Going to the doctor = sin????

[Sam]

Another young man who was a room mate in Bible School in Minnesota and later shared an apartment with me in Cincinnati told about a church in NE Ohio where he lived that preached very strongly against doctors and medicine. He said they were a "reproach" to Oneness in that area.

[Michael The Disciple]

I just did a search on deaths from medical error.

Medical errors are one of the Nation’s leading causes of death and injury according to the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (www.ahrq.gov). A recent report by the Institute of Medicine estimates that as many as 44,000 to 98,000 people die in U.S. hospitals each year as the result of medical errors. This means that more people die from medical errors than from motor vehicle accidents, breast cancer or AIDS.

So let us not be to quick to judge those who believe they should trust God for healing.

What will people do when the mark of the beast sets in? When you cannot go to the doctor, get meds, or even buy and sell period without taking it?

To learn to trust God in everything sounds reasonable.

[MissBrattified]

I respect people for trying to be consistent, but I still believe this is ignorant. Refusing medical care and asking God to handle it instead is akin to refusing to get in a storm cellar when a tornado is about to hit your house. If you have a storm cellar, get in it. If you have a bandaid, put it on your cut. If you break your leg, go get a stinkin' cast.

[RandyWayne]

Originally Posted by Sam

I didn't name names or cities.

1. The UPC sectional Presbyter has been dead for years. His church was a couple hours from where we live. Some good friends of ours had moved to the Cincinnati area but some of their family was still in that city and going to that church. Our friends visited their family at Thanksgiving and one of the children was sick and was on the couch. When they visited again at Christmas the child was still on the couch. The parents were taken to court because they would not allow medical care for their children based on what they had been taught at that church. The pastor refused to go to court on their behalf. When the judge asked the mother why she would not take her child to a doctor she answered, "I did, judge, I took him to the Great Physician."

A young couple from that city and church moved into our city. My wife was babysitting and had to change the little boy's diaper. His scrotum was grotesquely huge and she was shocked. When she later asked the mother about it she told her that he had a hernia but they were trusting the Lord to heal it. One time we were talking and one of them (don't remember if it was the husband or wife now) said, "Bro. ------ has not been to a doctor in years." When I asked, "Well, where did he get his glasses?" I was told that that was not the same thing.

2. As far as I know one of the ALJC pastors is still alive. For several years I was sectional Youth Leader for the ALJC. We used to visit his church and it was commonly known that he preached against doctors and medicines. One time when we were there my wife overheard one of the saints apologizing to him because her sister was taken from a car accident in an ambulance to the hospital. She was explaining that someone called the police and an ambulance and she could not stop them from taking the woman to a hospital.

Another pastor told about how when the tornado hit that town in 1974, the pastor's wife had a lot of shattered glass embedded in her. The pastor played a tape of her screaming while they pulled those glass splinters out of her "but she didn't go to the doctor or to a hospital."

3. Another ALJC pastor in our section and his wife used to go to Florida each year and there they would see a doctor. They could not do it here in Ohio because a previous pastor had taught against doctors and medicine. This man and his wife are both dead now.

Funny that they didn't trust God to remove the glass splinters and felt THEY needed to do it.

[MissBrattified]

Originally Posted by seekerman

LOL!! Now you want a number? LOL!!

The so-called, self-named 'apostolic churches' which teach the ultracon standards are typically the one's who do this. Your asking about a number is simply your attempt to deflect the focus from the truth about the ultracon teachings.

I was raised in the UPC, but we fellowshipped independent and ALJC churches. In my experience, this belief was mostly isolated to independent, ultra-conservative churches or members of the former AMF. However, I can recall a few older ALJC and UPCI ministers who held a fairly extreme view on going to doctors.

A minister who pastored not too far from where I grew up, and had a pretty large congregation, taught that you weren't supposed to go to doctors. My Dad argued with him a few times over the issue, because he did wear glasses. That minister's daughter died after childbirth from eclampsia, which can usually be prevented/cured with the appropriate treatment and delivery of the baby. It was a very tragic, preventable death. From what I understand, the daughter also didn't want to go to the hospital, but I think if I had been her husband or father, I would have called 911. I really don't understand just allowing someone to die.

[MissBrattified]

Originally Posted by Esaias

How many churches teach this?

I'm very surprised that you haven't ever come across this. It was a fairly common thing when I was a child. It's probably less common now, but there are definitely churches that still teach you shouldn't go to doctors.

Others teach a variation where you can use natural medicine, women can use midwives, etc., but no modern medicine, doctors or hospitals.

[Esaias]

Originally Posted by MissBrattified

I'm very surprised that you haven't ever come across this. It was a fairly common thing when I was a child. It's probably less common now, but there are definitely churches that still teach you shouldn't go to doctors.

Others teach a variation where you can use natural medicine, women can use midwives, etc., but no modern medicine, doctors or hospitals.

I'm talking about churches that teach and believe 'you sin against God if you go to a doctor or take your sick child to a doctor'.

I am not talking about teaching that we/you/I/us/whoever ought to have more faith in God than we do doctors.

I wasn't raised in any church. I was a true heathen until Jesus got ahold of me.

I am aware that some - S O M E - Pentecostals - mainly trinitarians, and S O M E charismatics taught it was sinful to seek medical care from doctors in the past, but I had recently heard on another thread how so many OPs taught this and how many people have died as a direct result of this.

Now, I AM aware that many of the 'signs following' type churches (aka serpent handling churches) reject medical care, but even they - as far as I know - do not teach it is a S I N to go to a doctor.

[Esaias]

Originally Posted by Michael The Disciple

I just did a search on deaths from medical error.

Lots of people have been messed up by doctors and hospitals.

Just a side note - serpent handling Christians generally avoid doctors. Yet they have a lower per capita death rate from snake bite than the rest of the population who are bitten, and who certainly would never choose NOT to seek treatment. Go figure.

[Steve Epley]

I have known folks who trusted the Lord solely for their healing. Bishop Haywood and in the early days of Christ Temple they practiced that. In many of the early Azusa papers it refers to solely trusting the Lord for healing without medical aid. Pentecost across the board frowned upon saints going to the doctor in the early days. Any yes some uc taught the same and sadly some of them died. Would they have lived under doctor's care that is something we can never know? However this was also prevelant among Trinity groups as well. I do not teach that however I do honor folks who have made that decision.

[seekerman]

Originally Posted by Steve Epley

I do honor folks who have made that decision.

For their children?