When we walked in the room, the air and the mood just felt heavy. A woman sat on the couch, holding her sick son. Laxon couldn’t really sit up on his own, his eyes were wide and expressionless, and he was drooling. He wouldn’t respond to his name, and when Jonathan ran his finger down the sole of his foot, there was no response. His mom told us that they were waiting for the witch doctor to come and see him, and she seemed reluctant for us to pray for him. Finally she consented, and we began praying. Even though she told us it was a fever, he didn’t feel warm at all– but still something felt off.
We started praying softly over him, and the Lord told me to start humming and singing “Sanctuary,” and Jonathan, Jen and Andrea also joined in. We kept praying, and soon I felt the Lord put the hymn “How Deep” on my heart… but I didn’t want to sing it. It’s a long song, and I thought it would be awkward to just start it up in the middle of the quiet room. And, to be brutally honest, I was afraid of singing it just for the sake of hearing my own voice. That was a big fear. I kinda battled fear for a minute, before I finally started singing it. And immediately, it felt better. The Lord reminded me of Jonathan’s words, “cultivate a spirit.” We were all praying for the peace, freedom, love, joy, and hope of the Lord in the room and in Laxon, and I felt like the Lord was just once again pressing His sovereignty on me. I kind of gave up the expectation that Laxon would be healed, and just started focusing on bringing the Lord glory in that moment, in that house. And it felt good. Just to sing to Him, to rest in the confidence that He is absolutely in control, and He would bring healing if and when He wanted to. So no matter what happened, the Lord was in control, and we were just worshipping Him because of that. By the time we left, it was a really, really peaceful place.
When we got home, Jen shared a verse that kept popping into her head, about how “this one could only be cast out by prayer and fasting.” So we decided to fast lunch to pray for him. We went in the room, put on some worship, and just started praying for him, and literally begging for his life. It was a really cool time. Because the truth is, the battle has already been won. If we go in there trying to fight the battle on our own, it’s just not going to work. But if we rest in the confidence that He already has victory, we can just worship Him and ask that His Spirit would fill the room, and that Laxon’s little body would just come under the authority of it’s rightful owner– the Lord. The enemy will try and convince us that we have to fight the battle– and that usually leads to us trying to fight ourselves, to try and muster up authority or power. But in reality, that’s not our place. He already has victory, and we just have to claim it.
Later that afternoon, we went back to visit the house and pray over Laxon some more. As we rounded the corner of the house, there was Laxon… sitting up and alert! He was painfully shy and probably freaked out by the huge crowd following us (the kids in the neighborhood tend to swarm when we show up), but he was there! I was shocked. We prayed for him again and talked to his mom a bit before we left. She said that he started getting better a little while after we left– that was right in the middle of our fasting!
The more I thought about it, the more excited I got. Because I realized that this was the first time that I didn’t pray for healing just for the sake of a miracle, for some kind of proof. And I wasn’t looking to my own abilities to heal him– I wasn’t thinking of it as a superpower. I kind of didn’t expect the Lord to heal him, just because I felt the Lord telling me that He is sovereign, that I needed to trust in that, even if it’s not the outcome I wanted. He told me to cultivate a spirit, and for once I did, and it felt great and peaceful. And that’s when the Lord chose to heal him! I know absolutely that this is not about me at all, it’s about His glory– but I just love that the Lord waited until I knew that before He allowed me to see something like this. So that I would know that it’s not about me and it’s not about the miracle– it’s all about His timing, His sovereignty, His glory.
