I love when God orders the events of our lives and then makes it clear that it was all Him.

After church today, I received a text message from a man I have never met (I’ll call him Vern).  He read the story of Mavic’s healing on this website and contacted me. 

Vern (via text):

Hi Chris.  My name is Vern.  (After referencing this website)…I am having problems in my life.  I was wondering if I could possibly talk or meet with you.  If anything, please feel free to text or give me a call back.  Thank you for taking the time to read this.  God Bless.

I called Vern and we talked for almost an hour about his situation.  He shared the troubling circumstances of his life.  I gave counsel and then prayed with him over the phone.  At the end of the conversation, I offered to meet with him in person if he would like.  He asked if I was going to an evening service at church tonight and I said “No, but my church has a small group meeting of about a half a dozen that I will be attending” and I invited him to attend.  He took me up on the offer.

At the small group meeting, there were seven of us (counting Vern).  We have an agenda for these meetings, but everything seemed to pale compared to the pressing needs of this young man.  He informed us that his situation was severe.  The enemy was putting destructive thoughts into his head.  We all felt compassion for him and took turns offering Godly counsel.

During the conversation, Vern acknowledged that while he believes in God, he has never surrendered his life to God.  Expressing an interest in doing so, we talked about what it means to live for God.  Vern wanted to claim Jesus for his own life and turn his life over to his creator.  That’s exactly what he did.

After praying with him, Mark (one of our regulars) asked an important question.

Mark:

Did you feel anything during the prayer?

 Vern:

Yes I did.  I felt my heart melt.  It felt like there were chains on my heart that broke off.  Also, pressure in the back of my head moved to the front and my breathing went from short breaths to long, relaxing breaths.

I’m not sure what that reaction fully means, but at a minimum it shows me that he took the prayer seriously enough that he let God in; God was doing something.

God’s timing is amazing.  Tonight was our first meeting since changing the small group day to Sunday evening.  Vern needed the love, support, and guidance of our small group.  God had everything work out perfectly.

By the way, Vern is the THIRD STRANGER to make a profession for Jesus Christ connected to Mavic’s healing (the other two are documented on that post).  This is the Biblical model!  In fact, if you go through the 1st 5 to 7 chapters of the gospel of John, every time someone put their faith in Jesus, it was always associated with a supernatural event (the vast majority being prophecy). 

The miraculous is designed to bring credibility to the words.  Preaching with a demonstration is much more effective than preaching without a demonstration.  Jesus tended to demonstrate. 

This is so exciting!