God's Word Works

Celebrating 30 years of Rhema's Prayer & Healing School

“I’ll preach that Jesus saves and heals. I’ll preach that He fills with the Holy Spirit and that He is coming again.” As a minister of the Gospel, Kenneth E. Hagin long carried a dream in his heart to help those who suffered in pain and sickness the way he himself had once suffered.

Born with a deformed heart, Kenneth was paralyzed and bedridden at the age of 15. On the very first night he became bedfast, completely beyond all medical help, he died and went to hell three times. Each time he approached the entrance to hell, a voice spoke and he returned to his body. On that night—April 22, 1933— Kenneth E. Hagin was born again.*

In that same year, Kenneth began a determined study of God’s Word. And though everyone around him told him to prepare for death, he got a revelation of Mark 11:23–24 and faith for healing was quickened in his young heart. On August 8, 1934, God raised Kenneth off the bed of sickness—completely healed and whole!

It was at this moment that God birthed something greater in Kenneth E. Hagin—a desire to see the lost saved and the sick made well. He began to preach and teach salvation and divine healing wherever he went. Though he didn’t know it at the time, this was the beginning of what would become a worldwide ministry—a ministry founded on prayer and the healing truths found in God’s Word.

Over 40 years after Kenneth was raised off the bed of sickness, God began to speak to his heart about a change in his ministry. Though he had been ministering on prayer, healing, and faith in crusades and meetings all over the United States, it was time for a new direction.

“I saw it in the spirit,” Kenneth said, “that God wants us to have . . . a Prayer and Healing Center where folks can come. And we’ll go out to some of them, but some of them need to come and stay until they get healed.”

During the afternoon of October 1, 1979, that vision from God became a reality as Kenneth E. Hagin held the first session of Prayer and Healing School. He began by explaining, “These services are going to be different. Many times in healing meetings [people] expect to be healed because hands are laid on them. And that is one way to minister healing. But even that won’t last if you don’t get the Word in you.

“No one will receive healing and be able to keep it unless they build a faith of their own. That’s because there’s an enemy arrayed against us—the Devil—who has come to kill, to steal, and to destroy (John 10:10).

“But when you’re equipped with the Word, praise God, it makes the difference. That’s one thing that we want to do in these classes—get the Word of God into people. So that’s the reason we tell people who need healing, ‘You come and stay until you get healed—whether it’s a day, a week, a month, six months, or a year.’”

In these classes, in addition to teaching on healing, Rev. Hagin taught on prayer as the Lord had directed him. “This is not only a Healing School,” he noted, “but this is a Prayer School. We’re going to learn to pray in various ways. However, in these services, we’re not only going to teach prayer, but we’re going to pray.

“The Apostle Paul, speaking by the Holy Spirit, tells us to put ‘supplications, prayers, and intercessions for all men, for all that are in authority’ first (1 Tim. 2:1–3). Let’s just follow the directions as simply as God gave them and do what He said to do. And then we’ll get results. These prayer meetings will have an effect around the world.”

The effects of Prayer and Healing School have been felt around the world. People and nations have been changed, and adverse situations have been turned around. And Prayer and Healing School’s foundation on the Word of God, established 30 years ago, is still as strong today as it ever was.

Through the years, some things have changed. Seeing the need for more in-depth teaching on both prayer and healing, Rev. Hagin divided Prayer and Healing School into two separate sessions. Today, Prayer School meets every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday at 1:00 p.m. from September to May.

Healing School runs morning and afternoon sessions throughout the year. Morning meetings are held at 9:30 a.m. in the Prayer and Healing Center, which opened its doors in 1982. These meetings are open only to people in need of healing and those who accompany them. Afternoon meetings, held at 2:15, are open to RHEMA Bible Training Center students as well as the public.

As they have from the beginning, Prayer and Healing School attendees learn to pray out God’s plan for their own lives and for the nations. They learn how to receive and keep their healing, and how to minister healing to others by both precept and example.

And though Kenneth E. Hagin went home to be with the Lord in 2003, the anointing has only grown stronger on the RHEMA campus and in Prayer and Healing School. Rev. Hagin’s son, Kenneth W. Hagin, and grandson, Craig W. Hagin both minister with a strong healing anointing. And Lynette Hagin, wife of Kenneth W. Hagin, teaches on prayer.

So, as Kenneth E. Hagin said during the first week of Prayer and Healing School, “Come and stay a month with us. Come and stay until you get healed and have your faith built up enough to stay healed. The Spirit of God is moving, and the Word of God always works!”