Foundations of the Christian Life. Chapter 18: - The Laying on of Hands.

Foundations of the Christian Life.
Chapter 18: - The Laying on of Hands.


Why study Laying on of Hands?

Hebrews 6:1-3.

It is a basic doctrine that we must understand and experience if we are to go on to maturity.

What is the Laying on of Hands?

It is the touching of a person in the name of Jesus in the context of prayer with the purpose of imparting some spiritual blessing to them.

The Laying on of Hands is a scriptural procedure that is rich in meaning. It is a physical act that is normally done in the context of prayer.

BASIC IDEA.

In the Bible the hand speaks of what a person does.

Psalm 20:6.
“Now I know that the LORD saves his anointed; he answers him from his holy heaven with the saving power of his right hand.”

Psalms 8:6.
“You made him ruler over the works of your hands; you put everything under his feet:”

Psalms 102:25.
“In the beginning you laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of your hands.”

For this reason it was practiced where a symbolic act was needed so that others could see what the person praying was doing. It suggests that God is at work. In fact the usages in the Bible indicate that when we reach out our hands in the context of prayer there is a real sense in which God also reaches out his hand to do that which we pray for.

Because of the presence of this Divine element it is more than a symbol. Like Baptism and the Lord's Supper it is a Sacrament, something happens in response to faith in the rite. It is transformed, by the presence of God into a channel of Divine Grace. It is a prophetic action.

Again, the correct way to understand the Laying on of Hands is through the concept of the Prophetic Action.

This is not to say that Laying on of Hands does anything in a magical sense by itself, but coupled with faith-prayer it becomes spiritually effective in bringing the power of God to bear in a situation.

The basic idea here seems to be that when we extend our hands in faith and obedience to do God's work, then he also extends his hands to do it.

Exodus 7:5.
“And the Egyptians will know that I am the LORD when I stretch out my hand against Egypt and bring the Israelites out of it."

Exodus 7:19.
“The LORD said to Moses, "Tell Aaron, `Take your staff and stretch out your hand over the waters of Egypt- over the streams and canals, over the ponds and all the reservoirs'- and they will turn to blood. Blood will be everywhere in Egypt, even in the wooden buckets and stone jars."

Exodus 8:5.
“Then the LORD said to Moses, "Tell Aaron, `Stretch out your hand with your staff over the streams and canals and ponds, and make frogs come up on the land of Egypt.'"

Exodus 8:16.
“Then the LORD said to Moses, "Tell Aaron, `Stretch out your staff and strike the dust of the ground,' and throughout the land of Egypt the dust will become gnats."

Here we see the prophet, the man of God, stretching out his hand – but at the same time God stretches out his hand to do the thing spoken forth.

Hence Laying on of Hands is NOT the person, but God IN AND THROUGH the person. It operates in such a way that you cannot tell the difference between God's hand, your hand and authority.


USAGE IN THE BIBLE.

(1) In Praying For a Person.

In this context there is the idea of the transference of LIFE from the person praying to the one being prayed for. (In this discussion I use the word “LIFE” in capitals to mean some spiritual “content”, but the question is left open as to whether or not the “content’ is good or bad. The situation of prayer determines this.)

(a) Blessing.

Genesis 48:14,15.reached o
“But Israel reached out his right hand and put it on Ephraim's head, though he was the younger, and crossing his arms, he put his left hand on Manasseh's head, even though Manasseh was the firstborn. Then he blessed Joseph and said, "May the God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has been my shepherd all my life to this day,…”

(b) Healing.

Matthew 9:18.
"While he was saying this, a ruler came and knelt before him and said, "My daughter has just died. But come and put your hand on her, and she will live."

Mark 16:18.
“… they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well."

(c) Imparting Spiritual Gifts.

1 Timothy 4:14.
“Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid their hands on you.”

(d) Imparting Spiritual Power for ministry in Ordination.

Acts 6:6.
"They presented these men to the apostles, who prayed and laid their hands on them."

Acts 13:3.
"So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off."

(2) In the Sacrificial Rites: As an Identification.

Exodus 29:10,19.
"Bring the bull to the front of the Tent of Meeting, and Aaron and his sons shall lay their hands on its head. Slaughter it in the LORD's presence at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting… "Take the other ram, and Aaron and his sons shall lay their hands on its head.”

Two ideas here:
(a) They laid their hands on the animal thereby identifying themselves with it. It then became their substitute and died in their place.
(b) In the act of Laying on of Hands their guilt was transferred to the animal, and was put to death in the animal. Again there is an imparting of “LIFE” but in this case the “LIFE” is the sin and its consequences, a negative “LIFE”.

Note:
This idea of "identification with" is very strong in the NT. Jesus blessed and healed people without the Laying on of Hands many times, but wherever the person's condition or social situation had made them a social outcast, or in any way socially unacceptable, Jesus was careful to touch them in the healing act. This showed that he recognised that, to some degree, their physical condition was caused by feelings of rejection or had been compounded by rejection. He demonstrated that he indeed loved them and accepted them by touching them. He too was an outcast (Isaiah 53:3). Where acceptance and healing from rejection was a key element in the healing process, Jesus touched people.


(3) In Criminal Cases: As an Act of Testimony.

Leviticus 24:14.
"Take the blasphemer outside the camp. All those who heard him are to lay their hands on his head, and the entire assembly is to stone him."

Here the idea is identification primarily.

(4) In Ordination: As a Recognition, Setting Apart and Empowering of A Person For Ministry.

Acts 6:6; 13:2-4 (above).
Titus 1:5.
"The reason I left you in Crete was that you might straighten out what was left unfinished and appoint elders in every town, as I directed you."

WARNING: - 1 Timothy 5:22.Why Not?
“Do not be hasty in the laying on of hands, and do not share in the sins of others. Keep yourself pure.”

Why Not?
This has two applications:
(a) To Ordination.
If you ordain someone you are in some way answerable to God for that person's ministry. That person could ruin your own life and ministry if they go off the rails. Also Christ's reputation is at stake. A candidate for ministry must be checked out fully, tested and tried, before being ordained. Hastiness in appointment will mean that problems will not have had time to show up.

(b) A Wider Application.
In the Laying on of Hands there is a transference of "LIFE". This can be good or bad, and can be two-way. If a person is demonically possessed there can be a transference (Why else would Satanists "ordain" people?).

(5) In the Conversion Experience.

In the Early Church conversion was always made up of three parts:

(i) Repentance and Confession of Christ as Lord.
(ii) Water Baptism.
(iii) Laying on of Hands.

This is primarily why it appears here in the list of Foundations to do with Conversion. It was done for two reasons, Church Membership and Imparting of the Holy Spirit.

a. Church Membership.

By receiving the Laying on of Hands the convert showed that he/she was identifying with the church, thus was submitting to the authority of Christ as represented in the church. When we submit to the Laying on of Hands we are recognising that the person DOING it HAS authority, or REPRESENTS authority, to which we are submitting, and from which we wish to receive something.

Hence the new convert is baptised (with the Laying on of Hands) into Christ, i.e. into his Body, the sphere of his Lordship and Authority. By doing this we say we are submitting to the Authority of Christ AS VESTED IN THE CHURCH.

The person baptising represents Christ, to whom you are submitting, but he also represents the delegated authority of the Church, to which you are also submitting.

By this act a person became a member of the Church, and was immediately related to other people in the Church who could care for him.

Individual conversion immediately becomes relationship to a corporate body.

NOTE:
This aspect of submission is vital in the Laying on of Hands. If, e.g., the blessing sought is healing then there is no way healing can flow if the person being prayed for does not internally submit to the authority of the person praying for him/her. This is a major reason why many do not get healed. The Command in James to seek the prayer of the Elders of the Church when sick is related to this. Often sickness can be rooted in rebellious attitudes towards the Church (1 Corinthians 3:16,17) so there is a need to deal with those attitudes if one wants healing.

1 Corinthians 3:16,17.
"Don't you know that you yourselves are God's temple and that God's Spirit lives in you? If anyone destroys God's temple, God will destroy him; for God's temple is sacred, and you are that temple."

* The "You" in this text is, in the Greek, the second person plural so it refers not to the individual Christian but to the Church as a group.
* The "anyone", however, is an individual.
* The meaning then is this: "If anyone seeks to destroy the Church God will destroy them."
* Such destruction can come through sickness or death.

b. To Receive the Gift of the Holy Spirit.

An imparting of "LIFE". This follows from the above. When we submit to the authority of Christ and his Church, we become members of the Church, which is the sphere of the Spirit's activity in his fullness. Therefore when you enter Christ, i.e. his Body - the Church, by faith you enter into the common experience of the Spirit (2 Corinthians 13:4), and you can grow in this experience. Spiritual growth will not normally occur when a person cuts him/herself off from the (local) Church (Hebrews 10:23-25).

This coupling of conversion with the Laying on of Hands is the origin of the rite of Confirmation. Historically the two went together.

In the NT the Laying on of Hands is seen at Conversion.

Acts 9, 19:1-6.
That these were conversion experiences was discussed in Chapter 15 when we looked at Baptism. We will not cover the same ground again here.

There is one difficult case:

Acts 8:4-17. The Samaritan Revival.
“Those who had been scattered preached the word wherever they went. Philip went down to a city in Samaria and proclaimed the Christ there. When the crowds heard Philip and saw the miraculous signs he did, they all paid close attention to what he said. With shrieks, evil spirits came out of many, and many paralytics and cripples were healed. So there was great joy in that city.
…But when they believed Philip as he preached the good news of the kingdom of God and the name of Jesus Christ, they were baptised, both men and women….
When the apostles in Jerusalem heard that Samaria had accepted the word of God, they sent Peter and John to them. When they arrived, they prayed for them that they might receive the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit had not yet come upon any of them; they had simply been baptised into the name of the Lord Jesus.
Then Peter and John placed their hands on them, and they received the Holy Spirit.”

It is easy to be a sloppy reader with this passage because it is a little difficult. However there is some historical background that makes understanding the issues here more clear.

The Samaritans were "half-castes", the result of Gentile intermarriage with the northern tribes of Israel. As such they had two things against them as far as the "Jews" were concerned:
(i) They has separated from the true religion after Solomon's reign, so were heretics, and,
(ii) For 400 years they were rejected by the Jews as being "worse than Gentiles" because they were of "unequal yoke".

This attitude on the part of the Jews resulted in the total exclusion of any Samaritan from the (Catholic) worship of God based in Jerusalem. As a result the Samaritans had set up a sort of "Protestant" cult. This had created strong division in the worship of God, and had created a deep feeling of rejection on the part of the Samaritans (c/f John 4).

There was a real danger that this division would be perpetuated into the Church if the Samaritans became Christians, which this passage tells us they wanted to do. Jesus had accepted them, but this had to be formalised by the Church, which at this time was composed entirely of Jews. The Jewish nature of the Church had to be formally extended to include others.

This is the point of the story: to show how, in the Church, the old divisions of Israel were transcended and healed. It is one of three stories about three groups isolated from God's people - Samaritans, Gentiles (Acts 10), and John's Disciples (Acts 19), all of which are dealing with the same issue - the old divisions of Judaism.

To receive these people into the Church was a radical step, going against 700 years of Jewish history.

We read that the Samaritans accepted Jesus as the Messiah, but they "did not receive the Holy Spirit". Note that it does not say that they had not "received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit" or "the filling of the Spirit". We cannot interpret what is written to suit ourselves. That is to misunderstand what is at issue here. The story is not here to tell us that there can be a two-stage experience of the Spirit, and, in fact, cannot be stretched to mean that. It is written to tell us how God, in Christ, healed the age-old divisions of Judaism. Hence we must read "They had not received the Holy Spirit" to mean exactly that. They had gone through all of the proper forms of repentance and Baptism yet God had not, for some reason, given them the Holy Spirit. They were not, in our terminology, “Born again”. If we do not, have the Holy Spirit we are not Christians.

Romans 8:9.
“You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.”

The problem appears to have been a faith block. The history of the situation means that they could not really believe that they were accepted, and this doubt based in rejection caused a block to their faith in respect to salvation.

When John and Peter came down they laid hands on the Samaritans. An unthinkable act! They came as leaders of the Church, in them the authority of Christ in the Church was centred.

The Samaritans now did a new thing, they submitted to God, but also to his delegated authority as represented in these Jews - ending the rebellion of 700 years. Peter and John, on their part, showed their acceptance by actually touching them. The old divisions were healed. This caused a healing which released faith and the Samaritans were born again, they received the Holy Spirit.

The purpose of this episode was to maintain the unity of the Church as one Body. There could not be allowed to be a Jewish Church, a Samaritan church, and a Gentile Church. The Spirit comes in one Body, under one authority structure - the apostles. The Samaritans would have clearly understood all of this.

This passage does not allow, therefore, for a two-stage experience of receiving the Spirit. The Samaritans were clearly not fully saved in our sense of the word before the Apostles came down to them. This reception of the Spirit was their first experience of the Spirit, as is quite clear from the context itself. They "had not received the Spirit for it had not fallen on any of them".

Interestingly enough, however, their baptism by the disciples who first witnessed to them was still considered to be valid, even though their faith was clearly deficient at the time. This is because it was Christian Baptism. We should not get too hung up on the order of things. We come to God in different ways. This story shows us that it is OK to be baptised with true Christian Baptism, and yet not be a Christian, but that baptism to still be held valid when true faith comes later on. So long as the baptism was conducted by Christians in a Biblical way it appears to be acceptable even if the candidate has not gully come to faith. This follows from the fact that baptism is an eternal event, a once for all eternity thing. Because this is true it is impossible to be “re-baptised".

HANDS THAT MINISTER THE GRACE OF GOD.

Hebrews 6:1,2.
“Therefore let us leave the elementary teachings about Christ and go on to maturity, not laying again the foundation of repentance from acts that lead to death, and of faith in God, instruction about baptisms, the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgement.”

The Laying on of Hands appears here between baptism and the resurrection of the dead. This tells us one further thing about the Laying on of Hands. Baptism is the start of our Christian walk on earth; resurrection is its end. What comes in between is the Laying on of Hands, the period of our Christian service.

Hands symbolise what we do (in God), i.e. our ministry.

God wants us to use his power in ministry during our lives. Ministry is a fundamental thing in the life of every Believer, a foundation plank on which we are to build our lives.


Some Ministry Aspects for all Believers:

(a) Matthew 28:18-20.

All Christians are to witness, get converts, baptise and disciple. There is no suggestion here that such ministry should be restricted to the apostles.

(b) Mark 16:16-18.

All converts are given the power to work miracles, heal, cast out demons, etc. in the name of Jesus. Again, this is for “all who believe”.

(c) Romans 12. 1 Corinthians 12.

All Christians are given gifts of the Holy Spirit for use in the Body and for evangelism.

HOMEWORK:

Think about the concept of the “hand” as explained in this study. Take a look at the following verses and try to work out what they could mean in a symbolic sense to us.

Leviticus 1:4, 3:2,8,13; 4:4,24,29,33;
Leviticus 14:14, 17, 24,28; 8:23
Leviticus 21:17-19.

TRANSFORMER VERSE:

The Laying on of Hands.
Mark 16:18.
“… they will pick up snakes with their hands; and when they drink deadly poison, it will not hurt them at all; they will place their hands on sick people, and they will get well."

1 Timothy 4:14.
“Do not neglect your gift, which was given you through a prophetic message when the body of elders laid their hands on you.”

PRAYER:
Father , I thank you that you call us to share in your life and ministry and you have given us this simple, but effective way of ministering your grace to others by touching them in your name. Grant me opportunities to pray for other and impart to them of the life you have placed in me. In Jesus name I ask it, Amen.