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[Thankful]

Hello,
I have a question about the people in the Bible that were healed by Jesus (and even by the apostles). When these people in the Bible experienced healings does this also mean that they have been saved and redeemed by Jesus as well?

[jimwalton]

Great question, thanks for asking.

Physical healing, even by Jesus, has nothing to do with salvation. Salvation is based on someone choosing to repent of their sins and align their lives with Jesus. Just being healed by Jesus doesn't mean they experienced salvation.

I'm anticipating that you may say, "But they had to have faith to be healed, right?" Yes, but there are different kinds of faith in the Bible, and faith means different things.

• Faith is "complete trust or confidence in someone or something." This is the commonplace use of the word apart from any religious significance, such as when a person has faith in a chair to support his weight or has faith in his employee to do a job well.
• Faith is "firm belief in something for which there is no proof." This is the definition unbelievers often use to ridicule believers, insisting that they, unlike religious people, trust only in that which is demonstrable. This is not the biblical definition of faith. (I've included it in this list because of its popular appeal, but it's not one of the ways the Bible defines faith.)
• Faith is "belief in, trust in, and loyalty to God." This is an explicitly religious definition, in many ways similar to the theological definition of faith as involving knowledge, assent, and trust. Faith here is pictured as going beyond belief in certain facts to include commitment to and dependence on God.
• Faith is "a system of religious beliefs." This is what is meant when one speaks of "the Protestant faith" or "the Jewish faith." What is largely in view here is a set of doctrines. The Bible uses the word in this way in passages such as Jude 3.

The faith required for healing is different from salvation faith. They were coming to Jesus believing in His power and trusting in His ability to heal them, which is the first step in recognizing Jesus as God. But it was not salvation faith where they choose to actually align with Jesus. When Jesus healed the ten lepers (Lk. 17), only 1 bothered to return to even thank Him. There's no indication they repented of their sins and aligned themselves with Jesus. When Jesus raised Jairus's daughter from the dead, we are not told that the daughter later made any kind of commitment to Him in faith. One might think she did, but it's not the healing who saved her but instead her future commitment.

We can talk about this more if you have more questions or want to talk about it further.