Contents
- Introduction
- Cracked spine
- Spine healed
- Satan tries to steal my healing
- Doctor’s pills and feet trouble like torment
- Desperation prayer
- Feet healed
- Stutterer healed
- The man in the wheelchair
- The man walks
- No money
- Satanic attacks
- Harry’s eye healed
- Growth disappears
- Bell’s Palsy
- Lady has a baby
- My wife has a baby
- Jesus healed all who came to him
- “Your faith” can get you healed
- Sin no more
1. Introduction
There have been some rich and famous people who have died from sicknesses. All their money and fame couldn’t buy the best doctors in the world to heal them. That is the problem. Doctors and medicine cannot heal people. They can help relieve the pain, and slow down the sickness, but they cannot heal anyone. There is only one healer, and that is the God of the Bible. God said: “I am the LORD that healeth thee.” (Exodus 15, 25)
When Jesus was on earth, he demonstrated what the Father is like, by healing every single person that came to him. We can see from the ministry of Jesus, that it is God’s will for every person to be healed. Peter said that Jesus went around healing all who were oppressed of the devil. (Acts 10, 38)
So there is only one way to get healed, and that is to ask the Father in the name of Jesus to heal you. You need to ask the Father what is the problem, why you are not getting healed, then do whatever He tells you to do. How do you hear His voice? You will feel it in your spirit. Some people hear the audible voice of God, but most people don’t. You might say to yourself: “if only you could see Jesus, then you would be healed,” but Jesus said: “Blessed are they that have not seen, and yet believe.” (John 20, 29) So we can be blessed by our faith in believing, without actually seeing Jesus. I will go into details about that later in the story.
First I would like to share with you some of my own experiences, and hopefully you can get some ideas and guidance from the healings that I have received. May God bless you and heal you in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ as you go through this book. Remember – He loves you. In the book of Job, Satan killed all of Job’s children, and inflicted him with terrible diseases, but God loved Job, and healed him. Satan is the destroyer, but God the healer.
- Cracked spine
When I was 20 years old, I was a passenger in a sports car, and the driver rolled the car. I got thrown out, and when the doctor had x-rays done in the hospital, he said I had a cracked spine. I asked him he could fix it, but he said he couldn’t. After a few months in hospitals, and ‘light’ duties, the pain went away, and all seemed well. Six years later the pain came back. It was very bad. I thought I would have to spend the rest of my life in a wheelchair. To get out of bed was quite an ordeal. I would throw off the sheet and blankets, and roll onto my stomach. Then I got my left leg off the bed, then my right one. From a kneeling position, I could slowly lift up my back until it was in an upright position, and then I would stand up and go to the toilet!
3. Spine healed
After about two weeks of terrible pain, I went to a religious meeting in a park, arranged by a businessmen’s group. They had a preacher from Australia. He asked us: “How many of you believe you are saved?” I raised my hand, because I believed I was saved. I believed that Jesus died on the cross for my sins, and I had asked him to be my Saviour when I was young. Then he said something that shocked me. He said: “It is the same faith that heals you!” That was different to what I believed. I thought that you just needed a tiny bit of faith to get saved, but to get healed; you needed faith the size of a mountain! I didn’t have faith the size of a mountain, so it was out of reach for me!
Then he quoted a verse from the Bible. “He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities, the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes we are healed.” (Isaiah 53, 5) In other words, Jesus died for all our sins, and was whipped for our healing. So he said that if we believe that we are saved, then we have enough faith to be healed. It was all in the same verse, and in the same atonement. It is paid for in full! He said that Peter spoke of it as being in the past tense. “Jesus carried our sins in his own body on the cross, so that we could stop sinning, and live righteously; and by his stripes we were healed.” (1 Peter 2, 24 – my own translation!)
It is all past tense. Jesus has already paid for all our sins and all our sicknesses. Then he challenged us. He told us that if we believed it, we were to raise our hands and say: “With the stripes of Jesus I am healed!” He put the healing within my reach. So I raised my hands and said: “With the stripes of Jesus I am healed!” Instantly, all the pain left my spine! That was one of the most wonderful days of my life.
During the day, I was asked to sing. I had just made a long playing record, and most of the back-up band was there, so they backed me on a few songs. Later, I wrote a song about healing, and it is getting more views than any of my other songs on the YouTube. It is called: “There is healing (in the name of Jesus) by Don Foster.”
- Satan tries to steal my healing
The next morning I got out of bed like normal. No more struggling. I took it for granted. That afternoon as I was driving my car, the pain came back. My mind went back to a story I heard from Mrs. L. She had told us how she had warts on her hands when she was young. She tried everything to get rid of the warts, but nothing worked. One day, when she was a married woman, she looked at those warts, and said words something like this: “Satan, my body belongs to the Lord Jesus, and these warts don’t belong here!” About three days later, she was vacuuming the carpet, and when she looked down, she saw all the warts were gone! She went running to her husband, dancing around him shouting: “They’re gone! They’re gone! They’re gone!” He thought she had ‘gone round the bend’ until she was able to calm down and tell him what had happened.
As I meditated on her story, I said: “Get thee behind me Satan; with the stripes of Jesus I am healed!” Then, immediately, all the pain left my spine. What a relief. In theological terms, it is called spiritual warfare. Every day the devil tried to steal my healing. When I said the above words, the pain left immediately. The pain came back every day for about three months, then once a week for a few months, then once a year. By the grace of God I am still healed – 42 years later. Sometimes when I share my story with people, they mock me and scorn me, but I can still remember how terrible that pain was, and how wonderful it was to get healed. There will always be mockers and scorners, but when you get healed, nobody can take away the reality of it from you. So forget the mockers. When they have trouble, they will know all about it. Glory to God! God must always get all the glory. He will not share His glory with another. “I am the LORD; that is my name, and my glory I will not give to another.” (Isaiah 42, 8)
- Doctor’s pills and feet trouble like torment
Later that year I had another problem. I was singing in a city, and I felt very sick. A lady suggested I go and see her doctor. He gave me some pills. When I took them, my skin turned a purple-reddish colour. So I stopped taking them and went to see the doctor again. He told me to stop taking the pills, and didn’t charge me for the second visit. After that I had terrible sores come out on my feet. Like scabs and oozing. I sat in the sun, hoping that the sun would dry up the problem, but the problem didn’t go away. As time went by, the problem got worse. My feet were so itchy. Every night I would scratch my feet before going to bed. After a few months I scratched my feet, and the blood came through. After that I would scratch on top of my socks. In public, I would have my feet under the table scratching with the heel of the one shoe on the top of the other. It was like torment, day and night. I kept saying: “With the stripes of Jesus I am healed,” but it didn’t work to heal my feet.
- Desperation prayer
After about six months, it started spreading up my legs. I imagined my whole body being covered with the scabs and oozing and itchiness. I was very scared. One day a preacher asked me: “Why don’t you pray for the sick in your services?” That was something I never wanted to do. When I was a teenager, I saw an evangelist advertize healing, but I never saw anyone get healed. So, I had made up my mind that I would never do that. I didn’t want to make a fool of myself, and I didn’t want to make a fool of God. One night I lay in the bathtub before going to sing in a church service, and I got to thinking about what that preacher had said. I was desperate. So I said a desperation prayer. I said: “God, if you heal my feet, I will pray for the sick in every service.”
- Feet healed
That night after I had sung and played the guitar, I just felt like doing it. I invited the sick people to come to the front for prayer. Three people came out, a man and two women. Each one had back trouble. I thought: “That is easy, if God has healed my back, He can heal theirs!” The next morning the man phoned to say he was healed! He had fallen down a mine shaft and broken his back. The two women also said they were healed.
Then a few days later, it dawned on me that my feet weren’t itchy anymore. After about ten days my skin was healed, except for one spot where it had started. A scab stayed there for about three months, then it went away, but it wasn’t itchy. Praise God, I am still healed. For many years I prayed for people and many people got healed. There are so many stories.
- Stutterer healed
One day we came to the car to drive four hundred miles to have some church services, and the car windshield was smashed. I mention this to show how Satan works to try and stop the work of God. On the Friday night service I prayed for a boy who stuttered. After prayer, he spoke without stuttering. On the Sunday morning service, his dad came to the church and told us how his boy had stuttered since he was a baby, and struggled at school. He told how on Friday night his son came home speaking clearly. On Saturday morning he made him read a chapter from the Bible, and he didn’t stutter. He did the same Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning. So he came to church to say thank you. All glory to God. When you work for God, the devil becomes your enemy. In science class at school we were taught that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. This is also true in the spirit world.
- The man in the wheel chair
One Sunday afternoon, I was reading a book about the Holy Spirit, and as I finished reading the last chapter, I felt I must give a copy of the book to a man down the street. First, I went to the washroom, and then I told my wife. As I told my wife, urgency came over me, like the Holy Spirit was saying: “Right now, hurry up and go!” I grabbed a copy of the book and my jacket and ran down the street. As I ran, I was putting on my jacket. In the Bible it says how the Holy Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness. I think that was what I was experiencing.
As I ran down the street, I saw a man in a wheelchair. He had a short sleeve shirt on, and looked very skinny. He was flagging me down. I didn’t want to stop, I was on a mission to deliver this book, but he looked so pitiful, that I couldn’t ignore him. A story from the Bible flashed through my mind about the prophet who disobeyed the LORD, and ended up getting killed by a lion. (1 Kings Chapter 13) However, I stopped briefly to see what he wanted. He said he wanted me to push him to the Salvation Army Men’s Home. I explained that I had to deliver this book, but if he was still there when I got back, I would push him.
When I got to E… house, there was no reply when I knocked. I left the book by the door, and ran back to the man in the wheelchair. As I crossed the street, an old chorus became real to me: “It’s bubbling, it’s bubbling, it’s bubbling in my soul.” When I got to the man and started pushing him, I immediately asked him if he believed in Jesus as his Saviour. He said he did, and he said he believed he was not going to die of Multiple Sclerosis. I hadn’t a clue what he was talking about, because I had never heard of that disease before.
- The man walks
As I pushed him in the wheelchair, I told him how my cracked spine got healed, and how my diseased feet got healed, then I offered to pray for him. He agreed, so I laid my hands on his shoulders, and asked the Father to heal him in Jesus’ name. Then I shot a quick silent prayer up to God asking what I must do next. What popped into my mind was how Billy Graham said that Jesus told the man with the withered hand to stretch out his hand. That is why he asked the people in his meetings to come to the front of the stadium to receive Jesus as their Saviour. He believed we must do something in response to our faith.
So I told the man to test himself. Then he stuck out both his feet and said: “I think I am healed!” Then he got out of his wheelchair and took it from me, and pushed it down the sidewalk. He was shaking, so I automatically reached out towards the wheelchair. Then he shouted at me: “Don’t highjack me!” So I backed off. He was determined to do it himself. As we walked I told him how Peter walked on the water as he kept his eyes on Jesus. I told him to keep his eyes on Jesus.
- No money
When we stopped opposite the Salvation Army Men’s Home, he said: “Can I ask you a favour?” I said: “Sure.” He replied: “Will you buy me a cup of coffee?” Up the street was a donut shop, but I had no money. For months I had cried on my pillow for God to send me money. The church was giving us twenty five dollars a week, and after paying life insurance and car insurance, there were times we didn’t even have food to eat. I didn’t tell him my troubles, but just replied that I didn’t have any money on me, which was the truth.
Then he just started crossing the street. I ran and stopped the traffic – I didn’t want him to get run over now that he was healed. He upped the wheelchair by the curb, then at the door there was a big step, and he asked me for help. I was encouraged by what he had done at the curb, and told him to give it a try, and if he couldn’t do it, I would help. He did it himself, and said something in a foreign language, and he was gone inside the building.
As I walked back up the sidewalk where he had pushed his wheelchair, it suddenly became so real to me how Peter had ministered to the man at the Gate Beautiful in Acts chapter three: “Silver and gold have I none, but such as I have, give I unto thee, in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.” Wow. Peter was also poor. He didn’t have any money either! He was leader of the world church, and didn’t have any money! I got so blessed as I thought about that. I felt like I had just stepped out of the pages of the Bible. It felt like I was walking on air as I retraced the man’s steps! For months I had cried to God for money, and now God had done something that money couldn’t buy! Hallelujah! All glory to God. We serve a good God!
- Satanic attacks
I mentioned earlier about satanic attacks in connection with the boy that got healed of stuttering. After my experience with the leading of the Holy Spirit and the guy in the wheelchair, Satan came against me big time. The people of the church came against me and called in the head office and the district. They wanted to kick me out of the church in the middle of winter, when it was -10 C in the day and -20 C at night. We had nowhere to go. Our car was broken and we had no money. When we were in England my wife had a vision that the leader of the church was going to come against us. I didn’t want to believe her, but when we landed at the airport, the leader of the church came to get us. At a distance my wife said: “That’s the man I saw in my vision!” I still did not want to believe her, but her vision came true!
It felt like my “crucifixion” experience. The religious leader of the Jews was the one who condemned Jesus. The leader of the church told me my Bible was “no good.” It is just like my science teacher taught me – for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Everywhere Jesus went, the religious leaders followed him, trying to catch him in his words and plotting to kill him. Jesus said: “Blessed are ye when men shall revile you and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you falsely for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven, for so persecuted they the prophets which were before you.” Matthew 5, 11-12. I am putting that in as a warning to you, so when things go wrong, you might feel that it is God working against you, but it is actually the devil that is attacking you, using people, even very religious people. The devil even used Peter against Jesus, and Jesus told him: “Get thee behind me Satan.” (Matthew 16, 23)
- Harry’s eye healed
On one of our visits to my parents, they told us how Harry’s eye was completely black. Harry was my sister’s cat. They said that over a period of about six months, the pupil of the eye had grown bigger and bigger until it covered the whole eye. We took the cat to the vet, and he shone a light in the bad eye, and said the cat was blind in that eye. My wife asked him if there was anything he could do for the cat. He scorned my wife saying there was nothing that could be done for the blind eye. When we pulled into the driveway at my parent’s home, my wife suggested we pray for Harry’s eye. She mentioned the tapes we had heard by Kenneth Hagin, where he quoted Jesus as saying that where two agree on earth concerning anything, it shall be done by our Father who is in heaven. (Matthew 18, 19) Well, I didn’t have enough faith for that so I told her to pray. She told me to hold hands and just agree with her.
The next day we left, and about two weeks later my mother wrote to say that Harry’s eye was healed. She took Harry to the vet and he said there was nothing wrong with the eye. So she asked him to write a note saying that God had healed the cat’s eye, but he refused! He has to answer on the Day of Judgment. Three of the cities where Jesus did mighty miracles, he condemned, because they did not repent. He said that if those miracles were done in Sodom and Gomorrah, they would have repented in sackcloth and ashes! (Matthew 11, 20 -24)
- Growth disappears
Many years ago my wife had a growth on her wrist. When she went to the doctor who told her that it was a Ganglion Cyst and she would have to go the hospital overnight for an operation. He said that if they made a mistake, she would lose the use of her hand and suggested to her to smack the ganglion against the wall. At first she thought he was kidding, but he was very serious. Since he thought that it was a fairly dangerous operation she decided against the operation. After the pain became almost unbearable she hit her hand against a wall and then shrieked out in pain. I got very angry with the devil, and rebuked Satan in the name of Jesus. About three days later she showed me that the growth had gone, and it has never come back. That was about 28 years ago when Ganglion Cyst removal was not so easy. Thank you LORD! Jesus said that all things are possible to him that believeth. (Mark 9, 23)
- Bell’s palsy
Many years ago my wife had Bell’s palsy, where the one side of her face was paralyzed. It was so bad. I felt hopeless and helpless. She had to wear an eye cap and I saw her closing her eyelid with her finger as there was no moisture in the eye. I didn’t know what to do. My faith felt so weak even though we had seen so many fantastic healings. This problem seemed too big for me.
Then she started listening to Derek Prince tapes and learnt about applying the Blood of Jesus. The Holy Spirit told her to have communion three times a day, and tell the devil, out loud, what the Blood of Jesus bought for her while Jesus hung on the cross. She started having communion three times a day, telling the devil what the Blood of Jesus had done for her. After a week she was healed! When she went back to the doctor, he was shocked. He said he had patients who have this problem all their lives, and he could do nothing to help them. Thank you Jesus for shedding your blood on the cross of Calvary that paid for our salvation and for our healing. Thank You too for Derek Prince.
- Lady has a baby
When we travelled in evangelism we used to stay in the homes of various congregation members. In one city the lady of the house asked for prayer. She kneeled down by the armchair, and we laid our hands on her and asked her what her request was to which she simply replied “Unspoken request.” As we were praying my wife petitioned God to heal her womb, and felt something move under her hand. The Holy Spirit said, “Within a year you will have a son.” When we were done and were all standing her eyes were big and tears were welling up in them. She asked my wife why she prayed for her womb. My wife told her that that was what the Holy Spirit instructed her to pray. God knows what you need before you ask him, and when you serve him he will give you the desires of your heart. For fifteen years she and her husband had prayed to have a child. God heard and he answered. The next time we went to that city for meetings, she had given birth to a beautiful baby boy.
- My wife has a baby
My wife had many miscarriages, and it seems like she would never have any children. Once when we were at a meeting, Sister Gwen Shaw prophesied over her that in a year’s time she would have a son. The following year she was pregnant. Then the devil tried to kill our unborn son. We were working at an apartment building, and one morning at about 5am, my wife went to the kitchen to get a drink of water. She walked right past the front door, and as she got into bed there was a big bang at the front door, and the fire alarms went off. Someone had set off a massive fire cracker right at our front door. A few seconds earlier, she was right by the front door, and with the fright, she probably would have lost the baby. Jesus said the devil comes to “steal, and kill and to destroy,” and he uses people to do his dirty work for him. By the grace of God, our son was born healthy and well. About a year and nine months later, we were going on vacation, and someone slashed all our car tyres. The day we left, there was a note at the front door saying that if we came back they would kill our son. So we didn’t go back. Our son is still alive. Thank you Jesus.
- Jesus healed all who came to him
Jesus healed everyone who came to him for healing. He never turned anyone away. He never told anyone that they were not good enough or not worthy. I think it is good practice to repent of our sins when we come for healing, to make sure there is no hindrance in the way to our healing. There was never any sickness or disease that Jesus couldn’t heal. So there is hope for everyone and whatever your problem or sickness might be, Jesus is able to heal.
In some cases there were demons involved, and Jesus cast out the demons to get the deaf and dumb healed. (Mark 9, 25) Jesus even raised the dead. There was nothing that was impossible for him. Jesus said that all things are possible to him that believeth. (Mark 9, 23) Peter said that Jesus went around healing all who were oppressed of the devil. (Acts 10, 38) Jesus said: “Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto my Father.” (John 14, 12)
- “Your faith” can get you healed
This is what Jesus taught. Many times it was Jesus’ faith that got the job done, like the raising of Lazarus from the dead, and the stilling the storm. However, there were also many times when Jesus told the people that it was their faith that got them healed. I am going to give you some examples.
Two blind men came to Jesus for healing, and he said to them: “according to your faith, be it unto you.” (Matthew 9, 29) They were both healed. So their faith in Jesus got them healed.
Jesus told the woman with the issue of blood: “Thy faith hath made thee whole.” (Matthew 9, 22) So her faith in touching his clothes got her healed.
Jesus told blind Bartimaeus: “Thy faith hath made thee whole.” (Mark 10, 52) So his calling out to Jesus resulted in getting him healed.
Jesus told the Samaritan leper: “Thy faith hath made thee whole.” (Luke 17, 19) So his obedience to Christ’s words got him healed, then he went back to say thanks.
Jesus told the centurion: “as thou hast believed, so be it done unto thee.” (Matthew 8, 13) His faith in Jesus got his servant healed.
So it is simply by believing in Jesus that we can be healed. If we do not get healed, let us ask the Lord to show us what we must do to get healed. When He shows us by His Spirit, then we must do whatever He shows us.
- Sin no more
I think God expects us to smarten up and quit sinning after we have been healed. Jesus healed a man who had a physical problem for thirty eight years. He told him to take up his bed and walk. Later, he found him in the temple and said to him: “sin no more lest a worse thing come unto thee.” (John 5, 14)
We had some meetings once with a minister that had a tremendous healing ministry, and he called out a young man with a leg iron on one of his legs, with a built up shoe. He got him to sit on a chair on the stage of the city hall, and got him to take off the irons and the shoe. The one leg was a few inches shorter than the other. He prayed for him, and nothing happened. Then he said to the young man: “If the Lord heals you will you serve Him?” The young man hesitated. The minister repeated the same question and he said: “Yes.” When he said “yes” his leg lengthened to the same length as the other leg. We never saw him again at the meetings, but I heard a report that a few weeks later his leg shrunk and he had to put on the leg irons again. I was so sad to hear that. God is not a new toy to be played with. He means business.
Now unto Him who is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy, To the only wise God our Saviour, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, both now and ever. Amen.” (Jude verses 24-25)
I also have a gospel website, if you would like to check it out: Country Gospel and Bible.
