Transcript Introduction to Biblical Health and Healing

Introduction to Biblical
Health and Healing
Patrick Pun, MD
Creating Christian Culture
CGS Grad and Career 2003
Acknowledgements
• “A Sure Foundation” Health Care Bible
Study by Patrick Pulliam, MD
www.thesmi.org
• Summer Medical Institute 2000, 2002,
2003
Biblical Health and Healing
• Take one snake and
pass it down.....
Overview
I. The Current State of Healthcare
II. The god of this Age and health care
III. A Biblical Understanding of Health
IV. Creating Christian Culture in Healthcare
The Current State of Healthcare
• Access, rising costs, uninsured, malpractice
• The patient/provider relationship suffers
• The attitudes and expectations of patients
and providers about medicine and health
Something has gone wrong in the practice of medicine, and we all
know it. It is ironic that in this era, dominated by technical prowess
and rapid biomedical advances, patient and physician each feels
increasingly rejected by the other. Clearly, one root of the problem
lies in the patient-doctor relationship. High technology tends to
dehumanize care, and third-party regulations, paperwork, and
malpractice threats distract the doctor. Nevertheless, the
responsibility for dissatisfaction with modern medical care lies not
only with the patient and the system but also with the physician.
Richard Gorlin, M.D.
Access is a symbol;
the real issue is us.
John Ring, M.D.
(President of the AMA, 1991)
Is there no balm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
Why then is there no healing
for the wound of my people?
Jeremiah 8:22
The god of this age: Naturalism
• Worldview: Basic assumptions about the
reality and nature of all things
• To understand the culture of medicine
today, we need to look beyond the “matrix”
to see operating system, fundamental beliefs
The Operating System:
Naturalism
• A world without God, without Creator
The Operating System:
Naturalism
• A world without God, without Creator
• Therefore, man has become the measure
of all things. Nothing else that matters
The Operating System:
Naturalism
• A world without God, without Creator
• Therefore, man has become the measure of
all things. Nothing else that matters
• Reductionistic: since we are rational
beings, we try to understand the universe
by reducing everything to its basic
principles.
Naturalism
“[Naturalism is] a worldview based on the idea that
the final reality is impersonal matter or energy
shaped into its present form by impersonal
chance…. Humanism is the placing of Man at the
center of all things and making him the measure of
all things…. [Man begins] with himself, with no
knowledge except what he himself can discover and
no standards outside himself. In this view Man is
the measure of all things, as the Enlightenment
expressed it.”
Francis Schaeffer
Implications of Naturalism
•Science and technology can understand and
solve all of man’s problems
•People no longer seen as purposeful, spiritual
beings; we are reduced to biologic machines
Implications of Naturalism in
Health Care
•Goal is to make humans “work better” as
biological entities
•Method is through research, understanding of
disease and cure, further development of
science and technology
Problems of Naturalism
Mr. K is a 46 yo man with severe alcoholic
liver disease. Over the past 2 months, he has
been hospitalized 3 times in the the intensive
care unit for life threatening GI bleeding
secondary to his continued heavy alcohol
abuse. He requires all of the resources of the
ICU and barely survives each time. He is told
that if he continues drinking, he will not live
2 months. He says that he has tried to quit
many times in the past, and knows that
alcohol will likely kill him. When asked if he
has anything to live for, he is unsure.
Problems of Naturalism
Mr. P is a 65 yo with gastric cancer which was
treated with chemotherapy 4 years ago and now
deemed miraculously “disease free.” Yet on
repeated outpatient office visits, he refuses to
take his prescribed blood pressure medications
and he has taken up smoking. When asked why
he is seemingly unconcerned about his health ,
he says “I don’t have anything to live for.”
The Problems of Naturalism
• Is this a solely biological problem?
• More than biological machines
• More to this world than reductionistic
principles
• More to this life than being “disease free”
The Problems of Naturalism
– “And yet purpose remains an inescapable element in human life.
Human beings do entertain purposes and set out to achieve them.
The immense achievements of modern science themselves are,
very obviously, the outcome of the purposeful efforts of hundreds
of thousands of men and women dedicated to the achievement of
something that is valuable – a true understanding of how things
are. A strange fissure thus runs right through the consciousness of
modern Western man. The ideal that he seeks would eliminate all
ideals. With dedicated zeal he purposes to explain the world as
something that is without purpose…. We all engage in purposeful
activity, and we judge ourselves and others in terms of success in
achieving the purposes that we set before ourselves. Yet we accept
as the final product of this purposeful activity a picture of the
world from which purpose has been eliminated.” Leslie Newbigin
Response to Naturalism:
Existentialism
– Existentialism arose to address the
emptiness of Naturalism
Response to Naturalism:
Existentialism
– Existentialism arose to address the
emptiness of Naturalism
– Existentialism is the idea that we need to
create our own meaning out of life
Response to Naturalism:
Existentialism
– Existentialism arose to address the
emptiness of Naturalism
– Existentialism is the idea that we need to
create our own meaning out of life
– Gave birth to New age movement: grasp
for spiritual meaning
Alternative Medicine
– Homeopathy, magnets, crystals, psychic
surgery
Alternative Medicine
– Homeopathy, magnets, crystals, psychic
surgery
– No basis in science or rational thought
– Can be dangerous!
Biblical Perspectives on Health
• Normal Anatomy and Physiology: Gen 1-2
• Physically: No death or disease
• Socially: Perfect relationship with nature
and others
• Spiritually: perfect union and relationship
with God
Biblical Perspectives on Health
• Results of sin: multilateral disease
• Spiritual: Man separated from the glory of
God
• Physical: man and creation subject to
disease. Rom 8:20-22
Biblical Perspectives on Health
“For the creation was subjected to frustration,
not by its own choice, but by the will of the
one who subjected it, in hope that the
creation itself will be liberated from its
bondage to decay and brought into the
glorious freedom of the children of God.”
Biblical Perspectives on Health
• Social: Man now at odds with creation and
others
Biblical Perspectives on Health
• Man’s fundamental disease is separation
from God
• Physical death is a direct result of the Fall;
but it is also a reminder of the reality of our
spiritual death
• Psalm 38:3-8
“Because of your wrath there is no health
in my body; my bones have no soundness
because of my sin. My guilt has
overwhelmed me like a burden too heavy
to bear. My wounds fester and are
loathsome because of my sinful folly. I am
bowed down and brought very low; all day
long I go about mourning. My back is
filled with searing pain; there is no health
in my body. I am feeble and utterly
crushed; I groan in anguish of heart.”
Biblical Perspectives on Healing
• God is the source of all healing.
• If you listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God
and do what is right in his eyes, if you pay attention to his
commands and keep all his decrees, I will not bring on you
any of the diseases I brought on the Egyptians, for I am
the Lord, who heals you” Ex 15:26
• “See now that I myself am He! There is no god besides me.
I put to death and I bring to life, I have wounded and I
will heal, and no one can deliver out of my hand.” Deut
32:39
Biblical Perspectives on Healing
• God plan is to bring us from death to life
• “When the perishable has been clothed with the
imperishable, and the mortal with immortality, then the
saying that is written will come true: ‘Death has been
swallowed up in victory.... The sting of death is sin, and
the power of sin is the law. But thanks be to God! He gives
us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ.” I Cor 15:5457
Biblical Perspectives on Healing
• God’s ultimate plan is to restore unity and
redeem all aspects of our humanity
Shalom: Biblical Health
• Physical wellness: Gen 43:27-28
• “He asked them how they were, and then he
said, ‘How is your aged father you told me
about? Is he still living?”
Shalom: Biblical Health
• Peace and social vindication: Ps 35:27
“May those who delight in my vindication
shout for joy and gladness; may they always
say, “The Lord be exalted, who delights in
the well-being of his servant”
Shalom: Biblical Health
• Presence of the Lord: Ez 37:26
“I will make a covenant of peace with them; it
will be an everlasting covenant of peace
with them; it will be an everlasting
covenant. I will establish them and increase
their numbers, and I will put my sanctuary
among them forever.”
Naturalistic vs. Biblical Medicine
Naturalistic
Biblical
Goal
Disease free
Shalom
Source of Disease
Pathogens
Source of healing
Medicine/technology
Separation from God
Redemption
Creating Christian Culture in
Healthcare
• Avoid Dualism
• Begin to see the spiritual root of physical
illness
• Practice a shalom view of health
Creating Christian Culture
• Address spiritual, social roots of illness
• Show mercy and grace
• Address physical needs
Questions to ponder
• On what basis do you judge someone as
being healthy or sick?
• Have you seen direct links between physical
and spiritual illness?
• What is an area of your life that you need
the shalom of Christ?
• In what ways can you encourage shalom in
the world you live in?