3.2 Missio Dei paradigm and HIV and AIDS
3.2.3 Missio Dei and Healing
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ones entrusted to know God‘s will. As an example, Avis‘ criteria for acts of ministry and of God‘s mission exclude the act of a new convert who would take the initiative to repair a bridge damaged by heavy rain because the person is not yet baptised and no church community is present to acknowledge what the person is doing.
In this regard le Roux (2011) seems to be more inclusive. For him all members of the congregation are primary agents of mission. Le Roux does not interpose barriers based on the level of church membership. He states this in an inclusive way, ―Every member should adopt St Paul‘s challenge that all members of a congregation are ambassadors for Christ and each one should have a vision of participating in the mission of God‖ (:107). Like le Roux, the present study expects all categories of church members to participate in missio Dei. For this reason, interviews were conducted among people who identified themselves as church members without taking into account their level of administrative church membership28. However, what is observed in the present study is the response of the church as an institution, not the separate initiatives of individuals. The question here is: what is the significance of missio Dei in the context of health and healing?
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48). Since the FMCSA, as Christian church, takes Jesus Christ as a model of its life and work, it is important to reflect on Jesus‘ understanding of the missio Dei.
Secondly, the concerns Jesus‘ healing ministry responded to will be considered. Schmidt (2007:5) commenting on the leper‘s healing in Matthew 8:1-4 suggests that one disease can be the cause of several kinds of sufferings. Schmidt observes that this person was physically healed of leprosy, emotionally healed of fear and depression, relationally healed because he then could return to his society and spiritually healed as he was allowed to join the community of God‘s people. According to Howard (2001) and Dube (2007), Jesus intervened in all such ailments and conditions. Dube (2007:91-95) states that Jesus healed physical, social, psychological, and spiritual illnesses. Social illnesses include isolation and fear surrounding the illness while spiritual illnesses comprise sinfulness and possession by evil spirits (:91-92). She also mentioned that Jesus‘ healing involved freedom from racism and social and economic injustice. Jesus advocated justice in favour of the weak; challenged ungodly scriptures that were used to support injustice and challenged religious leaders and structural conditions that were affecting human health. She therefore qualifies Jesus‘ healing ministry as holistic healing. Maddocks (1981:30-52; 58) agrees with her view of Jesus‘ healing as holistic and asserts the existence of many other healings done by Jesus but not recorded in the Bible. From these assertions, Jesus‘ healing ministry may be described as holistic, addressing physical, psychological/emotional, spiritual, and social conditions affecting human well-being.
Thirdly, the way in which Jesus carried out his healing mission is considered. According to Maddocks (1981:60-61) Jesus in his healing mission, addressed the sick, touched them, smeared their bodies with oil, applied saliva and mud poultices to the diseased parts of the body, addressed the individual‘s faith and their prayer for thanksgiving and for the forgiveness of sins.
In some instances, Maddocks mentions that Jesus also allowed people to touch Him or to touch the fringes of his cloak. Schmidt (2007:13-15) also remarks that God has integrated a built-in system that the body can automatically use to heal infection. These examples of Jesus‘ methods of healing illnesses are incomplete. Jesus‘ act of feeding people (Mark 6:30-34; 8:1-10), changing water into wine at Cana (John 2:1-11), and raising the dead (e.g. Lazarus in John 11.1-44 and Jairus‘ daughter in Mark 5:35-43) (see, Maddocks (1981:40-41) are also acts of healing, since their aim was to return people to a healthy state. However, it is crucial to draw from this account that, as part of fulfilment of missio Dei, Jesus was using various ways, including the basic elements of medicine (saliva, earth), to restore people‘s health.
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A critical reflection on Jesus‘ healing ministry by physicians Stumpff (1986:215, 217) and Howard (2001:290) concluded that Jesus healed both psychological and physical illnesses but that there was no genuinely physical and truly organic illness that was healed (:290). However, the view held by Maddocks (1981) is different. For him, it is a ―distortion of the New Testament evidence to say that Jesus pronounced more on morals than on physical and mental, health‖
(:58). Maddocks maintains that Jesus‘ ministry ranged far beyond illnesses, their underlying causes and human control. He understands that Jesus‘ intervention aimed not only to heal the illness but also to replace it with something worthy in order to recreate the person in God‘s image (:59-60). According to Maddocks, these physicians use their limited knowledge to explain something beyond their capacity and that they should rather admit that Jesus was healing all the diseases and related ailments using divine techniques not necessarily controlled by human beings.
Various diseases were healed by Jesus during his earthly ministry. Whether or not infection was removed from the body, what matters is that the person recovered their strength and returned to normal life in the community. Nevertheless, Badenhorst (1986:214) and Anderson (1986:178- 179) suggest that even modern medicine is God‘s revelation and a means to alleviate human suffering, and that physicians are inspired by God in their profession. This insight draws everything together under the control of and obedience to God. The advantage is that both physical and non-physical healings are taken as components of one unit and transpire because of God‘s intervention, and thus are part of missio Dei. This therefore displays the necessity of collaboration among all the agents in human healing. It is with this understanding in mind that, according to Mkhize (2011), the South African government has started a national programme of collaborating with various religious denominations to help patients who have been hospitalised.
Lastly, emphasis is placed on the reason why Jesus initiated a healing ministry. Four reasons are presented here. A according to Maddocks (1981), the healing ministry was part of Jesus‘ master plan for the missio Dei. Maddocks (1981:45) identifies this agenda in Luke 13:32-[33] where Jesus announced that he would cast out demons and perform cures ‗today‘ and ‗tomorrow‘ and finish his course on the third day. Maddocks also traces healing ministry in Luke 4:18-19 referring to Isaiah 61:1ff where Jesus affirms having been anointed to release the captives and to recover the sight for the blind and claimed that, ―Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing‖
(Luke 4.21) (:45-46). The consistence of this ministry in Jesus‘ plan was also recognised by Maddocks (1981:52, 53), Jonker (1986:143), and Schmidt (2007:29). In exploring the gospels of Matthew (9:38; 10:1), Mark (3:13ff; 6:7-13), and Luke (10:9), these authors realise that casting out
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demons or unclean spirits and healing diseases had always been part of Jesus‘ commission to his disciples and was part of his agenda of fulfilling the missio Dei.
Secondly, Badenhorst (1986:212) and McCauley (1986:226) specify that healing was not an activity added to the core mission but a well-reflected upon and planned component emanating from God‘s will. Gous (1986), König (1986), and Ramaila (1986:219-221) expand on this notion by insisting that healing comprises much more than mere physical health. Rather, the physical effect is a door to a meaningful life. König (1986:79-83) also insists that Jesus‘ ministry of healing and feeding people was not an incentive for salvation but part of salvation. As for Ramaila (1986:219-221), healing is the inauguration of the kingdom of God and a restoration of the whole of creation‘s original state and human domination that was stolen by Satan after Adam‘s fall and divine curse. These observations therefore make the healing ministry an integrated, central and required part of missio Dei which thus implies that Jesus had to initiate it.
Thirdly, Maddocks (1981), Gous (1986:17), König (1986:92), Jonker (1986:144-150), and Schmidt (2007:28) link the healing mission to the life of Jesus. To illustrate their point, the profile of the church‘s mission which entails six major salvific events portrayed in the New Testament as defined by Bosch (2011:524-530) will be used. These are the incarnation understood as Jesus‘ identification with the weak and oppressed and Jesus who is interested not in eternal salvation but in the suffering of victims; the cross symbolising Jesus‘ death because of his identification with those on the peripheries; the resurrection portraying the joy and victory over death; the ascension ensuring the sharing of the throne with the living God; Pentecost meaning the power and boldness in the face of adversity and oppression; and the parousia giving hope in the primacy of the future. In the same way, each of these authors links the healing ministry to some of these events to give it a spiritual meaning. As an example, Jonker (1986:144-151) introduces three shifts of emphasis in Jesus‘ healing ministry: from a theological emphasis on the cross to Easter and Pentecost; individual ministry to ministry of the Lord‘s body (Koinonia); and healing sickness to the current healing of the whole person with emphasis on the spiritual. For Maddocks (1981: 45-47; 64-71; 166-167) Jesus was crucified not because he evangelised but that he performed healing miracles and thus this ministry is more on the forefront than the other components of the missio Dei. Likewise, Schmidt (2007:28-29) uses Jesus‘ death to explain that our healing comes from Jesus‘ stripes and God‘s Love. The aim of these authors is to identify the healing ministry with Jesus‘ life and thereby justify its centrality to Christians‘ and Christian churches‘ mission.
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Lastly, Ackermann (2008) and Maddocks (113-116) find the reason for the healing ministry in the Eucharist. For Ackermann (2008:121-122), the Eucharist reminds us of the betrayal and the pain that Jesus went through and assures his presence in the midst of the sufferers. It also symbolises an invitation of the partakers to the feast, together with the crucified and the risen and a foretaste of the messianic banquet. In this way, it creates togetherness where all people are welcomed and rejoice, support and suffer in relationship with one another and with God while they resist the evil and affirm life. Similarly, three points relating to healing with the Eucharist may be found in the views of Maddocks (1981:113-114). He suggests that through the Eucharist, we are enfolded in Christ‘s love and assisted to proclaim the beginning of the Kingdom and time of salvation/healing. Therefore the Eucharist recalls the invitation to the holy banquet in heaven.
Maddocks (1981:116) also refers to the ancient church‘s practice of offering fruits which was a sacrament of creation and redemption to suggest that the church should do the same, making the Eucharist become ―the anticipatory celebration of a healed creation, a foretaste of the Kingdom of God.‖ In addition Maddocks (47:52) portrays Jesus‘ miracle of Cana of changing water into wine and the miracle of feeding people as, like the Eucharist, a symbol of messianic salvation/healing, a foretaste of things to come. These meanings and metaphors link Jesus‘
(holistic) healing ministry to the Eucharist‘s meaning of the past, the present and the future, and this displays the necessity of healing within the scope of missio Dei.
Given this exploration, it is argued that the healing ministry was initiated by God as a component of missio Dei. In fulfilling this, Jesus envisioned the holistic healing of the person and used various methods to achieve this. Therefore this ministry is very important and a requirement of missio Dei agenda. Hence, any church claiming to be Christian and wishing to participate in building God‘s Kingdom like Jesus did, should, in the words of Maddocks (1981:60), ‗be true to its Lord.‘ This church should have a sound theology of healing translated into visible action and embracing all aspects of the human existence and world. This leads to the core question: How does HIV and AIDS, which is the central focus of this study, finds a place in the scope of the healing ministry as a component of missio Dei? This question will be addressed in the next section.