The Bear

Golden brown. Short curly hair and a sweater embroidered with a pink ribbon. The ribbon, the symbol in the fight against cancer, specifically breast cancer. This was the bear I pulled from the box my father sent me. A bear on a mission.

On April 19th the Trinity United Methodist Church in Gansevoort, passed the little bear around the congregation. From my mother’s collection atop her bookshelf, my father had taken the bear and asked the members to pray for Gail Barley, the wife of Bill, pastor of Living Stones Church in Kona. They filled the bear with prayers. Gail battles cancer and is being treated in Honolulu. This is the second bout.

Since the inception of the monthly Prayer and Healing services, Living Stones has experienced the power of faith in the Lord. People with aches and pains have been healed. Those who were deaf can now hear. Those who were lame can now walk.

On Sunday Tammy testified that she prayed with a woman she met in the parking lot near her workplace. The woman’s young niece had a tumor and was scheduled for evaluation and surgery the next day. It looked grim and the woman struggled to check her emotion. The Lord told Tammy that she needed to pray for the woman’s niece, not later than evening when she gathered the day in reflection, but now. Awkwardly, she asked the woman if she minded that they prayed. Honestly, what do you say, unless you are a total bonehead?

With the woman’s permission Tammy laid her hands on her and began to pray. Right in the parking lot, in the broad sunshine of Hawaii! Long story short, the woman looked for Tammy the next day. During the evaluation the tumor could not be found, surgery was cancelled and the girl went home. When did all this take place? The moment they prayed.

Richard a member in my community group has also experienced the healing powers of our Lord in many ways. Not long ago his hair hung down to his shoulder blades. Addicted to pain killers, he lived an injured life as an alcoholic and a smoker. Screws like Frankenstein's protruded from his neck. It was fused together after a piece of furniture fell on his head. In March, he asked the Lord for healing and through His Power the miracles happened. Now, this man sits next to me at our meetings. He turns his head to me when he speaks. No pain. I see a buzz cut and a clean shaven believer, who basks in the glow of the Lord instead of the glint of a empty bottle. No one can explain where the screws went. They just are not there any more.

Be transformed!

I have experienced miracles in my life. Shamefully, I rarely acknowledge my father as one. It is easier to chalk it up to modern day medicine than the intervention of God. But then I recall the evening I got the news that the cancer had not spread to his bones. I put that in the miracle column. But could He not have easily erased the cancer there, like hitting the backspace key on a keyboard and wiping out a whole sentence? Then there is the miracle of my brother’s eyes and the miracle of my broken heart. So I have no reason to believe otherwise.

I gave the bear to Bill last Saturday and like all other members of Living Stones continue to pray for Gail.

We don’t know the Lord’s will. We wait upon the Lord.

These testimonies are shared on the Living Stones website. Click on the names in the text.