Praying Medic's Blog, page 121

Light Duty Assignment

Trigger warning: This story makes references to physical and sexual abuse. Please consider this before proceeding if you are likely to be triggered by them.

Editor’s notes: This story takes place over a two week period and is the longest message I’ve ever posted on this website. The names have been changed for the sake of privacy. 

After God healed me of a soul wound that had been triggering angry responses for several months, my EMT partner was assigned to another unit and I began working with a new EMT partner. I like him a lot. He’s easy going, laid back, and an excellent driver. The first day we worked together was one of the least stressful days I’ve had in years. The second day we went on a call for a woman I had transported many times before. She’s slightly obese, but I’ve never had a problem lifting her from her wheelchair to the gurney. This time, as we lifted her, I felt a something pop in my lower back followed by a dull pain. We finished the transport without any problems. The pain was so minimal I though it was a minor muscle strain like I usually have. “Just finish out your shift,” I told myself. “Go home, take some ibuprofen, and lie on ice and in the morning you’ll be good to go.”

We ran four or five more calls that day and I was doing okay. I still felt a little dull pain in my lower back now and then, but it wasn’t bad enough to make me think it was a serious injury. Late in the afternoon I decided to lie down in the back of the ambulance to rest my back. It was about 110 degrees. We were idling in a parking lot with the air conditioner running, which basically turns an ambulance into a convection oven. After 20 minutes of lying on the bench seat, we had to do a transport. As I got up off the bench seat, I felt the muscles in my back begin to spasm. The spasms were so severe I couldn’t stand up without holding onto something to support my weight. I decided to lie down again, which was the only position I could find that relieved the muscle spasms.

“I have bad news,” I yelled to my partner who was up front. “I can’t stand up.”

He hopped out and came around to the side door. “What do you want me to do?”

“Call dispatch. Tell them we’re out of service and have them find a unit to cover our call. I’ll call the boss and break the news to him.”

Dispatch gave our call to another unit and we went back to the station. I sent a text message to my wife asking if both the gel packs were in the freezer. She replied, “Yes they are. Having back pain?”  I’d come home enough times with minor muscle strains that she knew I had and injury. There was no one available to report my injury to so I clocked out and went home. I spent two hours laying on a cold pack when I got home, but the pain was no better. I called and told my employer I wouldn’t be able to work tomorrow.

The next day I went to the main office to report an on the job injury. After filling out the required paperwork my wife drove me to the occupational health office. The doctor examined me and felt I had strained ligaments. He put me on a lifting restriction of ten pounds. We drove back to work where I talked with a woman from human resources. She gave me the option of accepting a light duty assignment and being paid, or staying at home and being paid almost nothing. I took the light duty assignment, which would involve assorted jobs like putting together training materials, and cleaning training equipment. It sounded pretty boring, but I needed to make some money to pay the bills. I wasn’t happy about any of this.

My wife was driving me home when she pointed out the silver lining behind this particular cloud. “You know honey, I have a feeling like God is going to use this whole thing for some purpose we don’t know about yet.”

I love how she encourages me at times like this. “He’s always doing stuff like that, isn’t He?” As she drove I wondered who God would touch this time.

In the morning I went to the office for my first 8-5 work day in more than 30 years. I met two people who were also on light duty. They would be my accomplices during the next few weeks as God unfolded His plan.

Tina is a nurse who ripped her knee open on a steep gravel driveway. Sandy tore the ligaments in her knee lifting a patient at a nursing home. While Tina and I had injuries that would heal over time, Sandy’s knee would require surgery and some time in rehab. It was a prognosis she didn’t like.

I spent most of my first day doing online training. Tina and Sandy put together ring binders with training materials for the new employee class that was coming up. As much as I could, I tried to eavesdrop on their conversations throughout the day. At one point, I saw a large lump protruding from Sandy’s lower lip.

“Are you chewing tobacco?”

She put her finger to her lips. “Don’t tell anyone.”

“Don’t worry. You’re secret’s safe with me.” I learned by listening to their conversations that Sandy’s surgery was scheduled a couple weeks from today. At the end of the day when were all leaving, she gave me a pat on the back. “I guess I’ll see you tomorrow.”

As we walked out the door to the parking lot I casually replied, “Tomorrow we get your knee healed.”

“Boy…wouldn’t that be great.”

I gave her a confident smile. “See you tomorrow, Sandy.”

My wife pulled in the parking lot and I got in the car. “Hey baby. It’s good to see you,” I said before I gave her a kiss. “I think I know who God has on His radar.”

“You do?”

“I sure do. She’s a young lady named Sandy.”

The next morning, Sandy, Tina and I met in the training room while we waited to see what today’s work assignment would be. Sandy opened her lunch container and pulled out an empty water bottle. “Now that’s love” Tina said.

“An empty water bottle is love?” I asked.

“It’s a spare spitter!” Sandy replied with a smile. She handed her tin of Copenhagen to Tina, who took a dip and handed it back.

I looked at Sandy, “Remember when I told you last night that tomorrow we’d get your knee healed? Well, I wasn’t joking.”

She looked at me for a moment then slowly putting her hand in front of her mouth she said, “Oh my God, I think I heard about you. Are you the medic that heals people?”

It wasn’t the answer I was hoping for. I’ve tried hard to keep the healing stories out of the flow of company gossip. I went into self-protection mode. “Where did you hear about me?”

“I don’t know. It was either in a dream or someone I worked with. I was working with this EMT. We were in the ambulance driving down the road and he told me about this paramedic he worked with who heals people. I remember the exact spot on the road we were at when he told me.”

“So you’re not sure if it was a dream or if it was someone you actually worked with?”

“I can’t remember. I have a lot of weird dreams about things that are going to happen in the future, so it could have been a dream.”

“Well that’s interesting,” I replied. I was a little nervous at the thought that maybe word was getting around about what I was doing, but the possibility that it was a dream eased my concerns. “So yeah, Sandy…I’m the medic who heals people. How would you like to have your knee healed?”

She looked at me with suspicion. “That all depends on what kind of healing you’re talking about.”

“Look, if you’re concerned that I might be using energy healing or Reiki, don’t worry. I’m not. I’ve prayed with Reiki healers who couldn’t get healed at their own meetings. The kind of healing I do is all Jesus.”

“Which Jesus?”

Many New Agers claim to use Jesus as their spirit guide, but their Jesus isn’t the same one I know. I needed to make it clear who I was referring to. “The Jesus who died on the cross for our sins.”

Tina finished my sentence, “And rose again on the third day.”

I looked at Tina. “Nice catch.”

“My husband and I used to pastor a church. I guess I’m what most people would call a little ‘backslidden.’ I still love Jesus. We just got tired of the judgmental BS going on in the church.”

“I know exactly what you mean,” I replied.

Sandy had one more question. “Does this healing work if you’re skeptical?”

“Yes it does. God doesn’t care what you believe when it comes to healing. He wants everyone healed.”

“Okay I guess you can pray for me.”

“Cool.” I pulled my chair a little closer to her. “So what exactly happened to your knee?”

“I was lifting a patient at a nursing home from the bed to the gurney and when I pulled them toward me I heard a pop in my knee. My partner heard it too, and he was on the other side of the bed. My surgeon says it needs arthroscopic surgery to clean out some stuff that’s floating around in the joint and to reattach some things that were torn. I’m having surgery on the sixteenth.”

“Maybe you won’t need surgery.”

“That would be so cool!”

“Before I begin I want to let you know that this is something any Christian can do. It’s not a special gift. Jesus gave authority to all His disciples to heal the sick. This is something you can do, too. I placed my hand on her knee. “Tina, I want your help. You know how this works.” She placed her hand next to mine and prayed silently. “I command ligaments, tendons, bones, cartilage, nerves and all connective tissue to be healed right now in the name of Jesus. I command spirits of pain to leave.” I prayed for a couple of minutes then asked what she felt.

Pointing to a spot just below her kneecap. “Something’s happing right there. It feels like…I don’t know. Like pins and needles.”

“Sweet. That’s the power of God healing you.” I placed my hand on her knee again and repeated the same process two more times. “You should get up and test it out.”

She got up and walked around the room. She was barely limping at all. She came back and sat down smiling. “I have to admit, it feels a lot better.”

I would have continued praying over her knee until it was completely healed, but we had work to do and I would be with her again for at least a few more days. I also thought she might be completely healed by tomorrow morning.

I had an appointment with a doctor at occupational health that afternoon to evaluate my progress. It didn’t go well. My back was still very sore and I had limited range of motion. I could only sit in a chair for about 20 minutes before the pain was so bad I had to get up and walk around. The doctor scheduled me to return in a week. “If you’re not any better by next week, we’ll have to start physical therapy.”

I left the office a little discouraged. I really wanted to get back to regular duty, but I knew God was going to use my time on light duty to do something extraordinary with Sandy. It was one of the strangest birthdays I’ve ever had.

The following Monday we met in the training room. Tina didn’t show up for work. Sandy was in good spirits, but when I asked how her knee was doing, she said it was about the same as the last day we worked together. On the bright side, she wasn’t wearing the knee brace she’d been wearing ever since the injury. We spent the day cleaning CPR mannequins and I shared some healing testimonies, including a few recent stories about emotional healing.

I told her about a friend we prayed with over Skype who wanted to be healed of painful emotions. We asked the Holy Spirit to show her what memories He wanted to heal. Suddenly she became aware of the time when her father molested her at the age of four. It was a memory she had completely blocked out and she had never told anyone about it. My wife and I took her through a simple process of healing the emotion and memory of the event. When we were done praying with her we took her back to the same event and all the painful emotions associated with it were gone. I told Sandy, “Sometimes Jesus will show the person where he was during the event. Many times they will see Him standing next to them or they’ll feel His embrace in the midst of the trauma.”

Sandy began crying uncontrollably. Putting her hand over her mouth, she curled up in a ball in her chair. I gave her a few minutes alone to allow the emotional storm going on inside of her to pass. After she regained her composure she said, “I began crying because when you got to the part where you said Jesus was with people while they were being abused, it suddenly dawned on me…He was there with me through all that crap I went through. He said, ‘I will never leave you or forsake you.’ And He really meant it didn’t He?”

“He sure did. He’s never left you for a single minute. He’s always been there.” Over the last few days she realized that I was a person she could trust. After hearing a few stories of people who had been healed of emotional trauma she began to share about the many times in her life she had been abused, molested and raped and how she had come to despise men because of how they had treated her. As she spoke I could see the woundedness in her soul take over. Her eyes often misted over with tears. “I’ve had six miscarriages. I even had to deliver one my babies alone at my house in the bathtub. It was stillborn.”

We cleaned mannequins and for the next hour I listened as she related the disappointment and heartache she’s been going through with her current girlfriend. She told me about all the ways she showers her with love, only to be ignored and rejected. Her affection is never returned. At one point she confessed the biggest fear she had about her relationship with God. “I talk to God all the time, but I have my issues with Him. I’m afraid He’s going to try to make me straight if I let Him have His way with me and I don’t want to be straight. I never want to be with a man again. The thought of being with a man makes me want to vomit.”

“Sandy, God’s highest concern with you is that you come to know how much He loves you, how much He is for you, and how much He wants you to live in freedom. Your sexual orientation is a secondary issue to Him. He’s not going to over-rule your free will. He won’t make you straight if you choose not to be.”

She came back with a reply I didn’t expect. “But the bible is pretty clear about homosexuality. God doesn’t like it. So what makes you think He isn’t going to try to make me straight?”

“Well, you’re right on that point. God designed us to live a certain way. But we all have the freedom to live however we choose. He doesn’t force us to live the way He wants us to. You know there are a lot of voices out there telling people how they should live. How we live is determined by the voices we listen to. God just wants us to live a blessed life. At some point we have to ask ourselves if He knows what’s better for us, or if we do. I tried for a long time to do things my own away and I made a mess of my life. Even though I don’t always do what He asks me to do, the more I let Him call the shots, the better my life is.”

We cleaned more mannequins and talked about her loathing of men, her relationship with Jesus and her tumultuous past. I noticed several scars on her arms in different stages of healing. She noticed that I was looking at one scar in particular.

“I’ve been cutting since I was ten. It’s how I deal with the stress when it gets to be too much.”

“But you do realize that cutting isn’t good for you, right?”

“It works for me. It’s just how I deal with stress.”

“But if you could be healed of the painful emotions, you wouldn’t need to cut anymore, because the stress would be gone.”

“But it’s my comfort zone. I don’t do it unless I’m really stressed out. Mostly I just drink to relieve stress, but sometimes when everything is going crazy, cutting helps ease the pain. It’s just how I’ve learned to cope.”

“Sandy, a lot of us are living in a kind of spiritual prison and we don’t even know it. The prison has us chained in a cell that keeps us living out of the pain from our past. We’re plagued with feelings of shame, inadequacy, self-hatred, and bitterness, and we can’t seem to find peace. Jesus came to set the prisoners free, but some of us would rather bang our cup on the prison bars and complain about how bad life is in our little cell, rather than walk out of the cell and be free. When a prison cell is all you’ve ever known, you develop a comfortable attachment to it. It’s not a perfect life, but it’s all you’ve ever known. So you try to make it comfortable. You paint a mural on one wall, and hang a picture on another. You put a potted plant in the corner and try to make your little cell as nice as you can. But you’re still living in a cell. Outside the cell is a life of freedom. But when all you’ve ever known is your cell, freedom is a risky proposition. You don’t know what it’s like outside your cell. You can’t even imagine it. If you’re ever going to be free, you have to believe that what waits for you outside your cell is better than what you have now. You’ve become comfortable with your life, but God wants to give you a life that is so much better than what you have now.”

We cleaned more mannequins as she meditated on what I said. “So I have a question for you. I noticed last night that sometimes the pain in my knee was completely gone but this morning it’s back again. What’s going on?

“That’s a really good question. Healing is a battle. There are two sides at war. God and His kingdom want you to be healed; Satan and his kingdom want you to live in pain and misery. I can get you healed, but because a lot of symptoms are caused by spirits, like the spirit of pain, if the spirit comes back, the pain comes back, even after you’ve been healed. The spirit is trying to convince you that you weren’t healed. Spirits only have influence over you if you believe what they tell you. So if you refuse to believe you have a knee injury the spirit has to leave. Just keep believing you were healed and when the pain comes back refuse to accept it. You might even do something to demonstrate your belief that you’re healed as a way to get the spirit to leave. When my wife was healed of two herniated discs in her back, the pain returned a few times but she refused to believe she was injured. She did housework or cleaned the side of the pool until the pain left.”

“So I could go running or work out at the gym?”

“Well, I wouldn’t run a marathon, but after you’ve been healed if the pain returns and you do some kind of exercise that would normally make the pain worse, I wouldn’t be surprised if the pain leaves completely.”

The work day was coming to and end and we had all the mannequins cleaned, so we put away our things and got ready to go home. We filled out our timesheets and made our way to the parking lot. “See you tomorrow, kiddo.” I got in the car and told my wife what we talked about. She was glad to hear that God had opened Sandy’s heart to hear what I had to say. That night I had a dream. In the dream, I wrote an essay that caused a homosexual person to change the way in which they lived. I woke up to my alarm and wrote down the dream.

It was Thursday morning and I took my usual seat in the training room with Sandy. She had an excited look in her eye. “I took your advice and went to the gym last night. Man, it was crazy,” she said with a smile. “I was having pain in my knee again so I told it to leave. I decided to do some squats and the whole time my knee felt great. It was just like you said. I thought it would make it worse, but instead the pain went away completely.”

“That’s freakin’ awesome!” I gave her a high five.

We spent the day putting together more training material for the new hire class. I had my occupational health appointment in the afternoon. I arrived at the office and signed in. A few minutes later they called my name and I was escorted to an exam room. The technician took my vitals and asked how I was doing. “Actually, I feel pretty darn good.” The tech made a note in the chart.

“On a scale from one to ten how bad is your pain?”

“I’m not having any pain right now, so I’d say a zero.”

He made another note in the chart and before he left he said the doctor would see me in a few minutes. I said I silent prayer asking God to let me return to normal duty. A few minutes later the doctor came in and introduced herself. She glanced at the chart. “I’m looking at the notes here and the tech wrote ‘You’re feeling pretty darn good.’ I guess we can go on to the next question. Have you been doing any exercises?”

“Yeah, some. I’m doing some stretching exercises in my pool and it seems to be helping.”

“How deep is your pool?”

“Nine feet, why?”

“That’s perfect. I have an exercise you might want to try that a therapist told me about. It does the same thing an inversion table does, but it doesn’t give you a headache. Get a couple of water noodles and some ankle weights. Secure the weights to your ankles then go out in the deep end of your pool with the water noodles under your arms. The weights will stretch out your muscles just like an inversion table.”

“Wow, that’s brilliant. I just might try that.”

She typed a few notes in her report before asking the next question. “So do you have any plans to get away from the summer heat?”

“Actually, yes I do. I’m flying to Seattle at the end of the month to be the guest speaker at a conference.”

“Really? What’s the conference about?”

“Uh…a bunch of different things.” I wasn’t expecting her to ask for details about the conference, so I hesitated to tell her more. How the heck do you tell a stranger you’re going to be teaching about traveling in the spirit and not have them think you’re a wacko?

I figured I could tell her the truth and she could either write me off as a flake or she might be interested and our meeting could turn into another divine appointment. I decided to go for it.

“Right now I’m planning to give three or four messages. I hope to speak on healing the first day, seeing in the spirit the second day and traveling in the spirit the third day. That is, unless God changes the plan. The stuff I’m speaking on is a little outside the box for most people, but God’s been teaching me about this stuff for a few years and I love teaching people what I’m learning. My wife is going to speak too. She’s not sure what she’ll be talking about yet, but it will probably be either emotional healing or marriage and relationships.

“So they’re flying you there and paying for your expenses?”

“Yeah, pretty much.”

“Why did you pick Seattle?”

“I lived in the Puget Sound area for sixteen years and I have a lot of friends there. I began learning about healing years ago when I lived there. I published a book last year based on what I’ve learned and my friends asked me to come back and share what I’ve learned. It’s like a homecoming party for me.”

“Sounds like you’re going to have a great time.”

“It’s going to be a blast.” I shared a few stories with her about patients I had seen healed. She shared the story of her mother’s healing of cancer and some of the miracles she’d witnessed. I shifted gears and began telling her about some of the people I’d seen healed recently, including Sandy and the friend we prayed with over Skype who was molested by her father. Her countenance suddenly changed and her eyes welled up with tears.

For the next 30 minutes she shared the stories of emotional and sexual abuse she had suffered at the hands of various men in her family and the beatings she had endured from her ex-husband. “The last time my husband beat me, I might have died if my six year old son had not called 911. The police showed up and arrested him. There was a restraining order and eventually we were divorced.” Then she told me about the time she went to Hawaii and ended up sleeping on a couch at a friend’s house. “I woke up at three in the morning and one of the guys staying there was sitting in a chair, looking right at me. He didn’t do anything to me and it wasn’t like he was looking at me in a sexual way, but to this day I can’t sleep without having a sheet or blanket pulled all the way up over me. I went to counseling and hypnosis and they tried guided image therapy, but nothing helped.”

I listened to her story and when she was through I told her we might be able to help her.

“I have a lot of friends who have experience with emotional healing and they’ve taught me a lot. My wife and I are new to this, but it’s not exactly rocket science. After I went through my own emotional healing, and my wife went through hers, we realized it isn’t that complicated most of the time. If you’d like to meet with us away from the office, we’d be happy to explain the process to you and if you want us to try to get you healed, we’d be happy to help.”

“That would be great. So are you going to write a book on emotional healing?”

“That’s a good question. I was thinking of writing a book on deliverance and emotional healing, but the concepts my friends and I have learned are so strange to most people that it would be hard to write them in a straight forward book and have people take it seriously. Are you familiar with C.S. Lewis and the Screwtape Letters?”

“I loved that book.”

“Well I began writing a story last year in the same style as the Screwtape Letters. It’s a parable about the spiritual world that teaches the principles of inner healing and deliverance in a way that doesn’t draw the kind of criticism that a straight-forward book on the subject would. You don’t have people demanding chapter and verse when you write fiction. I wrote about fifteen short segments in this story and posted them on Facebook and people really loved them. I plan to write a fictional novel based on what we’ve learned that can be used as a guide for emotional healing and deliverance. Who knows, it might even turn into a trilogy.”

“I’d really like to read the story. I don’t have a Facebook account, but maybe I can hack into my sister’s account and find it.”

“I have it saved as a Word document that I can send you. All I need is your e-mail address.”

She asked for my contact information and I gave her my e-mail address. She pulled up an e-mail window on her laptop. “Okay, I just sent you an e-mail.”

“Cool. I’ll send you a copy of the story.”

“What’s the name of your healing book?”

“Divine Healing Made Simple. You can find it on Amazon.”

She tried to log in to Amazon. “The network won’t let me access the site.”

“Don’t worry about it. I have a copy in my car I’ll give you.”

“Oh, thank you!”

“So getting back to business….what do you think about the prospects of me returning to regular duty?”

“As far as I’m concerned, you’re clear to return to normal duty. I’ll dictate a letter to your employer. Just have a seat in the waiting room until they call your name.”

I got up and shook her hand. “Thanks. I’m really looking forward to getting back in the saddle again.”

I went to my car and got the book then went back inside. I autographed it and asked the receptionist if I could go back in and give it to the doctor. She buzzed me through. I walked over to the desk where she was dictating my letter and handed her the book. “It’s a pretty broad overview of healing and it covers a lot of subjects. Some people plow through it in a single day. Some people read it a little at a time.”

I opened the book and showed her the table of contents. After reviewing it for a minute, she said, “I should be able to get through it in a week.”

I’ve never spent so much time with a doctor talking about things not related to my own health. “Well, I guess I better get going. Thanks so much for your time.” I returned to the waiting room, but before I could sit down they called my name. I went up to the window, got my discharge papers, signed for them and walk out the door. I called my wife to give her the good news then got in my car and headed back to the office to finish out the day. I handed in the paperwork and a couple of people congratulated me for passing my return to work physical.

Tina had an appointment with her doctor in the morning. Sandy would see her surgeon tomorrow for her pre-op appointment. It’s a four hour drive from Phoenix to Show Low in northeastern Arizona so she got an early start. I was praying she wouldn’t need surgery. But even more, I was praying I would have an opportunity to help her get healed of the emotional wounds that have kept her in chains.

I plan to keep in touch with Sandy and the doctor. If anything changes, I’ll keep you posted. 

The Person of Peace

In Luke chapter 10, Jesus talks about the harvest and how to find a person of peace. In this video, Brian Fenimore illustrates how God opens the heart of a person of peace to our message.

Brian is the director of the Plumbline Ministries, an organization based on advancing the Kingdom of God. The focus of his ministry is to equip the saints for the work of ministry in schools, seminars and media throughout the World. He is the author of several books and study notes including Foundation for the Prophetic Ministry and Heart Standard for the Prophetic.

Dead Raising Training – Tyler Johnson

Tyler Johnson brings “Dead Raising Team” Training (DRT) to Las Vegas

 

Tyler Johnson, founder of One Glance Ministries, and featured team member in the documentary film, “Deadraiser” brings his unique and unprecedented training  seminar, “Dead Raising Team” Training (DRT) to Las Vegas, NV.

When: Friday evening August 22nd at 7pm

Saturday August 23rd from 10am to 5pm

Where: 8755 West Warm Springs Rd, Las Vegas, NV, 89148 (Cross streets: Durango & Warm Springs), in the Epic Church building.

Delving into the reality of resurrection power, this training is for those that desire to walk in the miraculous, especially pertaining to raising the dead. We realize this is uncommon for most, thus the training starts with more basic teaching and builds from there.

Topics Covered:

Commissioned to Raise the Dead
The “Theology” of Dead Raising
The Supremacy of Christ
Accounts of Dead Raising in History and The Present
The Foundation of Life (Immortality)
The Practicals of Dead Raising (Includes Q&A)

Tyler Johnson studied theology at Biola University, and is a graduate of Bethel’s School of Supernatural Ministry in Redding, California. He is a husband, father, author, international conference speaker, and missionary. He functions primarily in healing, miracles, prophetic evangelism, and a spirit of revelation.

He and his wife, Christine, founded and direct The Dead Raising Team, have written four books, and are being used by God to spread fire and revival in the nations. Their website is oneglance.org, and the

DRT’s site is DeadRaisingTeam.com.

TUITION: $40 per person. You must register online for this event.

REGISTRATON LINK: http://www.oneglance.org/One_Glance_Ministries/DRT_Trainings.html

For inquiries, questions or additional information, please contact Millian Quinteros at (702) 582-6455 or  by email at DominionFireChurch@gmail.com

Dominion Fire Church is a creative arts, healing and supernatural Christian outreach ministry in Las Vegas, Nevada. Information can be found at www.DominionFire.com or by emailing DominionFireChurch@gmail.com. This event is presented exclusively by Dominion Fire, and is not affiliated with Epic Church or any other organization.

 

Emotional Healing – 10 Minutes to Freedom

The day after I received my own healing of wounds caused by anger, I went on a call to an emergency department to transport a young woman for mental health treatment. We arrived early and as I waited for her to be ready for the transport I read the transcript dictated by the social worker who interviewed her. Her depression and suicidal thoughts began a year and a half earlier after she had her child. She suffered from postpartum depression that never went away. Since her child had been born she had several outbursts of extreme anger. In one incident she punched holes through the wall of their apartment. In another incident she almost stabbed her husband with a knife. She had come to the hospital the previous day for treatment of depression and suicidal thoughts brought on by another incident with her husband where she was overcome by feelings of anger and tried to push him into traffic. I also read where she said she had been molested as a teenager.

As I read her report it became obvious that she was suffering from the same thing I had just been healed of. It seemed like she had a wounded or fragmented soul that was temporarily taking control during certain events and she was over-reacting in anger. We loaded her in the ambulance and I spent the first 10 minutes of the transport telling her about my own struggles with anger and how I had been healed of it the day before by talking with a friend. She listened intently and I could that tell my testimony was giving her hope. As I came to the end of my testimony, I asked her a direct question:  “I know you were molested as a teenager. Do you want him to die?”

“I don’t want him to die a violent death. I just want him to die and go away.”

“My friend got me healed and I think we can get you healed. The first thing I did was go back to one of the events where I could feel the anger. Then he led me in a few prayers. When we were done, he had me go back again and try to feel the anger from the events, but I couldn’t feel it any more. It was like there was a door that I could go through any time I wanted to and could re-live the experiences and feel the anger again. But after we were done, it was like the door was closed. In fact, I couldn’t even find the door.  So here’s my question: Would you like to be healed of your anger?”

“Yes I would.” She put out her hand and I took hold of it.

“I need you to go back in your mind to one of the incidents that creates a feeling of anger. When you can feel it, let me know.”

It only took a few seconds. “Okay, I feel it.”

“I’m going to have you repeat what I say.”  These are the prayers we said together:

“God, I confess my anger as sin.”

“Jesus, I believe you died to take away my sins.”

“I do not want to be controlled by anger any more.”

“Lord, I ask you to take this anger from me and give me your peace in return.”

“I ask you to heal the wounds in my soul caused by anger and I receive your healing.”

She repeated everything I said.

“Okay, now I want you to go back and try to feel the emotions from any of the events.” She sat there for a moment then looked at me in shock.

“Crazy, huh? You can’t feel the anger any more, can you?”

She immediately realized she was healed and her mind was already thinking about how this could be used for other problems. “Do you think it would work for other emotions?”

“Like what?”

“Sadness.”

“I think it will work for any emotion that you don’t want. God will often give you something in exchange for what you give Him. So if you give Him your sadness, He may give you His joy in return. If you give Him your feelings of rejection, He may give you His acceptance. I think this is something you can do yourself. I mean, you’re going to be sitting here for a couple of days without much to do. You may want to sit quietly and talk with God and ask Him to heal you of all this stuff.”

We arrived at the hospital and got her registered. Before we left she thanked me for taking the time to help her. This was my first attempt at doing emotional healing with one of my patients and it seemed to be successful. The amazing thing is that it didn’t take 2 hours but only 10 minutes. I don’t think inner healing is as hard or as complicated as some people make it out to be. I realize that this may not be true for every person or for every situation. Sometimes the process will take longer, depending on the severity of the emotional trauma. Even if we can’t address every problem a person might have in the short time we have with them, we can show them the power God has over their problems and give them hope that they can one day live in complete freedom.

My Emotional Healing

During the last year or so I noticed that my friends have been asking a lot more questions about emotional (or inner) healing. A few months ago my wife began having dreams about doing deliverance and inner healing. Some of my friends have seen significant breakthroughs in the area of emotional healing, particularly with people who suffer from PTSD, Satanic ritual abuse, and Dissociative Identity Disorder. I feel like one of the things God wants to teach us more about in the present season is emotional healing. I’ve been learning a lot from talking with Steve Harmon. When I listen to the things he’s experienced, it made me realize that I might need emotional healing too.

I have a lot of friends who have done inner healing in the past and from the stories they’ve shared I thought it always took a long time to get someone healed. I’ve also heard enough horror stories from friends that I have some apprehension about going through it myself.

After weighing all of this, I felt like I only knew of a couple of people that I trusted enough to take me through the process of emotional healing, if I was going to go through it at all. I wasn’t sure I needed it, and if I did, I wasn’t sure what the issues were.

A few weeks ago I had a very difficult day at work. A bunch of small things happened throughout the course of the day that would normally not cause much of a problem.  Because I could see some of them coming before they happened, and I felt a little anger beginning to grow inside of me I told myself I was not going to let these things make me angry. Despite this, I spent most of the day in a very angry mood. Fortunately, I was able to sit quietly in the ambulance most of the day and my anger didn’t have an opportunity to hurt other people.

About a year ago I was assigned a new partner.  He has a way of doing his job that seems to push every button I have. I often find myself being angry over some little thing that he did. I began to wonder if perhaps God put us together to help me deal with some problem I was struggling with.

I’ve spent a lot of nights after work venting my frustration to my wife who is always sympathetic. One problem of having a supportive circle of friends is that sometimes they’ll try to justify your sin. I had accepted people’s justification for my occasional moments of rage, but I felt like there was something causing it that needed to be dealt with once and for all.  As I reflected on past events that caused outbursts of anger, I realized that they were all triggered by a similar set of circumstances.

I remembered someone writing about emotional wounds and describing one of the symptoms: One sign that you have an emotional (or soul) wound is when you over-react to a certain type of situation repeatedly. An example is if you are usually an easy-going person that seldom gets angry. When certain situations repeatedly trigger the same type of response; in this case an over-reaction of anger, there’s a wounded or fragmented soul that’s creating this situation. Some people describe it as feeling like they’ve temporarily become another person.

 

I’d like to share some observations on wounded and fragmented souls. What follows is my understanding of the issue today. Much of what I believe on the subject has come from friends I trust who have shared their experiences and observations and from books I’ve read. I am not dogmatic on these views and I have no doubt they will change as I gain a better understanding of this issue:

I remember a woman saying that she had a terrible fear of going in basements. When someone asked why she had this fear, she told them it was because she had been molested by her uncles in a basement when she was a child. At the time this was happening to her as a child, a part of her soul was wounded by the emotional trauma of the event. The traumatic event created a part of her soul that was dominated by the emotion of fear and it was specific to going into a basement. The wounded part of her soul was separated (fragmented) from the main (core) part of her soul.

I believe it is God who separates wounded parts of the soul to protect the core of the personality from suffering greater damage. The fragmented parts of the soul deal with the emotions and the memories of traumatic events. Separation from the core prevents the wounded parts of the soul from becoming the dominant influence over the core of the soul. In effect, the fragmenting of the soul compartmentalizes the wounds and minimizes the damage that can be done to the rest of the soul. The part of the soul that is fragmented remains hidden until the person experiences a similar event that triggers the emotion. For the woman with the fear of basements, the thought of going  into a basement, became a trigger that caused the soul fragment to temporarily take over control of her core.

All soul fragments have as their main goal the protection of the core personality. A soul fragment will assume control when they perceive there is a threat to the individual. When we have an experience that the fragmented soul perceives to be a threat, the fragmented part of the soul takes over control our mind, will and emotions, and we react to the situation from that place of woundedness. This is why the actions of a soul fragment are usually an over-reaction. Soul fragments have less understanding of what is considered normal and acceptable behavior. When the perceived threat goes away, the core of our soul regains control and we go back to functioning normally.

Lately I’ve been having these moments where a fragment of my soul was taking over control of my mind, will and emotions, and it was causing me to over-react in anger. In thinking about this and praying for understanding, I became aware that it was related to a couple of events that happened when I was a teenager. I finally accepted the fact that I needed to be healed of this emotional wound.

One of my friends who has done a lot of inner healing saw my recent post on Facebook about my need for emotional healing. He sent me a message asking if I had time to talk. We talked the following day for about 2 hours. During our phone conversation he took me through the process of inner healing. The actual process he used had several parts to it. I only have space to discuss one part of it here. I may write about the other parts in future messages.

I’ll outline the process he used because it’s one that you might want to use yourself. I’m aware that formulas for healing have limited use, but if you’ve never done this before, you need a place to start and it can be helpful to use a process that worked for someone else. Just realize that the best way to approach inner healing is to involve the Holy Spirit and Jesus and allow the encounter to be directed by them as much as possible. When it comes to inner healing, the Holy Spirit is best and bringing up the problems that need to be addressed while Jesus is the one who heals the wounded parts of the soul.

One general point to consider: In order to heal the wounded soul, the part of the soul that is wounded and/or fragmented must be allowed to take temporary control of the mind, will, and emotions. This means you will usually have to go back to an event in the past that causes the emotion to be felt strongly. In order to receive healing, the wounded soul fragment must usually meet Jesus and receive healing and instruction from Him.

The first step was to have me go back to a place in my life where I could feel the anger again. This was not hard to do. There were many places in my mind where I could go back and relive an event that would bring up the emotion of anger. My friend had me go back to one of the earliest events and when I was feeling the emotion from that event, he had me say some short prayers, which I’ll list below. One thing he requested of me was to resist the temptation to over-think the situation. Inner healing is a purely emotional issue and when you attempt to rationalize or think about what’s happening it ruins the flow of emotions.  He urged me not to think too much about what were were doing.
I confessed to God that my anger was a sin.
I said that I believed the blood of Jesus had taken away the penalty and consequences of my sin.
I asked Jesus to take away my anger.
We felt like Jesus wanted to give me something in return for giving Him my anger. I felt like he wanted to give me His peace. So I asked him to give me His peace in exchange for my anger and I received His peace.
I asked Jesus to heal the wound in my soul.
When we were done with this process my friend asked me to go back again and try to feel the emotions from one of the events. I was very surprised when I tried to go back to the events. I found that I could not go back to any of them and feel the anger. It was like there had been an open door to the events that I could go through any time I wanted. But after I went through this process, the door was no longer open. In fact, I couldn’t even see a door to the events. It was almost like they had never happened.

The fact that I could no longer access the events or feel the emotions of anger from them led me to believe I really was healed. This is not to say that I’ll never again get angry. That’s not what emotional healing does. It doesn’t take away your ability to feel certain emotions. It just heals the wounded parts of your soul that are dominated by them.

I received a strange confirmation the following day. When I arrived at work the next day, my partner told me he was being transferred to another unit. I couldn’t help but think that God had finally accomplished what he wanted with this partner and it was time for me to have a new one.

In my next message I’ll share the story of a woman who was healed of the same thing I was healed of in the back of the ambulance.

Stuff You Didn’t Know About Steve Harmon

Many of you have come to know Steve Harmon from his messages that I’ve posted here during the last year. I’ve come to know Steve as a friend and I consider him to be one of my favorite mentors. I began sharing Steve’s Facebook updates here because….well, Steve doesn’t have time to run a website of his own. He doesn’t have a Youtube channel or a Twitter account (at least not that I know of). He doesn’t write books or sell teaching DVDs. He’s too busy getting the sick, the tormented, the mentally ill, and the addicted people of the world set free. Because Steve doesn’t have time to publish his messages on a website he graciously allowed me to post them here. I felt someone needed to do it because I believe he’s on the cutting edge of what God is doing today.

Steve is a true innovator in the ways of the kingdom of God. While most people are content to learn one way of doing healing or deliverance, creating a ministry around their method and settling for “good enough” (which means that some people are set free, but many are not) Steve is never going to be satisfied until everyone he prays with receives the healing or deliverance they need.

I receive a lot of prayer requests for healing and deliverance. Many of these people have received prayer from the big name healing ministries you all know about and they are no better. Steve gave me permission to send him the most difficult requests I get because he loves people, he wants to see everyone set free, and he won’t give up as long as the person is willing to keep pursing their freedom. Steve’s desire to learn and teach others has been a great source of hope and inspiration for me. He’s promised to share more of what he’s discovered in the coming months and I’ll be featuring his stories here as he writes them.

Steve doesn’t have a paying job. He does healing and deliverance full-time and he leads worship on the weekends at a small church in southern California where he also ministers to the homeless. He’s living life completely by faith in God’s ability and desire to meet all his needs.

Steve didn’t ask me to write this message. I did it because I wanted you to know a little more about him. I asked him to send me a link to his Paypal account so I could post it here, because I think his ministry is worthy of our prayers and financial support. Please consider praying for our friend, and if you’d like to make a donation to his Paypal account, you can do it by clicking on his picture below.

Thanks in advance.

 

The Appearing – Jeremy Mangerchine

This is an excerpt from Jeremy Mangerchine’s  book The Longest Bridge Across Water

It was a chilly fall evening. The sun had almost completely gone down, leaving our house dark. A small, yellow lamp warmly and dimly illuminated the windowless room where I sat. One room over, Shannon and our son, Noah, sat in our bedroom happily watching a kids’ show on the computer. It was Sunday, and I had to go back to work early the next morning. I felt like mindlessly relaxing by watching the Sunday night football game. Instead, I decided to find out what the Lord was up to, because, all day long, I had felt a tugging deep within my soul that I really didn’t understand. I felt uneasiness, but not in an evil sense; this uneasiness came because I sensed Him tugging at me and luring me out of my comfort zone.

I began to pray and thank the Lord for being awesome and for just being Him. As I enjoyed Him, I escaped deeper and deeper into Him until I was immersed in His loving presence. It was the safe, peaceful, and warm embrace of two lovers. I was completely unprepared for what happened next.

As I sat and basked in the glory of my wonderful Daddy, without any warning, Jesus appeared in front of me. He didn’t look like He’s described in the Book of Revelation (as He appears to some people), Jesus in His glorified state with white hair like snow, eyes of fire, feet like burnished bronze that were refined in a furnace, and a voice like a roar. The Jesus who appeared to me was Jesus hanging on the cross.

The movie The Passion of the Christ reminded the Church that Jesus’ death on the cross was far more violent and traumatic than the images we commonly see. It showed us what a torturous experience could actually do to a human body. But even the graphic images of that movie did not compare to what I observed that evening. In the vision, I saw Him from the waist up, facing me, but slightly turned to the right. Immediately, I jerked away in shock and tried to look the other way, not wanting to see the horrific image that had so unexpectedly appeared to me. At the same time, I was drawn to Him and could not look away.

His body, which may as well have been a carcass, was draped on the wooden torture device, and His mangled flesh was not even distinguishable as human flesh anymore. He was scourged, beaten, and bruised so badly that His entire body was black and a purplish blue as if He had been covered in gasoline and set on fire for about three minutes, only to have the flame extinguished prior to death. His face didn’t even have distinguishable features. It was a swollen and contorted blob, beyond recognition.

He was not hanging in a physical state of peace, like we so often depict. Rather, His body was in shock from the pain inflicted on Him, to the point that He was convulsing. These convulsions were beyond His control, and every time He convulsed, His body seized forward. When that happened, it tore the wounds of the nails holding Him to the cross. It was a constant cycle of agony. As I watched Him struggle, my heart melted with compassion. Am I really watching Jesus suffer on the cross?

Finally, after many gut-wrenching, failed attempts at composure, He paused and, with great purpose and authority, took a deep breath and lifted His head. With complete calmness and control, He turned His head toward me. What is He going to do? I wondered. His eyes were not the eyes of a man who had given Himself over to be destroyed. Rather, they burned with love, forgiveness, compassion, mercy, and grace. His eyes locked with my eyes. As He stared into my eyes with great intensity, He simply said, “I love you.” Then He disappeared.

Until that day, Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection had not held the importance they deserved in my life. In fact, it wasn’t until several months after this experience that they really did. The very Son of God had appeared to me and allowed me to see part of the agony of His sacrifice of love for me. It was an undeniably important moment in my journey, one that would define everything that followed.

Jeremy’s book The Longest Bridge Across Water is available on Kindle for $0.99 this month.

Why Are Some People Not Healed?

This is part of an interview I did with S.J. Heald for Heaven Connect. The entire interview can be found here.

SJH:

Some Christians are filled with faith and live a holy life, and yet they are suffering with illness and health problems. Also there are sick children, such as those with terminal illness like cancer. Why are these not healed?

Praying Medic:

This is a delicate issue and unfortunately, it’s one that has been greatly misunderstood. I don’t think it will help anyone if I tip-toe around this subject, so I’d like to give an honest answer that will probably be hard for many people to accept and frankly, will make some people angry.

Much of the disappointment and heartache that comes from failed attempts at healing is due to misconceptions about God and the kingdom of darkness. Many of us believe that God can heal whomever He wants and that if someone is not healed, it must be because God doesn’t want them healed. That’s a bit like saying if someone doesn’t get saved it’s because God doesn’t want them to be saved. There’s an entire school of theology built around this idea, but the truth is that divine healing simply doesn’t work this way. Actually, there is very little in the kingdom of God that does.

John Wimber was given a vision from God that illustrated the problem we’re discussing. This is how he described it in his book Power Healing:

“Suddenly in my minds eye there appeared to be a cloud bank superimposed across the sky. But I had never seen a cloud bank like this one, so I pulled my car over to the side of the road to take a closer look. Then I realized it was not a cloud bank, it was a honeycomb with honey dripping out on to people below. The people were in a variety of postures. Some were reverent; they were weeping and holding their hands out to catch the honey and taste it, even inviting others to take some of their honey. Others acted irritated, wiping the honey off themselves, complaining about the mess. I was awestruck. Not knowing what to think, I prayed, “Lord, what is it?”

He said, “It’s my mercy, John. For some people it’s a blessing, but for others it’s a hindrance. There is plenty for everyone. Don’t ever beg me for healing again. The problem isn’t on my end, John. It’s down there.”

When people have sought prayer for healing repeatedly to no avail, there is a strong temptation to believe that God has a divine purpose for our sickness or that He simply doesn’t want to heal us. It’s just human nature to think this way. This is despite the fact that the bible teaches that God sees both sickness and death as His sworn enemies and despite the fact that there isn’t one passage in the bible that plainly teaches that sickness is used by God for any kind of divine purpose. In order to better understand how healing works, let me draw a comparison with something most of us are more familiar with.

Healing, like salvation is not a sovereign act of God. Rather, it is accomplished when we do what God commissions us to do. Salvation comes as a result of man proclaiming the gospel. The proclamation of the gospel is a task that has been delegated to man as God’s representative and salvation depends upon our obedience. People are saved when men and women preach the gospel faithfully. If people are not saved, it is not because God doesn’t want them to be saved. It is because we’ve failed to proclaim the message we were given. Healing operates in the same way, through God’s representatives – the church.

God sent Jesus into the world to reveal his will concerning healing. Jesus didn’t just heal a few people that the Father chose here and there. He healed entire villages of all who were sick and demon possessed. He also raised the dead and he commissioned his disciples to do the same things He did. If we believe that God wants people to become sick and die at a young age– we must explain why He sent His Son into the world to defeat sickness and death and why He commissioned His disciples to carry out the same plan after He ascended into heaven.

The ministry of Jesus sent a clear message to the world that God is opposed to sickness and death. If it is the will of God for man to be sick, no one in history violated the will of God more than Jesus. Just as God desires all men to be saved, He also desires all men to be healed. Jesus gave us, His disciples all the power and authority we’ll ever need to deal with sickness and death. Once He gives us authority to do something, He is no longer responsible for doing it – we are. The ball is now in our court and it has been for 2,000 years. It’s up to us to exercise the authority He has given us.

As God’s ambassadors, it is our job to enforce His will here on earth with regard to healing. If we don’t learn how to conquer sickness and death by releasing healing, people are going to die. Most people have never been trained or equipped to heal the sick, raise the dead or cast out demons, even though these are the most basic things Jesus taught His disciples to do. When healing doesn’t happen, it is not because God wants people to be sick– it is because His ambassadors have failed to use the power and authority they’ve been given. Many of us try to put the responsibility back on God because we don’t want to admit that we’ve failed to take our responsibilities seriously. This is the reason why I wrote my book on healing. My heart’s greatest desire is to train and equip the saints to do the work God commissioned us to do.

Love, Power & Truth – Steve Harmon

My guest blogger today is Steve Harmon

Two years ago I met a Satanist on Haight/Ashbury in San Francisco where the start of the hippy movement began. God taught me a lot in that experience about how people get set free. It basically works with three components, and it was these three components that Jesus used in His ministry.

So this guy asked me for a cigarette and I told him I don’t smoke. I began a conversation with him. He told me he was an Iraq war vet, in the marines. He’s homeless and apart of the “Occupy Oakland” movement. We talked for about 20 minutes then he told me that he had a torn rotator cuff that needs surgery. I asked him if I could pray for it to make it well. He said, “No, no…I’m a Satanist bro”. He proceeded to tell me all of his beliefs about God and the world. I just listened to him. I then said, “I’m not like other Christians you’ve met. I love people and I see value in you. There’s love in you. There’s a big heart that has been covered and people don’t see it, but I see it.”

He then told me that he has two daughters living in Oakland and that last week he celebrated his 12 year old daughter’s birthday. He gave her a birthday cake which was “hash brownies” (Marijuana laced brownies). She got so excited and was jumping up and down saying  “You’re the best dad in the whole world!”, and he said he started crying when she said that. I actually started crying myself just because the situation was so messed up, but in that, his daughter showed him a form of love and it moved him so much. Up to this point, I just wanted to hold this big guy because he was starving for love.

He told me that he nearly beat a man to death for raping his daughter’s friend. He served 5 years in prison for it. He was pouring out his life to me. I asked him again if I could pray for his shoulder and at this point, he felt more comfortable with me and he said, “Sure”. So I laid my hands on his shoulder under the signal light on the corner and started to command the infirmity to leave. I prophesied as well, then I told him to check out his shoulder. When he moved it, the pain started leaving. I prayed again and it was completely gone. He was swinging his arm and couldn’t get it to hurt. He was shocked because he also had been a shaman and he would heal people, but could never be healed himself.

From this point, I just laid into him the good news of Jesus in a way he had never heard. He was no longer objecting to it. I told him “God has a plan for your life.” He started crying  because his mom used to tell him that when he was once a pastor! His mom told him recently that all the seeds he sowed into people’s lives, (ten or fifteen of them) had gotten off drugs and were walking with God now. He cried telling me all that and said, “Now look at me. I’m homeless and an alcoholic?”

I told Him, “The Lord is still saying ‘yes’ to you,” then I asked if I could pray the Holy Spirit on him. He said “yes”.

I told him, “When I touch you, you’re gonna feel something that cannot be compared to any other drug you’ve had.” I put my hands on him and prayed for fire and love. His eyes were closed and tears were coming down his face.

After I was done, he opened his eyes and said, “That was intense!” We talked more and I just kept pouring the love of God into him. After I was done, God told me to tell him that tonight Jesus was going to visit him in a dream. He said, “Okay!” He told me that 16 years ago was the last time he felt God. I told him “16 years from that day God came and touched you again because He loves you”.

On the corner where rebellion against the establishment was birthed in the 60′s, God showed up in love and in power to tell a prodigal son to come home.

I didn’t engage with him and argue all of his outlandish ideas about Jesus and the Father. I ignored it, changed the subject, and told him about the love that I saw in his heart. I kept hitting that point until he finally softened. He was changed from a hardened Satanist into a sensitive puppy dog. Here’s how it worked:

Love brings down the walls. Power brings validity to truth. Truth sets the person free. When I first met the guy and he found out I was a Christian, he immediately put up a wall to me. My goal was to get the truth into him, but I couldn’t because of that wall. So what did I need?

Love.

Love brings down the walls. It makes the person realize you’re not a threat. Once the wall was down, he let me in and then I could display God’s power through the healing. Once the power was shown to him, when I spoke truth, he was more open to believe it because the miracle testified of the truth. Many people have walls up and it’s because they’ve been hurt. Trying to display God’s power and speaking truth to them can be difficult. Love should be the thing that begins every encounter.

For some people, you’ll have to display love to them for a very long time before you’ll have a chance to display God’s power or speak truth to them. This is because their walls won’t come down easily and until the wall is down and they feel safe with you—there’s no way they will receive the truth. At the same time, you can’t only work in love and expect that everyone will change. Mother Teresa did a lot of loving throughout her life and yet thousands died in her loving arms, scared, depressed and fearful. When love and truth is shown without the power, you can have a person who believes in the existence of a supernatural God, but they have very shallow faith that is shaky and can waver.

The moral of the story is: you need all three.

Can People Lose Their Healing?

This is part of an interview I did with S.J. Heald for Heaven Connect. The entire interview can be found here.

SJH:

Can people lose their healing? If so, why?

Praying Medic:

There are two situations I can think of that allow symptoms to return after we are healed. In many cases the return of symptoms after healing is evidence that a little more warfare needs to be done. I had a chance a couple of years ago to help my sister in law obtain healing for an occluded artery in her leg. She had poor circulation in her leg for years and her foot was always cold and numb. Her doctor considered placing a stent in the artery to keep it open. One day, I asked if she wanted to be healed and she said “yes’.” I commanded the artery to be open and the circulation to return. She didn’t feel anything different until the next morning, when she woke up with a warm foot that had normal sensation and circulation. Later that day, her foot became cold and numb and she thought she had lost her healing. With a worried heart she asked me what happened. This is a classic case of  how sometimes our symptoms will return after we are healed.

I sat her down and explained that healing and sickness are a battle between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of darkness. I told her that God wants us to be healed and the enemy wants us to be sick. She immediately understood. I explained that the enemy brought the symptoms back to convince her she wasn’t healed and that we needed to do some more warfare. I commanded her leg to be healed again and in a few minutes the circulation returned. I told her that all she needed to do was to resist the enemy’s tactics if it happened again. With a smile of understanding she confidently maintained her healing and she’s had normal circulation since that day.

Some diseases and painful conditions are spiritual in nature and the return of the symptoms indicates a return of the spirit and a need to find out why it returned. The bible gives examples of people who had physical symptoms with spiritual causes (see Luke 13:10-13 as an example.) In such cases the spirit must be removed before the symptoms will leave. But when a spirit of pain or sickness returns, it’s often because it has a home in the person (See Luke 11: 21-26.) The key to preventing the return of the spirit and a return of the symptoms it causes is to remove the demonic home.

Demonic homes are created by things we believe about God, about ourselves or about others that are not true, or by sinful behaviors and attitudes that we allow in our hearts. These things give spirits opportunities to exert their influence over us. If you believe for example, that God the Father cannot be trusted, because your father abused or neglected you, the mistrust you have in your heart toward God the Father will allow an orphan spirit to influence your thinking. It will continually remind you that God the Father is like the abusive Father of your childhood and that He can’t be trusted. Many people live their entire lives under the influence of such spirits. Evil spirits only have influence over us to the degree that we permit them, and most of what we allow them to do to us is permitted because of what we believe. A slightly different way in which spirits can affect us is through sinful attitudes we have. Allow me to illustrate with one of my own experiences:

I had been seeking permanent healing for chronic neck pain for a long time. I received prayer a number of times and the pain would always leave temporarily, only to return a few days later. One day, a woman praying for me asked if I had anger toward anyone. God showed me in a vision, a person I had been angry with for a long time. I knew that I needed to let go of the anger I had toward them. When I released the anger to God, the pain in my neck immediately left and never returned.

I allowed a demonic home to be created by my anger. When people prayed for my healing, the spirit would leave but it always returned because its home was still there. Identifying wrong views, attitudes and behaviors and renewing our mind to the truth about them (repenting) removes demonic homes. Once this is done, and the spirit no longer has a home, it can be removed and the symptoms usually will not return.