My Story Part 3

So now that I could hear the voice of God, my mission was to start praying for people to get healed. Of course, this is easier said than done, mostly because of those nagging thoughts inside your head:

"Well what if they don't get healed? You'll really look stupid then!"

Better yet:

"What if God doesn't want to heal this person and I'm actually going against His plan by trying to get them healed?"

Ok so now its time for a quick side note: God wants to heal everyone! Here's the reasoning behind this. Matthew 10 tells us that healing the sick, etc. should accompany the preaching of His kingdom. Sickness and death came into the world because of Adam's choice in the garden - not because God wanted them to come. Sure, God can use them for good, but that doesn't mean they are His way of working or the best way of obtaining results. Basically, the devil tries to wreck someone's life by putting them in a wheelchair or making them paralyzed or whatever you want to fill in the blank with - and God still frustrates his plans by using even those horrible things to make something beautiful. Make no mistake - God didn't want that person to get hurt and is eagerly waiting for one of His sons or daughters to enter the situation and release His redemption: healing of body, soul, and spirit.

Now, you can imagine how difficult it would be to pray for someone with those awful lies running through your head. So, since I was going to a Christian college at the time, I decided to try first on other believers. It still wasn't very easy, but I finally saw God heal someone through me!

That was another turning point in my life.

It's hard to go back to powerless Christianity when you see the utter shock on someone's face when they can no longer find the pain that was just in their body a moment ago. You want a rush? THAT is a rush! Even the Dean of Students heard the two of us shouting and screaming about what had just happened! So within the rest of that semester, I saw God heal about 10-15 more people (I kept a tally on my dorm room door). However, I still had one problem: I didn't have the guts to pray for someone out on the street. The thought of doing such a thing excited me, but at the same time it scared the bejeebers out of me! I needed to find a large group of people who were running in the same direction as me. This search was mostly unsuccessful, though I did find a faithful few at the college of like mind as I. Then I remembered hearing that Chad Dedmon (speaker referred to earlier) was a graduate of the Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry. It sounded like just the right place for me! So after the (fall) semester ended, I packed up my few belongings and drove to Redding, CA with my mom and older brother.

It turned out that the school didn't take new students half-way through the year, so I found a place to live and got to know some of the students who were in the school. I quickly found out that the people here are very serious about taking healing everywhere; the streets, homeless shelters, malls, stores, and even to the bars! I felt like I was in heaven! Finally, a group of people who loved me enough to push me out of my comfortable shell! I started going out on their Friday night outreaches and got to see many people healed in public places and some of them even received Jesus!

As this was happening, I began to understand a concept I'd heard people talk about before, but really hadn't meant much to me. Read my next blog to find out what it is :)!

John H.

My Story Part 1

I was born and raised in the church, as were my parents before me (and possibly even their parents). Mom was a missionary's daughter, while dad was the son of a retired army chaplain who lived through the Depression.

Growing up in the church, I knew about God and all that sort of thing and committed my life to Him at age 5. Unfortunately, either I didn't know what was going on or I forgot because I pretty much had Him in the farthest nook in the back of my mind all through Junior High and High School. I never felt like I was perfect enough for Him, even though on the outside I was a "model Christian". My character was, in fact, very good and I was looked up to by many for my values and standards. Unfortunately, I felt pretty dead inside and was wondering if I would ever actually meet this God of mine before I got to heaven. I was rather jealous of the people in the Old Testament because God did all sorts of things for them, but I never saw Him do anything for me. So, for most of my life, I thought of God as being "up there" and mad at me because I wasn't perfect enough for His standards.

Somewhere in this time period, I heard about God healing people (a little hard not to, since I grew up in John Wimber's Vineyard church). But for some reason, it stuck with me now and I began to want to see this sort of thing happen where I could watch - I wanted to know that God is real. I ended up going to another Vineyard Church a few years after John Wimber died: Vineyard Christan Church in Laguna Niguel, CA. There, I heard many more testimonies of supernatural healings and "God stuff".

Now that I was comfortable with God being real, I wanted to see God heal people through MY prayers. Again, though, I didn't think I was perfect enough for His power to flow through me. I had too many flaws and sins for my own standards. The standards weren't bad, but my mindset concerning them actually kept me from experiencing God. This sort of thinking continued, even though I was going to a Bible college.

Then, after 1 year in college, I went to a hear a speaker named Chad Dedmon. I don't even remember why. At any rate, he turns out to be this young, surfer-looking dude from So-Cal who had seen God do a lot of things in his life. He didn't really have a sermon or anything you'd normally hear from a speaker, but instead he just called out things that God had told him He wanted to heal physically in poeple that day. I remember that several people reported being healed on the spot, but there wasn't anything that was physically visible that was healed. But then, Chad found out that a woman was there who had one leg shorter than the other. Having found this out, he said, the craziest thing I'd heard up till that time:

"Who wants to see a miracle?"

I was stunned when I heard this, thinking that there was no way you could possibly say this with certainty. But hey, if a visible miracle was going to happen, I wanted to see it! So I went down to the front with about 50 other people where he had the lady sitting on the stage with her legs dangling over the edge. Chad made sure that everyone could see her legs clearly, then held them out straight and commanded the short one to grow out in Jesus' name. Before my eyes, that leg grew out!!!! I was stunned. It actually grew out too far by an inch or so! I had watched the knees to make sure there was no funny business going on and I could not deny what had just happened. Then Chad said another crazy thing:

"Well that was a good prayer!"

I was speechless. How could this guy act so....simple, so.....happy and content and confident? I was still trying to figure this out as he commanded the (now) longer leg to go back even with the other leg (and it did, of course). I went back to my seat with tears running down my face in awe of God. I knew that if God could use this unpolished college-age guy, He could use me too.

So that was the first major turn in my life. Guess what? God can (and will) use you too - if you let Him!

John H.