So, as I lay there in bed watching television and growing more delirious from the pain, I started to channel surf and came across a popular Christian talk show. To my surprise, the topic of the show was healing. It immediately grabbed my attention and sent me spiraling downward to the point of “grabbing at spiritual straws.” The combination of pain and unanswered prayers simply pushed me too far, and my faith began to slide to an all-time low, as I succumbed to the invitation of that television preacher.

I don’t know how many times I promised myself that I wouldn’t resort to the hype, but the severity of the pain, and God’s silence,  found me stretching my hands towards the television preacher. I’d resolved never again to be duped by one of these guys, [  2  ]   but the pain had made me delirious. Before I could stop myself, my hands just “flipped” towards his outreached hands, and I was hoodwinked once again. Now, you can’t blame me. I was painfully desperate. If you’d been me laying in that bed and hurting as badly as I was, I’m quite sure you would have done the same thing. My suffering had once again pushed me over the edge of spiritual rationality and sent me plummeting downward into that never ending abyss of spiritual hallucinations, as I seriously hoped and believed for my television miracle.

Whatever the underlying principles behind my spiritually maligned decision, at that moment I actually started to believe that maybe this guy [ 2 again ]                was in tune with me, as he seemed to be speaking directly to my specific physical needs. His ability to preach with such conviction and personal persuasion had lifted my downcast faith, hyped my mental awareness, and swelled my hope. A series of supernatural visions in my mind caused me to fly strictly on spiritual adrenaline. After all, he was speaking directly to me, wasn’t he? I mean, whom else could he be talking to at the time? I was the only one in the room, and when you think about the technical wonder of the television signal, and the ability of that signal to project a person’s image “live” from the studio in southern California, directly to the television set hanging off the bedroom wall, why wouldn’t a person in my desperate state of mind believe that he was speaking to me?

That’s when my faith exploded. He mentioned that the Lord had shown him a gentleman lying in his bed suffering from pain to the lower extremities, probably the feet. His prophetic vision was of me. There was no doubt in my pain racked mind that he had some how been spiritually connected with me. How many other “gentlemen” could be lying in bed with pain to the lower extremities, especially the feet? This was no mere coincidence—it was divine intervention—and I was going to collect my miracle. So, with my faith soaring high enough that it felt like the wind was actually brushing across my face and through my hair, my faith reached out to his. Driven by desperation, I had simply become a victim of my own circumstances. I was truly overcome by that sudden wave of spiritually-induced hysteria and the need to be healed. In other words, it sounded good to me at the time, so I tried it again.

I was so quickly overcome by the hype of the moment that I was surprised myself and succumbed to the invitation to reach out my hands. At first, it was an involuntary muscle reaction, but suddenly the image of the preacher on my 20-inch color television screen looked so realistic that I felt as if maybe I could actually touch him. I couldn’t believe my ears. Was it possible that God was finally going to use the medium of Christian television and this well-known faith healer to reach out, touch me, and remove this painful thorn? I had heard testimony from others who were healed this way, so why couldn’t it be my turn? It seemed so right, and his message seemed to be personally directed at the part of my body that was in excruciating pain. This didn’t hurt my faith,  which was soaring to an all-time high. It was as if this smooth-talking television preacher in his three-piece suit and tie had been sent from God to answer my earlier supplications, spiritual insistence, and demands for healing. Could it be that God had finally decided to take pity on me? Or was He just so tired of my pathetic faith that He was going to manifest my long overdue healing to shut me up? Whatever the rationale behind this miraculous moment, at least I seemed to be standing on the threshold of healing. As critical seconds passed by, it looked as though the floodgates of Heaven were about to open and pour out their blessings of healing power.

buy.com   

barnesandnoble.com     

berean.com  

amazon.com

Be sure to enter the name of the book and author in their SEARCH box to find the book...Thanks!