It started to set in during the busiest month for a pastor, December. The constant infections, the hacking cough, the flulike symptoms. After weeks of this seemingly morphing flu/brochitis/strep throat, friends recommended going to an urgent care to get an antibiotic to “kick this thing”. His wife called the naturopath because she wanted to get to the bottom of it.

Little did she know how low the bottom could go.

~~~~~

The office, which usually books up months in advanced told us it would be April before there was a spot. Dejectedly, but silently praying, I asked if there was anything else.

“Oh, wait a second. There was a cancellation at the beginning of next week. We could fit your husband in there.”

Praise God we got that spot, or else we might just have taken the course that so many others had gone…round after round of different antibiotics trying to target the ever morphing disease.

Lyme disease.

The tiny little spirochetes that spiral into every nook and cranny of your body, blood, tissue, ligaments, and even brain. These microscopic bacteria, transmitted into my husband through a tick bite during our 2016 fall family trip to Cape Cod, was the culprit of the demise of my husband’s health, energy, focus, and even emotional well being.

We praised God because we caught it early, unlike so many others who have undergone years of misdiagnosis. We were highly optimistic that with the vast array of supplements, diet, and natural spirochete killing herbs we could kick this thing.

But then, 2017 was a roller coaster ride of small interludes from the bedridden state that my husband was in. I watched my husband rally to meet peoples needs, and go to meetings, and try to continue to move the nonprofit he runs and church he was planting forward, only to watch him crash into bed the minute he got home, sometimes for days before the next big push. There was one appointment in late fall, after weeks of fasting and Daniel diet and diligently taking herbal remedies at just the right time round the clock, when his “body scan” showed a very weak concentration of Lyme, and we thought for sure we were almost done, if we could just keep pushing with the strict diet and the constant supplement-taking. Healing eluded us as the strain of ministry stress taxed his body, and his self discipline to eat free of “junk” eroded. Many a healing prayers were prayed throughout this process, especially as we celebrated Danny’s 40th birthday in November.

As we rang in the New Year, we did so with influenza beginning to wreak havoc on our household, and most of all, on the already immune-system-depleted body of my husband. 2018 was looking even dimmer than 2017. Our housechurch ceased to meet in our home and all Shalom City Church activity ceased, except for our weekly prayer meetings and kids ministry. As I slowly recovered from flu complications of pneumonia and a cracked rib, I watched my husband slowly get worse. In bed for days on end. No longer able to rally for certain events. I was weary. He was even more so. Our children grew accustomed to “We can’t, guys, Daddy doesn’t feel good.” Some days Danny said he was ready to go be with the Lord and couldn’t do it anymore…

“Will this ever end, Lord?”

In one of our prayer meetings in early February, the Lord knew that constant question upon my heart. Will it end? Or is this what the rest of our lives will look like? After we had prayed for the different people in our community, and after we had practiced listening prayer, we decided to lay hands on Danny and pray, again. The healing did not come that night, but a whisper of the Holy Spirit did.

“The days of this Lyme disease are numbered.”

I heard it in my spirit, and a ray of hope broke through. A promise. An end in sight. As I looked upon my Lord and continued to pray into the promises of His Word, I KNEW. The days of this disease are numbered. There is a set time that this will end. There is a number of days that this disease is allowed to plague my husband’s body and mind, but when those days were done, he would be healed. I knew they were not yet coming to a close, but they would in the near future.

And we would wait in expectation.

Late February rolls around, and Danny gets a phone call from friends in the neighborhood. “We really feel like we need to come over and pray for you. Can we do it on Sunday night (Feb. 25)?” That happened to be the night that Danny’s parents, on their whirlwind trip back from Japan, would be spending with us so that we could have a birthday dinner for Katy-Grace and Gwennalyn, (whose birthdays were just days away, (March 1). We agreed to have them come later in the evening so we could have the birthday dinner beforehand.

Little did I know February 25 was the last numbering of the days of Lyme disease. With that birthday celebration we would also welcome the birth of new health for my husband.

After a Japanese dinner, and cake, and festivities, a handful of people ushered into our living room. The original neighborhood guys who called the meeting didn’t even show up.

But the right people did.

Danny’s righthand man in Restore Life. Two men who were ever faithful at all our prayer meetings. A new guy who recently moved into the Curb, a young men’s house in the community. Danny’s mother and father and sister. We started praying, in faith, that even if the rest of the prayer warriors weren’t there, God’s presence was.

We prayed for a while, listened for some time, and then the new guy spoke up. He was rocking side to side, maybe nervous, maybe filled by the Spirit to speak.

“Can I read James 5:13-16?

And he proceeded to read:
“Is anyone among you suffering? Let him pray. Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise. Is anyone among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up. And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.”

(As he first started to read, slightly numbed by the number of times elders had prayed over Danny, I’m thinking, “yeah, yeah, we’ve read and done that passage a hundred times this past year…”)

But the new guy kept going, in cadence with his rocking,

“I keep sensing that there is some bitterness and resentment that the Lord wants you to release to Him Danny. Is there anyone you might be holding resentment towards?”

At this, it was like a match just got lit in me. This was it. This was what Danny needed. Freedom from all the disappointments and pain.

“Yes, probably.” Danny spoke.

“Are you ready to confess it?”

“Sure.”

“Ok.”

Long pause.

“Like now?” Danny puzzled.

“Yes”

It was now that the fire and the agreement in my spirit about what the new guy had read and said welled up.

“Honey, name them out loud, right now. Release them.”

And Danny proceeded to list off, to the Lord, in the presence of this Body of Believers, his parents, his wife,

the girl that had rejected him in middle school,
the broken friendships when he first became a Christian and all those that disowned him because of it,
the individuals who had let him down,
people throughout his years of ministry who had gone back on their word and caused ministries to collapse,

individuals in the present who had betrayed him, gossiped about him and slandered him.
He released them all before the Cross that paid for their sin. and his… for over twenty minutes between silent sobs and quiet moments of reflective listening to the Spirit.

And he recommitted himself into the Lord’s hands.

Our prayer time ended with Danny’s father (an Elder in the PCA and missionary in Japan) anointing Danny with oil. Danny was on his knees with all of us huddled over him and his father’s hand on the back of his neck. He started feeling a hot burning on his neck that ran down to his spine and said it felt like his neck and back was on fire…

After receiving his Father in Heaven’s blessing in light of confessed sin and the cleansing that Jesus brings, and receiving his earthly father’s blessing (which is every son’s desire, even grown ones), we ended the prayer meeting.

There had been many a good prayer meeting before, so I wasn’t expecting too much immediately, just a vague sense that eventually all would be well.

~~~~~

The next morning Danny got out of bed, declared that God was leading him to do a 5 day, distilled-water only fast, and that he was going to try to go into the office for a half a day’s work, since he was feeling really good. (aka, not about to collapse back into bed because of the pain and fatigue)

Around 1:00pm, I receive a call from him.

“Hey Honey, I’m actually still feeling pretty good, so I’m gonna stay at the office and keep working on stuff I need to catch up on. I’ll be back by dinner time though.”

I was excited that he was feeling well, but in the back of my mind I was wondering when the crash would happen. Would it be one day in bed because of a full day’s work? or three? We would we have to wait and see.

The next day, he wakes up.  “I’m feeling pretty good again today.  I’m gonna go into the office and then I had that meeting lined up that I need to go to.”

Didn’t hear from him at all that day. But he showed up for dinner, still with energy, still with no pain.

The next day was the same.

And the next day.

I kept waiting for the crash. Even weeks later when he was still fully functioning but started to let fast food and sugar creep back into the diet, I thought,

“This will crash him for sure. I KNOW it is all linked to his diet and detoxing.”

BUT IT DIDN’T.

He continued barreling along day after day, week after week, fully functioning. THIS was when I knew he had been healed. And that it was from the Lord. For the past year and a half I had been on Danny’s case with lectures and youtube videos about diet and Lyme disease and detoxing and eating vegetation. All along the way, there was this faith that God could heal. But it would really take God PLUS our hard work (at diet, supplements, etc.) to get him better.

How gracious of our Lord to rip the feeble rug of self-effort and self-righteousness out from underneath my wobbly little knees, and allow me to fall on the Rock that He is.

His promises that never fail, the ones we prayed on our knees together for all those long months, the ones that so many friends and loved ones prayed for Danny, they were coming true, because

This is the confidence we have in approaching God;

that if we ask anything according to His will, HE HEARS US.

And if we know that He hears us-whatever we ask-

we know that we have what we ask of Him. I John 5:14-15

so when God’s Word which never returns void tells me…

I am the Lord who heals Exodus 15:26

and….

Heal me, O Lord, and I will be healed. Save me and I will be saved for you are the One I praise. Jeremiah 17:14

and…

He sent out his Word and healed them and delivered them from all their destructions. Psalm 107:20

We will choose to join our own voices with what His voice has already spoke and believe Him for it.  Even if it takes a while.

and while we wait,

We will revere the Lord’s Name,

and

the Sun of Righteousness will rise with healing in His rays. 

Malachi 4:2

 

*Note* If you, or someone you love, is struggling with Lyme disease, Danny’s doctor’s office is known throughout the country for its successes in treating the disease holistically. There is hope! God hears, and smart people study how to fight this. Longevity Health might be of aid to you. Also, educate yourself with this documentary about Lyme Disease.