The laying on of hands is an age-old tradition in the church dating as far back as Moses and Joshua. It is a practice you see in the charismatic church quite often today.
But deliverance minister Mike Signorelli says there is a proper way for kingdom leaders to handle this method, especially when you are praying for someone of the opposite sex.
“If you are a man, stop putting your hand on women’s stomachs when you are praying for them. There are boundaries that have to be maintained,” says Signorelli, Lead Pastor of V1 Church in New York City. “I’m seeing people do things while they are praying for people that are very unwise.
“I’ve talked before about pushing people down (being slain in the Spirit), but you have to be very careful of how you are touching another person. Here’s the thing: Are you relying on that particular point of contact or are you relying on the Holy Spirit that is going to do the work through you?
(Note: For this particular teaching, fast forward to the 1:27:58 mark of the video).
Christian podcaster and revivalist Isaiah Saldivar says kingdom leaders—even in prayer services—must be aware of who exactly they are ministering to.
“Remember that you are touching someone’s wife,” Saldivar says. “These are real people, these are not numbers for online views or for a TikTok video. These are someone’s wives and daughters.
“From what I see, there are a lot of [male] preachers I wouldn’t want praying for my daughter. We need to be very careful about how we handle people, how we handle someone’s wife. Some of you might get knocked out from the side because you are putting your hands in places where they don’t belong. … It’s just not appropriate.”
Saldivar says there are appropriate ways of going about “laying on of hands” to pray for someone.
“I would just do lightly on the shoulder, maybe, if her shoulders aren’t bare,” he said. “Your hand on top of her head is always safe, but you just need to use wisdom. Touching the stomach is a sexual place and I see a lot of weird stuff go on. I look at some of these prophetic services, which, most of the time, 80% of these people are young women. You have guys just doing some weird stuff, so you have to be careful.”
Signorelli says he has witnessed a lot of online videos and he sees men touch other women’s stomachs.
“It’s super weird, and it needs to stop,” Signorelli says. “I mean, you’ll get up there and do a sermon where you talked about how sexually perverse you were for years, and then they get down off the stage and lay your hand on women’s stomachs for the next hour. That’s not OK, bro.
In this video, Lester Sumrall tells the story of when British evangelist Smith Wigglesworth punched a man with cancer in the stomach and the man was miraculously healed. The early 20th-century preacher was also known to violently shake people into their healing, and legend has it that he helped raise 14 people from the dead.
But, Signorelli said, none of us are Smith Wigglesworth, and sometimes God may grant the grace of healing but God is not in the method.
“When I’m doing deliverance ministry, I want people to say this was an atmosphere of gentleness,” Signorelli says. “That this was an atmosphere of love and peace and joy. But when you come out like a WWE wrestler and it’s like it’s the main event and you are manhandling people all over the place, who is getting the credit? Who is getting the glory? It’s you.
“For me, I haven’t even been touching people and just allowing the Holy Spirit do the work. Again, I’m trying to operate in a level of wisdom. Just because I can do it, doesn’t mean I should.”
Signorelli challenges pastors to read Galatians 5 to truly understand his message.
“Start comparing your ministry and your methods of ministry to the fruits of the Spirit,” Signorelli says. “That should be the litmus test.” {eoa}
Shawn A. Akers is the online editor at Charisma Media.
