing of Pentecostal Africans. It provides insights into current developments by using the explanatory concepts of innovation, competition, and agency. The article draws on data obtained through an interdisciplinary, transnational, and multisite investigation of eight Pentecostal churches in Kampala, Nairobi, Cape Town, and London. Methods used included ethnographic observation, visual ethnography, and semistructured interviews. Pentecostal Africans in Africa and the diaspora, this article argues, are simultaneously reenacting centuries-old faith-informed healing practices and creatively reinventing aspects of these practices to assert their relevance in a postmodern world characterized by religious plurality, competition, and secularism.

The Nazaretha, Zionists, and Other Rebels in Segregated South Africa

Zionist churches proliferated in South Africa’s segregation era amid a global revival of the doctrine of divine healing. Among the nearly eight hundred new denominations that emerged were some of the largest Zionist churches, including Ignatius Lekganyane’s Zion Christian Church (ZCC) and Isaiah Shembe’s Nazaretha Church. All of these new denominations took root in the absence of government recognition and during a period when church-state relations were in flux. Many Zionists found ways to work around and in spite of segregation-era laws, but these efforts occasionally ended in disaster—as at Bulhoek in 1921. For scholars, Zionist churches have long posed problems of categorization. Scholars once imagined Zionists as embodying a distinctively African expression of faith, but important new scholarship has challenged this understanding. The time is ripe, however, to reassess what made Zionists different. This entry looks to Zionists’ doctrine and methods of evangelism to understand them as segregation-era rebels.

Reading the Fourfold Gospel From the Two Creation Stories in Genesis: A Creation Theological Understanding of the Fourfold Gospel for Holistic Mission

The Fourfold Gospel of regeneration, sanctification, divine healing, and the Second Coming was introduced to Korea in the early 20th century and played a crucial role in developing the Korea Holiness Churches. It seems, however, that the previous understanding of the Fourfold Gospel has some limitations in helping Christians to participate in missio Dei. Because missiological hermeneutics of the Fourfold Gospel has focused mainly on the theology of redemption, it has frequently led to a narrow understanding of missio Dei. Through the reading of the two creation stories in Genesis, we can recognize that God’s creative works already have redemptive meanings and that His redemptive works already have creative/creational meanings. In this sense, it is also possible to see the Fourfold Gospel from a creation theological perspective. This understanding may positively motivate Christians to participate in missio Dei to restore and complete God’s creation as his vicegerents and stewards.