I had been crippled for about five years and was unable to do many nurturing and motherly things. My body was producing tumors, I was hemorrhaging all the time, I had a growth in my lung, so I had difficulty breathing, and I had back problems. I was bed ridden for a long time. In fact there was a period of 3 months straight that I was in the hospital. My family and I had been prepared that I may die, however I didn’t want to die, because I wasn’t finished here yet!

One Easter evening a Jewish lady called my mother and told her that she must bring me to this little church to get prayed for by a young 19 year old Evangelist Healer. I was brought up as a strict Catholic, we were never allowed to go to another church (or the roof would cave in!) I still remember my mother on the phone, saying, “Leah, you’re Jewish, what are you doing in an Evangelistic church? Your dead relatives will roll over in their graves!”

Leah’s answer was priceless… “JEWISH, SMOOISH, VHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE…GOD IS GOD! NO MATTER, VHAT THE BUILDING IS!!! YOU GO TO GET VELL! YOU GO TO GOD!”

My husband, who proclaimed he was an atheist, said, “YOU ARE GOING!”

Needless, to say Mom, Dad, my husband and I went. We left our children with my teenage brother. When we got there the church was packed. In fact there were only four seats left!

They were singing and shouting things like praise God, thank you Lord and Amen. I thought how rude these people were, shouting out while someone was speaking! In my church you didn’t sneeze out loud because you would disturb someone deep in prayer…

Then the evangelist said “There are those of you out in the audience who think we are strange or rude… ” (He is reading my mind!) “… because you have been in churches that are quiet and still. But, God is in this place tonight, and we are here to rejoice!”

I looked around and all I could see were happy faces, even those who were crying had this wonderful glow about them. Happy and in peace!

The Evangelist started speaking from John, and then Matthew. Again as I started to wander in my own thoughts, he started to read my mind saying, “There are those of you who are here who have spent months in the hospital. You have trusted Doctors, hospitals, all kinds of tests… But, did you ever ask God? Did you ever ask Him to come into your life? Did you ever ask Him to heal you?”

I’m thinking NO I didn’t because I was brought up believing that God is the God of judgment and if you are ill, you are being punished for something you did to offend the Almighty. I wasn’t sure what did but I was a rebellious teen… Not bad, just marching to a different drummer. I was forbidden to wear makeup so I became a model, then a hairdresser, makeup artist for show people, and an exhibition ballroom dancer, and traveled all over the USA…ALL THINGS THAT WERE SINFUL IN MY PARENTS EYES. They believed you graduated high-school, got a job or went to college, got married, had children, took care of grandchildren, retired and died. Also you lived at home till you got married! I didn’t fit into their mold so I was BAD!

Back to the Evangelist… Almost word for word, what I was thinking, came out of his mouth. I just couldn’t believe it! Then he said “YOU ARE NOT HERE BY MISTAKE! GOD has invited you here tonight to change your life…FOR GOOD! AMEN.”

The Evangelist said, “Stand up if you want to know God…better than a brother, a parent or a friend.” I found myself standing up, being held up because I was in so much pain. This youthful healer continued to say he would stay till 3:00 in the morning (if need be) to pray for all of us who needed to be healed. Then he went back to preaching from the bible. I sat down.

When the time came for healing, they asked us to walk up front and take a place in one of the pews. I went, and sat the furthest away from The Evangelist as possible, not knowing that my father, my mother, and my husband, had also walked up front. In fact, my father sat next to me, and my mother next to him.

The Evangelist went to my mother first and said, “You have severe headaches. You do not tell anyone because you are afraid of having a cerebral hemorrhage… So you pop aspirins all day long, which is making your nose bleed profusely, filling up towels and sheets with blood.” He prayed for her.

My father who wore a hearing aid was listening intently. The Evangelist went to my father, and said “Sir, take out your hearing aid…you will hear what I am saying. You have arthritis of the spine, and you stand up all day” (All this was true.) Then he asked, “Do you believe in God? Do you believe in miracles? Do you believe that almighty God can heal you?” My father answered “Yes” to all these questions. Then he placed his hands over my father’s ears and prayed. My father was an old Italian (even though he wasn’t old), and most of the time he would think and say “What do you know? You are just a kid, a mere child!” But he was completely mesmerized by this 19 year old messenger from God.

As the Evangelist was leaving my father, someone shouted from the back, “Praise God!” My father, without his hearing aid, instantly answered “AMEN!”

Then this young healer came to me and said “SISTER, YOU NEED AN OVERHAUL!” Indeed I did. He told me my body was producing tumors all over, one in my breast, one in my lung, others in my female organs, and that I hemorrhaged all the time. (ALL TRUE.) He said I had trusted doctors but had not asked God to heal me because I thought I was unworthy of such a gift. (TRUE.) Then he added, “And by the way, throw out all your shoes that have a lift on one shoe.” I had worn them for years because of a bad back, and one leg was shorter than the other but I wasn’t wearing them that night. I had sneakers on!

He asked me if I believed that God was going to change my life from that moment on. I just shrugged my shoulders. He told me ALL I had to do was THANK GOD IN ADVANCE… No matter what! No matter what I felt, no matter how sick I was, no matter what circumstances I faced, just “KEEP THANKING GOD IN ADVANCE.”

When the Evangelist asked if I could do that, I said yes, I would try. Painfully I returned to my seat. People started coming over to me and told me that they could tell that God was going to change my life.

All this happened on Easter Sunday evening. Monday morning my kids got themselves off to school. My father came home early and asked how I was feeling. Gritting my teeth I said, “I’M THANKING GOD IN ADVANCE.”

The kids came home… The same thing, “I’M THANKING GOD IN ADVANCE.”

My mother came home… “I’M THANKING GOD IN ADVANCE!”

WAS I IN PAIN? “Yes! But, I’M THANKING GOD IN ADVANCE!!!”

Tuesday, the same thing… “I’M THANKING GOD IN AVANCE!!!!!”

Wednesday morning… I’m up at 5:00 am baking muffins, packing the kids’ lunches, and laying out their clothes. I served my husband breakfast in bed. No one, including me, noticed that until that very day I was totally unable to even lift a milk container for the past five years.

Everyone left for the day. It was now 8AM and I started cleaning a fifteen-room house… It really needed it! I cleaned the oven, the windows, and the refrigerator, shampooed the carpets, washed and waxed the kitchen and laundry room floors. It was now 11:30AM and I fell to my knees laughing and crying, saying, “THANK YOU LORD! THANK YOU!”

It was the first time in years, that I wasn’t in pain, and that I was able to do these things. I wanted to shout it to the world but who do you tell? No one was home.

So I called an old patient (from when I worked in a doctor’s office.) She had Polio as a child, and wore all kinds of braces on her legs, hips, and arms. I told her the story and asked her to go to church with me to get prayed for. She did…and uses only half the braces now!

© Carole Devecka, God Given Daisies CaroleDevecka@comcast.net