Victor Chen Ministries

In August 1998, Duke University reported that a study of 4,000 people aged 65 or over found that those who participated in religious activities were 40 percent less likely to have high blood pressure. Research has, in fact, shown that religious people are less depressed, have healthier immune systems and deal better with addictions than non-religious.

Prayer has been used as a healing agent for centuries. And now, medical research has proof that it really does work.

The above cases are two among thousands of cases of people who have recovered against all odds. In each case, while medical care certainly played a role, ultimately it was prayer that brought their remarkable recovery.

Calling on divine intervention has been entrenched across cultures for thousands of years. Medical researchers, reluctant until recently to acknowledge a link between faith and recovery, are now concluding that, indeed praying, may make sick people better. A team at the National Institute of Health (U.S) reviewed more than 250 studies published since the 19^th century and found a positive connection between prayer and healing for nearly every kind of cancer, cardiovascular disease, hypertension, colitis, and enteritis.

There is even evidence that patients who are prayed for by friends, family, or prayer groups – sometimes hundreds of miles away – are more likely to recover faster from illnesses than those who have nobody praying on their behalf.

How does prayer works?

Prayer is communion with God. When we come to rest in God, we become more relaxed. We must be still before Him. Enter that rest in faith, believing that He is your Comforter and Healer. Cast all your cares and worries to Him, for He is the Lord who heals you. Claim and confess healing of your ailments as by His stripes you are healed . God’s Son Jesus took 39 lashes on the cross and each stripe represents a major disease classification. All diseases, mental or physical fall into one of the 39 classifications.

Prayer works

There is ample proof that prayer is beneficial.

In an attempt to understand the depression that often accompanies hospitalization, Duke University researchers assessed 1,000 hospital patients from 1987-1989; they found that patients who were religious and prayed, coped better than those who didn’t.

In a widely publicized study of the effect of intercessory prayer, cardiologist Randolph Byrd studied 393 patients admitted to the coronary care unit at San Francisco General Hospital. Some were prayed for by home-prayer groups; others were not. In this randomized, double-blind study, neither the doctors and nurses nor the patients knew who would be prayed for. But all the patients received medical care.

The results were dramatic and surprised many scientists. The people whose medical care was supplemented with prayer needed fewer drugs and spent less time on ventilators. In addition, the prayed-for patients were:

Scientifically on a personal basis, prayer calms a person and the person is nurtured by a sense of peace. This will inhibit cortisol, adrenalin and noradrenalin – hormones that flow out of the adrenal glands in response to stress. These chemicals in excess, over time can compromise the immune system, cause hypertension and heart disease, stroke, peptic ulcers, and inflammatory bowel disease.