Passerby,
I’m sure you remember the first time we met at your workplace and how you mysteriously fell onto your back in the middle of the street. If you would like, I could speak more about that.

This peculiar blessing of Her Holiness is not uncommon but is unnerving, isn’t it? One minute, you are going about your business, and the next, you are waking from unconsciousness on the floor—or, in your case, on the asphalt.

For a couple of years, everyone I prayed for experienced what you did. The response was so regular that I learned to ask others to stand by to break their fall so no one hit their head. That period began with this event.

• • •

In our late forties, Claire and I regularly attended a traditional Episcopal church of thirty-somethings with young children. It was in an all-white, upper-middle-class neighborhood of college graduate professionals. We arrived at church—meeting in a grade school— early one fine Spring morning to pray with and support the young pastor, Gregg, as was our custom. This morning, he was a little frustrated and reported that he did not have a sermon he was pleased with and wanted to seek direction from the Spirit. As we waited in Her presence, She said, “Offer to heal the people.” We divied up the anointing oil I normally carried and discussed how to do as She asked.

Gregg described the change to the congregation, and at the place in the Episcopal liturgy where the homily is normally given, he invited the people to come up and receive healing. I stood to his left, and he to the right of the center aisle.

The people came forward and formed two lines. As the first approached my outstretched hand—I never touched her—the Holy Spirit overcame her, and she fell backward to the floor. She lay on her back, arms stretched straight up to heaven, praying aloud in a language other than English.

Please remember, Passerby, this was a small traditional Episcopal church that had no tradition of such things. I indicated to the ushers that I was in need of help. They came, and I explained to them that they would need to be of assistance to those who fell down so that they did not hurt their head when they fell. They became our first ‘catchers’.

Because of the number of people lying in the aisle, it became impractical for me to stay where I was, so I began stepping over bodies to reach those who wanted healing. In that way, I worked my way to the back of the sanctuary. Half of the congregation was on the floor when there were no more in need of prayer.

The phone calls fielded by the church office on Monday were overwhelmingly negative. The rank-and-file were angry. Somehow, they held the poor young pastor responsible for what they had no explanation for. Well…neither did we.

• • •

Heal Somebody

“Your healing is in the hands of those for whom you have received Healing”

—Spoken by the Holy Spirit to Helder

In other words, there is healing reserved for us in the amount we are willing to heal others. Do we genuinely want to be the fully human beings She created us to be? Then, finally laying our egos and our “holy wants, needs, and desires” (Eugene Peterson) aside, we must sacrificially lay down our lives at the feet of our broken, hurt world (as Jesus did) and heal somebody.

There is a whole world on our doorstep still waiting for the healing that God has put in your hands for their sake, and until then, we will not be fully healed.

Jus’ sayin.