How great Thou art!

After our healing conference in Vaalbeek last March we received the following mail from Dora:

“It was my desire to once participate in a Fatherheart School or a conference of Gods Ambassade. I had great doubts as to whether this would ever become reality:

• Would I dare to go? Unknown places and people frighten me, so most of the time I dare not go anyhow.
• Would I be able to take leave from work?
• Would they agree at home?

God knows our desires. Often even before we give it any thought our hopes are realized and He has a leading hand in so many things we cannot see.
As one night I took the bus at the train station in Leuven to go home. Bus nr 2 is the busiest bus route of Leuven. The busses are small and crowded and it is often a struggle to get on, let alone find an empty seat. That night I suddenly saw Annie was on the bus and there was even an empty seat next to her. Soon we were talking about the healing conference in March. She hadn’t discussed it at home yet and so had not decided whether or not she would go. She suggested –if she ‘d go- to go together.

I didn’t see Annie anymore after that. Boldness is a regular topic in our church this year and there was also a nice testimony to dare “getting out of your comfort zone”. God showed me that if I would like to attend the conference I needed to take some responsibility for it:

• e.g. dare to send an e-mail to Annie to ask if she would be going. The very next day I received an enthusiastic confirmation and we could share rooms if I wanted to, notwithstanding she was suffering with a severe hernia (see her testimony on this website) she was determined to go and get healed. We could pray for it together.
• adjust my work schedule and request leave at work. It worked!
• explain at home I needed to get away a little while from the hustle and bustle of everyday life and purposefully seek silence. It helped that Vaalbeek was a familiar place, the children used to go to music camp there. I was able to explain I wanted to thank God for the healing in the past five years. This month five years ago I had surgery for breast cancer and Jesus reached out to conquer an impossible mountain (of chemo, radiation and hormone therapy) while I was going through serious doubt and a major depression.

Just being there at the conference was a great victory for me! But there was more! It was good we started with Psalm 103, right away that first evening God asked me –since I came to thank Him- why I was, during worship, again focusing on all my problems.

That morning I had gone to the doctor before work with an upsurge of rheumatism in my hand, the pain had caused several sleepless nights. The medication I’m taking causes an onset of osteoporosis. Then there is the care for my severely ill mother… All my issues, I put them in the prayer box the next morning and let go of them with God. These are all things I cannot solve by myselve.

This conference taught me a whole lot about believing in the supernatural power, in which Jesus finished everything and He bore all our sicknesses and all our worries. It creates space and vision, assurance and security, and so touches upon the very core of our existence.

Great things happened through prayer at the conference (e.g. Annie’s complete healing from the back aches). I waited long for that one word from God for me. There was prayer for healing from breast cancer and from depression and again this inexplicable fear glued me to my chair. I’m struggling to surrender to this supernatural world although I have learned to receive and to hold on to so much. Is it pride? That night I needed Psalm 121 very much:

I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.
My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth.
He will not suffer thy foot to be moved: he that keepeth thee will not slumber. Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.
The LORD is thy keeper: the LORD is thy shade upon thy right hand.
The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night.
The LORD shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul.
The LORD shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even for evermore.

On the last day the Lord gave me a beautiful image: when Antoine (a participant) stood in front of us, I saw my father standing there telling me to praise and magnify God together. That moment I experienced a profound forgiveness and peace inside. It is a dream that gives me strength to continue, a dream that speaks of the infinite love of our God.
Thank You, Father, that I could be there!”