Can you lose your healing?

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William Branham taught that it was possible for God to supernaturally heal a person and then for that person to lose their healing. Speaking of a person being healed, William Branham states:

...if you start doubting again, the very faith that taken it out, unbelief will bring it back again.

William Branham even said that if he told a person "thus saith the Lord" that they would be healed and they didn't have faith, they wouldn't be healed:

But, no matter, if my word was absolutely THUS SAITH THE LORD, and you would disbelieve It, you'd die, anyhow. Certainly. Here is THUS SAITH THE LORD, and many of them receive It and die. Many of them go to hell, when, THUS SAITH THE LORD, "You don't have to." Is that right? ...See? It's what… It's all based on your faith.

What does the Bible teach?

The Bible does not contain even a single account of a person losing their healing.

William Branham seems to be providing an excuse where people, perhaps because of excitement, adrenalin or the placebo effect, start feeling better after having been prayed for and then after a few days their disease is back.

Let's take a look at a couple of examples from the Bible where Jesus said that people were lacking in faith.

The first is Peter walking on water in Matt 14:29:

Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus.  But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!” Immediately Jesus reached out his hand and caught him. “You of little faith,” he said, “why did you doubt?”

Here Jesus' faith (Thus saith the Lord) overcomes Peter's fear and lack of faith, not the other way around.

Try applying William Branham's explanation here: Jesus has TSTL for Peter to walk on the water, but Peter disbelieves, sinks, and drowns, "you'd die anyhow. Certainly." That explanation makes the victim's unbelief more powerful than God's Word, which shall never pass away. Clearly, Jesus faith was more powerful than Peter's doubt. Just as clear, do not blame the victim for Bro. Branham's false claim.

Another example is when the man brought his son to Jesus that the disciples were unable to heal:

When they came to the crowd, a man approached Jesus and knelt before him.  “Lord, have mercy on my son,” he said. “He has seizures and is suffering greatly. He often falls into the fire or into the water.  I brought him to your disciples, but they could not heal him.”

“You unbelieving and perverse generation,” Jesus replied, “how long shall I stay with you? How long shall I put up with you? Bring the boy here to me.”  Jesus rebuked the demon, and it came out of the boy, and he was healed at that moment.

Then the disciples came to Jesus in private and asked, “Why couldn’t we drive it out?”

He replied, “Because you have so little faith. Truly I tell you, if you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

If Bro. Branham had the faith of TSTL, then the mountain would move / the person would not die, but instead he excuses himself and blames the victims. By comparing the Bible to Bro. Branham, he again proves his unbelief in his own TSTL statements AND directly contradicts Jesus teaching.

It is true that Jesus sometimes commends others for their faith, such as the Centurion in Matt 8 or the Caananite woman in Matt. 15. But I do not recall Jesus blaming victims for dying after he said they would get well. In fact, His prayers are answered in spite of others unbelief, as above or in Matt 8:26 "What are you afraid, O you of little faith? Then he rose and rebuked the winds and the sea, and there was a great calm."

I find it much more compelling when comparing these spurious statements to the Gospel, rather than just leaving it to the reader to determine if Bro. Branham's explanation is plausible.

Conclusion

This appears to be a simple case of William Branham providing an excuse for people that were never healed by God in the first place. This was a common ploy used by healing evangelists as related by Walter Hollenweger, a noted Pentecostal historian who worked as translator for Branham in one of his campaigns in Switzerland, who wrote of William Branham:

He possessed an extraordinary diagnostic gift and could identify the illnesses (sometimes even the names) of persons he had never seen. Unfortunately his healing prognosis was accurate only in rare cases. The excuse of healing evangelists in such cases has always been: The patient did not really believe; for they were convinced that faith leads automatically to health.

Quotes of William Branham

Someone wrote me a letter today, a woman that was healed with cancer. She said, "For the first two or three days, I was gloriously, I felt wonderful. Then on the third day," said, "I had an awful upset. Have I lost my healing?"

Now, that should be explained in every m--every case each night. No, that's the--the most perfect sign of your healing. After seventy-two hours, the corruption's setting in the growth. It's dead. It'll... It may be... God sometimes will--can perform a miracle, and it won't even be any growth.

Now, I--I can tell you this. God, Who is my Judge, Who I stand before, I... By newspaper clippings, front page headlines carrying this, it could be showed here at the platform. I seen the time when people come to the platform with hanging cancers, hanging on their bodies; and while prayer was being made, their cancer turning white, dropping off, and rolling down across the floor while I was praying for them. God, Who is in heaven, that looks down, knows that's true. When newspaper reporter standing there and shoot the picture of it, and declared in the newspapers on the front page. That's Christian newspaper (See?), where they got Christian editors, men who believe God, and got a feeling for sick people for the lost.

Now, none of these things move us. God can reveal in my hotel room what you would never know. So that's all right. All those things there, just He lays, just... Always let the Lord have His way.

Well, what about a lump of--of dead flesh laying in your body? Well, you'll almost go through death. That's the time to stand and give God praise. That's right. Yes, sir. Don't waver in your faith. There's exactly the truth that you're healed. See?

Now, when that... Well, if we'd kept the cancers that'd passed through the people... One year, I believe, it was. we had so many jugs and bottles we couldn't even put them on the platform to show the people when they'd passed out. Doctor's names written on them. That's right.

If a growth had passed, it'll die, turn loose and the adhesions and things that stick that there, it'll pass from you if it can. If it can't, then you're going to get sick, because it'll lay right there.

In plain words where the simplest child would understand, and the only way I know to put it, it'll rot. And it's laying right in there rottening in your body. And when it does, your heart stream, your bloodstream is being purified by your heart, and it picks up that and causes sickness and headaches, and oh, you can't stand up hardly.

And the person immediately, the patient, weak in faith, will say, "I lost my healing." Why, God's not that kind of a Father. You can't lose your healing. Jesus purchased it. It's yours. When Jesus prayed for Peter, said, "I'll pray that your faith fail not," not his morals, 'cause they did, but, "That your faith fail not..." See?

Now, now, when you go... Now, let me show you what takes place. Excuse me for saying, "Let me show you." I didn't mean that. I don't mean that. I could show you nothing, but I'll tell you to the best of my knowledge what I see in the realm of it.

That when that cancer goes out, when it's cast out, and you see the very evidence of everything that was of the Son of God in His... in the leading of His people, working and showing His signs and wonders and that demon is pronounced gone and you feel it's gone, and then in two or three days, if you start doubting again, the very faith that taken it out, unbelief will bring it back again.

And the Bible said, "When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, walks in dry places, and when he returns he brings seven other devils worse than he was." Is that right? And the last estate of this man is seven times worse. You're going to die then.

Say, '"Is healing lasting?"

Just as lasting as long as faith is.' That's right. Just as long... Salvation's the same way. Just as long as you got faith, you're healed. When you lose faith, you're gone.

The patient then, that the evil has gone out of the patient, the cancer is dead. For a few days they feel fine. Like the cataract, tumor, or whatever it may be, they feel fine for a few days, and then the first thing you know it begins to swell, swell. And then if the patient isn't truly instructed in the Word of God, they'll lose their healing as sure as anything, because they get sick and get twice as bad as they ever was. And that's the best sign you ever had that you're healed, certainly, is swelling. It's gone away.

If I prayed for a person, and I—I tell them people they're going to live. I believe they're going to live. But, no matter, if my word was absolutely THUS SAITH THE LORD, and you would disbelieve It, you'd die, anyhow. Certainly. Here is THUS SAITH THE LORD, and many of them receive It and die. Many of them go to hell, when, THUS SAITH THE LORD, "You don't have to." Is that right? [Congregation says, "Amen."—Ed.] Sure. See? It's what… It's all based on your faith.

And today when we think that we're different from the other fellow, and so forth, it just does not work. We must still accept that basis of the shed Blood. And therefore, when God was called on the scene, to heal a man, He healed a man upon the basis of his faith. And when he's called on the scene again, He will heal the next man the same way, or He acted wrong. If God ever did heal a man because he believed, and then the next man calls with the same kind of faith, God is obligated to do the same thing to the next man. If not, He's respecter of persons, and acted wrong in the first place. So, you see, back to the Word. I--I believe it with all my heart.

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