A story of healing

I'm learning that you can't outline how healing comes to people. Here's one man's unique story.

It was a cool, drab February morning, just warm enough for the snow to begin melting. As I walked the indoor track at the Park District field house, a smiling man dropped his jacket on the bleachers. We introduced ourselves by first names and shook hands, and headed off on the circuit together.

Bill asked what I did. I replied, “I do spiritual healing.”
“Oh,” he said, “I believe in that.”
“Tell me more,” I encouraged him.
He eyed me cautiously, “I found Jesus.”
“I’d like to hear about that.”
Reassured, Bill smiled. This was clearly a story he enjoyed telling. And one that moved me deeply to hear. Deeply.

“Around 2000,” he began, “There was a large Mary sculpture that was going around the country on a flat bed truck.”
“Yes I remember seeing it.” While it held no emotional meaning for me, we had taken some out-of-town Catholic friends to see work of religious art in a nearby church parking lot.

Bill and his wife were in the Catholic church till about 1967. “Then I got mad about something and walked out. We went to other churches, and for about 10 years we were Methodists. That’s where I learned about the Holy Spirit. And I’m so grateful.”

Later one day at work, Bill threw a coffee cup at a colleague. Fortunately it missed her, but he had to ask himself at that point, “What am I doing?” He asked a buddy to sign him out, and he went home for the day. His buddy called Bill’s wife to give her a heads up. “Something’s wrong with Bill. He just walked off the job, and he’s on his way home.”

His wife set up an appointment for him to see, in his words, a shrink.

Before that appointment, this Mary sculpture was in the area. They were driving, and his wife asked Bill if he’s like to see it, and he said No. They turned into the parking lot, though, and she asked if he’d like to get out and take a closer look, and he said No.
Father Paul, a hands-on healer, was there, and she asked if he’d like to talk to Father Paul, and Bill said No.
Yet he found himself talking to Father Paul who asked, “How can I help you?”
Bill said, “I don’t know. I’m very angry, and I don’t know why.”

He talked and talked and talked. Father Paul put his hand on Bill’s head and prayed. As he was praying, a storm came up - wind blowing the folding chairs around, and lightning, so intense that Bill couldn’t hear the prayer. Finally the storm quit and there was peace. He felt as though a burden had been lifted.
His wife asked, “Are you OK?
“Yes,” Bill nodded. “I think I can sleep tonight.” then he added, “Wasn’t that the strangest storm!”
His wife looked at him. “Storm? Bill, there was no storm.” Bill realized it had been his own personal turmoil raging within him. No one else saw a storm.

About a week later his wife asked Bill when he had last suffered a migraine headache. These had plagued him from childhood and, though he had tried many medications over the years, nothing had helped. He realized there had been no headaches since Father Paul had prayed for him. In addition, all the anger was gone. They canceled the doctor’s appointment.

Bill went back to work and though nothing had changed, he wasn’t upset by his work environment anymore. No more Mr. Crabby.

He had never read the Bible. But his daughter, an Evangelical Christian, gave him one after this experience. Several months later he read about the Day of Pentecost. In great excitement Bill came running to his wife, “You have to read this! This is me!” He was thrilled by the description of the Holy Spirit as a rushing, mighty wind.

He and his wife returned to the Catholic church because, as she said of Bill’s transformation, “This is real. This is real.”

His story lasted about 30 minutes. We put our jackets on and left the field house together still talking. We hugged in the parking lot. “God is good,” he said as we parted. “Yes,” I agreed, He sure is.”

Wild Bill's story

There’s a revealing account in a book called “Return from tomorrow,” by George C. Ritchie.  The hero was nicknamed Wild Bill because of the shape of his drooping mustache.  Wild Bill accomplished unselfed love through a conscious decision to forgive his enemies.  Here are some excerpts from that story as recorded by Mr. Ritchie.

 ‘He was one of the inmates of the concentration camp, but obviously he hadn’t been there long: his posture was erect, his eyes bright, his energy indefatigable.  Since he was fluent in English, French, German and Russian, as well as Polish, he became a kind of unofficial camp translator.

‘We came to him with all sorts of problems . . . . But though Wild Bill worked fifteen and sixteen hours a day, he showed no signs of weariness.  While the rest of us were drooping with fatigue, he seemed to gain strength. . . . . his compassion for his fellow-prisoners glowed on his face, and it was to this glow that I came when my own spirits were low. . . 

‘So I was astonished to learn. . . that he had been in Wuppertal since 1939!  For six years he had lived on the same starvation diet, slept in the same airless and disease-ridden barracks as everyone else, but without the least physical or mental deterioration.

‘Perhaps even more amazing, every group in the camp looked on him as a friend.  He was the one to whom quarrels between inmates were brought for arbitration. . . 

‘It’s not easy for some of them to forgive,’ I commented to him one day. . .  ‘So many of them have lost members of their families.’

‘Wild Bill leaned back in the upright chair and sipped at his drink.  “We lived in the Jewish section of Warsaw,” he began slowly, the first words I had heard him speak about himself, “my wife, our two daughters, and our three little boys.  When the Germans reached our street they lined everyone against a wall and opened up with machine guns.  I begged to be allowed to die with my family, but because I spoke German they put me in a work group.

. . . “I had to decide right then,” he continued, “whether to let myself hate the soldiers who had done this.  It was an easy decision, really.  I was a lawyer.  In my practice I had seen too often what hate could do to people’s minds and bodies.  Hate had just killed the six people who mattered most to me in the world.  I decided then that I would spend the rest of my life – whether it was a few days or many years – loving every person I came in contact with.” ’

It's very humbling to ask, "Would I be able to make that decision to remove hate from my life -- by loving every person -- even those who had murdered my children in front of  my eyes?"  This is what Christians of all stripes profess.  Yet Wild Bill was a Jew - and understood exactly the demand Life was making on him.  To not hate.   To live, to truly live and to live truly, he would love.

Through whose eyes?

A recent comment on another blog (Christian Science Fellowship - Metro Chicago) grabbed my attention. The writer referenced the story of Simon the Pharisee.

Briefly, Simon was a sceptic of Jesus, but invited him anyway to come to dinner. In that culture anyone could come and watch the wealthy eat. But one woman came whose profession made her completely unwelcome. Her motive was to honor Jesus' unconditional love for people even like her.

The tension grew. Simon was offended by her presence and could hardly stand that Jesus allowed this lowest-of-the-low to be near him. Jesus understood the woman's motive -- to somehow become the good and pure and useful person God made her to be. He blessed her deep desire and sent her away telling her her sins were forgiven.

The comment writer left me asking this question: Am I seeing the unwelcome guests in my life through the eyes of Simon -- criticizing, condemning, putting down? Or am I seeing unwelcome guests through the eyes of Jesus -- willing to discern honest repentance, to bless and to heal?

More than sledding

Wheee!

In January my grandson and I had a great one-on-one vacation. We drove to the Wisconsin north woods to visit relatives and engage in great snow activities. We sledded, snowshoed, baked cookies in a happy extended family setting.

One day my cousin was supervising some sledding behind their house. I stood nearby, camera in hand, to catch some of this fun. I wasn’t participating in the sledding activity, became of a hurting back. I was praying, however -- from the standpoint that this pain was trying to suggest I could be separated from God’s love – a relationship I hold very dear. Or that God was too busy to care for every detail of His universe.

It wasn’t a prayer to God as a super person to stop what He was doing and look after me, so much as an affirmation that an infinitely good God who is Spirit and Truth infinitely maintains harmony. If God is wholly good and fills all space, then this pain could not be a reality in His presence. A loving God doesn’t send evil. He sends harmony.

Now at that point in my prayers, it occurred to me that I had been indulging in some pretty self-righteous criticism that morning. Right now, I have no idea what it might have been. But at the time it seemed important and troublesome.

Big deal! Who doesn’t criticize? Well, yes. Except that I had lately been making a fairly successful effort to see beyond the human scene. To discern more of God’s goodness and His good creation. So criticism now stood out by way of contrast as a backward step in a forward spiritual journey. This kind of negative thinking was no longer comfortable.

So I began undoing that criticism, replacing the “wrongs” I had been anguishing over with what was clearly right about the person or situation (while I don’t recall the specifics, I do remember the process!) appreciating the good qualities – what God knew from His vantage point to be enduring and true.

This happy mental conversation took place even with great laughter and fun punctuating the snowy scene all around. About midway down the hill, the boys were packing snow into a little jump for the sleds in hopes of gaining some “air time.”

My cousin clowning on a tube

Then my cousin said, “Sandi, why don’t you go down the hill? I’ll hold your camera!”

Moment of truth. Do I really believe that God, Spirit, is my whole substance and my only substance? That matter cannot make laws to undermine God’s harmonious control?

The feeling in my back hadn’t changed. It still hurt. But thought was moving, so I trusted God, divine Mind, as the source of that movement and settled onto the sled behind my grandson. We sped down the hill landing with a bump on the other side of the jump. And that was the last time all day that I thought about my back. In fact, it’s been uncomplaining ever since.

I just love adventures in learning more about God’s great love.