Inner Healing in the New Testament
But I say unto you, That whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: and whosoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be in danger of the council: but whosoever shall say, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.
Matthew 5:22
In Luke 11:20, Jesus said that if He was driving out demons by the finger of God, then the Kingdom had come upon those listening. While all the other miracles of the Old Testament had been done previously by other prophets, deliverance was unique to the New Covenant, and, by this verse, a distinguishing feature of the Kingdom being present. Despite a small faction in so call “liberal” theologians that attempt to say different, demons, or evil spirits, are presented as the primary cause for many ailments and behaviors. The basic difference between a Pharisee and Sadducee was that the Pharisee believed in the resurrection from the dead and evil spirits, while the others did not. Obviously Jesus believed in evil spirits, because He cast them out of people!
So, the understanding of the role of deliverance in the New Covenant is quite understood. So much as healing is the children’s bread, and Jesus said this in reference to casting out a demon (Matthew 15:26), this is just as necessary in the Kingdom as healing and salvation is (the Greek word for “salvation” generally indicates all three). But, where does this leave the place of inner healing in the New Testament? This was a stumbling block for a while for myself, until it suddenly occurred to me, as deliverance and the miraculous is the apparent half of the gospel, the inner work of the heart is its covered, veiled, or hidden work. The other “half”.
