A friend of mine and I were talking yesterday. He has been diagnosed with leukemia and the doctors want him to have a bone marrow transplant. After hearing about the side effects, he has pretty much decided to take his chances with prayer and a natural holistic approach of treating it. He does not want his body ravaged by the poison of chemo. Yesterday he sent me a video of a 93-year-old pastor friend praying for him and laying hands on him. His older friend began the video by saying that he had seen people get healed through prayer and he had seen people that did not.
I have prayed for people on more than one occasion and have seen them miraculously get healed. Indeed, I was healed of serious life-threatening maladies on several occasions, and I passionately believe in prayer and have total faith in God. I do know that doctors are tools of God and have their purpose, but so does prayer. I have found in my prayer life that it takes patience, faith, and perseverance of praying and praying and praying and I do know that people do get healed by God as was I.
I received the following from a reader:
A young man had been to Wednesday night Bible Study. The Pastor had shared about listening to God and obeying the Lord’s voice. The young man couldn’t help but wonder, “Does God still speak to people?” After the service, he went out with some friends for coffee and pie, and they discussed the message. Several talked about how God had led them in different ways.
It was about ten o’clock when the young man started driving home. Sitting in his car, he just began to pray, “God…If you still speak to people speak to me. I will listen. I will do my best to obey.” As he drove down the main street of his town, he had the strangest thought to stop and buy a gallon of milk. He shook his head and said out loud, “God is that you?”
He didn’t get a reply and started on toward home. But again, the thought, buy a gallon of milk seemed urgent. The young man thought about Samuel and how he didn’t recognize the voice of God, and how little Samuel ran to Eli. “Okay, God, in case that is you, I will buy the milk.” It didn’t seem like too hard a test of obedience. He could always use the milk. He stopped and purchased the gallon of milk and started off toward home.
As he passed Seventh Street, he again felt the urge, “Turn down that street.” This is crazy he thought and drove on past the intersection. Again, he felt that he should turn down Seventh Street. So, at the next intersection, he turned back and headed down Seventh. Half-jokingly, he said out loud, “Okay, God, I will”. He drove down 7th street several blocks when suddenly, he had a strong feeling to stop.
He pulled over to the curb and looked around. He was in a semi-commercial area of town. It wasn’t the best area in the city, but it wasn’t the worst of neighborhoods either. The businesses were closed and most of the houses looked dark like the people were already in bed.
Again, he sensed something, “Go and give the milk to the people in the house across the street.” The young man looked at the house. It was dark and it looked like the people who lived inside were either gone or they were already asleep.
He started to open the door and then sat back in the car seat. “Lord, this is insane. Those people are asleep and if I wake them up, they are going to be mad, and I will look stupid.” Again, he felt like he should go and give the milk to whoever lived there. Finally, he opened the door, “Okay God, if this is you, I will go to the door and I will give them the milk. If you want me to look like a crazy person, okay. I want to be obedient. I guess doing this will count for something but if they don’t answer right away, I am out of here. “
He walked across the street and rang the doorbell. He could hear some noise inside. A man’s voice yelled out, “Who is it? What do you want?” Then the door opened before the young man could get away. A man was standing there in his jeans and T-shirt. He looked like he had just got out of bed.
He had a strange look on his face, and he didn’t seem too happy to have some stranger standing on his doorstep. “What is it?”
The young man thrust out the gallon of milk, “Here, I brought this to you.” The man took the milk and rushed down a hallway speaking loudly in Spanish. Then from down the hall came a woman carrying the milk toward the kitchen. The man was following her holding a baby. The baby was crying. The man had tears streaming down his face. He began speaking and half crying, “We were just praying. We had some big bills this month we had to pay, and we ran out of money. We didn’t have any milk for our baby. When I heard the doorbell, I was praying and asking God to show me how to get some milk.”
Just then his wife who was in the kitchen yelled out, “I asked him to send an Angel with some milk. Are you an Angel?” The young man reached into his wallet and pulled out all the money he had on him and put it in the man’s hand. He turned and walked back toward his car and the tears were streaming down his face. He knew that God still answers prayers.
1 Cor:2:11
. . . Even so, no one
knows the things of God
except the Spirit of God