“I Am Restoring You to Who You’ve Never Been”

Guest Blogger, Pam L 

Back on July 9th I posted the story of a gathering at my home that had occurred some years earlier. The post highlighted a miraculous healing. Pam, the one healed, having no knowledge of my post, ‘serendipitously’ reached out to me a week or so later on an “unrelated” prayer matter concerning the wild fires in and around Redding, CA. (Which just so happens to be where Chuck’s Church ministry team is from). Odd, as I haven’t been in touch with Pam in several years. But, the date I posted was 5 years to the day that she first posted her testimony and six years to the day of her healing. (I had no idea it was the same day. In fact I had originally posted that it was in August). All so wild. Here is Pam’s direct testimony of all that God was doing in her life at the time of her healing. Enjoy and be blessed!

Pam L’s Blog Post – Originally posted on July 9, 2013

 

“I am restoring you to who you’ve never been.” That’s what He told me. Jesus.

He came to me in an early morning dream, before the sun was fully up, on March 14, 2012, and invited me to a take a journey with Him, in answer to a specific prayer lifted before bed the night before.

“I have breakthrough for you.  But I can’t bring it unless you do this.  Take this journey.”

“Okay.”

“I’m restoring you to who you’ve never been, so you can be the authentic version of who you were created to be.”

And so began the most spiritually and physically transformational journey of my life.  Though the totality of that journey isn’t the topic for this post, one specific event that occurred during it is.

Get ready, this particular testimony is apt to blow your hair back just a bit.

One year ago today, in fact, just about this time of night, I was at a gathering on the front lawn of the home of the Director of Prayer ministry for the church I attend. He had invited members of the prayer team to come hear about his cousin’s ministry at a church out West.  On the way over, I lifted a prayer to God.

“Lord, you’ve been talking to me about a lot of things, shown me things that I thought were true, and everything is so messed up.  Would you touch me in a really personal way tonight, so I know everything is on track and okay?”

The gathering was beautiful.  About 30 of us had come out and we sat there on the front yard, looking out over the lake.  The sun was low in the sky, painting it with shades of pink and amber, and it reflected in the mirror-flat water below. As the guitarist and worship leader began to lead us in songs, I was filled with such gratitude to be there.  Up until that point, the journey I was on with Jesus had consisted mostly of Him taking me to the depths of every wound that had scarred my heart, wounds that I now know had altered the course of my life and who I was within that life.  At times the grief was so intense and unspecified, had I not known I was on a journey with Jesus, I would have been quite worried about myself.  It was as if He was using a spiritual scalpel to scrape my heart clean, and make it new.  Looking back, I think I was grieving for the very loss of myself that had occurred over the course of my life.  At the time of this gathering, I sensed my period of grief was transitioning, though to where I wasn’t sure.  But in that moment, having some peaceful lake time and worshipping God under the sunset sky was such a blessing.

After our time of worship, Chuck (our host’s cousin) shared some incredible testimonies of different healing miracles God had performed, both over the course of Chuck’s life and in his current ministry. I’ve always been encouraged by testimony and hearing about God at work, and this was no different. But when Chuck said, “Let’s see if God wants to do some healing tonight,” I remember wondering what the two pastors in our small crowd were thinking. I’d never seen any healing before.  I’d never even been to a healing service, and I’d been walking with the Lord a long time.  Then Chuck introduced a young man named Chris, who was gifted in Words of Knowledge.  He spoke about injuries so detailed and so specific, it could only be God talking through him.  As someone would come forward with that particular injury or ailment, a few of us would gather around that person, pray simple prayers and God would heal.  It was absolutely amazing to witness!

Then Chris asked for a woman whose left leg was shorter than her right and had back issues and had to go to the chiropractor.  No one raised a hand or came forward.  As I was standing there listening, I physically felt a nudge in the small of my back, almost like “Get ready.”

No one was standing behind me.

Chris asked again and still, no one.  And then he said –

“Is there a woman here with one leg shorter than the other and has back issues?”  I tentatively raised my hand.

“I have one leg shorter than the other…”, I said quietly, my voice trailing off.

“Tell me about it.”

“Well, I’m pretty sure it’s my right leg and I don’t go to the chiropractor. But when my shoes wear uneven, my hips will clunk when I walk and my back does bother me.”

“It’s you.”

“It’s me what?”, I asked nervously.

“It’s you God wants to heal.”

No one in this crowd knew I was on the journey with Jesus, nor did they know about my intense grieving process since mid-March.  No one.

Chris asked me to sit in a chair and make sure my hips were square against the back.  Then he asked me to lift my legs straight up.  When I did, everyone could see that my right leg was about an inch and a half shorter than my left.  I was surprised at the difference. I didn’t realize it was that significant.  I was also a bit freaked out at what might be happening.  At first I was going to keep my eyes closed, thinking “What if this doesn’t…” and then I stopped myself.  “It doesn’t matter what happens, you keep your eyes open – that’s an act of faith!”  All year long, God had been speaking to me about acting in faith and leaving the rest up to Him.  So I kept my eyes open, even though I was nervous.  Then Chris said to Dave (the host),

“Dave, all I want you to do is just hold your hands right about here [about six inches above my shins] and say ‘leg grow’.”

And Dave did and we all watched my right leg grow, right there and keep growing until it was even with my left!  It was pretty wild to watch…kind of surreal and almost like I wasn’t watching my own feet, but someone else’s.  To think I would have missed seeing that if I had closed my eyes!  When I was asked later what it felt like, what I could remember was the feeling of little butterfly wings gently fluttering along my lower right leg, coaxing it to grow longer.  It was incredible!  I kept looking down at my feet smiling and being amazed at what God had done and how He had answered my prayer to “touch me in a really personal way” and assure me things were on track.  And because everyone else saw it too, it can never be denied or forgotten. I can never doubt that it happened.  Praise God!!!

I asked Chris later about God being specific, calling out for a woman with her left leg shorter than the other.  He told me that she probably was among us, but might have been nervous to come forward.

“It’s okay.  Even though she didn’t come forward, God may have still healed her.  She’ll just discover that later.”

The next day, I kept looking down at my feet and I couldn’t stop laughing, and smiling, and thanking God.  Funny thing is, if someone had asked me if I had anything that needed physical healing, I would have said no.  I never thought about my leg and that it was uneven.  It wasn’t anything I focused on, I just knew that it was.

Two days later, Dave sent me a scripture that he said he had read the day before, and felt he was supposed to send it to me:

But as for me, I shall walk in my integrity; Redeem me, and be gracious to me. My foot stands on a level place; In the congregations I shall bless the Lord.  (Psalm 26:11-12)

Dave shared with me later that up until he saw my leg grow, he had kind of been “doubting” the healings that night.  How awesome that God prompted Chris to ask Dave to be the one to hold his hands above my leg and tell it go grow.  That’s so like God, working both sides of the fence like that, and targeting Dave’s doubt in the process.

I told my cousin about my leg growing the day after it happened.  When he came to visit a few weeks later, he asked me if I remembered the time he had commented to me in homeroom in high school that I “walked funny” and how it had hurt my feelings.  I had.

“You don’t walk funny anymore.  You always had an odd gait, but you don’t now.”

I’ve had only one backache since then, ironically after praying for someone else’s back.  I’ve learned now that sometimes that can be a word of knowledge too, and so I prayed for that person’s back again.  It was voting day and I had to walk to the polls.  My back was so seized up (like this other person’s), I couldn’t walk and it had come out of nowhere.  So later in the day I prayed

“Jesus, you already healed this.  My legs are even.  I need to go vote and can’t.  Would you please heal my back?”

Just like that, the pain was instantly gone! And my back has been great ever since.

The day after the healing, while walking my dog around the neighborhood, I asked God about my leg and what did it mean.

“Lord, when I think of you healing my leg and what happened, I keep seeing a solid white wall on beautiful green grass. Why?”

This wall was about 6 feet long, just there in an open span of gorgeous green grass.  He revealed to me the wall is a spiritual marker, a symbol, of my spiritual healing.  God growing my leg was the physical marker, the evidence, that the grieving part of my spiritual journey was done and breakthrough was coming.  I learned later that white is the biblical color of righteousness, and green often symbolizes new beginnings and growth.

God also helped me understand that He grew my leg so everyone there would know that He could do the impossible.  We’d all seen it, and all the other incredible healings that night, with our own eyes.

And that dream I referenced at the beginning of this post? When Jesus asked me to go on the journey with Him?  He told me breakthrough was coming and that He was restoring me to who I’d never been.  Well, I’d never been someone with two even legs.

I’ll always have this encounter with God.  An encounter that forever changed my perspective of Him, and our relationship, and showed me there is so much more to Him than I’d ever known or realized or trusted Him for.

God can do the impossible.

Testimony faith.

Happy anniversary to me. 🙂

Please pray for the victims of the raging wildfires in California. My cousin, Chuck reports on the devastation but also on the doors now opened for Jesus and His Bride.