Testimonies of Healing

A Healing Testimony From 12 Years Ago

This is one of my early healing testimonies tha took place before I was used to seeing God heal though me. This account took place in San Francisco at a renewal meeting on September 6, 1994. (I was on the ministry team for the renewal meeting and a lady named Jan was an apprentice to the team and praying with me.)

The ministry time was fairly powerful and the Lord was deeply touching people. I led most of the prayer, but Jan prayed as well. A couple of times I did not know exactly what to pray for a particular person and Jan seemed to get exactly the right thing. When that happened, the Lord led me to put my hand on Jan's shoulder and silently pray for an impartation for her to minister. The Lord reminded me that He was anointing me to impart the ability to impart into others. It was exciting watching that occur with Jan.

One lady came up to us quite upset. She was sure that she was demonized because she had been present once when her friend stole an idol from a museum. I told her to stand there and worship the Lord and we'd be back to pray with her in a second; that we had promised to pray for someone else first. She said she'd work through it on her own if she had to. I said that we'd be happy to pray for her as soon as we were done with the other lady. Again I suggested that she worship the Lord while she waited.

We went to pray for the other lady, who was a friend of Jan's. The Lord touched her very powerfully and we stayed with her for about 10 or 15 minutes. The Lord continued to move Jan's friend and touch her, but after about 5 minutes, He did not show us anything else to pray for her. He did, however, speak to me about the lady who was waiting for us to come and pray for her. He said that He wanted to assure her that His power to protect was greater than the enemy's power to harm. He wanted to establish her trust in Him. He did not want to deal with demons at all, but He wanted to bless her.

As we walked back to this lady, I told Jan to let me take the lead on this because it was not going where she though it would be. Jan was more than willing to honor my request. We got back and I started praying over the lady what the Lord had shown me to pray. The lady opened her eyes and was very excited. She said that the Lord had shown her that this was just an attack of the enemy to try and steal her blessing and she had decided to let the Lord bless her anyhow.

I continued to pray for her. I noticed that she kept her eyes open and looked at me the whole time. I suggested that perhaps she would be able to receive more if she closed her eyes and concentrated on worshipping the Lord. She said that she was deaf and had to keep her eyes open to read my lips to know what I was praying.

I suggested that we move to where the light was better then, so that she could see more clearly. She agreed and we found a spot. As I continued to pray for her, I could feel a very strong healing anointing come on me. My hands were tingling and warm, and the light pressure had returned on the top of my head. I don't know how it I knew it, but I knew that Jan was experiencing the same anointing and sensations.

I started praying for an increase in the healing anointing. The lady we were praying for went down. I touched her ears and asked the Lord to open them. Then I asked Jan to put her hands on the lady's ears and pray for her. The lady broke into the biggest smile and tears came to her eyes. I asked her if she could hear what Jan was praying for her. "Yes," she replied, "I can hear her. I can hear!"

We prayed for her a little longer and then moved on. We were, of course, both excited about what the Lord had done for her. I mentioned to Jan, "You know, we had nothing to do with that. That was the Lord healing her." Jan nodded. Then I went on to ask Jan if her hands had been tingling and hot when she prayed for her. Jan said yes. I told her that was a healing anointing, and she should learn to recognize it because the Lord wanted to more of this. Jan said that matched up with some prophesies that Kim Clement had spoken over her. I remembered the Lord telling me that Jan was experiencing the same things I had, so I asked her if she felt a pressure on top of her head, as though someone was lightly touching her there. She said that she did. We both assumed that was God's hand on us as we ministered for Him.

We looked over at the lady who used to be deaf. She was sitting up, talking to a friend with animated gestures and clearly very excited. I walked back up to her, staying behind her where she could not hear me or read my lips. I asked if the Lord had blessed her. She said "Oh yes!" Then she turned her head to face us, and she had this look of radiant joy on her face. I am not sure which was the bigger miracle for her--God opening her deaf ears or God breaking the power of fear over her life.

A Healing Testimony From 10 Years Ago

About Physical Words Of Knowledge

This testimony is from ten years ago, before I understood about physical words of knowledge. It's hard to remember way back when I was first getting started in healing, so it is fun for me to look back at this. It seemed like God had to "hit me over the head with a club" to get my attention instead of just giving me a subtle hint. (I bet I'm not the only person to have that experience.) This testimony shows how God manages to get the point across even when we are clueless and when we aren't trying to pay attention...

May 24, 1996:

I spent the whole week leading up to this Friday being sick. It started with a severe headache (I am not prone towards headaches) on Tuesday that became crippling and caused me to leave Tuesday night class early. By Wed night, it had gotten to bad that I could not walk unaided and I also felt like I was going to throw up -- through I never did. By Thursday AM severe pain had spread to my kidneys and lower back and my husband was considering taking me to the emergency medical clinic. I kept waking up in pain in the middle of the night and could not sleep. Things seemed to ease up a bit on Friday. I decided to go to our Church's Friday night renewal meeting. Normally I would be on the ministry team. But that night I just planned to come and receive prayer. I sure felt like I needed it and felt in absolutely no place to minister to anyone.

Recently, both attendance at the renewal meetings has been way down (35-45) and the ministry team participants have also been way down to about 3 or 4 (and sometimes just Debbie and myself). Well, Debbie and I both showed up at church early -- mostly out of habit, but neither of us went up to the conference room where the ministry team meets for pre-prayer. The past few weeks, ministry team pre-prayer has been just been Debbie, Bill Hernandez (the associate pastor who is over the renewal meetings) and myself.

Debbie and I were in the sanctuary and we both mentioned to the other that neither of us felt up to praying this week. Eventually Bill came down to the sanctuary to hunt us up and we agreed to go upstairs and pray/intercede for the meeting, but both of us expected not to minister (pray for others) that night.

At the prayer meeting, we mostly sat in silence waiting on the Lord. We did a tad of petition, but mostly we just sat there and waited. I'll tell you, we were a pretty motley crew -- not at all the victorious team folks imagine us to be. Then after a long while (maybe 10 minutes of silence), Bill closed off the prayer time. He looked at me and asked me if I'd gotten any sense of direction for the meeting. It was now 7:30 PM and the worship was already starting downstairs. I shook my head no. I also realized that Bill's question meant he had no idea of what the Lord wanted to do that night. Then Bill asked Debbie the same question and her response was the same as mine.

About then I sort of wishfully spoke out. "I don't have a sense of direction for tonight's meeting, but I sure hope it is a healing service! I've been sick all week -- stuff out of the blue that I don't normally have problems with -- and I sure need a healing!"

"Really?" said both Debbie and Bill at the same time, "Me too."

"You know what that is, don't you?" Bill asked.

"You're not saying that all this sickness is word of knowledge, are you?"

Bill nods his head. Then he explains how that has happened to him in the past. One time God had let him be sick for about 3 weeks with the symptoms of a liver disorder. Then he was at a kinship and one gal there asked for prayer for her dad, back on the east coast, who was dieing of liver cancer and had been given only a few more weeks to live. About then, God quickened to Bill that he'd been experiencing the same symptoms because it was a word of knowledge. Bill laid hands on her as she stood in for her dad, and prayed for him. After praying for her dad, Bill's symptoms gradually diminished over the next three or four days and finally went away. The day after Bill prayed, the woman's father went into remission and was well enough to attend her wedding, 6 months later. He lived another 6 months after that and then went to be with the Lord.

Bill felt that since all three of us started suffering from things that were not our own issues about the same time that it was probably a word of knowledge. I mentioned that God was sort of mean if this is how He gave words of knowledge -- letting us suffer for a whole week. Bill said he could not explain it, but that God sometimes gives words of knowledge this way. He said it is part of the "hard side" of ministry. Debbie said that she was relieved to find we'd all been experiencing the same thing and it was not just her.

It certainly was the hard side of ministry. All three of us felt so "beat up" and unspiritual that none of us felt sufficient to minister. Back in the early days of renewal I had heard over and over that we are to minister out of fullness and if we are not full, we should go get filled up instead of ministering. But there were only three of us available to minister that night, and all three of us felt we were running totally on empty. In fact one of us, I don't remember which one, said "if anything happens tonight it will definitely be the Lord because none of us has anything to give."

Anyhow, Bill suggested we pray about it and see if healing was on God's agenda for tonight. So we prayed and during that time God confirmed to us that He did intend to come with healing anointing that night. So we wrote down our various symptoms/disorders we'd suffered all week as a list of words of knowledge. We also asked the Lord to show us anything else He wanted to heal and we got a few additional words. Then I got a word that the Lord wanted to heal broken relationships that any among us (those at the meeting) might have and to and bind us together in unity. Bill decided that we should each give our own words and Debbie said that she'd rather not speak in front of the group -- public speaking makes her uncomfortable. So Bill wrote down Debbie's words, but asked me to deliver my own words myself.

It was now about 7:50, and the service had been going for 20 minutes. Bill asked us if we remembered the teaching Don Pirozok had done about the paralytic at the healing pool? Don's slant had been that Jesus was standing before the man ready to heal him, but the only way he could perceive of a healing happening was the traditional way (an angel stirs the pool and then the first one in is healed). But Jesus wanted to do it differently than the traditional way. He tied this to the renewal and expected God to come in and move the way we were used to, but that we needed to allow God to stand before us and do it however He wanted to. I mentioned to Bill that this was really good teaching and he ought to share it at the meeting tonight. Bill said that was his intention and asked if any of us knew where that passage was. So we all three grabbed some paperback bibles that happened to be in the conference room (which did not have concordances) and began leafing through the gospels looking for the passage. I am pleased to say that I found it first. (Smile.) So the teaching for that night was born in conference over a 10 minute period 20 minutes after the service had already begin. This was definitely a spontaneous (as opposed to pre-planned) renewal meeting.

Somewhere about then, Debbie and I mentioned to Bill that we weren't planning to pray for people tonight because we were so beaten up. Bill said, "Really? I wasn't planning to pray either. This should make for an interesting ministry time."

Then we decided to close in a brief prayer and go down to catch the remains of worship (we have an hour of worship at our renewal meetings). As we did our closing prayer, the Lord fell on all three of us and renewed us. We spontaneously all broke out in laughter at the same time. By the end of this prayer time, we felt very renewed and empowered and each knew that all three of us would be ministering that night.

So we went downstairs. There were only about 30 people there. Bill said to me that he is not surprised that attendance is down because it's a holiday weekend and some people are out of town for the weekend. But he had a strong sense that the Lord was going to show up powerfully.

During the service, the Lord gave me another word -- that someone in the group had recently learned that a close friend was saying hurtful things about them behind their back. That God wanted to empower this person to forgive before a root of bitterness set in. Sigh. I was not so sure I wanted to give that word. But God impressed it on me a second time, later in the service.

By the time it came to give my words, I had two non-physical healing words and 4 physical healing ones. When Bill gave his words, one of the words he gave was that someone was fighting off the start of a cold or flu and that God wanted to heal them so that they did not get sick. I remembered thinking to myself "Now, that is really stretching it Bill."

Then we went into ministry time. The Lord showed up powerfully during ministry time and it was easy and fun to pray for people. His power seemed to be there and also there was a free flow of words of knowledge and the prophetic. It was not the "fire and power" Mehesh had predicted for Friday night (which he says is the literal day of Pentecost), but it was a good meeting. During the course of the evening, I ended up praying for people with conditions that matched each of the words I'd had that night except for the stomach problem. I even ran into the woman who'd just recently found out that her close friend was spreading false rumors about her behind her back. And I got to pray for someone with the stomach disorder the following Sunday morning (about 36 hours later).

I also ended up praying for two people who were "fighting off coming down with something". It was the flu for one and a cold for the other. I was a bit surprised at this because I'd discounted that particular word Bill gave as being to trivial to really be a word of knowledge. I mentioned this to the Lord. He kind of laughed at me and told me that was why He gave me both of the people that Bill's word applied to. He wanted to teach me to simply take His words as they were given -- not being afraid to give the ones that seem "too hard" or too specific and not discounting the ones that seem to trivial.

It was a good meeting and I went home feeling, yet again, awed by the Lord. I got home about 11:30 PM and went pretty much straight to be. I slept the whole night through until my husband woke me up at 5:00 AM the next morning to take him to the airport for his trip. Most of my physical symptoms were gone and the ones that remained were very minor in intensity compared to what they had been during the week. I was reminded of Bill sharing how they gradually faded and disappeared over a 3-4 day period and was encouraged. I do think that what I experienced was a word of knowledge. I've often had words of knowledge where I feel the physical pain, but it usually happens just before I am to give the word and usually the duration is very short. I've never had a whole week of being in pain from a word of knowledge before. It is sort of outside of my picture of God and how He does things. But it seems to be within Bill's experience and it seems to have been what happened to me last week. Maybe it's time for a theology adjustment.

(Lately the Lord seems to be putting a lot of time/energy into teaching me not to try and limit Him by my expectations. Every time I think I've finally learned that lesson, I brings me into yet another situation where I find myself unconsciously limiting Him.) Thank God that He is a patient teacher!

Healing At The Friday Night Service

(This testimony is about impartation of anointing to pray for healing.)

The ministry team pre-service prayer was very powerful. I could really feel the Lord's presence since the moment we started praying. During the prayer time, the Lord showed me a picture of a spinal column. It was as clear as if I was looking at one of those skeletons you see hanging from a metal stand in science classes. I could see the spine in great detail. The Lord called two things to my attention as I looked at it. There were some odd little ridges in the middle of spine (about two inches above the bottom of the shoulder blades). These spiky little ridges looked like they were putting pressure where the nerve was and I got the impression that there was great pain when the person moved. Then I saw the bottom of the spinal column in great detail, just above the tail bone. One of the disks between the bones looked funny and misshapen, and I got the impression of constant pain in the lower back. The picture was so graphic that I almost reached out to touch it.

We have a time when we share any words of knowledge that the Lord may have given us during prayer. I shared the picture I'd seen, explaining that I'd never seen a picture that clearly before.

Usually during pre-prayer, the ministry team prays for each other after the time of intercession. But we'd gotten started late, so we did not have a chance to do so. I remembered thinking that we should have prayed for each other, but it was no big deal. Then we went downstairs for the service. I still felt the Lord's presence resting lightly on me.

I was doing the transparencies on the overhead projector for the worship time, something I do not normally do. The worship leader was not following the list, so I was having to hunt up transparencies, etc. This was a little distracting and I could not enter into worship as fully as I'd like to. Bill, one of our pastors, was leading the service. He started sharing the words of knowledge at one point and asked me to come up and explain the picture I'd seen. (So much for remaining anonymous... I hoped that the word was accurate. It would be really embarrassing if there was no one with a bad back to pray for sometime during the evening.)

Then Bill did a teaching on healing. After that we had more worship and then started ministry time. I recruited a catcher and started praying, expecting a very powerful anointing. The anointing turned out to be about the same as usual, maybe even a little less powerful than I was used to. I was sort of disappointed because I was really expecting the Lord to come in much greater power. He was touching people, but I'd have to pray for them for about five minutes each.

(I like it much better when God invades the ministry time and the pray-er is almost incidental. It is much more exciting when the Lord comes in incredible power.)

After a while, I stopped praying and went over to Bill to mention how good his teaching had been. He said that it was a really powerful night. I was surprised, because it did not seem that powerful to me; it seemed sort of average. I told Bill that since he seemed to have so much anointing, I'd love it if he would pray for me. We couldn't hunt up a catcher, so I just kneeled on the ground. Bill started praying for me and I could really feel the Lord's presence increase. It felt like someone was pumping electricity into my body. I had a real sense of being empowered and started feeling full to overflowing. The term I use for that feeling is "dripping full." I could hardly remain kneeling, I felt like I was going to fall over backwards. But it is technically difficult to fall over backwards from a kneeling position unless you are a gymnast or something.

Eventually I did end up falling over backwards and was laying there under the Lord's power. It felt good to be in His presence and I decided that maybe I'd just stay there for a long time. But a very, very heavyset lady came and stood almost directly over where I was laying. She was acting like she was about to fall on me, so I decided to get up and move to a "safer" location.

I noticed a leader from my previous Church. She was just leaving. I decided I should greet her. She had just stepped out of the room into the hall, so I followed her out. We had a brief discussion. During that time, I happened to touch the young man who was with her on the shoulder. He went down--no catcher or anything. I wasn't even praying for him, I just happened to touch him. The Holy Spirit came on him powerfully.

Then my hands really started tingling, so I decided to pray for the shoulder of the lady I'd gone out to greet. I put my hands on her shoulder (she had a chronic condition) and they got really hot. I tried to pray intelligently, but God's power was flowing through me and making me shake. I did manage to ask the Lord to increase His healing anointing. But then all I could do was laugh. So I stood there with my hands on her shoulder shaking and laughing. We stayed that way until the heat went away, about five minutes later. She said that it felt really good where I was touching her and after we were done praying she said that it still hurt, but not nearly as much as before. Meanwhile, her friend was still on the flood, and God was still touching Him.

His anointing was so strong and it was so much fun ministering under it. It felt like God was filling me so full that the overflow was hitting the people around me. I literally felt like a little kid with a squirt gun (filled with blessing instead of water). I was going around squirting everyone who got near me, and many of them were powerfully effected.

Desta is on both the worship team and ministry team. This evening she was doing worship. She had been sick with the flu all week. She wandered out into the hall, trying to go home a little early. I asked her how she was feeling and she said not very well. So I offered to pray for her and I recruited a catcher. Within a few seconds, she was on the floor and began laughing. She felt much better.

After a while I returned into the main room. The worship team had stopped playing and the ministry was mostly over. There were still a few people laying on the ground, resting in the Lord.

I walked over to a few people from the worship team, feeling very playful in the spirit. Before I had a chance to do or say anything, the bass guitar player turned to me and said -- "You know that back you saw the picture of? That was me. I've had a back problem in my lower back since I was 13 and have been in constant pain. And a few years ago I hurt my back in the middle of the spine, right where you saw those spikes."

So we decided to pray for him. I laid my hands on the two places where his back was sore. Someone else was ready to catch and another person was standing in front of him, with her hand on his forehead. We asked God to come with His healing anointing. All of the sudden I felt this flush of fire shoot through me and my hands got burning hot. Or maybe his back got burning hot. We're not really sure which got hot first but soon both were on fire. I felt like electricity was going through me and started shaking as I stood there with my hands on his back. He went down and I followed him down, keeping my hands on his back until the heat diminished some. I tried to pray intelligently, but often would break out laughing in the middle of a sentence because God's joy was on me so strongly. I noticed that he was in a very awkward position for someone with a bad back, but he did not appear to be in any discomfort. When he got up, he said that is back, which had been in constant pain for years, felt better. There was no pain at all.

The Holy Spirit goes Grocery Shopping

(in Oakland Cali)

We were going to have a new-wine party because Daina and Ken Doucet and Cheryl Weber and Penny Spence and David Holmes were out visiting the San Francisco Bay Area. (They are from the TACF, and 4 of the five of them are on staff there.) Daina and her husband were staying at my house and the others at a friend's house. About an hour before the guests were due to arrive, Daina decided she'd like to go to the grocery store to get some grapes and cheese for the party. So we went. As we walked through the entrance, Daina was telling me about a friend and said, "She's a real prayer warrior..."

The person directly in front of us turned around and said, "A prayer warrior, huh?"

So I asked him if he was a Christian. He said he was and then began telling us about his church and making other Christian type of small talk. His wife went on ahead to go collect her groceries. We chatted for a few minutes and then he mentioned that he had been sick.

I am not sure what came over me, but I asked him if he'd like Daina and I to lay hands on him and pray for healing. He said ok, so we did. We were standing in the main aisle right by the door, and a lot of folks were coming and going past us as we stood there. As we began to pray, the Lord's presence increased tangibly in the area. The guy's eyelids began to flutter and he began to sway. The Holy Spirit was clearly all over him. In fact, both Daina and I could feel the Lord's presence quite strongly ourselves.

We only prayed for about 3 minutes or so. When we finished, the guy opened his eyes and thanked us. He went to catch up with his wife and Daina and I began our shopping. But the Lord's presence stayed heavily on us, and we both broke out laughing. We were both filled with the Lord's joy and commented to each other how strongly we felt the Lord's presence once we began to pray. As a matter of fact, we could still both feel His presence and His anointing on us quite strongly. We continued laughing as we did our shopping.

Then the fellow we'd prayed for came running up to us, very excited. He told us that he was healed. We both said, "Praise the Lord!" The Daina decided to give him a copy of the Spread The Fire magazine, as she had spares in the car. So she went to get it and I went off hunting for decorative toothpicks for the cheese squares. When I got back to the front, Daina and the fellow were both there. Apparently he had followed her outside when she went back to the car. His wife also came out, excited that her husband had been healed and asked Daina if we'd pray for her as well. So they grabbed me and we found a not too crowded spot in an aisle between two cheese counters. The wife said she needed prayer for anxiety. So we began to pray, and the Holy Spirit showed up again. The wife had looked a bit stressed when we first started praying for her, but we could see the Lord all over her as we prayed. When we finished, she looked much more peaceful. They went on home and Daina and I finished our shopping. We kept our eyes and spiritual antennae open, just in case the Lord wanted to minister to anyone else. But He did not point anyone else out to us. So we paid for the groceries and went home, feeling very excited by what He had done.

When we got home, half an hour before the party was supposed to start, there were already four people there. We started sharing what the Lord had done at the grocery store, and His anointing came back on us just talking about it. About then Penny and Cheryl arrived from the friend's house. They could immediately sense the anointing and took our hands. We stood in a circle and invited the Lord to come touch and fill us. Then I felt impressed to go get Joyce and invite her into the circle. (Joyce is on staff at my church and has a very strong prophetic anointing.)

The five of us moved to the dining room and the Lord really fell on us. We started praying for each other and all Heaven broke loose. It was awesome and it also got a bit on the wild side, with some physical manifestations. Several people had arrived by this time--there were 34 of us all total. Many of them began to crowd into the dining room as we prayed for each other. We sort of started praying for the people around us and pretty soon it was a full pledged and very powerful ministry time. That impromptu ministry time lasted about 1.5 hours and then we gathered together to do some worship. It was an incredible night. And it all started when the Holy Spirit decided to go grocery shopping with us.

I want to see His presence and His influence permeate every aspect of our day-to-day lives! He is welcome to go grocery shopping with me any time, or to come into whatever aspect of my day-to-day life that He wants. I believe we are going to see more of His presence and power and touch come into what has previously been mundane areas of our lives.

God Comes with Power to My Work ...Literally!

[This testimony is not explicitly about healing, unless you consider God's fixing a broken mechanical device as healing. But I cannot resist throwing this one in, because God really does want to show up with His power at each of our work places.]

It was late in the work day and I was hungry. I had this can of chocolate flavored protein supplement which I felt like I really needed. The stuff doesn't taste that great cold, but if you heat it, it tastes like hot chocolate. So I poured the stuff into a coffee cup and went to the kitchen area of our company, which is very near our receptionist's desk. There is a microwave in the kitchen area, and I like to heat the protein supplement in the microwave, turning it into "hot chocolate".

I put the cup in the microwave, pushed all the right buttons and...nothing happened.

"Oh, Lord! Please, I really want this stuff hot!" The prayer slipped out before I even realized it, because prayer has become very much a part of my lifestyle--I pray about everything, even little things like this.

I pushed the bottoms again, and the microwave started up.

Just then the receptionist walked into the kitchen. She was talking to me even before she got in there...

"Sorry, Teresa, the microwave is broken. It went out earlier today...hey! What did you do it to it to get it working?"

"I prayed."

"No, really, what did you do?"

"Really, I prayed."

"Awe... come on... what did you really do."

"I really prayed."

"Why would God fix a microwave for you? That doesn't even make sense."

"Because He knew I really wanted this chocolate hot. So He did it for me."

"You're kidding, right? God really answers your prayers when you pray?"

"Yeah, lots of times. It's all about relationship. If you are in a personal relationship with Him, then He gets involved in every area of your life, even little things like this."

"No way!"

"Yeah."

"Gee, maybe you could pray for me to win the lottery."

"I don't think it works quite like that."

"Oh, if I win, I'll donate a lot of money to charity... that should make Him happy."

"That's not quite how it works.. it's about getting your life in alignment with His Lordship... letting Him be the boss..."

"Hey, I think it's all about doing good and treating people right."

(Sometimes I'm a little slow, but I suddenly realized that God was opening a door for me to witness to her. She'd been in the hospital all last week with a bad asthma attack. I felt like I was supposed to invite her to the Wednesday night healing services our Church just started having a couple of weeks ago.. and I'd been praying that God would open an opportunity to invite her. Maybe this was it, but maybe it was more. I was not sure how to proceed so I silently asked God to show me.)

"Well, not exactly. We can talk about sometime if you want."

"If Christianity's not about doing good to people and treating them right, then I don't even want to talk to you about it."

Suddenly a wisdom that was not my own came on me... "Well, you got part of it right. The bible says the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all of your heart and all of your soul and all of your spirit. The second command is similar: love your neighbor as yourself. You are certainly right that treating people well and doing good is important. In fact, it's the second most important commandment. But the most important piece of it is to be in a personal and dynamic relationship with God--to love Him and obey Him and let Him be the boss of your life..."

The conversation continued for a little longer, she was open and receptive. I mentioned that if she ever had a free Wednesday night, she might want to consider coming to my Church and let us pray for her about her asthma. She said she'd like to do that...maybe in early December. I was astonished at how open and receptive she was... and I began to realize the reason the Lord "fixed" the microwave wasn't just to give me a cup of hot chocolate, but to demonstrate is power and His caring to an unsaved coworker. I was so excited about this, and will be following up with her on prayer for her healing and also on the personal relationship with God.

Well, there is a little more to the microwave portion of the story. The next day I was sitting in my office working. She walked in and said, "Hey, Teresa, the microwave's gone out again. Do you want to pray over it and see if you can fix it again."

I told her that it probably didn't work that way.. but I went over and tried the microwave... and Larry (another coworker) was standing there. Well, he asked me if I was going to do my voodoo mumbo-jumbo over it. (I guess Karen, our receptionist, has been talking about yesterday's microwave incident.) I said that I didn't do any magic, but sometimes God answers my prayers because I have a deep and close personal relationship with Him. Well, the microwave did not start, but God did give me an opportunity to share the gospel briefly with another co-worker...

He has a way of working things to His glory and arranging the most interesting (sometimes even humorous) divine coincidences. I am praying that the Lord will heal Karen's asthma as a sigh to the whole company that He is both real and caring. At any rate, I'm inviting Him to continue to orchestrate divine appointments at work...

Charles Ndifon Healing Conference

At Trinity Center Church in Victoria BC

On October 6 to 11, Trinity Center Church in Victoria BC held a healing conference with Healer/Evangelist Charles Ndifon. I was able to fly out there and attend the meetings from October 7 until Oct 10.

I had some frequent flyer miles I had to use by the end of the year or I would loose them. I felt the Lord wanted me to take Victoria, who was a prophet/evangelist friend, to Toronto with me for Catch The Fire on those miles. So I made reservations, but before I cashed in the tickets, the Lord spoke to me in a dream and told me we were to go to the healing conference at Victoria BC instead. (He spoke the same thing to Victoria.)

Monday night before the conference began the Lord reminded me of the dream and spoke to me about it for two hours, promising He would meet me there in wonderful ways and that I would see His healing flow forth from my hands. As long as we were talking, I asked Him if He could somehow arrange for me to be on the ministry team.. I love to pray for people!

We flew all day Wednesday and arrived at the conference Wednesday night. I really liked Charles. He preaches a simple message that certainly builds faith and there is absolutely no hype or manipulation, but there is a lot of the power of God! The sick were healed as he prayed for them.

Thursday morning we went to leader's meeting with Charles, and he encouraged us to present a simple and positive gospel rather than try to get complicated. His ministry buddy Jeff encouraged us to live our convictions (rather than preach them) and to preach Jesus, and to present Him as good news. That message really stuck with me.

At that leader's meeting, Victoria and I were "invited"--ok, I asked and was given permission--to be on the ministry team. YES!!! Just like God promised me. That night we came early for the ministry team pre-prayer and instruction, and God showed up. It was pretty much like a renewal meeting! God comes in power and empowers those of His people who are seeking Him.. He **is** a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.

It was a wonderful experience to be on the ministry team. The worship was spectacular.. the teaching good and the ministry time powerful. Personally, I saw some routine healings, but nothing spectacular, just some back and neck injuries healed, and stuff like that. All the same, it was neat to see God come and heal people as we prayed and asked Him to. He is a good God! It was a great night for us, and a wonderful meeting. God's sweet presence was tangible all over the building. My highlight of the evening was that the Lord gave me a word of knowledge that one lady I prayed for was not saved. I got to lead her to the Lord before praying for her healing, then God healed her!

We had the next day off to go shopping, and arrived for the evening meeting. The ministry team pre-service prayer time was powerful again... oh did God show up! His fire and His joy were all over me; it was beyond description. God touched Victoria powerfully too. (The ministry team pre-prayer time, in and over itself, would have been worth flying out to Victoria BC for!) God shows up there!

After worship, they called leaders up to pray for us for an impartation. Victoria and I went up. Charles Ndifon spoke to us and exhorted us that the impartation and anointing were not for us personally, but to minister God's kingdom. We all nodded our heads in agreement, desiring more than anything to be used to forward God's kingdom in His power.

Charles prayed a prayer over the group, and the power and presence of God was so strong that many of us found it difficult to remain standing. Somehow I was still on my feet when Charles got to me to lay hands on me and pray for an impartation. The instant he touched my forehead, I heard God say that He was imparting an increased healing anointing in me, and that was why He sent me there. I felt God's power all over me and I went down the instant Charles touched me.

Then I felt a peace come over me and I laid there very quietly. At first God was all over me. Soon that diminished, and I became aware of my friend Victoria laying next to me. God was all over her and she was shaking and crying, then she started laughing. I was a tad disappointed that my own experience was not more powerful. I remembered thinking to myself "It looks like Victoria 'got it'--Lord, please give it to me too."

The Lord replied that He had already done so, but to lay still and not get up just yet, because He had more He wanted to do in me. At that instant I had a choice.. I could have gotten back up and went to my seat.. but I choose to stay there and obey God. A few minutes later, God's power and presence came on me so tangibly that I was not aware of anything else. God was real and present and I was very much aware of Him.

He reminded me that He has sent me here for an impartation of healing anointing and that He had most certainly done that in me. He also spoke to me about boldness and how He was going to increase His boldness and faith in me, that I might go forth in this anointing and serve Him. It did not seem like it took very long (though I am told that I was "down" for quite some time).

When I sat up, they were just finishing the altar call and invited those who needed healing to come forward. It took me a few minutes to be able to stand.. by then people were placing their hands over the part of their body that needed healing and Charles was praying for them, as a group, over the microphone. Ministry team people were laying hands on various ones and praying for them. The Lord called my attention to a woman who was standing by herself. He told me to go pray for her. She had glasses on and her hand was over her right eye. I was not sure what she needed healing for...maybe near-sightedness?? In obedience, I went over to her and placed my hand over her hand and prayed something like.. "In the name of Jesus Christ, I command you to be healed right now!" The power of God hit her and she went down.

We had been instructed to leave people alone when they are down, rather than soaking them in prayer. I wanted to interview her and find out what happened, but it did not look like I would have the chance. She was going to be down for a while. So I moved on to the next lady. Charles was no longer praying in the microphone, so I interviewed her, prayed briefly and with authority and then interviewed her again. She said she was healed! I doubled checked and asked her to see if she could make it hurt (a back injury), and she could not! she had pain when we first started praying, but now it was completely gone. Praise God!

About then, the lady I'd prayed for jumped up, screamed, "I can see!!" and ran forward to give her testimony. She had been totally blind in her right eye and now she could see. Wow! Talk about a faith booster for me! I could see that God was in the business of healing! I saw God do some awesome things that night as I prayed.. a lady deaf in her left ear got her hearing back! A lady with a serious left knee problem got healed and could walk ok afterwards. One lady had a digestive problem and lots of pain. When I put my hand on her stomach it got burning hot, and she was amazed at the heat. When the heat went away, there was not any more pain!

Almost everyone I prayed for God healed.. and I seldom prayed more than two or three sentences. God was definitely in a healing mood that night and it was so much fun to be allowed to participate in that with Him! I was so excited about what He had done that I was telling anyone who would listen! On the same night I saw a blind eye open, a deaf ear hear and someone with a lame knee walk normally! WOW!

From what I can gather, God was moving powerfully all over the room, He was not a respecter of **who** was doing the praying, but He was quick to heal. Not everyone was healed, but many were and God definitely demonstrated His power and His glory and His love/compassion for the hurting and wounded. What a good God we serve!

Healing Testimonies From A Benny Hinn Meeting

Sometimes God both humbles and blesses us at the same time. I happened to be flipping through the TV and saw an ad that Benny Hinn (a healing evangelist) was coming to town. I did not have a good opinion of him and told the Lord so. The Lord told me not to judge His servants and then instructed me to volunteer my services at his crusade as a worker. At the training meeting, I was assigned to be an usher captain. I also came the day before the meeting to help set up.

I arrived a bit late, so they did not really need me. I was going to leave (go home) but God stopped me and told me to go pray over the seats. (By the way, I am told that there are 18,000 seats in the arena). So I started to go back in, and was met by two of the Benny Hinn staff. We got into a conversation during which time I shared that God was prompting me to walk around the seats and pray. Then encouraged me to do so. Since they were staff, with official badges and everything, I took that as "official permission" and started walking through the seats, praying.

June 24, 1999

Fairly early in the service, Benny gave an altar call. So many people steamed forward that there was no way to count them all. I happened to be assigned to one of few areas where there was a stairway down to the main floor. Our section had many of the new converts coming through it, and there were literally people as far as the eye could see. They streamed down the aisles, filled up the front and there were so many of them that did not all sit on the lower level and a few were standing the staircase leading down there. It was incredible. I could literally feel the Lord's joy at all of these new believers.

Not long after that, they took an offering and that kept me so busy that I lost track of what was going on.

Then it was time for a bit more worship and healing prayer. The power of God was so tangible in the room. I was assigned to stand at the little steps from the bleachers to the main floor, and keep people from going down prematurely. So I was right there in the thick of it, and it was SO powerful. God's presence was tangible. I closed my eyes and worshipped during part of this, and I opened them and looked around during part. God's presence was on the people--you could see Him so tangibly on many of them. It was a beautiful sight, and powerful as well.

God had told me He was going to heal a lame person in a certain section as I prayer-walked the grounds and prayed on Wednesday afternoon. Well, I ended up being assigned to that very section. When it came time to give testimonies, one of the first people down was a woman who was carrying a cane, waving it joyfully in front of her and practically dancing down the steps. I said to her, "Looks like you won't be needing that any more!" She replied something like, "Not any more, but before this I could hardly walk ten steps!" Wow! I was SO blessed that God allowed me to see the very healing He'd given me the word of knowledge about the day before!!

Let me just share a few other things that I saw. I will prefix it by saying that not everyone was healed, but many people were. I saw a lady get up out of her wheelchair and walk! It was such a lovely sight. I saw one of the prayer team helping a toddler walk for the very first time--it's deformed legs straightening before my eyes as I watched. The father was following behind with tears of joy streaming down his face.

During the testimony time, I was stationed on the main floor, right down where the action was. That meant I got an awesome view of what God was doing. I was just guiding people where they should go, not working directly with them. But some were so excited that they just had to tell me what God did for them. They shared stories of chronic pain leaving, people moving necks and backs that used to be unusable, a teenage girl who was healed of "chronic depression", a woman carrying her leg braces and lifting her knees very high with a look of absolute rapture on her face. God did so many awesome things!

There may have been some fakes in the crowd just trying to get up on the stage to be prayed for. There may have been some people who were caught up in the emotion of it all. But one thing I am absolutely sure of, the Holy Spirit was tangibly present and there were a lot of very real and very powerful healings.

I wish I should share the expressions on people's faces with you as they discovered they were healed. Oh God, it was so awesome. There was man who had chronic pain for over 11 years and it was suddenly gone! There was the woman who felt the warmth of God go through her and burn away cancer in her body.. God was on the move!

June 25, 1999

Friday was the final day of the Benny Hinn crusade. As expected, God showed up big-time. I was serving as an Usher captain, overseeing 6 ushers that were servicing about 2000 seats. There are an amazing number of "situations" that come up and need individual attention, so believe it or not, I missed most of the service--except, of course, when it came time for the altar call and healings/testimony parts. I got to be right in the think of it then.

My favorite "situation" to handle was a woman who came and got me during the evening service. The service had been going for about 1/2 hour, all worship, and God's presence was already tangible in the room. She had a problem that she needed help with--she needed to accept Jesus right then and she could not wait for the altar call!! So I took her outside of the main auditorium to a quiet corridor and led her to the Lord. She had all these things that had been at her in her life. Her husband wanted a divorce, her oldest daughter was getting rebellious and unmanageable, etc. She was literally overwhelmed at what was going on in her life. I prayed for those concerns and then had her pray with me to invite Jesus to be her Lord. As she repeated the salvation prayer after me, God's peace washed over her. You could see a change in her muscle tone as she "relaxed" into His peace, tears streaming down her face and a smile on her lips. Isn't God wonderful!

So many powerful things happened during the ministry time on Friday. I could not begin to recount them all, so let me share just one story. There was a lady in the testimony line who was standing there holding a cane and worshipping God for all she was worth. The line had been moving very slowly, and she had been standing in front of me for quite some time. Many of the people around her where agitated, because they thought the line was for people who wanted to be prayed for regarding healing, not a testimony line for those who had been healed. They wanted the line to move faster.

Meanwhile, this lady ignored them all and kept worshipping. I was careful not to touch her because that is against Benny Hinn's rules. I softly prayed to bless what God was doing on her. God was obviously touching her. Oil formed on her forehead. A little later, gold dust appeared on top of the oil. After a while the woman opened her eyes and looked around. I told her that God was really touching her and about oil and gold dust on her forehead.

She said "Really??" I said "Yes!" The next thing I knew, she grabbed me in a big old bear hug and said "Thank you!!" I told her God was the one who touched her and I had nothing to do with it, but she was so thrilled. She began to tell me a bit about her story.

Her friends wanted her to go forward in her wheel chair but she refused, deciding to walk up with her two canes "in faith" that God would touch her. She only had one cane as she told me this story, and was not even using it, she was just holding it. She explained how she could not walk without two canes--one was not enough. I asked her what happened to her other cane and she had no idea. It still did not occur to her that she was not using the one she still held.

As the talked, the Lord came on her again and the color of her skin changed from a pallid gray to normal skin tone. I knew God was doing something incredible. I did not touch her, but I stretched my hand in her general direction and prayed out loud, "Lord, thank you for the way you are touching her. Lord, we just bless what you are doing in her." She started worshipping again, with her arms up stretched and the cane dangling from her hand. The line moved a bit, and she stepped forward, still worshipping and not even using the cane. She was now about 8 steps away from me.

About then, a ministry team member came by. There are not very many ministry team members, and one had not been by in about half an hour. I motioned her over and pointed out the lady with the dangling cane to her, saying that I thought God was really touching her. The ministry team lady did something that was a real treat for me. She invited me to go with her to minister to this lady. (Remember, only Benny Hinn and his small ministry team are allowed to lay hands on people and pray for them.) So I was delighted to go with her and "help."

She asked the woman what God had been doing for her. The woman was so blessed that she could hardly answer, other than proclaim how magnificent God is. She also managed to inform us that the pain is gone.

"How long have you had the pain for?" she was asked. "For over a year," came the reply. "How frequent is the pain?" "It is constant. I am always in pain but now it is gone!"

She started worshipping again. The ministry team lady asked her about the wheelchair, and the woman explained that she could walk without it, providing she use two canes. I had my hand lightly on her back as she talked to the ministry team woman, because she was getting so drunk in the Spirit that she looked like she might go down any moment. The ministry team woman asked her, "Well, has that changed since God has touched you tonight?"

"I don't know" the woman replied.

The ministry team lady began backing away from her. "Shall we try it?" she asked.

The woman unconsciously took a stop towards her and then another, still holding (and not using) her cane. But she did not realize she was walking. "Oh, I can't walk without a cane, it's just not possible ... hey!!! I am walking!!!" You should have heard the delight in her voice as she realized she was doing the impossible.

Needless to say, the ministry team lady pulled her out of line and took her up front. I watched them go, tears of joy in my eyes.

About two hours later, I finally had a chance to sit down for a few minutes. I sat in the front row seat of the bleachers, near the staircase. I closed my eyes and worshipped for a few minutes. It felt so good to sit down and so good to worship.

"Teresa, open your eyes and look." God said.

The woman who learned she could walk without a cane was walking past me, waving at me. She did not have her cane any more. I hopped up and ran down the short flight of stairs to greet her. She told me the whole story of her healing. She had a serious heart condition and was scheduled to have open heart surgery the following week. That would no longer be necessary. She used to also have shortness of breath, which went away, and she was able to walk unassisted. I would say God did an excellent job on her!

Healing Crusade In Beleem Brazil

With Randy Clark

Saturday morning was a very powerful time at the pastor's conference. Bill Johnson gave a moving testimony about being hungry for God and then Randy preached on impartation and hunger for anointing. The ministry time was explosive as people called out to God for more of Him. It reminded me very much of the type of anointing I used to feel at the early days of renewal in Toronto when they were still at their first building.

On Sat Night, more people came to the crusade. I don't know the head count, but it looked like several thousand more people. It began to rain just as we arrived at the healing tend and the electricity and generator all went out. So Rodney and his interpreter had to shout and the people had to crowd up front into the ministry area to hear. While that was going on, Bill Johnson prayed for the team for impartation and anointing. His prayer must have worked, because almost everyone had an exciting testimony. We prayed in the healing tent for an hour before service began and also for the 1st hour of worship. The electricity came on just before the main meeting was to start, and the rain stopped.

The first person who came to me for prayer was a mute man. A lady named Sue teamed up with me and it was great fun working with her.. God gave her part of the strategy and gave me part of it and both of us needed the other. The man was not healed of his muteness, but we did lead him to the Lord and we did see the Lord's peace wash over him.

Sue and I prayed together for a second person, a elderly lady that had severe head pain for 45 years, was deaf in her left ear and had bad arthritis. God healed her head pain first. When we were praying for her ear, she began to sing. We asked her to be quiet and let us pray and she explained that the hearing had come back. It was faint but she could hear! So we asked God to increase the hearing and He did. It was not quite perfect, but she could hear someone speak to her in a normal voice from about four feet away, quite an improvement from being totally deaf in that ear for 31 years. God also healed the arthritis.

Then Sue and I were instructed to split up because there were many wanting prayer and they did not want us teaming up, so more people could be prayed for. I saw a lady healed of a severe migraine (the pan left as we prayed). I saw a sore back healed and also a lady who could not bend her knee or ankle healed and she could walk properly and without pain. Also, a lady was very near sighted and her eyes hurt. The pain went away and her vision improved dramatically, close to normal.

There were some unverifiable things I prayed for that God may or may not have healed. They brought me a deaf, blind and autistic child that showed no signs of improvement. So God was not healing 100% of those I prayed for, but neat things were happening. (As an aside, they brought the autistic child back to me the next day. She had gone to bed autistic, but when she woke up in the morning, she was normal! Her mother was very excited and hunted me up to share the testimony with me.)

Just before Randy preached, we were instructed to go back to the main meeting. We had been told earlier to go to our team leader when we got this instruction, so I hunted up Rodney and stood next to him. Rodney told me that he was not ready to go, so I should grab the next person in his line and pray for him. I did. It was a lady who had "pain in her eyes". I began to pray for her. As I did, she became excited. The pain was gone. I was trying to figure out if this mean she had headache type of pain from eye strain and the headache left of what? It was something along that line, but it also turned out that she was so nearsighted that she was considered legally blind. Now she could see much more clearly. Before everything was blurry and bright light hurt her eyes. Now she had close to normal vision and light did not hurt her eyes any more!

We left for the meeting and it was incredible, similar to the night before. I am told that here were about 22,000 in attendance. Since I got to the platform late, there were not any empty chairs left it to sit in. However, one of the dancers was sitting on the raised box where the keyboard and keyboard player were. She motioned me to sit next to her--we are talking front center of the stage, not that far behind where Randy was speaking with his interpreter. I did not want to be in that visible of a spot. But my legs were tired and there was no where else to sit, so I decided to join her. The keyboard player was also sitting there.

I suddenly felt prompted to pray for her. So I put my hand on her shoulder and whispered my prayer into her ear. God touched and blessed her--you should have seen her smile! Then the keyboard player wanted me to pray for him too, so I did. I took his hand and prayed silently. But God came all over him. He never made any noise, but he was weeping and shaking and he ended up as a little ball on the ground. Each time I tried to let go of his hand, he would just squeeze it tighter. I had no clue what God was doing, but He appeared to be meeting him. So I stayed and prayed silently for him for most of the message.

After the message, Randy asked his team to give words of knowledge. As usual, God gave me three words of knowledge to share. God gave words of knowledge to many people on the team. It was clear He was about to do something big in the corporate healing ministry, but I did not get to see what it was, because I was sent back to the healing tent to pray for many sick people who were waiting there. God continued to do a lot of neat healings that night during the one on one ministry in the healing tent.

My absolute favorite, and I am still extremely excited about it, was a lady who was paralyzed on her left side. Then she came to me, she could not walk properly but shuffled and dragged her left leg. She could barely lift her left arm and she could not twist at the waist at all. As she slowly limped up to me, I remembered thinking that I did not have the faith to pray for her. Then I caught sight of the team praying next to me out of the corner of my eye. They were heeling a man out of his wheelchair, and he was walking! Seeing their miracle boosted my faith.

After some prayer, the lady showed a little improvement in her shoulder, she could lift her arm about twice as high. So I prayed some more, and then the arm went higher. It was literally joint by joint with two or three prayers for each joint, but about 90% of the paralysis left her. She was walking at a regular pace and taking regular sized steps, she could bend and twist at the waist, she could lift her arm above her head, she could rotate her shoulder and bend at the elbow. I was just starting to pray for her wrist when they told us to all stop praying and get on the bus. She was, of course, extremely excited, and said she'd come back the next day for more prayer, hoping to get rid of the last little bit of paralysis that was left.

Man, I was excited about that one. It was so exciting to see her walk! It was so exciting to see dramatic increases in mobility after each prayer. I prayed with her for over an hour, but it was well worth the time invested to see God do a miracle of that magnitude one step at a time!

At one point she asked me why God was doing the healing a little bit at a time. I told her that I did not know, but doing it slowly, a little bit at a time was a whole lot better than if He was not doing it at all. When I said that, she agreed strongly.

Great things happened in the meeting itself, thousands were healed and a lot of people had cancer lumps fall off of them and tumors disappear. Many of my teammates had dramatic stories on the same level as the testimonies I shared. God did a lot of great things that night, and a lot of people were saved as well. But the thing I was most excited about was this paralyzed lady being able to walk almost normally again. I came to really care about her (and I sort of got to know her well) because I spent so much time working with her.

[Previous Lesson] [Next Lesson]

Support Gateways of His Light by sharing this page on social media