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[0:00] Let us pray. O God, the source of all health,!

[0:30] Amen. Please be seated. It's interesting the two songs you chose. Many, many years ago, I was a vice commandant of the Air Force Chaplain School.

[0:48] And so we would have chaplains come in in all states of disrepair, and we would try to get healing for them and instruction so that they could go out and do their jobs as chaplains.

[1:00] And I was teaching an elective in what we call contemplation, and I just thought we'd sing a couple of songs that touched our hearts.

[1:16] And these are the two songs. And Mary Ellen, Steve DeGueck did the guitar. These were new songs. We had to teach these songs to the chaplains. When we finished singing, tears were running down their faces.

[1:31] I don't know if you looked at these words. These are love songs to Christ. Beautiful. Well, Mary Ellen is my wife.

[1:41] I'm Dave. We're very happy to be with you. And for this week and for the next three weeks after this, I'm supposed to be over here by the mic, and so are you, Mary Ellen.

[1:53] So I wandered away from the mic. I have a schedule and a faithful forest, if you would hand that out.

[2:06] This is where we'll be going over these four weeks together. So, I'm going to go to the main open. I'm going to go to the exam. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one.

[2:16] I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. I'm going to go to the next one. lip. lip. lip. lip. lip. lip. Thank you.

[2:50] Go down and tell me.

[3:20] Record history and today's issues. Next week, we're going to get into how-to's in healing prayer.

[3:31] How to give, how to receive. Biblical do's and don'ts. We're going to divorce Christian healing from the sawdust trail.

[3:42] Not that many people did not get healed on the sawdust trail, but when people think of Christian healing, often they think of a pastor or a preacher paying somebody to come up and fall down for healing.

[3:55] And so we want to talk about, we're doing the same kind of ministry, except I'm not paying anybody. But we hope that people will be healed.

[4:06] And we're going to talk about just being set free. Illness, discomfort, pain binds us, imprisons us.

[4:21] The Lord wants us to be free. We're going to talk about that. And I'm also going to bring up post-traumatic stress disorder.

[4:32] Post-traumatic stress. That's not just for people who have been in combat. You've probably been bombarded with PTSD. God wants to rid us of that.

[4:45] To heal us of that trauma. Okay, and then August 16th, the guts of healing in the 21st century. And the big three. Anger, bitterness, and forgiveness.

[5:00] Or lack thereof of forgiveness. And then we'll talk about the family. And generational healing. We'll talk about 21st century addictions.

[5:11] And freedom from those. 21st century addictions look a lot like Bible addictions. Just the substance is different. Because it comes down to getting caught up in sin.

[5:25] And it invades our bodies. And becomes an illness. And then the last Sunday is going to be about suffering. When we think God's saying no.

[5:39] Why does that happen? Why doesn't he say yes all the time? There was this. What was that movie? The guy was.

[5:50] God went on vacation and left him in charge. One of those. Evan. Almighty Evan. Evan Almighty. Evan Almighty, right. So God left him in charge.

[6:01] And he thought he'd just say yes to everybody. So the computer requests were coming in. He was going yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. The stock market broke. Because everybody wanted to win on the stock market.

[6:12] Everybody can't win on the stock market. Everybody can't win on the lottery. And so sometimes God says, well, you know what? That's what we'll talk about in four weeks.

[6:22] Then we'll talk about parish methods. And we'll finally have a commissioning. Okay. So that's where we're going. Tonight we're talking about rekindling the fire.

[6:36] Question. How many hand raise if you have ever lit a wood fire in a fireplace? Most of us know about doing that. What happens if you don't tend the fire?

[6:49] Yeah, it'll just sort of simmer down. And basically you end up with embers. What we're talking about is the fires of revival in faith.

[7:02] How we rekindle the fire. How we turn the embers back into flame. How do we ask the Holy Spirit to inflame us?

[7:17] Because only the Holy Spirit can inflame us. Okay. So. Slide. There we go.

[7:30] So I'm going to be saying slide a lot. And that's Jim's tip off to flip to the next slide. See, Forrest and I learned that in the armed forces. You say slide and something magical happens on the screen.

[7:44] So now you want to go back a couple. There we go. There you go. I see. Every time I say slide, you hit the button. So we're talking about revival in Christian healing.

[7:58] God is doing a revival in our present age. In case you hadn't noticed. And a lot of it is being done in healing. So we'll talk about the physical, emotional, relational, and spiritual aspects of healing.

[8:11] Slide. That's you. That's me. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Dave and I first met in 1966.

[8:26] And that was before I was a librarian. I was in college in Montevallo, Alabama. And I was on a Thanksgiving holiday in Pensacola, Florida.

[8:41] And he was in flight school in Pensacola. And we met in his house. He was renting a house with three other marine flight students.

[8:53] And my former roommate, who I was visiting, was dating one of his roommates. So we just kind of walked into his house.

[9:07] We've been together ever since. We met in November of 1966 and got married in June of 1967. We decided that since I grew up in the Christian Science Church and he grew up in the Roman Catholic Church, he decided that Middle Road was the Episcopal Church.

[9:38] Sounded right to me. It wasn't for me, but it was very, very strange for me. But I went along.

[9:50] And when we met, we weren't really believers. And so it took us a couple of years to become believers.

[10:07] Could you throw your voice a little more? There are some people who can't hear. Oh, I'm sorry. It took us a couple of years to become believers. And Dave became a believer in Vietnam and came back.

[10:25] He went to Vietnam, a pagan, and came back a believer. I wasn't real excited about that. But in a few months after that, I became a believer myself.

[10:48] I gave my life to Jesus Christ. And it was fun, interesting, rocky.

[11:00] We did a lot of Bible studies together. And on the way, I was introduced to the Holy Spirit through a program in the Catholic Church called Life in the Spirit.

[11:17] And that was very beneficial for me. And then in the mid-80s, I was introduced to healing prayer in Woodbridge, Virginia.

[11:37] And then in the late 90s, I was reintroduced to it in Greenwich, New York, working with Father Nigel Mumford for several years.

[11:55] I was on his prayer ministry team. And that was very, very exciting and challenging. And I went through all four levels of the McNutt School of Healing Prayer.

[12:12] And then I also helped facilitate those levels at the Spiritual Life Center in Greenwich.

[12:22] My healing ministry now, we just moved here from Woodbridge, Virginia. And in Woodbridge, we restarted the healing ministry at that church down there.

[12:40] And they now have a very active healing ministry on Sunday mornings during communion. They have at least two prayer teams on duty during communion every Sunday morning.

[12:56] And many times, they need more than just the two teams. So we started out with one team, and maybe they didn't see anyone during the entire service.

[13:12] And I know I remember one Sunday morning, there were at least four teams back there and still a line waiting for people, people waiting to be prayed for.

[13:31] So, and this is just the beginning for us here. I'm not sure where this is going to take us here. So, back to 1966.

[13:45] I wasn't looking for a wife. But she showed up. And I fell in love immediately. We had absolutely zero spiritual basis for our relationship.

[14:00] I'm kind of embarrassed to say that today. But the Lord took a little longer and let us cook for a while before he popped us out as believers.

[14:11] Mary Ellen was in a strange religion called Christian Science, which I didn't understand. Back in those days, I felt all religions were kind of on a par. And so, geez, Christian Science, I don't know what that is, but it's got Christian in it, so it must be okay.

[14:28] And we had to learn a lot about each other and about each other's faith background, although we didn't have a lot of faith. You could put both our faiths in a thimble at that point.

[14:41] The Lord worked with me through a fellow Marine. He was a lay person, so was I. And he just came along beside me and led me to Christ.

[14:51] That's why I'm so strong on lay people touching lay people. He used what they call today friendship evangelism. And I went from a, all religions are the same and I don't understand any of them, to Jesus is my Lord and Savior, and that is exciting.

[15:11] And books kept being pumped at me. One of them was Peace with God by Billy Graham. Another was The Sword, what is it?

[15:24] The Cross and the Switchblade, David Wilkerson. And then Dennis Bennett was just coming on the scene at 9 o'clock in the morning.

[15:38] And so I read 9 o'clock in the morning later in 1970. But these books were what God was using to cement my relationship to Christ. And in that, the filling of the Holy Spirit.

[15:51] And along with that, a new understanding of healing. When I went through seminary, there were zero courses in Christian healing. But then I found out about the Order of St. Luke the Physician.

[16:04] And I went through their course and passed with flying colors because there wasn't any final test. And then I began to work in the whole area of healing in the parish.

[16:16] I always had a healing service midweek in the parish. We were, I was really serious about that.

[16:27] But when I became the Suffolk and Bishop for Hurricane Dan Herzog in the Diocese of Albany, I realized I needed to get caught up with him. And so we did a lot of praying together and learning together as just what it means to be instruments of healing.

[16:44] And so as we talk through this tonight, we're going to see that we have really kind of missed the boat in traditional Christianity when it comes to healing.

[16:56] So that's where we're going at this point. And I believe, and I have pretty good backing on this, that God is still in the healing business today.

[17:11] Okay. Okay. Mary Ellen, you're up. Okay. There are many examples of people being healed in the Old Testament. And I'm going to read a few of those.

[17:25] First one is Numbers 21, verses 7 through 9. Therefore, the people came to Moses and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against you.

[17:42] Pray to the Lord that he take away the serpents from us. So Moses prayed for the people. Then the Lord said to Moses, Make a fiery serpent and set it on a pole, and it shall be that everyone who is bitten, when he looks at it, shall live.

[18:01] So Moses made a bronze serpent and put it on a pole, and so it was. If a serpent had bitten anyone, when he looked at the bronze serpent, he lived.

[18:15] Okay. Good. Thank you. And the next one is 1 Kings 17, 21 through 24.

[18:28] 21. 21.

[18:39] 21. Okay. And he stretched himself out on the child three times, and cried out to the Lord, and said, O Lord my God, I pray, let this child's soul come back to him.

[18:55] 22. Then the Lord heard the voice of Elijah, and the soul of the child came back to him, and he revived. 22. And Elijah took the child, and brought him down from the upper room into the house, and gave him to his mother.

[19:11] 23. 24. And Elijah said, See, your son lives. 25. Then the woman said to Elijah, Now by this I know that you are a man of God, and that the word of the Lord in your mouth is the truth.

[19:27] And I forgot to say slide. Slide. Okay. 2 Chronicles 7, 14.

[19:40] Probably most of you know this one by heart. If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves, and pray, and seek my face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin, and heal their land.

[20:01] And Isaiah 53, verse 5. But he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities.

[20:13] The chastisement for our peace was upon him. And by his stripes we are healed. Most of the New Testament is filled with spiritual, physical, emotional healing.

[20:32] The Greek word sozo actually means both salvation from sin and healing. Other Greek words in New Testament include therapeuo, therapeutic healing, and hygiene, or returning to health.

[20:54] Matthew 4, 23 and 24. And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all kinds of sickness, and all kinds of disease among the people.

[21:19] Then his fame went throughout all Syria, and they brought to him all sick people, who were afflicted with various diseases and torments, and those who were demon-possessed, epileptics, and paralytics.

[21:34] And he healed them. Jesus came to the people offering a three-fold ministry, teaching, preaching, and healing.

[21:48] Jesus healed people of unclean spirits or demonic activity, leprosy, blindness, deafness, blood diseases, epilepsy, dropsy, fever, greed, and other ailments.

[22:06] He also forgave people their sins, and thus healed their hearts. But healing didn't end, as some try to teach, when Jesus left the earth, or when his apostles died out.

[22:20] He commissioned his disciples to continue that ministry, along with the preaching and teaching. Listen to what Luke 9.1 says.

[22:33] Then he called his twelve disciples together, and gave them power and authority over all demons, and to cure diseases. The book of Acts is filled with miracle healing stories by Peter, John, Paul, and others.

[23:00] And the early church even had a healing service. And that's in James 5, 13 through 15.

[23:11] Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing psalms. Is anyone among you sick?

[23:23] Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of the faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise him up.

[23:38] And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. The scriptures inspired by the Holy Spirit call the church to a ministry of spiritual, physical, emotional, and relational healing.

[24:01] Healing is supposed to be as important in a church's life as preaching, teaching, and the Eucharist. Slight. So, we went through this not because we think you didn't know it, but it's the foundation.

[24:19] What we do is founded on Scripture. Healing is throughout Scripture. So, Jesus healed people, and he told his disciples to heal, and they were to pass on the healing ministry as the church grew.

[24:35] I have a question for you. What happened to healing? Slide. Why did the healing ministry take a back seat and then get put in the trunk of the car we call the church?

[24:52] Did the laying on of hands and miracle healings stop with the dying of the last apostles as some teach? Not according to history.

[25:04] Slide. There was a doctor of the church named Tertullian. He was a second century lawyer. He came up with the word Trinity, by the way, for God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

[25:21] He said this, The noblest work for a Christian is to exorcise demons and perform cures. Next slide. So, Irenaeus was another leader.

[25:37] He was in the third century an intellectual bishop. He taught Christian healing. And then John Chrysostom in the fourth century. Remember we have the prayer of John Chrysostom in our prayer book?

[25:51] We said it today. I'll bet you said it today. That's right, because you had morning prayer. He described the church as a hospital for sinners rather than a museum for saints.

[26:03] St. John Chrysostom was sometimes called marble mouth. Marble mouth. Because the way he preached walked away. We still have this information so many years down the road. So you can hear him saying, the church, of course it would be in Greek, the church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints.

[26:25] And then one person we're much more familiar with, Augustine of Hippo, who was a fifth century scholar, father, we like to say, of Anglican theology.

[26:39] He at first opposed healing. He didn't like it. He didn't think it had any place. He thought it ended years before. Then he saw people actually getting healed.

[26:50] And he was man enough to investigate. And he began to practice healing ministry as a bishop. And saw his people come into healing in a time of persecution.

[27:04] Slide. But, there was trouble on the horizon. The church became formalized. It actually became the official religion of the Roman Empire.

[27:19] And people's views of God began to be distanced. They began to see God as a God of wrath, who, like the emperor, if you don't obey, he's going to do you in.

[27:34] They believed that man's main purpose was to atone for his sins and try to escape hell. There was not really a belief that God might be interested in healing anyone, not on the earth.

[27:47] Then the plagues made early death an almost certain thing. Very few people lived to old age. Any hope of healing was swept away as whole villages succumbed to the black death.

[28:04] It's something we have, we cannot even conceive what they went through in Europe during the time of the black death. And so the sacrament of anointing for healing changed to what they called extreme unction.

[28:23] Anointing the head and the hands, trying to get God to forgive them so when they died they would go to heaven. Extreme unction had nothing to do with healing.

[28:35] That's where it moved. In such an environment, something had to fill the vacuum. You know what it was? Magic. Magic captured people as education waned in the dark ages and there seemed no escape.

[28:54] We'll try anything. So the church, seeing the dangers of believing in magic, distanced itself even more from the whole healing enterprise.

[29:08] And you know what? We still haven't come out of superstition, magic. We just do it a little more sophisticated in our age. I won't ask if anybody has a lucky magic rabbit's foot on their key ring.

[29:26] Or, do you ever walk under a ladder? Yeah, I do. But that's bad luck if you walk under a ladder. How about, do you put your horseshoe up which way do you put it up?

[29:41] Do you put it up this way or this way? You put it up this way so the luck, the good luck will fall into it. I don't even want to talk about astrology, psychics, and even Reiki.

[29:57] These are, none of these are based on any fact whatsoever. They're magic. So, let's move on to the next slide.

[30:08] the Protestant Reformation. Martin Luther believed in Christian healing. But he was so intent on teaching people to be saved by God's grace through faith that he didn't major in Christian healing.

[30:26] But he believed in it. He prayed for people and they got healed. On the other part of the continent, John Calvin, John Calvin was trying to get rid of any hint of magic in the new Protestant church.

[30:43] And so he distanced himself completely from the practice of healing prayer. He shut down last rites. He shut down any attempt to cajole God.

[30:58] He decided that, and this is where we first really hear this, healing stopped when the last apostles died because there was no need for it anymore. We had the Bible.

[31:10] And so he didn't like healing ministry. He said if anybody is healed by God, that's God's business, not ours. He said the church was to do two things, preach and teach.

[31:26] Now John Calvin is a hero. I'm not trying to shoot him down in any way, shape, or fashion, but he had a blind spot. His intent was to clear away the magic.

[31:39] But you've ever heard of throwing out the baby with the bathwater? I'm afraid that's what happened. And we're still living with that kind of fear in America today in a number of our denominations.

[31:52] It goes back to our friend John Calvin. Okay, next slide. God persisted, as he always does.

[32:04] The fire of healing almost died, but God persisted. Do you know the remnant theory from the scriptures? Where often if you look through the Old Testament, you'll see reference to the remnant.

[32:21] Every time the nation of Israel headed in the wrong direction, a remnant stayed faithful. That was where Elijah said, I'm all alone. And what did God say?

[32:32] How many are still there? I've got 7,000 who have not bowed to Baal. The remnant. So while the healing was kind of falling apart, God chose a remnant to carry on the ministry of healing.

[32:51] Have you ever heard of John and Charles Wesley? Healing. A number of Charles Wesley's hymns, if you read what he wrote, healing, Christian healing.

[33:05] John did simple acts of praying for people to get healed. Charles wrote hymns which accentuated healing. God began to replant the seeds of healing in the Protestant church.

[33:22] Slide. once again, the fire smoldered. The age of skepticism dug its roots into the church, stating that miracles or anything else that could not be explained by then modern logic could not possibly be valid.

[33:39] That's sometimes called the age of enlightenment, which had nothing to do with enlightenment. The 19th century was difficult for the healing ministry as it got squeezed between what were called evangelical cessationists.

[33:58] Healing has ceased. Evangelical cessationists on the one hand and liberal demythologizers on the other. A lot of the demythologizers became great leaders in the mainline Protestant churches in America.

[34:14] Now you have some idea why we're in trouble. Healing very nearly died. And once again, the vacuum was filled by other than Orthodox believers.

[34:30] Welcome Christian science. Welcome sideshow preachers. God's going to do his thing and if we don't honor it, it's going somewhere else.

[34:45] A lot of people got healed in Christian science. Some do today. It's not Christian healing. It's been said that Christian science is neither Christian nor healing.

[34:56] It's neither Christian nor science. And I'm not trying to whack Christian science. I'm just saying the vacuum was filled. And so, next slide, we roll into the 20th century.

[35:13] We rode into the century on horses. We rode out on rockets. Isn't that amazing? What happened in that century, in the 20th century? The fire was rekindled where else but in California, land of fruit and nuts.

[35:33] God has a great sense of humor. You ever heard of a street called Azusa? Azusa Street in Los Angeles? Around 110 years ago, 111 years ago, God did a really great thing.

[35:52] He launched a revival, a new Pentecost. We're going to talk about how that has affected us. But it was a group of people from the wrong side of the railroad tracks who suddenly got filled with the Holy Spirit.

[36:06] In that little church, they started something that God used to pop us in the healing ministry. an interest in healing began to show itself even in the mainline churches.

[36:21] Some doctors in the Episcopal Church began to examine the scriptures and saw healing. The order of St. Luke, the beloved physician, was quietly begun.

[36:34] Some priests started having quiet healing services in their churches on Wednesday mornings. people started getting healed and again through anointing and the laying on of hands.

[36:49] The Sadas Trail was seeing massive healings, sometimes manufactured falsely by preachers willing to pay a few people to get healed as examples for others.

[37:03] Elmer Gantries appeared on the scene causing mainline people to shy away from the ministry. But people were actually getting healed by God through it all.

[37:16] Next slide. Dennis Bennett. How many have ever heard of Dennis Bennett? Yeah. He was an Episcopal priest way back in the early 1960s.

[37:32] He burst on the scene. Anybody ever met Dennis? Yeah. He's now gone to his reward, but he touched a lot of lives.

[37:45] He actually brought the charismatic movement and healings into mainline religion. It was just amazing what he was able to do.

[37:56] He suffered great persecution, not from the unbelieving world, but from the believing world. world. He had this experience where he kind of messed with the assemblies of God people, and he learned how to speak in tongues.

[38:12] Well, he got the gift he didn't learn. And so he got up in the pulpit in this really posh Southern California parish and told him about experience.

[38:24] During coffee hour, the senior warden handed him his letter of resignation. he couldn't find a job.

[38:35] Finally, Bishop up in the Seattle, Washington area, who was an old friend of his, said, I'm going to close this church. Would you close it for me? And so Dennis went up there, and what happened to it?

[38:50] Boom! Became one of the benchmark churches for growth, for healing, actually for the charismatic movement. On the East Coast, we had another man who has had a good influence on us.

[39:07] His name is Terry Fulham. How many of you have met Terry Fulham? Yeah, East Coast people know him better. Terry Fulham was really a music professor, and he had the distinction of never attending seminary.

[39:22] His bishop said, you're going to be a priest. And Terry said, I do great on the organ. I do a pretty good job lecturing. I do bad taking care of people.

[39:34] But he talked him into it, and Terry Fulham took the ordination exams. Without ever going to seminary, he aced them. He was filled with the Holy Spirit.

[39:46] God chose this man to come to this particular church because God wanted to bring the revival to the East Coast. Christ. Well, it wasn't just the Episcopal Church.

[40:01] Catholics got caught up in this whole thing actually before Episcopalians caught it. And when they get caught up in anything, there are always millions of them. Have you ever noticed that?

[40:11] Yes. In 1975, 35,000 excited Catholics and a few Episcopalians met in the Jesus Touchdown Stadium in Notre Dame.

[40:25] to celebrate the work of the Holy Spirit. Not to be outdone, two years later, 50,000 people met in Kansas City to celebrate the fire of the Holy Spirit.

[40:41] Massive healings took place. It's estimated that there are today at least 250 million spirit filled Christians Christians on the earth.

[40:57] They're roaming the earth, not like Satan. They're roaming the earth, sharing the gift of the Holy Spirit. Many of them are in third world countries.

[41:09] It's been said, we don't bother with it because we can go to the doctor. They can't go to a doctor so they rely on the Holy Spirit. millions of them.

[41:22] And even in my early years as an Episcopal priest, I could see step by step the Holy Spirit invading the hearts of those who were open to him.

[41:34] Embracing the gifts of the Spirit. it. Many of us in this room are recipients of that joy. We're going to have a little testimony later, but how many of you have either received, have been on the receiving end or the sending end of healing in somebody's life?

[41:55] A large number. That would not have happened in the 1940s or the 1950s. A little bit in the 1960s.

[42:06] God is doing something wonderful. We don't know where the end of this is going to be, but right now we're living in a time of the filling of the Holy Spirit.

[42:18] Okay? Where are we today? Even though the fire has waned in some earlier ministries such as Faith Alive, Marriage Encounter, and Curcio, and the mainline churches are flirting with 2 Timothy 4, 3, and 4, you're going to find that there will be times when people will have no stomach for solid teaching, but will fill up on spiritual junk food, catchy opinions to tickle their fancy.

[42:52] They'll turn their backs on the truth. The fire is being rekindled, and much of the rekindling today is through the ministry of healing, healing, and that healing is taking place in North American Anglicanism.

[43:08] Next slide. One reason Dave and I are here right now is to teach about the ministry of healing, and to practice that ministry.

[43:20] healing. So here are some practical aspects of healing that are going on today, all around us, even in our church. Even in our church, God wants to heal our emotions, our bodies, our souls, and our spirits.

[43:37] And God wants to heal our emotions. He healed me of depression. many years ago, I battled.

[43:51] I had a constant battle with depression. And I would get to the point where I would be almost suicidal.

[44:03] I would wish that I would just die. And I, there were times when I felt like I was in a deep, dark pit, and the only way out of it was to die.

[44:18] And I tried Christian counseling. I tried psychological counseling. I tried different forms of prayer.

[44:31] And absolutely nothing worked. The only thing I did not try is medication. then we were invited by a friend to go, Dave and I were invited to go on a marriage retreat led by a wonderful clergy couple down in Destin, Florida.

[44:56] Well, at that time they were in Lake Martin, Alabama. They're in Destin now. Their names are Forrest and Nancy Mobley. They were doing marriage retreats mostly for clergy couples.

[45:10] And we went on this retreat and we spent eight days with them. And during the mornings we would have teachings on different aspects of marriage.

[45:25] And in the afternoons they would pray for us. Now as a preliminary to this retreat they sent us a ream of paperwork that we had to fill out and questions and questions and questions.

[45:40] And one of the things that I had written down on my sheet, one of the answers I had given was that I was hearing voices in my head that was saying, why don't you just leave?

[46:00] Dave and Sarah would be much better off without you. And then I would try to combat that by saying, that's not true.

[46:13] That's really, you know, but it was kind of a half-baked statement on my part. And we went to this retreat and Forrest and Nancy spent a whole afternoon with Dave and I praying for me.

[46:36] And during the prayer I received a deliverance and I received a healing and it was one of the most special things I have ever experienced in my life.

[46:56] I was so full of peace and joy after receiving that healing. And an interesting thing, another interesting thing was that my chest hurt for two weeks.

[47:14] I felt like I had had open-heart surgery. And actually I had. It was just that God had done the open-heart surgery on me.

[47:28] But I haven't been depressed ever since then. The depression is totally gone. And that was almost 20 years ago.

[47:42] Amen. God does heal emotions. All of us have to deal with emotional trauma. And as Mary Ellen did, we look all over to try to get it fixed.

[47:57] Sometimes we just need to sit down with some trusted folks and let them pray that God will do open heart surgery on us. I know that depression is one of the benchmark attacks Satan brings on women.

[48:16] And it just staggers me what that can do to people. And God doesn't want us to be stuck there. So we're praying that in this next month that God will do some open heart surgery and bring people out free from emotional trauma.

[48:40] God also can heal our bodies. So I'll give you a testimony. I had arthritis. We were living in Alabama.

[48:51] And I got an assignment to North Dakota. And I thought, this is going to kill my hands. I don't want to go.

[49:03] We were in a church where healing ministry was very active. And the way it would work in that particular church is there were a lot of rooms. And after church you could go into a designated healing room and someone would pray for you.

[49:19] And so I decided I need to get prayed for. I don't know if it will work. I've been teaching healing for years, but get down to your own personal stuff. I'll go.

[49:29] And so a great guy was there. He was an Air Force tech sergeant, Greg. And so I went to Greg in the healing room and I told him what was going on.

[49:41] And he just said, well hold out your hands. So I hold out your hands. Hey Lord, he needs these hands to get better. Would you do it in Jesus name? And guess what?

[49:53] Nothing happened. They still hurt. Another teaching is that God sometimes takes a little while for it to get done. In about a week I had no pain.

[50:05] I have had no pain. that was in 1990. Isn't that amazing? God can do this. Even arthritis, God can work in our hearts and our minds so that our bodies get well.

[50:25] God wants to heal us spiritually and free us from demonic oppression. Dave and I were involved in a what we discovered was an exorcism.

[50:45] We did not know it was going to be that way going into it but a friend of ours, very dear friend of ours, was actually diagnosed with heart cancer.

[51:00] and she was under special treatment and special watches because she was one of the only people alive diagnosed with heart cancer.

[51:17] They usually only find heart cancer in an autopsy. This lady was still alive and she would come down to the National Institutes of Health so that they could do studies on her.

[51:38] And she and her husband asked us to come over to their house. They were involved in a Bible study with us. And she and her husband asked us to come over to her house and pray for her.

[51:53] So we went over there that evening. It was Dave and I and another couple and then this the lady and her husband.

[52:06] And we started praying for her and we didn't we did not realize that this was going to become an exorcism.

[52:20] but suddenly her voice changed her whole countenance changed and as we were praying for her we we realized we've got to pray against the spirit.

[52:36] This is an evil presence and we've got to start praying against it. So we started praying against it and eventually she rested in the spirit and when she came out of it and was talking to us she said it's gone and she told us she knew when that spirit entered her and was but we were able to be instruments of the Holy Spirit to free her of this and she was able to she did eventually die but she died a true Christian believer.

[53:34] She would tell people when they told her that she was terminal she would say I'm not terminal I am eternal. That was great.

[53:49] And you know there are people that the old quote people think there's a devil behind every bush. Well that's only because it's true. But God is stronger than any devil.

[54:02] And it is just a fact that demonic activity is present trying to get to oppress us to get away in.

[54:14] And we're going to talk about that other weeks. How you get free from that which wants to hold you back. That which wants to hold you down.

[54:25] That which wants to hold you up. That way. Okay. So we're going to talk about that. And finally God wants to heal us relationally. relationally another thing that happened women came up for healing and in the process of the conversation she lives on another planet.

[54:56] You don't know her. You'll never know her. So I'm not don't look at each other and say I wonder if it's you. It's not you. She refused to forgive her father.

[55:09] He had done terrible things to her. She was miserable. As she explained what her father had done to her I just told her the truth.

[55:22] I'd be mad too if he had done that to me. But somehow you've got to move into the forgiveness business. And she said two things. He's dead.

[55:33] And even if he was alive I would never forgive him. Do you know what happens eventually to a person who refuses to forgive? The root of bitterness sets in.

[55:47] She was in torment. So I didn't know what to do. There's a guy named Mike Flynn who teaches healing today. He calls it the eight word prayer.

[55:59] Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus Jesus help me. So I gave a version of that silently. And God said you be her father.

[56:14] So I said I don't I'm not much for role play but would you I'm not going to do anything bad to you but would you just let me be your father for a minute and talk with you.

[56:26] And she kind of looked at me strange and said yeah okay. And so what I did was apologized to her and told her how much I loved her and that I'm just I was sorry that I did this to her and I would I just would love it if she could forgive me.

[56:45] As the tears ran down her eyes she said I love you dad. It was broken. She forgave her father her life turned around.

[57:01] Isn't that what God wants to do relationally? Adam and Eve had the perfect marriage until then they had a rotten marriage.

[57:15] They were blaming each other for stuff. I don't know if you're married today I know you never blame your spouse for anything. but it's a pit we fall into and if you're not married you find somebody else to blame.

[57:32] It goes back to Adam and Eve. God wants to heal relationships so that relationships begin to become lifting up rather than tearing down.

[57:44] God can do it in your life he's doing it in ours. Okay now we get to the last. So we were sent to pray for your healing.

[57:56] We would like to pray for you. We want to be done here officially in the next 15 minutes so that people can go home before it's dark but what we're going to do is we're going to stay here and pray for you.

[58:11] You know about testimonies? Some of you have been to churches where they have testimonies. I'm going to prime the pump by giving a testimony on behalf of a guy named Bill Broach.

[58:28] Bill is the rector of All Saints Anglican Church in Pensacola, Florida. He's probably about 60 years old. Used to be an airline pilot.

[58:40] Big tall guy. Of course to me everybody's tall. Kind of a tall guy. Well mannered. We met him last year and he said would you pray for me?

[58:53] The doctor said I've got some kind of a little node on my lungs. So we prayed that God would remove the node. He felt worse and worse and worse and worse and finally he went to the doctor again and the doctor said you need bypass surgery.

[59:11] And Bill said what about the node? The doctor said listen while I'm in there I'll check for it but what I need to do is do bypass surgery and so last month he had a quadruple bypass.

[59:24] In the process the doctor looked around for the node and he called yesterday and said the doctor told me not to worry about any dad blame. He used a different word node because it's not.

[59:39] if it's there I can't find it. You are healed. And Bill said that was not the big thing. The big thing was going into surgery for the quadruple bypass and the node completely at peace.

[59:54] Putting his life totally in God's hands. And he said if I wake up in heaven what a wonderful gift that's going to be. I'd rather wake up on earth but I can take either one.

[60:07] that's kind of where it is for us. So that's Bill Broach's testimony. He asked if I would give that to you. I did. Would anyone else like to share a testimony of a healing in your life? I can't hear.

[60:31] My name is Paul. Yes, Paul. And I got hurt in a factory and has taken muscle and back pain all the time. And my back was healed.

[60:43] Praise God. So you were working in a factory. You had back pain. How did you pray for healing? I went in front of people in church and they prayed over me.

[60:56] So you went in church. You went to the front and asked for prayer and a team prayed for you. Your back was healed. Stand up. Twist around.

[61:09]  Praise God. Thank you.