Well, people may think they already know all there is to know about healing, but when there's a healing line, more than half the congregation will get in the line for prayer. That tells me they don't know as much about healing as they think. Or that they don't know how to walk in the light of what they know.
Now don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying that ignorance about healing is what causes people to get in the prayer line. Rather, it is not knowing enough about healing and living in divine health that causes them to get in line repeatedly without receiving a lasting result.
No matter how well we know a subject, if we don't continue to practice or review what we know, we will forget some things. For example, after taking two years of typing class in high school, I became a fairly decent typist. Eventually, I joined the U. S. Army and was able to use the Teletype in Army communications.
That was many years ago, and, in recently I've started using email on my computer. I noticed that I am not as proficient a typist as I used to be. I did not keep my skills sharp through regular practice, so I lost some of the typing skills I once had.
A person may have acquired spelling, math or computer skills, but if he hasn't used them in a while, when he does try to use them, he discovers that his skills are rusty. The same thing can happen in spiritual matters.
You see, many Christians know about the subject of healing, but they're not as proficient in healing as they could be—simply because they haven't practiced what they know. In other words, they don't continually study the subject and act on what they have already learned.
There are certain subjects we need to brush up on continually, and healing is one of them. Unfortunately, when a minister begins to teach on the subject of faith or healing or another subject we've heard a lot of teaching on, some Christians think to themselves, "Oh, I already know about that." Then they tune the preacher out, so to speak.
In other words, they think they've already heard all there is to hear on the subject, so they quit listening to the message. But we need to remember that we may not be as proficient in our knowledge as we could be. Besides, it never hurts anyone to review what he has learned.
My dad, Rev. Kenneth E. Hagin, often told the story about a certain man who heard him preach many years ago. This man was an elder in one of the churches where Brother Hagin held regular meetings. The man had heard Brother Hagin preach on Mark 11:24 many times. After one service in which he shared from Mark 11:24, this man said to him, "That's the thirteenth time I've heard you preach on Mark 11:24, and I finally got it."
You see, sometimes it takes us a while to "get it." In other words, sometimes we need to hear something more than once before we really get hold of it and fully understand it. This is especially true for healing—we need to continually sharpen our knowledge of the subject.
Excerpt permission granted by Faith Library Publications