EVIDENCES OF SPIRITUAL AND PHYSICAL HEALING.
BLESS the Lord, O my
soul, and forget not all His benefits;
Who forgiveth all
thine iniquities; Who healeth all thy diseases. -Psa. ciii: 23.
West Camden, N.Y., Aug. 2, 1881.
My Dear Sister in
Christ:
I suffered a
great deal form heart difficulty when I was a child, but as I grew older and
stronger had less trouble and usually enjoyed excellent health. Occasionally
slight difficulty in breathing would indicate that all was not quite right, but
it would soon pass away, and was little thought of until the fall of 1865, when
more serious trouble commenced. The physician pronounced it enlargement of the
heart, and said medicines might give relief during the paroxysms, but there
could be no cure. I might live years, but was liable to die at any moment. Other
physicians, since then, have given more encouragement at first, but neither
medical skill nor change of climate have ever afforded more than temporary
relief. A part of the time I had had comparatively comfortable health, and
could do the most of the work for my little family; at other times have been
confined to the house for weeks, the least exertion of excitement causing
paroxysms of distress for breath too painful to describe. Sometimes the action
of the heart has been so weak as scarcely to be discerned, and I would like for
hours unable to speak or stir, though conscious of everything that was said and
done.
No one outside of
my own family knows that I have suffered, for I became tired of telling how I
felt, years ago, and if I was able to be out, would say in answer to friendly
inquiries, that I was usually well, without stopping to explain what my usual
health was. Winters have always been the hardest for me. The most comfortable
one I have known, for years, was that of 18770’8, which was spent South. All
last December I felt myself rapidly running down, and on the twenty-seventh was
obligated to give up all work. Two months of great weakness and suffering
followed, with only occasional days when I could breathe with comparative ease.
Breathing for the most part with irregular and wearisome, with most distressing
paroxysms of frequent occurrence. Two or three times I lay for hours in the
terrible sinking spells before referred to. Towards the last of February I
began to gain, and by the fifth of March was so much better that, if I sat
still, or moved about very quietly, I had no severe trouble to breathe,
only the usual trouble upon lying down.
Many times during
the past few years my attention has been called to cures wrought by God in
answer to the prayer of faith, but when I though of asking Him to restore my
health, the question would come, “How do I know that it would be for my good,
or His glory, that I should be cured? If it would be, why has He not blessed
the remedies used and cured me before this?” I felt no desire for anything He
did not see best for me. Sometime in February there was published in “The
Witness” an account f the case of Mrs. Yorks, of Honeoye Falls, whose voices
was restored, in answer to prayer, after having been unable to speak for eight
years. My sister brought me the paper, calling my attention to the article, and
repeated what a neighbor had said to her upon reading it,, “Why cannot Mrs.
Gibson have faith to be cured?” I said, “I don’t know that the Lord wants me to
be cured, He wants some sick ones in the world, and I am willing to be anything
He wants me to be.” Two or three days after this another brought me her
“Northern Christian Advocate” to have me read “a remarkable answer to prayer,”
which proved to be fuller account of the case of Mrs. Yorks. It then occurred
to me that there might be some Divine purpose in this; the Lord might be
calling to me; so I wrote to Mrs. Yorks, and also sent to you for “The Prayer
of Faith.” Mrs. Yorks’ answer to my letter and your book both came Saturday
morning, March 5th. The letter gave me light and strengthened my
faith. I commenced reading the book and soon found my questions in regard to
God’s will for me, answered. I saw my Saviour as willing to heal me as He was
those who sought Him eighteen hundred years ago, and I resolved to seek that
healing at once. I expected some suggestion from the Holy Spirit, in regard to
some arrangement for my united prayer for me, but, instead, came the words,
“Now is the accepted time, behold now is the day of salvation.” I tried to put
them away from my mind, thinking they came only because it was a very familiar
text, and tried to plan for consultation with Christian friends here, and a
correspondence with your and Mrs. Yorks, and have a time set for united prayer
for me, but only confusion of mind resulted from the effort, while “now is the
accepted time-“ was repeated again and again. To free my mind from the words, I
went to my Bible, to my “Silent Comforter,” to my “Daily food,” to my “Faithful
Promisor,” hoping to find some word from God to take their place, but in vain.
All this time I
was asking guidance and help from God. At once time my husband came into the
room for a few minutes and I thought of the promise “where two are agreed-“ but
he went out before I saw it clear to speak to him about it, and I asked the
Lord that if it was His will to restore me, in answer to our united prayer, he
might come in again soon, that prayer could be offered “now” and answered; but
Is aw him go away from the house and knew that that was not God’s way.
Then it occurred to me that I might be blindly resisting the Spirit in clinging
to the thought that “faith cures” must be wrought in answer to united prayer.
The “Golden Text” of the pervious Sunday’s lesson, “The power of the Lord was
present to heal them,” had occurred to my mind several times during the
morning, and now I began to look over the whole lesson, Luke v: 12-26, and
there I saw clearly, what it was strange I should up to this time have
overlooked, that the leper who came alone to Jesus was healed immediately,
just the same as the man with palsy brought by his friends. As I saw it seemed
as if my Saviour stood by me, more clearly revealed to the eye of faith than
ever before, and I said at once, “Lord if Thou wilt Thou canst make me well.
I know Thou art able, I know Thou art willing; Thou canst, Thou wilt, Thou
dost, Thou hast, I am well. Praise the lord!” With every word of this brief
prayer, soul and body had gained strength, and with the exclamation “praise the
Lord,” an indescribable thrill passed through my whole frame I was well.
Mrs. Mix had told you that you must “act faith,” and I began at once to use the
new strength which God had given me. It is natural for me in health to move
quickly about my work; the inclination had returned and I walked rapidly into
my room to do up the morning’s work there. It was son finished, with ease, and
I went out into the sitting-room and sat down in the chair I had left a little
while before, and I said “Can this be the same body I had half an hour ago? That
one so weak, so painfully weary all the time, this one so strong, so full
of the delightful restless activity of new life.” That afternoon I walked over
to my sister’s on a snowpath and up stairs to her rooms, with perfect ease-not
a single gasp for breath. That evening I told my husband what the Lord had done
for me. HE watched me earnestly while I related, step by step, the day’s
experience, and when I had finished said, “Well, you look and appear better, that
is certain, but it seems to good to be true.” The next day I walked to Church,
and after coming home rad aloud nearly all the time until evening service, then
walked to and from Church again. My husband said, “You have done a large day’s
work today; are you not tired?” I waited a minute to look myself all over, for
I had not thought of weariness, and I thanked God that I could say “not one
bit.” About three weeks after, my girl, whom I had engaged for a year, was
offered larger wages, and I was glad to be left to do my own work.
There has since
been no return of the heart trouble, and I never in the same length of time
suffered so little from pain or weariness. But this letter is already too long,
and yet I have not told, because I could not, half how painful was the illness,
nor half how glorious and complete thee healing; and how fain, then, must be
the attempt to express, by words, the immeasurably greater blessing which came
at the same time to my soul. I had sought the Saviour in youth and health, and
His presence cheered me all the weary years of pain. But during the last few
months there has been such an expansion and intensifying of everything
connected with my spiritual life, such joy and such peace as I never
experienced before, and never can describe. “O, that men would praise the Lord
for His goodness, and for His wonderful works to the children of men.”
Yours very truly,
Emeline W. Gibson.
