A friend held a gathering in her garden to celebrate her Birthday one afternoon this week. The sun shone and it was a lovely opportunity to get to know some of her neighbours over delicious buffet food and cool drinks. I had only met one of the neighbours at my table before. They are not believers in Jesus – yet!
Not long into the conversation, one of them asked what I do for my work. I explained as simply as I could about praying for people in streets and shopping centres and seeing them get well. I told them I had seen some crazy things and one lady asked “Oh, that sounds intriguing! What have you seen?” I just went with the flow, realising that this was a door that Holy Spirit was opening for me to put Jesus on display!
I chose one particular healing story and relayed it as non-church-jargonfied a way as possible, with some humourous parts that were in it too. I sensed generally a positive reception to the story around the table and I wondered how things might develop later. I didn’t feel it was time yet to offer to pray for anyone – this was a space to get to know each other and for me to listen to them and hear their stories.
At one point, I overheard one of the ladies saying to her friend how her neck was really bothering her. She didn’t know if she had slept awkwardly on it or wrenched it somehow, but it was causing her a lot of pain, especially whilst driving. I tucked that information away for future use, hoping that I would get an appropriate opportunity to pray for this lady before she left!
We both needed to leave around the same time, and I noticed she had gone into the house to say goodbye to our host. I followed her in and was pleased to see that there was no one else in the room apart from the three of us. After saying fond thanks and farewells, this neighbour “Valerie” gave me a card with some contact details of her business, in case she could be of service in the future. I told her I wished I had my card to give her, if ever she wanted someone to pray for her! Although it was a bit of a throwaway remark, she did thank me nonetheless - and I knew this was the moment!
Asking her if I had heard correctly that she had neck pain today, she confirmed how it had come “out of the blue” and was even excruciating at times. I knew my host would be very happy for me to offer prayer there and then – so I did. Valerie accepted and, touching the neck area very lightly, I briefly commanded all the pain and the source of pain to be removed completely through the Name of Jesus, and all the muscles to loosen and relax back to normal. Valerie was quite overcome, saying she had felt this power going all round the inside of her body during the prayer. She had never felt anything like it before!
She tested her neck and it was vastly better – just a little bit of discomfort left in one spot. After the second prayer, she said that – to her amazement - it was all good. Yayyyyy! It really was something to see her response to that encounter with God’s love and power. She said “Until you experience something like this for yourself, you just don’t know that it can happen” It reminded me of the verse in Psalm 34 that I love so much “Taste and see that the Lord is good”. Valerie was tasting His goodness - and it was even more delicious than party food!
Valerie mentioned another longstanding physical issue troubling her and I explained how God is able to heal any part of our body or body systems – He is the one who made them, after all! I then briefly prayed for that issue, assuring Belinda that Jesus was here, showing her who He is because He wants her to know Him, so He can touch every area of her life with His full life. Then we finished up with a blessing over her family to prosper in all the ways God had specially in mind for them.
It was just the kind of party I like best – where Jesus igets to be the life and soul of it and surprises someone with His miracle-working love! GLORY!!!