When Pigs Fly: Miracles of Healing - November 9, 2025

It is my privilege to invite you to today's sermon podcast.

I have made the Apostle Paul's prayer request my own.

When he states in Ephesians 6, 19, pray also for me, that whenever I open my

mouth, the words may be given to me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel.

May today's sermon come alive to you and aid you in your understanding of God's plan for your life.

I have a quick show of hands. How many of you in here believe today that God

has the ability to heal someone? Woo!

Blown away. It's like the wave in here, you know, like the football games. That's great.

But have you ever prayed for someone to be healed and God didn't heal them?

Has that ever happened? I'm not alone in that. That can be one of the biggest

tensions for people, both believers and unbelievers, is when you pray and God

doesn't answer that prayer.

And when we know he can heal and God chooses not to, it can be confusing.

It can stir up a lot of questions within us and perhaps even stir up some doubts

within you and for your own faith. Reminded of a story.

Of two kids about the same age, right about four years old.

They both were diagnosed with the same kind of cancer at the same time, one boy and one girl.

And these two would see each other at the cancer clinic, the children's cancer

clinic, when they would go there.

And they would play together sometimes when they were able to,

when they were healthy enough, getting their treatments or having their blood

drawn or the different kind of tests they had. And we come to find out they

attended the same church, but in different locations.

They had a similar kind of religious background. Their families did as well.

And they were both Christians and they both prayed. Of course,

the parents prayed for their children and prayed for one another's children.

Well, as time went on and the treatment continued, one of the two,

the little girl did not make it.

She succumbed to the cancer Despite the best treatment that she was receiving,

The little boy was confused, not sure why Where's my friend?

What's going on? The parents were bewildered Confused, had questions God, why is this happening?

Especially the questions of the little boy Who survived and later overcame that

kind of cancer Why God? Why this one, but not that one?

Both children with their lives ahead of them and trying to figure out,

God, I don't understand.

Well, I don't purport to understand why or to explain to you why today.

I can tell you that with both families, God was with them every step of the way.

And for my family, because I was the dad of that little boy,

Adam, when he asked, Dad, why didn't she make it? She's a Christian.

She believes in Jesus. She believes in Jesus.

I don't know why. I don't know what God's plan is, why God chooses to heal one and not another.

And maybe for us, it's a win-pigs-fly moment, right?

It just seems impossible to understand what's going on here.

But I can tell you, God always has a plan, and nothing, not even suffering,

is wasted in the economy of God.

I wish I could tell you today about the other family and where they ended up

and how things turned out for them.

I can't. All I can tell you is what happened with our family and how God continued to move.

But I do have faith and I do have trust that God did continue to move in the

family that lost their little girl and that God takes broken things and He puts

them back together, takes broken people, broken relationship, broken dreams,

and pieces them back together even for good.

And I can tell you this for certain, that that little girl who succumbed to

sickness here on earth is with her Savior today, present and accountable and

alive more than ever, more than you can ever dream of.

When we look to the Scripture, especially the Old Testament and the New Testament,

we can see that healing happened.

When you look at all the accounts in the Old Testament, we can see a young lady

named Hannah who grew older and never had a child and prayed for a child and

said she would give God this child if he would bless her with one,

she became pregnant and did exactly what she said that she would with that child. A miracle happened.

Some would discount her and say, when pigs fly, you're going to have a baby.

You're way past the age of doing that.

But she had faith and she believed and God moved and God did something incredible.

We see that Elijah raises a little boy from the dead, a miracle that had taken

place. He healed completely this boy who came back to life again.

We even see a miracle about Elijah's successor, Elisha, when he was dead and

gone and his bones were in the grave, that some dead body was thrown in there with him.

And when the body touched the bones, the guy came back to life.

What a story that must have been, right?

But a miracle, an incredible healing miracle.

We see that God instantly healed King Nebuchadnezzar of his insanity.

I want to tell you, there is hope for your crazy relatives out there.

There's biblical support here, but God does that.

He can heal your body. He can heal your mind. He can heal your spirit.

He can heal your emotions.

It's just not an Old Testament phenomenon, this thing we call healing.

When we look to the New Testament, there's over 30 different miracles that were performed.

And really, there's more than that, way more than that, hundreds more implied

that people were healed, that miracles were done.

Just think about Jesus. He healed a blind man.

He opened the ears of the one that was born deaf.

He healed those that had this skin condition of leprosy when they cried out to him.

We even know that Jesus raised the dead.

We know that in the book of Acts, the Apostle Paul was preaching so long one

night that this young person sitting up the upper story window there fell off and became dead.

I mean, that's the Apostle Paul we're talking about.

Don't complain about my sermons unless someone's keeling over dead,

okay? And the length of them.

So what happens? Did they just have the funeral right there since everyone's gathered already? No.

We see a miracle that takes place. And this boy that fell asleep when the church

service was going too long, he was brought back to life.

Incredible miracle, incredible healing that took place.

When we think about all these things Jesus did, the apostles did,

it's astounding the scripture that we want to share this morning from the New

Testament, the gospel of John chapter 14 and verse 12.

John 14 · chapter mention

When we think about all the whole scope of the scripture, all the miracles that took place.

Stand with me as we see this together today in just this one verse, a powerful statement.

Jesus said this in John 14, verse 12, very truly, that means it can be trusted.

John 14:12

Very truly, I tell you, whoever believes in me will do the works I have been

doing and they will do even greater things than these because I am going to my Father.

Wow, let's pray. Father, this is an incredible statement.

Lord, this is a humbling statement, considering all the things that Jesus did,

that he wants to continue that work, not just through the disciples of old,

not just through our forefathers,

Lord, not just through our grandma and grandpas that went to church,

but through us even today.

Lord, that's very humbling. And Lord, we don't know that we can live up to that.

But Father, we want you to have your way in us and through us.

And Father, Lord, impact our life, we pray today. In Jesus' name, amen.

Thank you for honoring God's word. Please be seated.

So the question comes up, well, if God can heal, then why doesn't he?

Or why didn't he heal that migraine headache that kept me from going out to serve at the food bank?

Why didn't God heal my depression when I was down in the dumps and it almost came to my end?

God, why didn't you heal me of that addiction that I just could not break free of?

God, why didn't you save grandma, save her from the illness that ate her up?

These are questions that lead some people to a dark place. Some people are led

because they prayed for a healing and it did not come.

They just assume that God's not real. My prayers were just wasted.

There's no one up there hearing.

It plants that seed of doubt into their life. Some people will say,

well, God's just not a good God.

Because if he has the power to heal, why doesn't he just heal everyone?

And that again throws that gear in the monkey or the monkey wrench in the gear works, whatever.

It's not good. Neither is my illustrations this morning, apparently.

Don't worry, I'm not going to pick on my wife today. I've learned my lesson.

I won't say I have the scars to prove it, but I don't.

Some people will say, well, God just doesn't care. God doesn't care.

These are all real feelings. Doesn't mean they're true, but they're real. People feel them.

People don't know what to do with them. People struggle in their faith because of them.

And so it just brings up something in our mind today.

You see, we do serve a God who does miracles, even healing.

But I got to tell you, he doesn't always do it in the way we expect.

To say it another way, our God heals, but he doesn't heal everyone all the time.

And that's a hard truth for us to take.

It's a hard truth for us to get our head around, to grasp.

Even we see this reflected in the New Testament. There was one of eight friends

that accompanied the Apostle Paul on his journeys, especially his third missionary journey here.

And in 2 Timothy 4.20, there's this guy, Trophimus.

Trophimus was one of Paul's guys. He was there.

They were going out doing mission work, not just the first time or a second

time, but here's his third time. And here's what the scripture said.

Erastus stayed in Corinth, and I left Trophimus sick in Miletus.

Now wait a minute here's a guy that's doing the work of

god right alongside the apostle paul right alongside other godly men you would

think for sure god would heal him of his sickness so he could get out there

and let's plant these churches let's share jesus with people but paul he left

trophimus there in miletus sick.

God chose not to heal him at that moment. God didn't make him whole,

so he could go and continue to be about the work. Even Timothy.

Now, this verse says something that I'm not in favor of, just so you know.

But there's a deeper point behind it, okay?

Timothy was sick, and here's what Paul tells Timothy. Use a little wine because

of your stomach and your frequent illnesses, 1 Timothy 5.23.

Now, there's a medicinal property of the wine, okay?

Don't say, oh, Pastor Mike said, I'm not feeling well.

Don't become a wino on my account, all right? Like, oh, Grandma Clampett on

that show. You know, she had her medicine.

That thing's a little stronger than medicine.

Even Paul cried out, 2 Corinthians 12, 7 through 10.

He cried out, I've got this thorn in the flesh that Satan has put there that

God lets me be afflicted with that keeps me humble.

This thorn in the flesh, he cried out, take it away from me,

God, I can't handle it anymore.

Scholars will debate what it might have been, eyesight or something else.

But nevertheless, God never took that away from the apostle Paul.

Whatever he suffered from, whatever that affliction was, Paul still suffered

that in the midst of everything that he did in the New Testament that's recorded for God.

So while God can heal, he doesn't always heal everyone.

And not everyone all the time. Now, there's some religious folks,

and be careful here, if you count yourself as one of those, because I've heard

this said before, well, the reason you're not healed is because you got sin in your life somewhere.

Come on, heathen, repent so God can heal you.

Others will say, no, you just don't have enough faith. You don't believe in God enough.

So if you only had more faith, then God would heal you. Eh, that's wrong.

Consider Job in the Old Testament, right? I mean, that blows some of these excuses away.

Another thing is it's not just sin, but you're doing something wrong in your

life, so why is God going to heal you so you can keep doing the wrong stuff?

You know, just a little bit of truth maybe to some of these, but it's not why.

And so what I want to do this morning is just give to you three reasons maybe

why Jesus didn't do some miracles, why Jesus didn't bring about healing.

And I'm not, again, saying I can answer the question, why does God heal some

and not others? I wish I had the answer to that.

But what I can tell you is these three reasons. First of all,

Jesus didn't do miracles or healing all the time because he refused to perform

miracles to prove himself,

to prove that he was the Son of God, to prove that he was who he said he was.

In Mark 8, verse 11 and 12, the scripture says this, the Pharisees came and

Mark 8:11

began to question Jesus.

To test him, they asked him for a sign from heaven, a miracle.

Scripture says, Jesus sighed deeply. And he said, why does this generation ask for a sign?

Truly, I tell you, no sign will be given to it.

I mean, it kind of echoes, the Pharisees here kind of echo the temptation of Christ. Remember?

Hey, the enemy, Satan, took him up to the highest point and said,

just cast yourself off of here.

Come on, you want to prove you're the Messiah to the whole world?

This is the time to do it. Just throw yourself down.

Doesn't the scripture say, after all, that he will not even let your foot hit the ground.

Go on, do it. Prove to everyone. Jesus wasn't going to prove who he was that way.

That wasn't God's plan for his son, Jesus.

To do these miracles to show that he's the amazing Jesus. And here he is to

do another miracle to show that he's the son of God.

That wasn't who Jesus was. It's not who Jesus is today.

He doesn't have to prove himself. You either accept who he is by faith or you don't accept him at all.

It's not because of who Jesus or what Jesus did that we trust him for healing.

Secondly, Jesus didn't do miracles, didn't do healings, because it says he never

performed a miracle that interfered with God's ultimate plan.

I want to tell you this morning, for each and every one of you,

God has a plan, a general plan that all should be saved, but a specific plan

of how God has created you to serve him and to serve others,

to live out your life in holiness.

God's got this great and mighty plan for you. We know that toward the end of

Christ's life on earth, the night he was betrayed, when they were in a garden

praying, that Judas betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.

And then he led the entourage of the temple guard to come out and to arrest Jesus.

And the sign of who Jesus was, was going to be a kiss from Judas.

What we affectionately call a Judas kiss, right?

And so at that time, in the garden, the scripture tells us Judas went up and he kissed Jesus.

And by that, they knew who to arrest. And when the guards came up to arrest

Jesus, to take him as prisoner, to take him back, give him the kangaroo court

that they had planned for him,

it says that Peter took out his sword or a dagger and cut off this guy's ear named Malchus.

Man, Peter was bold for Jesus. You ain't touching my Savior.

You better back up. Took that sword. Watch out now.

Peter was defending Christ. Now that seems like the right thing to do,

doesn't it? But you know what?

Jesus had a different plan right then.

The plan wasn't to live by the sword or die by the sword. So what does Jesus

do? He picks up Malchus's ear and he heals him.

Can you imagine being that guy?

You're going out there, think you're zealous for God. You're going to arrest

this guy, Jesus, who's stirring up trouble.

One of his followers cuts your ear off and then you get healed by the guy that

you're coming to arrest.

Man, I bet there's a story behind that we've got to ask in heaven.

Hey, could you tell me where Malchus is? I've got a question for him.

See, Jesus had a different plan. We get a hint of that plan here in Matthew

26, 53, especially for this moment.

Because Jesus says, don't you realize that I could ask my father for thousands

of angels to protect us, and he would send them instantly?

Jesus says, I could have done a bigger miracle here.

But then he says, but if I did, how would the scriptures be fulfilled that describe what must happen now?

See, Jesus had to be arrested. He had to be tried in an unfair trial.

This was part of God's plan for the Messiah, for the suffering servant.

Now, I appreciate Peter. I appreciate his zeal.

I appreciate his love for the Savior. And I don't know if this incident stirred

within him what Jesus predicted would happen later on when he would deny Christ three times.

And that all seems ugly. And maybe we've experienced that when we've prayed

for someone, when we've prayed for someone to be healed and it just hasn't happened.

And we get these twisted feelings and we're like, God, are you real?

Did you hear me? Did you not hear what I wanted to happen?

And maybe we're not listening to God to hear, well, I had a different plan.

I had something greater at work. and aren't you glad that Peter struggled with

this even through the denials because we see later on toward the end of the

Gospels that Peter is restored,

and that Peter later receives the Holy Spirit of God and we see all that happened

through his ministry and the apostles' ministry.

God's got a greater plan at work that maybe we don't always understand that

we can't comprehend this side of eternity and while it's easy for me to say

that The reality of dealing with that on our own is difficult.

And I don't discount that whatsoever.

But Jesus just didn't do miracles to do miracles to prove who he was.

He didn't do things that interfered with God's greater plan.

And third, he didn't do miracles when there was no faith.

We're told, and I talked about this last week, I believe, or the week before,

that when Jesus went back to his hometown and he was ready to minister there

in his hometown, people just said, well, isn't this just Joseph's son, the carpenter's son?

You know, kind of like, this guy's not going to do much. How can we believe

what's going on with this Jesus guy?

And the scripture records, Matthew 13, 58, and he did not do many miracles there

because of their lack of faith, because they did not believe who he was.

They did not believe what he could do.

And so faith is key in this, folks.

Faith is so important because I want to tell you, our faith,

the faith that we have in Christ, it moves the heart of God.

The faith that you have in not seeing Jesus and not having talked to him personally

one-on-one and not having felt his hands,

not having him seen and lived to heal somebody else, not seeing him one-on-one,

that kind of faith that you still believe in Jesus, it amazes God.

It moves his heart. I think about this. We're told in scripture,

I think the references there, that Jesus is walking through a crowd and the

crowd is so big that, man, you're just kind of squished and trying to make elbow room.

And through that, someone touches Jesus and he stops and he said, who touched me?

And the disciples were like, dude, what are you talking about?

Look how crowded we are. What do you mean who touched you?

He said, I felt the power go out from me. It just so happens that there was

a lady who had what the scripture calls an issue of blood. She couldn't stop bleeding.

We're not told where, but we can imagine there's a scope of medical science,

what it would say it would be.

But she had an ailment. She couldn't stop. And she had faith that if she just

touched the very hem of Jesus' garment, that she would be healed. That's a huge faith.

And this faith amazed God. And we're told in the scripture in Mark 5,

34, Jesus says, daughter, your faith has healed you.

Your faith that just by touching the hem of the garment, that would make Jesus

ceremonially unclean by being touched by a woman that had this issue of blood.

Jesus didn't care about that religious rule right here and right now.

He cared about this woman and that the great amount of faith she had,

she was healed because of that. Oh, the power.

There was a guy with leprosy who fell at Jesus' feet to worship him.

And in Luke 17, 19, we're told Jesus says, rise and go.

Your faith has made you whole or made you well.

Just the faith, Jesus says, you've got this irritating skin condition where

no one can be around you because they're afraid they're going to catch it and

their nose is going to fall off and their fingers are going to come numb,

nubs, nubs. Yeah, they're going to fall off basically.

Horrible disease. Bows down and worships Jesus and Jesus says,

your faith has healed you. Get up and go.

A blind man cries out, Lord, have mercy on me.

And in Mark 10, 52, Jesus says, go, your faith has healed you.

The faith, the belief that I can heal you, Jesus said, that's taken care of

it. I know you're trusting me for that.

So get up and go about your business.

Our faith moves the heart of God.

I want you to know that also our faith amazes Jesus. When Jesus saw faith in people, he was amazed.

He was amazed at that.

Remember the story of the Roman centurion who had a sick servant,

and he goes to Jesus, and he tells Jesus all about his servant that's sick at home.

Jesus, I know that if you just say the word, I'll go back and I know he's going to be made well.

I'm not even worthy for you. I'm a Roman centurion. I'm not worthy of you to

come under my roof. But if you just say the word, Jesus, I know that he will be healed.

The scripture says that Jesus heard him and that Jesus was amazed and that Jesus

had not seen such great faith in all of Israel.

Jesus is talking to a Roman, the occupiers, the ungodly.

But yet here's a man who trusts Jesus, who had faith in who Jesus was and in his ability to heal.

This was a wow kind of faith.

Don't you like those wow moments? You know, maybe you do your taxes and you

think you're owing all kinds of money.

And so you send a check with your tax form in, or I guess it's electronic now, maybe.

And then you get back a letter and you're like, oh, great. How much more do

I owe? And you open the letter and maybe it's a wow moment.

I'm actually getting a refund. Woo.

You know, it's this wow. wow, this was the kind of moment right here,

I think, for Jesus. This man's faith, wow, Jesus, he was amazed.

But again, thinking back to the passage I just referenced a few moments ago,

when Jesus went to his hometown, it was another kind of wow moment.

Like, wow, I can't even believe you said that.

Like, wow, did you really just do that?

When at his hometown, this is just Joseph's son. This is just the carpenter's

son. He's not some kind of religious guru that everyone's talking about.

So our faith might amaze Jesus in one of two ways. Either wow or wow, really?

So I'll leave that up to you to say where your faith is out right now.

But when it comes to your faith, your faith can move the heart of God.

You don't have to have a big faith either, okay?

Just pray with what faith that you do have, even if it's just like a little

mustard seed, even a tiny amount of faith. Pray with all the faith you have.

Because you know what? God will take that mustard seed, and what does the mustard

seed do when it's planted?

That little mustard seed grows in this huge plant.

Scripture talks about that. The plant's big enough for birds to come and land on it and nest in it.

Even if you have just a little bit of faith today, folks, I want to tell you,

pray with all that faith that you have.

God will grow that if you just begin to exercise it, if you begin to trust Him with that faith.

Aim for the kind of faith that amazes God.

Not a fake kind of showy kind of faith, but just a real faith.

That's just you believing.

Even when other people are saying, no, that ain't going to happen.

Forget that. When pigs fly, that's not going to come down. That's not going to happen.

Say, no, I believe it will. I believe Jesus can do this. Pray with that kind of faith.

We know last week I referenced the dad in the Bible whose kid kept throwing

himself into the pond to be drowned or throwing himself into the fire because

he was possessed by a demon, just could not get well.

And Jesus said, if you can do anything, or the man said, Jesus,

if you could do anything.

And Jesus said, well, if I could do anything, Everything's possible for him who believes.

And then in Mark 9, 24, it says, Immediately the boy's father exclaimed, I do believe!

Help my unbelief.

Maybe deep down you believe that Jesus can do it, but there's so many different

things clouding the way that you're just not sure.

Maybe you're not setting your expectations too high in Jesus because you've

been hurt before and you just haven't understood why.

Or you're just not sure God can do it. Will God hear me?

Maybe believe like some people have told you before. You don't have enough faith.

You got too much sin in your life.

This, that, or the other thing. God's not going to hear you.

Well, God will hear you. Confess that sin, get it out of your life for one.

Secondly, even if you just have a little mustard seed, be like this man,

help me overcome my unbelief and trust God that he's gonna be at work.

Still pray and believe the best that you're able to believe that God will move

and that God will do something.

Trust him in that.

Remember, our faith isn't based on what God does, but our faith is based on who God is. Yes.

God will heal when he wants to heal, but our faith shouldn't be based on that healing.

Our faith should be based in Jesus Christ, the one who is the son of God,

who came to earth to be born as a baby, to grow up and to live a sinless life,

to go through the same kind of temptations and experiences we all go through,

to be betrayed by his best friends, and then to hang on a cross and die an innocent

man for all of us who were guilty, for all those that were out in the crowd,

throwing rocks at him, spitting on him, making fun of him, mocking him.

Jesus was giving up his life for them, for us today, a couple millennia down the road.

Why did Jesus do that?

Because of his character, because of his attribute of love for us.

How do I know that? Well, I know it because of John 3, 16, for God so loved the world.

Talking about all the people in the world.

God loved you so much that he would not want to see you perishing.

Expiring, dying without that restored relationship between you and between God.

It's God's character that we can trust.

Faith doesn't rest on what God does or doesn't do, but it's based in his character,

which was proven on the cross for you and for me.

Jesus proved how much he loves you. Matter of fact, there's a scripture in the

Bible. I believe it's Romans 5, 8.

But God demonstrates his love for us in this. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

The innocent dying for the guilty. When Jesus came to earth,

that was his highest purpose.

His highest purpose wasn't just to go and to start healing people.

His purpose in coming to earth wasn't to go and start raising the dead from

the grave or doing amazing things or floating high above Jerusalem so that people

would believe he was who he said he was.

His highest purpose, as someone once said was, he was born to die.

He was born as a human being to die as a human being to become the sacrifice for all of our sin.

But we know it didn't stop there because we know after he was put in the grave,

that three days later he rose again, victorious over sin, victorious over death.

Jesus' purpose wasn't to heal bodies, but it was to save souls.

Your soul and my soul, that eternal part of us forever.

That's why Jesus came. Remember a few weeks back, I had talked about the four

guys who dropped their buddy through the hole in the roof.

Remember what Jesus said at that time? He didn't say, whoa, what's going on here?

Okay, buddy, you're healed. Get out of here. I'm trying to teach. He didn't say that.

Remember what Jesus said. Before Jesus healed his body, Jesus perceived the

thoughts of the Pharisees, what was coming down the pike there,

and he forgave him his sins first.

What was Jesus' primary mission? To seek and save that which was lost. Here's a lost man.

Yeah, his body was broken, not able to be used completely, but Jesus heals him

first by forgiving him of his sin.

I got a spoiler alert for you.

Lazarus, when he was raised by his friend Jesus, he died again.

Every other person that was raised in the Old Testament, raised from the grave,

came back to life, they died again.

I got to tell you, even these that are healed today, unless Jesus returns first,

they're going to die again, but not an eternal death.

And that's what Jesus came to take care of once and for all on the cross.

Every person that was ever healed in Scripture eventually died,

but there's going to be a day where that death will have no more victory over them. All right?

There's an eternal aspect here that we can't miss in this.

I've seen God heal. I've got stories in my family of God healing.

These stories build your faith because they know there's a God that encounters his creation.

I've seen God choose not to heal. God has not answered some of my prayers in

the affirmative for healing.

I'm grateful there's been some that he's answered. But I believe God can heal.

And I believe God will heal.

Even if he doesn't, there's an eternal perspective in mind.

Something so vital that we must believe in. And so this morning,

I just want you to pray with all the faith that you have, imperfect as it may be.

Just pray. Will you trust God's goodness and trust God's character above all?

That even when you don't understand what he's doing, but you know God's heart,

you know that God is love in who he is, in his character.

And that even though we go through difficult things, as the scripture says in

the Old Testament, yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.

That even if God chooses not to heal me, that that's not the final word.

That God has got something greater in store for me, for you,

for those that are asking for him to heal.

Remember, God's ultimate purpose is not in your healing of your body,

but God's ultimate purpose is in the salvation of your soul for all eternity.

Got to tell you this morning.

I want to thank you for joining today's sermon podcast. You can find a copy

of today's sermon as well as other sermons and the sermon outline from today

on our church's website,

www.mvcnaz.org.

It is my prayer also that you will seek out a church home that recognizes the authority of the Bible.