In the Gospels we read stories of Jesus and the Apostles in Acts performing miracles of healing, the unthinkable. Ironically, when we read the Gospels, most people in the world, Christians included, believe that miraculous healing does not happen anymore. They think it is something of the past. I used to discredit any thought of the miraculous until God changed my life with the power of healing and made the unthinkable become real.
In June 2013, a little over three years ago, I started a school at YWAM Montana called Endurance Discipleship Training School (EDTS). It is a Discipleship Training School that utilizes outdoor activities like hiking, rock climbing, and backpacking to grow in discipleship and minister to others. In my first week of EDTS, I heard people talking about the power of God healing people and I was shocked to hear this. My understanding was that God did not heal people in miraculous ways anymore and that was something of the past. My honest reaction being new to YWAM was that these people are crazy to even think of this. Little did I know that God had a plan to change my perspective. A couple of weeks after the school started I was invited to go cliff jumping in Flathead Lake with some friends. At first, I watched others jump in and it looked safe to me, so I jumped in. It was then that I realized that the water was too shallow and my foot hit the bottom. I told my friends that I hit the bottom but I thought I was fine. When I got to the shore and stood up it was then that I felt a sharp pain in my foot. The next day, in great pain, I went to urgent care.
They took an X-ray and told me that I had broken four bones in my foot and would be walking on crutches for the next three to four months. I was thinking, “How could I go on with EDTS, which requires so much use of my feet?” The doctor told me to come back in five days to see him after the swelling went down and to get an update. As my school was camping those five days, they were the longest five days of my life.
At this point, I questioned God on why he would send me to YWAM, then in just a couple of weeks send me home because of my foot? My friends and staff at YWAM were dedicated in prayer for my foot to be healed. I kept on telling them that God does not miraculously heal anyone anymore, that was a thing of the past. I told them to stop wasting their time praying for something that was not going to happen. Five days later I went back to the doctor to get an update on my foot. I walked into the doctor’s office with crutches and in pain. The doctor was pleasant to talk to and questioned me on what I am doing in Montana and at YWAM. I tell the doctor about EDTS and that we do strenuous outdoor activities. The doctor told me plainly that I would have to use crutches and there is no way that I could do any type of physical activities like hiking and climbing. The doctor ordered another X-ray of my foot now that the swelling had calmed down. As I was waiting for my X-ray results in the doctor’s office, I was frustrated with God and questioned him again, “Why would I be here only to be sent back home with a broken foot?” I was upset and said to God, “If you can really heal like people at YWAM said, then why don’t you just heal my foot?!” This is when the UNTHINKABLE happened! The doctor walked in with the old X-ray and the new X-ray in his hands. He looked at me and said, “I have never seen this before in my life, the new X-rays are showing that your foot is no longer broken.” I was shocked. Was I hearing the doctor correctly? I asked him to say it again because I could not believe what I had just heard. Amazed by what I heard the doctor tell me, I tried to stand up and see if I could walk. Then the truth hit me. I stood up and the pain that was in my foot was gone! I started walking without any pain or discomfort. Emotions overwhelmed me and I started crying because the unthinkable became real and the power of healing happened.
I went back to the YWAM base and told everyone I knew what had happened to me. Most people looked at me and said, “Did you not believe in the healing power of God?” I got on my knees in prayer to God to thank him for what He had done. I proclaimed to Him that I would not doubt His miraculous works in the present and that I truly believe in the power of healing. I am now a living testimony to that. I try to share my story to people that need healing so that they might have faith and know that healing does happen.
He said to them, “Because of your little faith. For truly, I say to you, if you have faith like a grain of mustard seed, you will say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move, and nothing will be impossible for you. (Matthew 17:20)
