Good morning! No, GREAT MORNING!!! August 23, 2007
I'd like to share the testimony of my healing from a long term physical ailment.
I can walk!!! Walking for the past two months has been so painful that it sometimes moved me to tears. Today, I got out of bed and walked across the room before I realized what I had done. I had walked without ANY pain.
A little background. two and a half years ago, the day after I arrived home from a Healing weekend in Oracle, AZ, my left knee became swollen to the size of a grapefruit. I couldn't even go to work because navigating stairs was out of the question. My knee would not so much as bend and it could not hold any weight. It wasn't the first time I had had problems with my knee so I decided to go to see an orthopedic doctor to find out what was going on. (Two years ago, I was still in the "I gotta know what it is" frame of mind. Thank God that He is patient and kind and helps us grow no matter how ignorant we may be.) When I went to the doctor, X-rays were taken and the doctor was absolutely amazed that I was able to EVER walk without pain because arthritis had deteriorated both knee joints. I was literally bone against bone. Actually the knee that wasn't swollen was worse than the knee that was. The swollen knee was more painful because it also had a torn meniscus. He said that I would be a candidate for knee replacement surgery in a short time. He was very apologetic and sorry to give me that news because after all "there is no known cure for arthritis." I remember looking at the X-rays and then looking him in the eye and saying, "I won't need surgery. My knees are going to be just fine. The arthritis will soon be gone." Strangely enough, he did not argue with me but just kind of looked at me like I had a bad case of denial on top of everything else. There is a verse that says
"No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is of me, saith the LORD." (Isaiah 54:17) This weapon (arthritis), may have been formed against me but the Word promised that it would not prosper IF I would condemn it. I had the righteousness of God in Christ and it was time for me to take a stand to see this situation change. So, that is what I began doing each day - standing in my righteousness in Christ and condemning the arthritis in my knees.
The doctor had told me that I should stick to swimming as my primary form of exercise so as to use my knee joints as little as possible. Well, I guess if I believed that the joints were going to continue to degenerate, I would have done that. But, instead, I went out and bought some new shoes for walking on the track and I put in 3 - 5 miles a day on my breaks and lunch hour at work. I would usually walk alone so that as I walked, I could praise God for His goodness and His healing that was regenerating my knee joints and I could also talk to my knees and tell them to come into line with the Word. I must admit that there were times that I must have looked like a full-fledged loon walking around the middle school track in the blazing summer sun, wearing business clothes and sneakers, muttering to myself. But those "sessions" really helped build the Word in me regarding my healing. I now realize that it was not beneficial for me to SEE the x-rays and to SEE the extent of the damage to my joints because that is the picture that I had to replace with a picture of health. It really took some time for me to do that because that image was so vivid in my mind's eye. We need to be careful what we look at because the enemy is ever-ready to use it against us at every opportunity. I avoided TV and radio (commercials about arthritis, pain-killers, etc), and I would not watch movies that dealt with sickness or disease. I avoided spending time with people who complained about being sick with no desire to be healed. I avoided newspaper articles about the rising cost of health care and diseases that were attacking people in the 50+ age group. The reasons to become discouraged were everywhere as were the enticements to ingest them.
When I went to visit Darlene Petty in Oracle a year later, she ministered to my knees. We actually felt something move in the left knee, the one that had been swollen. I believe that the torn meniscus in that knee was healed when she ministered to me and that is what we felt. I continued walking and I continued my "confession sessions" all of last summer as well. My knees were getting better and better and the pain was decreasing bit by bit. I rarely had to take anything for pain or inflammation once I learned that I could actually SPEAK to them and command them to leave. Mark 11:23 really works! Later, I was to go through a period where the pain became so intense that the thought of walking moved me to tears. But then I would command the pain to leave and command my knees to function in the name of Jesus Christ and I would have relief with no side effects - except, of course, for joy.
Also during this time, I spent every available moment filling my head with the Word on healing. I listened to many teachings on the healings of the gospels, numerous times. Whenever I was in the car alone, a healing teaching was playing. I got up in the morning and listened to the records on the healings. I read the records over and over again. I had to get it into my head and heart that healing for this particular affliction was available for ME. Until I got there, I would not be completely healed. Some things that I needed to get into my heart were: EVERY person that ever came to Jesus Christ got healed. Jesus NEVER told someone that they needed to suffer just a little longer and then they would be healed. The Lord often asked the person who came to be healed to do something that they could not do before they were ministered to. In MOST cases, Jesus Christ told the person that THEIR faith was what made them whole. I could not earn a healing, I would receive it by grace because of the loving sacrifice that Jesus Christ had already made. My healing was already paid for and I would need to TAKE it. I had to hold the Word higher than any senses evidence, including x-rays, prognosis, pain, etc. Until I did that, I would be derailed in my journey to healing by the lying signs of the enemy. The greatest thing that I needed to realize is that God loved ME and He wanted ME to be healed. Jesus Christ took those stripes for ME. I know that those stripes were way more painful than what I was experiencing and so I would not count them null and void. Finally, I knew in my heart that I could and would be healed completely and totally by holding fast to the Word.
In the meantime, the pain got worse and worse, I was constantly rebuking it and it was making me weary. Finally, it occurred to me that sickness and disease were defeated at Calvary so I shouldn't be entertaining them in my life right now! Finally, I got to the place that I realized that I didn't need to keep fighting this thing. It was time for the battle to end and I needed to be free. I'm sure that was available two years ago but my believing wasn't there yet in this particular area. Since we are healed according to our believing, not according to God's power, I received the amount of healing I believed for. It is not that God was holding back, it's that I was not receiving all that He had to offer me. This past Sunday, my husband, Ron ministered to me. After he ministered, I didn't feel anything or experience any "sensations." After a few minutes, I stood up and declared "By the stripes of Jesus Christ, I am healed." That scripture had become living and real to me. I knew that with each stripe he took, he experienced my pain and then he carried that all away. So I absolutely did not need to carry any more pain. As I began to walk, I felt pain but the pain was different somehow. That's when I finally understood something. I was healed but the enemy was going to try to make me feel like I hadn't been healed so that I would be discouraged and give up. THIS pain was a lie! Father brought to mind Romans 12:1-2 -- that I was not to be conformed to this world (the pain.) So, I forced myself to walk as normally as possible, without the visible limp that had developed to compensate for the pain. Man did that hurt! But I refused to confess or audibly acknowledge that it hurt. I also refused to take any drugs so that I would not be tricked into thinking that I was better because of the drugs. I constantly talked to my legs and knees and told them what they were to do. Every day at work, for the past three days, I would go for a one mile walk with a co-worker. She noticed, "Hey, you're not limping!" I told her, "Yep, my knees are all healed up." (I had told her I was sore from my weight workouts at the gym, which was part of the problem but not all of it. I refused to confess disease.) Little did she know, it hurt just as much but I wasn't going to conform to the pain. My knees were going to conform to the Word!
After three days of forcing my legs to walk normally, working out at the gym as if I had normal knee joints and forcing myself to go where I didn't want to go because it hurt so much, something happened. I believed that I was healed when Ron ministered though I still felt the pain. But this morning when I got up, I was so used to walking normally again that I didn't notice that I was walking that way without making a conscious effort to do so. The mornings were usually the toughest because the joints had been immobile all night. But I had NO PAIN!!! I was not conformed to this world, I was finally transformed by the renewing of my mind to prove that good and acceptable and perfect will of God! I am SOOOO excited! When we take God at His Word, He brings it to pass! The more believing we have in the Word, the better and faster it will work on our behalf. But God is so gracious and merciful and He doesn't browbeat us for not believing as much as we could. But he also doesn't "baby" us and heal us in spite of our unbelief. He carefully guides us and allows us to hold His hand as we go through the rough spots and leads us to a place of peace and joy. I am ecstatic today. I can walk and it doesn't hurt to do it!
"But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They shall mount up with wings as eagles. They shall run and not be weary and they shall walk and not faint." Isaiah 40:31 is a verse that I used to say in the Corps because it was a retemory and it was also a verse that would help me make it to the finish line of some of those grueling "Fun Runs." That verse has a whole new meaning for me today and my love for God has grown by great leaps and bounds. He truly loves us so much and will lead us out of whatever darkness we are in to see His glorious light, if we will refuse to fear but trust Him and Him alone.
Something else that I have realized now in looking back at all that has happened. I know that I was healed when Darlene initially ministered to my knees a little over a year ago. The pain that came a few days after she ministered to me deceived me into thinking that the healing had not really happened. Rather than taking a stand and resisting the lies of the enemy, I eventually began to act as if I had arthritis again. Soon, the arthritis returned and I lost my healing. We must hold fast to our healing by remaining thankful to God for what He has done and refuse to give in to the little things (symptoms, thoughts, etc.) that attempt to cause us to doubt what we have received. God is faithful and if He says that by the stripes of Jesus Christ we are healed, then that is the truth that we hold fast to. Anything contrary to that is a lie and we must refuse to give it even a moment's consideration.
If this sharing will help someone else to rise up in their own believing, please feel free to share it. To God be the Glory, great things He has done!
Jan Booze
Colorado Springs, CO
janeb1226@comcast.net
