Kelly and I going to the hospital (Feb 20, 1995)

I wrote (concerning the call to missions that I received during an alter call at the Toronto 1 year anniversary celebration):

I wrote (concerning the call to missions that I received during an alter "OK, Lord," I said, "but how do I get started?"

Just then Stacy Campbell took the microphone and began to prophesy. The first words out of her mouth were,

"You ask Me how you get started."

I knew that prophesy was directed at me, so I really paid attention. The Lord went on to give instructions to go to hospitals and pray for the sick, to show kindness to neighbors across the street, to visit and help those with Aids, etc. The parts that really jumped out at me were going to the hospitals to pray for the sick and ministering to people with Aids. It's hard to explain, but the Holy Spirit put a strong witness in my spirit as I heard this prophesy. I knew it was from Him.

Well, I had my first hospital visit today (monday, Feb 20). I had been at a renewal last night and the Holy Spirit fell on me powerfully. When I woke up this morning, the Lord's presense was still there, but I did not feel "dripping full" anymore. I asked Him about it -- "how come I'm not nearly as full as I was last night?"

"I don't give My anointing just so you can feel full," The Lord replied. "I give it so it can be used for My plans/purposes."

"Ok, Lord," I said, "How do you want me to use it? What do you want me to do?"

"When you were in Toronto, I told you to go to the hospitals and pray for the people there. It's been almost a month. How come you haven't gone yet?"

I hadn't been because I was chicken to go by myself and I was waiting to team up with a group that was going from my Church next month. That excuse flashed through my mind, but how could I possibly tell it to the Lord? I already knew what His answer would be and that my excuse just would not hold water. I told Him that I did not have any excuse.

It seemed as though He told me to go "today" then. I mentioned to Him that I didn't really want to go by myself the first time and asked Him if He'd send anyone with me. He told me to call Kelly, because He had already prepared her heart. So I went to the phone and called her. (We had been drunk in the Spirit together last night and spent about an hour taking turns praying "more" for each other. We found that just looking into each others eyes, we could see the presense of the Lord and would be filled with incredible joy and burst into a new round of laughter.)

So Kelly answered her phone and I asked her if she'd like to go to the Hospital and go through one of the wards and pray for whoever wanted prayer. She didn't even bat an eye. "OK," she replied. What time do we go there?"

I guess I'd been hearing right, because God had certainly prepared Kelly's heart. So I picked her up at 1:00 and we went to Alameda Hospital. Neither of us knew exactly what to expect. Would the Lord come with miraculous power? Would He heal someone? Would we be kicked out of the hospital?

We walked down the ward and prayed about who to go to. We passed this one lady's room a few times. She was very adgitated and nervous. We went into her room and told her that we were Christians and were going around the hospital visiting and/or praying for anyone who'd like us to. We asked her if she'd like prayer. She said that she did not care one way or the other. We got into a brief discussion with her and then she decided she'd like some prayer after all. The whole time we were talking to her, her eyes were flighting around the room nervously. We started to pray and she kept her eyes open and glued on us. We asked the Lord to come with His presense and His peace and His healing anointing. As we prayed, she began to relax. She closed her eyes and occasionally nodded in agreement with what we prayed. Then she fell into a very peaceful sleep. It seemed to both Kelly and I that the peace of the Lord had descended on her. We moved to another room.

Two elderly men shared that room and were glad for the company. They were delighted that two young women would come to their room to pray for them. They were much more taken with the fact that we came than with our prayers. The nurse wanted to come in and give them some medication and they told us to keep praying. Neither were born again, but both were genuinely moved that God cared enough about them to send someone to pray for them. We ended up in a rather lenghtly discussion (maybe an hour) with one of the two men. He was telling us his story (quite a tradegy where his daughter was stabbed 4 times in the chest and the family got into a severe car accident while they were on the way to the hospital to see her.)

The man also suffers very stronly with diabetes and is supposed to have two of his fingers amputated in a few days because of the diabetes. We prayed that the Lord would restore the fingers and that amputation would not be necessary. There was a gentle heat as we prayed, but the man did not comment on whether or not he experienced the heat.

I sort of think that maybe the Lord started a healing in his fingers, but there is probably no way to verify that. Kelly was not laying hands on him, but she got a strong impression that the Lord was healing the circulation in his fingers and restoring the decayed flesh at the same time that I was feeling the heat.

The man did not accept the Lord, but did invite us to come back and visit him again. I would like to go back in a few days and see whether or not the amputation is cancelled.

We talked to two other people, but neither of them wanted prayer.

When we left the hospital, but Kelly and I had a very strong sense of the Lord's presense. We felt that He was pleased with our going, even though we didn't see anything clearly miraculous or see anyone accept the Lord.