Nigel Mumford - This Is Where Your Healing Begins

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2020 Nigel Mumford

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ISBN 978-0-7852-3318-3 (eBook)

ISBN 978-0-7852-3316-9 (TP)

Epub Edition January 2020 9780785233183

Library of Congress Control Number:2019952653

Printed in the United States of America

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CONTENTS

This book is dedicated to
Dr. Francis and Judith MacNutt
For the years of friendship, mentoring, and
joy in the vineyard of the Lord.
Thank you for your extraordinary kindness.
You are both very dear souls.

N igel Mumford and I go back a long way, and I have enormous respect for him as a person and for his remarkable ministry of healing and deliverance. We are all uniqueGod doesnt do duplicatesbut I cant help but feel that Nigel is in some way more unique than others. He defies pigeonholing, categorization, and sometimes the rulebook: for an Anglican minister he can be distinctly un-Anglican, and I like that. Yet he is a man of God and does extraordinary things in the name of Jesus, and thats good enough for me.

The theme of this book has to do with practicing the ministry of healing and the miraculous healings that result from such a ministry. Frankly, that presents a challenge not just to me but to every Christian. Almost all of us agree that miracles occur today, but there are aspects that are far from straightforward. The miraculous or supernatural restoration of health raises many questions. Why do some people have the gift of healing and others not? Why can a single, simple prayer heal one sick person and the fervent prayers of thousands be ineffective for another? How do we balance prayer for healing and modern medicine? How important is our faith in seeing a cure happen? Is miraculous healing a rare exception or something we should expect more frequently?

I have no easy answers to these and other questions, and Im wary of those who do. I do not have the gift of healing, and I suspect it is far more widely claimed than genuinely present. Nigel, however, is one of the few people I know who genuinely does have the gift of healing and has, over many years, not just spoken on it but also practiced it with remarkable results. As a former Royal Marine, Nigel knows that two sorts of people write about war: the academics who have never strayed from their desks and the soldiers who were there on the battlefront. This is a book from the front line; this is Nigels territory. He has walked the talk, and Im prepared to listen to what he has to say.

As it pertains to healing and the related subjects raised here, I feel that any treatment of them needs to have a number of characteristics.

First, it needs to be stimulating. Its often supposed that facts give rise to belief. In fact, the reality is more complex: what we believe influences what we accept to be facts. And with healing and other related areas, its easy to let our own particular theological position govern how we see things. Nigelever a man to wade in and act while everybody else stands by, discussing what they should doasks questions, challenges assumptions, and proposes alternatives. Who else but Nigel would encourage us to give thanks to God as we take our medicine? (And, by the way, why not?) Its hard not to read this book without pausing to consider our own opinion on such matters. You will no doubt find yourself asking that very useful question: Is what Ive always believed actually the truth?

Second, it needs to be sensitive. A great deal of harm has been done not just to individuals but to the name of Christ by reckless, clumsy, and sometimes exaggerated claims about healing. Healing is not magic done for the praise of the practitioner or even the benefit of the church but for the restoration to health of individual men and women whom God cares for deeply. Love and grace must be present. Here, too, this book scores strongly: Nigel retains a pastoral heart in what he does and says.

Third, any discussion of these matters needs to be sensible. How do we balance prayer and prescriptions, miracles and medicine, the works of the Spirit and those of the surgeon? We are all aware of horror stories of individuals who, trusting in prayer, have thrown away their medicines with dreadful consequences. How do we deal with the complex relationship between body, mind, and spirit? Again, Nigela veteran of hospital treatment himselftreads carefully and wisely.

Finally, any discussion needs to be scriptural. With respect to healing and these other matters, Gods Word gives us a framework that we must work within. It sets limits beyond which we must not go: for example, we must never put healing of the body above our relationship with God. Yet it also sets goals for the practice of healing: it must all be done to the praise and glory of Father, Son, and Spirit. Here, too, Nigel is surefooted and keeps the focus on God.