I went hospital visiting last night, spending time with Luke Smith and George Harper. Both are great leaders at different ends of life – one in his thirties and one in his nineties. Both are visionaries working and praying in different ways for revival and wanting to get the most out of every drop of life God gives them. What a privilege to have people like that in church! Both are having a rough patch with their health, so it was good to sit round the bed with each of them – listening, talking and praying in the name of Jesus.
When I arrived home our Belfrey Group was well under way, meeting not around a bed but around our kitchen table. They were putting sweets, ribbons, cocktail sticks, foil and a candle into bags ready for the church’s annual Christingle service on Sunday. Kids love Christingle and it provides a good opener to Advent, as we begin to prepare for Christmas. Anyway, as people worked they were chatting and catching up, sharing news and things for prayer. It was brilliant. Practical. Personal. Prayerful. At the end we prayed for Neil Cole who’d arrived with an inflamed right ear which was temporarily deaf. So we got him to lay his hand on his ear, and we spoke to the ear and told it to hear, and told the infection and the pain to go and the deafness to disappear all in the name of Jesus. As we did so, Neil begin to laugh as he sensed things starting to happen inside his head. First he said he felt a gurgling sound, and then he could hear, and then the pain began to go. So we prayed some more, and by the time he left he was so excited as his ear was almost better. I received a text this morning that read: ‘Slept well, no pain. Improving. Thank you so much for prayers. Still grinning. :)’
It’s amazing what can happen sitting round a bed or a table in the name of Jesus.
Discipleship Blog 
Thank you for this testimony Matthew. I need to hear testimony regularly because it increases my faith, strengthens my inner being, focuses my prayers, refreshes me and inspires me to seek the kingdom in everything I do.
Testimonies are spoken or written words, records of what God has done throughout history. They reveal how an encounter with the Lord has transformed lives. A testimony invites us to experience the Power of Jesus, His healing touch in this case.
It reveals to us the Heart of the Father. He wants to make us whole, Jesus came to give us abundant life. Speaking out God’s word, praying it, meditating on it and believing it releases Jesus’ healing power – the medicine we need for our spirit, soul and body. When we speak His Word over our lives, it releases that power into our lives.
Psalm 147:3 ” He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds (curing their pains and sorrows)”
Proverbs 4:20-22 “Attend to my words…..For they are life to those who find them, healing and health to all their flesh”
By having a constant awareness of God and these testimonies, that speak of His nature, we increase our vision and effectiveness in our Ministry. We see more clearly how our God given gifts and His strength released through the Holy Spirit can empower us to change eternity. Jesus did everything in in His earthly ministry as a man who had set aside all his divine priviliges and power in order to model the Christian life for us. He always did the Father’s will and spoke with the presence and power of the Holy Spirit transforming the world around Him.
As I was writing this reply i just recieved a phone call from a brother who felt God had just said to him “Call Paul” he gave me such a message of encouragement. I really needed that this morning. It is amazing how God always shows up in mighty power when we as His children cry out to Him .
Allelujah!!!