Don’t faint, this really is a blog post, after a long delay! There is a genuine reason – my laptop ‘died’, and, depending on what you pay for when you buy one, it can take weeks to get a computer repaired. And in repairing it, it was completely re-formatted, which meant I lost everything on it…. 🙁 . For someone as un-technical and un-geeky as me, that’s a bit of a nightmare! So it’s taken me a long time to get it up and running again….
I won’t even attempt to ‘blog’ the last few weeks (or months!), as it’d be so long…. I haven’t been inactive – I’ve been regularly in Londonderry, as I have been since April/May, and there have been some amazing miracles that God has done – including countless arthritic/osteoarthric/rheumatoid arthritic healings, including a lobrly older lady, Peggy (I think her name was) who hadn’t really been able to walk without excruciating pain in her knees, back, and neck, for over 30 years. She just jumped up from sitting on her couch – which she’d sat down on with extreme caution – and she began to stride up and down her living room, and around her house…. another one where I could genuinely say ‘thank you, Lord, that’s an incredible miracle’ while thinking ‘I’d like to be able to do that!’
So many healings, until about 3-4 weeks ago…. I was due to go to Romania near the end of August, everything booked and even checked in on the flight: I took some boxes down my back garden (that’s a grand word for it!), it’s paved, and with my hands full, I tripped over…. of course, the first point of contact my body had with the ground was my knees! I’ve lost some weight, which helped, but it’s still a considerable weight that my knees had on them falling flat on concrete… I ended up flat out, and then couldn’t get up. It took me 15 minutes to get up: I’d grazed my right knee badly – the first time I’ve done that since I was about 8! – and Id forgotten how painful grazes are! It seemed, at first, quite marvellously I thought, that the real issue with my knees hadn’t been to badly affected by the fall.
By bedtime, I couldn’t move 🙁 – the story for the next three days! Cancelled flights to Romania – and as I’d checked in, it was nigh on impossible to get any money back (you only get a percentage of the tax back anyway)… Stairs presented an even greater challenge, but within a week or so, there was sufficient improvement to attempt Romania again…
Apart from meetings in Romania, the daughter of long-time friends was due to go into hospital, and I’d promised the parent s that I’d keep an eye on her, visit her, while she was in hospital. Many of you will have heard about her: 23 years old, diagnosed with stage 3 breast cancer, th first oncologist brutally told her – without too much consideration for treatment or alternative surgery – that she’d have to have a mastectomy. At 23, that horrified her. She saw a second Oncologist, who gave her a much less ‘deforming’ alternative prognosis, which helped. Her family live the other side of Romania, are very poor, and couldn’t get to Bucharest to be with her: I’ve known the family since 1992, so I offered to help her in whatever way I could.
Well…the best laid plans of mice and men…. I was going on the first Friday in September: two things happened. I didn’t hear from Ionela, couldn’t get hold of her….AND, on Thursday, lifting my luggage (those who have ever travelled with me will know I don’t travel light!) and bringing it downstairs, it slipped, and crashed into …..my knees…. 🙁 . Another cancelled ticket…. but, far worse, Ionela was already in hospital because she’d had a massive haemorrhage, and was found unconscious in her flat by her concerned landlady. She’d had monthly problems for a number of years: and in hospital, she was told she had to have a hysterectomy (at 23 years old….) before the cancer surgery, because of the risk of further major bleeds.
I’m now going Wednesday next week: she’s out of hospital, both procedures completed successfully, but she needs to rest extensively after them, so I can still do her shopping and stuff for her. The knees aren’t so bad the last day or so, so I’m praying that they improve even more over the next few days, and then during the time in Romania!
I’m back from Romania 11 days before taking a team of five plus me to Cali, Colombia, for 17 days. Lee from Maidstone, has been with me twice or three times before: the others have never been. Two are from here in Bangor – Thanney Pyper, who as well as wanting to go and pray for healing and see God do miracles, also wants to do any building work that people like Ana Beiba or Enrique Leal need doing, and Andrew Seaton: two from Londonderry, Davy King, and Adrian Curry. It’s the biggest team I’ve taken for some years, and we’ll be staying in a different place this time, so a lot of changes! I know it’ll be a great trip. There’s been so much ‘enemy assault’ over the last few months, as well as wonderful Godly blessings, I know that God’s going to do wonders there….
Back from Colombia on 8 November, a week later, I head to France to go and preach for a couple of weeks, which I’m looking forward to immensely. Just my luck to get to spend time on the Vendee – in November!!! May to September would be perfect…. !!
