I am really excited to write this blog post. I spent all day yesterday at work thinking about what I was going to talk about next. I really wanted to introduce my team that I will be working with the first 4 months of the race with, but I really felt called to write about this topic that God has been working out in my heart. The topic is Faith. I grew up in a Baptist church for most of my life. As a result, oftentimes the power of the Holy Spirit in a believer’s life is underplayed or not spoken of often. It is actually kind of funny that my students ministry back at home was doing a study on the Holy Spirit while I was away. What I am about to share with you blew my mind and took me about a week to process and it still opens up unlimited possibilities.
Here it goes. Around midway through training camp, a man named Deon began talking to us about the Holy Spirit. His first sermon was about how we are called to be witnesses and if we are to be witnesses, we must experience the baptism of the Holy Spirit. If you guys are getting a bit weirded out, so was I. I mean this guy was talking about healing the sick, raising the dead, casting out demons and stuff beyond that. He literally said we should expect God to do things even greater than these through us as we are empowered by the Holy Spirit. Greater than raising the dead? But, he didn’t just say that. He backed it up with scripture.
“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father.”
John 14:12
“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Acts 1:8
“Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received; freely give.”
Matthew 10:8
It goes on and on. I have grown up in the church all my life hearing these verses and thinking somehow they don’t apply to me. Like as if that was how God worked back then. But now he uses far simpler means to expand his kingdom. Simple preaching, a good kids ministry, good parental influences… etc. I was having such a difficult time thinking this applied to me. That God would seriously give me authority to heal someone was just mindboggling… It still is. Honestly, that first message did not convince me. The following night, he gave another sermon about Healing. He began giving countless stories about how God had used him to heal people. I nodded along like “those are nice stories”. “I have to see it to believe it.” He then proceeds from telling stories about healing to calling out for anyone who is sick to come to the front for prayer for healing. In my mind, I am about to lose it. “He is going to make God look bad” I thought. “He is calling for healing when it may not be his will.” I felt embarrassed for him. Then, the first girl came up and said she has had a migraine with varying levels of intensity for 6 years. He asked her what pain level she was at and she said like a 7 or 8 and he prayed healing over her and afterwards she said she couldn’t feel it anymore. I couldn’t believe it. I came up with all sorts of explanations. She wasn’t in pain to begin with. She was lying. This is a psychological trick. Anything but the fact that God supernaturally healed her. I felt sick to my stomach. Then, he began making his way down, healing person after person, each time my list of possible explanations dwindling, until he turned it around and told us to pray over those who are sick or in pain around us.
I turned to the first person I saw, which happened to be a girl from my squad as she raised her hand, crying, I saw many people from our squad crowd around her and ask what her sickness was. She then began to explain her worry about epilepsy and having a seizure on the race. She explained how expensive her medications were and how she really didn’t want to take them on the race. We all began praying for her, and as I was praying, I almost backed away and quit praying because of my disbelief. I figured like somehow I was hurting her chances of actually being healed because I was praying for her and was not expecting anything to happen. But, that is when God broke me. He reminded me of a time when I prayed a similar prayer, when I was a child, and he answered it. My brother used to have seizures. He would have really aggressive convulsive ones and was taken to the hospital for them a couple of times. Each time the doctor’s could not find what was wrong with him. But, he consistently had them for a couple of years. During those years, as a child, I prayed every night without fail that God would heal him. I don’t know why I believed he would. I had never seen God heal another person before and I don’t know why I didn’t give up after praying and God not healing him the first time. Maybe it was so I could look back at it now and learn a valuable lesson. Maybe it was so he could be further glorified. I don’t know why. But, I do know that it has been over 13 years since my brother has had a seizure. God healed him. I don’t know at what moment after what prayer God did it, but he did it.
This whole thing reminds me of the verse Matthew 7:7-10
“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
9 “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!
I really can’t figure out how to sum up what God was teaching me through this experience. I literally meditated on this all day yesterday and today. There is so much to know. But, the biggest take away I see is, what God is calling us to do is impossible. No amount of sermon preparation, organizational skills, good time management, or even good works can even bring you one step closer to accomplishing the will of God which is his kingdom here on earth. In order to build his kingdom, we must realize that the center of our work is based on a miracle. Salvation is the raising of the dead. Healing the occasional paralytic or blind man or even epileptic is nothing compared to what God wants to and can do through you if you trust him. You can do what Ezekiel was called to do in Ezekiel 37 “Prophecy to these dry bones that the breathe of God enter them and bring them to life. Live your life in such a way that if God doesn’t show up, you totally and utterly failed. I mentioned up above that I thought Deon was going to embarrass himself when he called people up for healing. It turns out I was the one who was embarrassed for thinking such a faithless thought. David puts it best when he says “No one who hopes in you will ever be put to shame, but shame will come on those who are treacherous without cause.” in Psalm 25. Lastly, I know that God does not heal everyone. But, I now have faith that God will always do what is best and if he does not heal someone as a result of a prayer tossed up in faith, then it is because he has something even better than healing in store. Sometimes I spend far too much time trying to figure out if it is God’s will to heal someone or to bring salvation to someone, that I forget to do what I know his will is which is to pray for the healing of my peers and the salvation of my friends with full confidence that he will deliver. This blog post went a little long. However, if you made it through the whole thing, I want to start a comment chain. If God has ever healed you or someone you know as a result of prayer, feel free to leave a comment so that everyone can know, Our God Answers Prayers!!!!!!
