The Spider is a church member who asks questions. A preacher once compared people who disagree with him to a spider. This website uses the name.
Medicine means pills, injections, operations and other help from doctors.
Blood pressure is how hard your blood pushes inside your body. If it is too high for a long time, it can kill you. Pills can control it.
A physician is a doctor.
To test God (or “tempt God”) means to put yourself in danger on purpose, to make God save you.
A yoke is a heavy wooden bar put on animals to make them work. In the Bible it can mean rules that people must carry.
This page gives the Spider’s opinion. The story is true. It does not name the family, any preacher or any church. Check it with the Bible.
Eight points
A mother and two sons, 23 and 19, stand at the grave of a man of 64. He was told: “Real Christians do not take medicine.”
The New Testament never tells Christians to refuse medicine. Paul told Timothy to take wine for his stomach. Luke was a doctor.
Clothes, cooked food, shoes, cars and watches are allowed. Only the pills are “no faith.”
Jesus did not jump from the temple to make God save him. Refusing medicine to make God heal you is the same thing.
Everything God made is good. Take it, and thank him for it (1 Timothy 4:4).
The old churches built hospitals. The new teaching told him not to use one.
The teachers were not at the grave. The family was.
Do not carry rules that Jesus never gave (Galatians 5:1).
The story
A man had high blood pressure. He had good doctors. Pills could control it.
He had a high job in the government. He stopped work early, to be with his family more. He did not like the slow life. He started going to a new church.
He had been baptised as a baby, in an old church. The new church told him: “That does not count. You must find God again.” They gave him books. The books said the world would end in the year 2000. It did not end. He was baptised again.
Then they told him: “Real Christians do not take medicine. God heals without it.” He stopped his pills. His blood pressure killed him. He was 64. His wife and two sons, 23 and 19, stood at his grave.
He did what he thought was right. This page does not blame him. It blames the teaching.
This teaching hurt real people.
The other side
People who teach this usually believe they are honouring God. God does heal. Christians should pray for sick people. And it is wrong to trust a doctor instead of God.
They often use the story of King Asa. The Bible says he went to doctors and not to God (2 Chronicles 16:12). But Asa’s mistake was leaving God out. It was not seeing a doctor. Read more in Dossier 44.
What the Bible says
Be no longer a drinker of water only, but use a little wine for your stomach’s sake and your frequent infirmities.
1 Timothy 5:23 · World English Bible
In simple words: Paul told Timothy: you are often sick. Take some wine for your stomach. Paul gave him a medicine.
Luke the beloved physician and Demas greet you.
Colossians 4:14 · World English Bible
In simple words: Luke, who wrote two books of the Bible, was a doctor. Paul loved him.
Those who are healthy have no need for a physician, but those who are sick do.
Matthew 9:12 · World English Bible
In simple words: Jesus said: sick people need a doctor. He did not say doctors are bad.
No verse in the New Testament says “do not take medicine.”
The rule is not fair
People make clothes, shoes, cars, watches and glasses from things God made. People cook food with fire. If medicine shows “no faith,” then all these things show “no faith” too.
But the teachers wear good clothes. They drive good cars. Some wear expensive watches. They do not call that “no faith.” Only medicine is “no faith.” And medicine is the thing that keeps sick people alive.
Why does the rule stop at the medicine? Why does it never stop at the car?
Do not test God
The devil took Jesus to the top of the temple. He said: “Jump. God promised that his angels will catch you.” Jesus did not jump.
Jesus said to him, “Again, it is written, ‘You shall not test the Lord, your God.’”
Matthew 4:7 · World English Bible
In simple words: Do not put yourself in danger to make God save you.
Stopping medicine so that God must heal you is the same. It tests God. Martin Luther said this in 1527. The Baptist teacher John Gill said it too.
For every creature of God is good, and nothing is to be rejected, if it is received with thanksgiving.
1 Timothy 4:4 · World English Bible
In simple words: Everything God made is good. Do not refuse it. Thank God for it. (Paul was talking about food. The Spider thinks it is true of medicine too.)
Christians built hospitals
For a very long time, Christians have built hospitals. In the 370s, a bishop called Basil built one in Turkey. In India, missionaries built many. Arthur Margoschis built St Luke’s Hospital at Nazareth, in Tamil Nadu, in 1892 (Dossier 07). Ida Scudder started a hospital in Vellore in 1900.
The man was told that his old church did not count. But churches like his old church built hospitals. The new teaching told him not to use one.
Who paid?
The teachers did not pay. The man paid with his life. His wife and his two sons are still paying.
Let not many of you be teachers, my brothers, knowing that we will receive heavier judgment.
James 3:1 · World English Bible
In simple words: God judges teachers more strictly than other people.
When a prophet speaks in Yahweh’s name, if the thing doesn’t follow, nor happen, that is the thing which Yahweh has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously. You shall not be afraid of him.
Deuteronomy 18:22 · World English Bible
In simple words: If a teacher says “this will happen” and it does not happen, do not be afraid of him. The books said the world would end in 2000. It did not.
The teachers were not at the grave.
Be free
Stand firm therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and don’t be entangled again with a yoke of bondage.
Galatians 5:1 · World English Bible
In simple words: Jesus made you free. Do not let people put heavy rules on you that Jesus never gave.
Pray when you are sick. Ask the leaders of your church to pray for you (James 5:14). And take your medicine. Thank God for it.
This page is not medical advice. If you are ill, see a doctor, and pray as well.
Do not let anyone put you under a yoke Christ never laid on you.
Want more?
The quick version has a game: “Where does the rule stop?” The full dossier has all the evidence.
Quick version → Full dossier →