Healing

Well then my fellow soldiers said to me, “How come that your foot is all right again?” And I faced a crisis in my faith and I missed it. I knew I ought to have said, “God healed me.” But, I was embarrassed to say something like that so I said, “It got well without medicine.” The moment I said that I knew I was in for trouble.

Well, you can guess what happened. It came back. And this time I prayed and I didn’t get healed. So I ended up in military hospitals in Egypt—and that’s not a very exciting place to be. I went down into what John Bunyan calls “the slough of despond,” the dark, deep, valley of despair. I just sat up in the bed and I said, “I know if I had faith God would heal me.” But then I always said, “But I don’t have faith.” I was right down in the bottom of the pit.

But one day a brilliant ray of light shone into my darkness and it came from Romans 10:17:

“So then, faith cometh by hearing...”

I said to myself, if I don’t have faith, I can get it. It comes. How does it come? By hearing the Word of God. So I was already reading the Bible, I made up my mind that I would read it twice as much. I lived in the Bible but I wasn’t getting healed.

Then I was transferred to another hospital, and this strange Australian brigadier in the Salvation Army, hearing of this soldier in hospital, took a very difficult journey of about 50 miles, which was not easy in those days. She had her American young lady coworker with her and the car was driven by a New Zealand soldier. It was a very small four-seater car. She marched into the hospital ward with her uniform flying and all her things that Salvationists wore in those days, overawed the nurse and got permission for me to go out and sit in the car. I didn’t even want to go out and sit in the car but she didn’t even consider that! I was a little bit embarrassed by being associated with this Salvation Army lady.

So, we ended up in the car in the hospital compound. I was in the back seat sitting next to this young American lady from Oklahoma. The Salvation Army lady said, “Let’s pray.” And when she said, “Let’s pray,” you prayed, there were no options. We started to pray and the young lady beside me began to shake. She was shaking violently. Then I realized I was beginning to shake. Then I realized everybody in the car was beginning to shake. Then I realized the car was shaking! Now, it was not moving, the engine was not running, but it was rattling and vibrating as if it had been going at 50 miles an hour on a rough road. I knew God was doing this for my benefit. It was embarrassing!

Then this young lady spoke in an unknown tongue. Now, I have become familiar with that. Then she got the interpretation. I don’t remember it all but I remember the central phrase and I knew God was speaking to me personally. This is what He said, it’s one of those things I’ve never forgot. He said:

“Consider the work of Calvary, a perfect work, perfect in every respect and perfect in every aspect.”

You know, that’s beautiful English. I knew God was speaking to me and I understood He was telling me that if I understood what Jesus had done for me on Calvary, it met all my needs.

I got out of the car just as sick as I got in but I said to myself, “I’m going to find out what happened at Calvary.” I began to read the Bible.

Then I thought to myself I need to get better acquainted so I armed myself with three colored pencils: one blue, one red and one yellow. Every time I found a passage in the Bible that related to salvation or the blood of Jesus, I underlined it in red. Every time I found a passage in the Bible that related to love, I underlined it in yellow. And whenever I found a passage in the Bible that related to healing or physical health, I underlined it in blue. And I spent another three or four months in that hospital. At the end I’d finished the Bible. And do you know what I had? A blue Bible. Nothing could have convinced me so totally that healing is God’s provision for His people.

But, I still didn’t know how to appropriate it. One day in Proverbs chapter 4 I found three verses which I want to commend to you because they’ll work just as well for you as they do for me. I can give it to you in the King James Version:

“My son, attend to my word, incline thine ear unto my sayings. Let them not depart from thy mouth, keep them in the midst of thy heart; for they are life to those who find them and health to all their flesh.”

Now, I being a philosopher was still reasoning, well, maybe when it talks about health it means just health of my soul. But even a philosopher could not argue with that. Health to all their flesh. Did you hear that? Health to all their flesh. So I said to myself, now I have the answer. If I will take God’s Word as my medicine, it will heal me. Then, being a medical orderly I said to myself, “How do people take medicine?” And usually it’s three times daily after meals. So I said that’s how I’m going to take the Bible as my medicine. I went to the doctor that was overseeing me and I said, “I want to get out of hospital. I’m not healed but I’m trusting the Lord to heal me.” He nearly sent me to a psychiatric hospital but I just escaped that. And so, he began to send for me and like Nicodemus, he sent for me at night to hear what I had to say. He was not a believer but very interested.

Eventually I was discharged from the hospital at my own responsibility uncured although a lot better. I remember the doctor saying to me, the last words were, “Now the two worst things for you are water and soap. Keep your feet and hands out of water and don’t use soap.” When I got to the medical corps base depot in Cairo, the sergeant met me and said, “There’s going to be a commanding officers inspection tomorrow, get cracking and scrub your equipment with soap and water.” It came to me, what it said about Israel and Egypt, “The more they afflicted them the more they multiplied and grew.” I thought no matter what they do, I’m going to get stronger.

I survived that inspection—just. I had to hold on with the tips of my fingers.

Then the army sent me to the Sudan. Now Egypt is a bad climate, especially for people with skin problems. But the Sudan is a far worse climate. Nevertheless I just went on, three times daily after meals I opened my Bible and said, “Lord, thank you. These words are life to me, health if I can find them, and I receive them as that, as medicine.” Within three months in that condition and in that climate I was totally and permanently healed without any further medical treatment.

Well, eventually the army sent me to a little place called Gibate on the Red Sea Hills in the Sudan just above the Red Sea. Well after that, after three years in what they called bad postings I had the right to apply for a good one so I said, “I want to go to Palestine.” They sent me there. They put me in a little medical base depot which was storing medical supplies to take into Europe when the way opened. And all the people working with it were Basutos (phonetic) from South Africa, so I was I think the only white person working with them.

At that time I had visited a lady in a town called Ramallah which in those days was a nice little Christian village. It’s almost impossible to believe today. She was a Danish lady and she had a small children’s home. The reason why I visited her was because soldiers all throughout the Middle East were saying, Christian soldiers, if you really want a blessing you need to go to that children’s home in Ramallah, which was about ten miles north of Jerusalem. I thought I’ll go there. I met the lady, saw the children, some of whom are here this evening, and I thought, “There’s a different atmosphere in this home. It’s really like being in the presence of God.” Before we left this lady trotted all the eight children in the home, had them kneel down and pray for me.

So I went away and I thought that’s a sweet home and I really felt good there. I thought, “That poor Danish lady, she’s so poor, she doesn’t have much money. She has eight children to feed.” I started to pray for her. And one day while I was praying for her I got a message in tongues. And then, as usual, I got the interpretation. And the Lord was speaking to me and He said, “I’ve joined you together under the same yoke and in the same harness.” I thought that’s strange, it sounds as though God wants us to get married. I had no thought of getting married at the time.

Well, a little while later I was back in this depot again, walking up and down, and the same thing happened. I began to speak in a tongue, I got the interpretation. This time the Lord said to me, and again I have these words, I’ve never forgotten them, “I have called thee to be a teacher of the Scriptures in truth and faith and love which are in Christ Jesus for many.”