Perhaps I Exaggerate

Somehow or another I ended up searching Google for documented cases of what non-Christians call “faith healing.” And I couldn’t find much. Maybe I shouldn’t have Googled that phrase; almost no one who believes in God uses it.

In any case, I thought it was depressing. The main reason it depressed me is that I saw a number of sites where people claimed alleged healings had been proven false. One example cited involved a man who got on the stage with Kathryn Kuhlman, claimed he had been healed of cancer, and dropped dead a week later.

The sad truth is, televangelists are generally extremely similar to politicians. The truth isn’t in them. If you get on the stage and stand before the cameras and claim you’re healed, that’s good enough for them. They don’t want to be around a month later, because you might still be sick, and that would threaten their income. I don’t know if Kathryn Kuhlman was for real or not. Nothing would surprise me.

Nonetheless, God does heal people. It happened in the Bible, and there is no reason why it shouldn’t happen now. And it makes sense that documentation would be hard to come by. What percentage of people who receive healing would take the time to have it studied and documented? What percentage of doctors would spend their time doing the exams and writing the reports? If you have a bothersome physical problem, and you pray for healing, and you get it, is your first impulse going to be to go to the doctor and pay him a thousand dollars to prove you’re okay? And what if you can’t prove you were sick to begin with? What if you were healed before you were diagnosed? You’d look like an idiot, going to your doctor and claiming to be healed, when he had never witnessed your illness.

Another problem with healings is that sometimes they’re so trivial, it would be embarrassing to talk about them. If God miraculously heals you of a cavity, are you going to run and tell your atheist neighbors? Of course not. They’d laugh you out of the house.

I’ve had a few healings that were clearly miraculous, but they were so minor, no one would be impressed. I can give an example. I had a flat warty thing on my jaw. My dermatologist didn’t care enough about it to suggest removing it, but it annoyed me, and it was getting bigger. I did all the Christian things, praying and claiming healing and taking authority and so on. And it went away immediately. I don’t mean it instantly disappeared, but it began going away immediately, and in a few weeks it was gone. Who wants to hear about a healing like that? It’s a wart. Nobody cares. No one is going to become a Christian because of my wart.

It’s a funny thing, but little skin problems seem particularly easy to heal by faith. I’ve had more than one. Try it yourself. I realize how silly it sounds. But it’s true. It may not boost your faith to the point where you’re ready to quit your job and become a missionary, but it beats paying to have your warts burned off.

It seems like some problems are easier to heal by faith than others. Don’t ask me why.

I had another healing people will find ridiculous. Twenty years ago, I made a decision to find a church, and I very quickly got a cold. But it was no ordinary cold. It refused to go away. It stayed with me for weeks and weeks. I think it was literally the cold from hell.

My head was full of things I had heard from charismatic preachers; I figured that since I had had supernatural experiences, they were telling the truth about theirs, too. You have to marvel at the naivete of youth. One of the things I believed was that you would be healed if you persisted in prayer and faith. So I attacked this cold and refused to give in. I refused to accept it, day after day, week after week. Finally, one day in November of 1987, I went to the fridge and looked in the freezer, and while I was looking, I saw a dark shape fly from me into the freezer and then out and through the slats in the back door, which was nearby. It was just a dark place in the air. I didn’t know what to make of it. And when I walked out of the kitchen, I realized my symptoms were gone. Instantly. And they didn’t come back. Two people witnessed it. I know it sounds crazy and unimpressive, but it happened.

Sorry, it’s not documented. Benny Hinn wasn’t there. No cameras. But I sure felt better.

Over the years, I’ve had all sorts of problems that have gone away without treatment, while I used my faith to fight them. But I can’t prove the healings were miraculous. Sometimes things get better on their own. Of course, sometimes they get a hell of a lot worse, too. I haven’t really needed a doctor since…actually, it’s hard to remember. I went to a doctor for my first kidney stone, and I was very glad to get the painkillers, but when I got my second stone, I got mad at my doctor’s receptionist and decided to stay home, and I was fine. I think the last time I really needed a doctor was when I was in law school. I had two disgusting spider bites full of pus. They probably would have gone away on their own; there was no bacterial infection. But having them lanced made life a lot easier.

Obviously, you should go to a doctor if you need one. But there is no way I’d rely on medical science alone.

God exists, and He works miracles. I’ve seen things stranger than healings, and I’ve had prayer after prayer answered, and there are many other reasons why I believe. He’s there. It’s very sad that greedy preachers discourage people with bogus healings that are later paraded in front of the public by TV journalists, but that doesn’t change the facts. You can be a Christian and go blind. You can be a Christian and die of cancer. But on the whole, your life will be better if you develop and exercise faith, and sometimes, you’ll get some wonderful surprises.

My stories may not be thrilling, but on the other hand, I have absolutely nothing to gain by telling them, so maybe you’ll find them easier to believe than the stuff you see on TV.