Firstly, thanks to Pastor Phil for his kind introduction.  I met him on MySpace — just stumbled across his profile and started writing to him then subscribed to his blog there… eventually it led me here.  I’ve had questions about the spirit-filled aspects of Christianity, as well as other things, which he has kindly answered.  He invited me here, and I’m amazed.

And that brings me to thanking all of you for your kind words about my post, and your welcomes.  I’m excited to be among a Christian community online!

I mentioned (in another blog) our prayer group leader Richard giving a sermon on divine healing.  It was awesome.  We had a few guests among us (really noticable in our teeny congregation!), as well as one who comes from time to time, which I’ll talk about.  Richard was filled with the subject, and the Lord inspired what he said.  Very clear, lots of food for thought even for people who would be questioning things.

Right after church I was asked to help pray for a gentleman named Christian, who comes to church periodically.  He is legally blind, but did have successful surgery on one eye, which has helped him a lot.  But he has been very discouraged and depressed lately, even to the point of not wanting to live.

There were 3 men and me praying for him, including Richard.  It seemed to be the right people, because we all understood what it feels like to be depressed even to the point of giving up life.  After the prayer, Christian just sat there in amazement that someone understood, that all four of us really did understand what he was going through. 

Now, before anybody gets upset about a person who even wants to do himself in, let me say something.  People will get irate and say, “how could he, it’s cowardly..it’s selfish! How awful.”  But if you have ever been there, where you really truly are considering taking your own life, what got you there, and what it takes to make you even to wanting to die, is what others must understand, if they are to help someone.

I’ll admit something here, in hopes of helping people understand (and that, for the purpose of helping people have compassion to pray for the suicidal person and not condemn him/her).  I have been there.  Many times, but only once or twice to the point of actually searching for a way to do it (so my kids wouldn’t be the ones to find me).

For me it was my marriage.  I believed (and still do), that marriage is for life.  You are married and bound to each other by God.  My husband was abusive and never respected me or my children.  Because of the cyclical nature of the abuse (and that’s another giant subject I won’t go into), there were days I felt like I could live with him forever, and there were even more days I wanted to die right now because I just could not go on like that any more.  I believed that God would fix the marriage, and prayed incessantly for that, and so to me, for 23 years, divorce wasn’t even an option.

I felt totally trapped and helpless and stuck, and I begged God to either fix things or “take me”.  Only the fact that my children might find me and would be motherless kept me from doing it.  At one point, though, I was actively looking for a way, which really scared me.  One other thing kept me from doing it, and that was the absolute belief that “maybe tomorrow” God would fix things, and I didn’t want to miss it (I’m extremely curious:).

That is what it takes to bring someone to suicide.  The feeling that things are unchangeable, you are powerless, you are miserable, and you just feel it is impossible to go on like that in your situation, and if you believe that God is there and would help, that you beg Him either to fix it now or let you die, it’s that bad.

For those who think it’s “selfish”, maybe yes, but on the other hand, if you understand how miserable you must be to even go against natural self-preservation, “selfishness” as such,  isn’t even in the mix.  You are SO miserable, you are literally incapable of seeing beyond your suffering. 

And when you add in the other factors, chemical imbalance that might be causing the depression, trauma from abuse or other events,  possible or probable spiritual warfare elements, the suicidal person absolutely needs help (and prayer) from someone who won’t condemn.

God never fixed my marriage.  But he did allow events to get to the point where I was led to see that essentially my husband was behaving like an unbeliever and was not pleased to dwell with me.  And I realized that although it wasn’t a solution, divorce wasn’t forbidden.  So there was a ”way of escape” given (I Cor 10:13). 

I still have depression (I think it’s now hormonal), but God is progressively working on that for me.  I hang onto Him for dear life when I’m down.  And I told Christian he has to do the same.  To guard what goes into his mind (i.e. not watching the news on TV and be careful where you go on the internet).  That the power we ask God to use to help him is the same power that created the universe, and it’s real and it works. In prayer we asked that God remove the depression and fill him with positive things.  I told Christian that now he has to FILL that space with positive things.  Pray the minute he wakes up.  Read the Bible every single day, even if it’s only one verse and think on that verse all day.

  I gave him my phone number and told him if he ever needs someone to talk to, even in the middle of the night, he can call me.  I need to remember to ask him about accepting Jesus as his personal savior and repenting from sin, etc., (which I think he did do already long ago, he’s been around our church for a long time).

If anybody reads this and is willing to pray for Christian, please do.  He is a very nice man, and I think he is hungry for the Lord in his life.  He is appealing denial (from insurance) for surgery on his second eye, which I pray will work out, or even that God would heal that eye if surgery is never allowed. 

Thanks to God for His love and healing. 

Thanks to all of you for your loving welcome. — Gerrie

Just read Pastor Phil’s blog comments and clicked on a couple of users, which led me to Lynn Gail’s posts on how the Lord treated women. Thanks to Lynn for her study and courage to write all that!  I don’t know yet exactly how this applies to me.  I newly received baptism of the Holy Spirit about a year ago.  Right before that, I did a study on the gifts of the spirit, and one in the “list” really popped out at me, as a “that’s what I would wish for if I could have anything I wanted.”…  Healing.    Why?  I don’t know, except that it stood out  to me at the time as being the one that “could help people the most.” But in my church, up till now, “anointing with oil” as part of praying for healing has always been strictly a function of elders and pastors.  Men. 

I’m just learning about the anointing and commissioning that Jesus really gave/gives to ALL believers (as opposed to only ordained people) to  preach the gospel, heal the sick, etc.  So the concept of a “non-ordained” person using oil in prayer is new…(oh, maybe in the last 9 months or so), by way of a King’s Seminary student who leads our prayer group, who has prayed over each of us, and sometimes with aointing with oil. 

At the November Autumn Leadership Conference in Van Nuys at Church on the Way, it was stated that prayer for healing is something that should be more “normal” in the church and not limited to ministers only, and that it IS something God wants to do for His people more often than NOT doing it.  A friend in New York who is a pastor of my denomination there  was at this same conference(and I just recently found this out), and he said that I should be willing to pray and anoint people with oil if they want prayer for healing.

I’m not ordained, and I’m a woman.  I’ve been reading books about healing by Francis MacNutt and James Garlow, and next is “Lord Disciple Me” by Richard Mull.  I’m praying about it, for the Lord to guide me.  And I’ve started to take it seriously, as in writing down in a journal book, the list of people who ask for prayer at church or at/to/through our prayer group.

The way the Lord pricked me to learn sign language 29 years ago and used me to interpret for the deaf and establish a program in my denomination to train intepreters and inform the ministry seems to have had a similar beginning to how I feel now about healing ministry.  I don’t know, time will tell whether God wants to use me in this way.  But just like an interpreter is merely a “conduit” of sermon messages from God through the speaker to the deaf people watching, I would be merely a ‘conduit” for the Holy Spirit to flow through and help people.  The trick is to walk the fine line between being “bold in the Lord” and being “presumptuous.”

I believe God is REAL, and that when we ask God to do something (such as healing or helping us get a job, etc.), we are actually asking for Him to use the very same power in our lives that He used to create the universe (and Paul mentions that the same power that raised Christ from the dead is in you), to intervene for us.   Of course he can only use a little piece of the power at a time because you know what it took to create a sun would be “overkill” on us!

And we have to remember who made it possible to even ASK for our Father’s help: Jesus Christ. Before Jesus, people had to go through the priest, with an offering too.  The priest could only go into the Holy of Holies (representing God’s throne) once a year, and ONLY the high priest could do this after killing a lamb, washing himself and his clothes, and sprinkling himself with the lamb’s blood.  But when Jesus died, the veil separating the Holy of Holies from the rest of the temple was ripped from the top down.  THAT is why we are allowed to go into the Throne Room of Heaven at all. 

I’m still trying to figure out why people can’t just pray for themselves, why do they need somebody to pray “for” them?  But we are commanded to pray for each other, and that’s why I do it, out of love for others and that God says He hears when we pray for each other. So if I get to be a conduit for that, hooray:)

Writing this as a record of my “journey”…. and for guidance from people like Pastor Phil.  Tonight at our 6 pm service, our prayer group leader is giving a sermon about healing, based on what we’ve been learning lately, and communion follows.  May the Holy Spirit visit the sanctuary mightily and make his sermon come “alive” and not be just “theory”.  We have a teeny congregation and usually only have about 35 people there.  But many of them need inner healing for sure, and some do need physical healing.  Thanks and praise to God for however He expresses His will tonight. gcl

A friend told me I should subscribe…so here I am.  For me the most difficult part is always what username to choose.  I’ve always used the default, my first name and last initial.  But today I actually thought of one that fits — ha! but then it was taken!  So I added something on the front of it, and so here I am.  It fits better anyway, I AM  “his”, the Lord’s prayer warrior, not my own:)

I’ve subscribed to this friend’s post, so hopefully I will meet others of like mind soon:)

gcl