“Once I was blind but now I see!” That was the testimony of a 21 year old man at “North” on Saturday night, 25th August 2012, where we were praying for the sick before the evangelistic preach. There were around 1,500 adults packed into the Coul Beck Farm barn in Hutton Rudby, North Yorkshire, as three people joined me on stage for a dramatic interview at around 8.00pm, after the “blanket healing prayer” but before the sermon. (The event is the annual gathering of the newly named ‘Christ Central Churches’ who are overseen by Jeremy Simpkins from Manchester.)
On stage, his brother and brother’s wife stood next to him. Both reported that he’d been born blind in one eye, (he’s very well known to the church he was camping with.) For the past few minutes, they had been testing him, asking him to count how many fingers they were holding up. They said he’d been born blind in both eyes, but had had a retina attached in his “good” eye in infancy, so that he had limited vision in one eye, but none at all in the other, “until now”!
“I can see! It’s amazing!” he said, as we closed up his “good eye”. And that was still his testimony later on during the weekend, as we drove home to London yesterday. Obviously with such an extraordinary healing claim, I am being cautious about details until I can present more information. Apart from anything else, I did 6 talks across the 3 day event, so I was pretty busy throughout, and am going away on holiday again tomorrow. I know that those who are understandably excited about this news will understand the importance of getting the confirmation correct, however long it takes. It’s best not to rush to press with internet “miracle” claims on these occasions! Especially because it can be a bit overwhelming for the man concerned. So watch this space.
We are so grateful that there were many other healing testimonies in the same meeting, several of whom I chatted to through the mic, as they told us their stories. Let me also say that there were many more, who seemingly were not healed, but there was a lot of excitement about those who said they were. (In fact Jeremy Simpkins, who brilliantly hosted the event did a superb talk on the mysteries and reality of the “unhealed” on Sunday night, speaking about “handing weakness” and “Paul’s thorn in the flesh.”)
Anyway, just going back to Saturday, after what was from my point of view a hugely enjoyable preach, we had 21 confirmed responses to the appeal for salvation on the Saturday night, of which 9 turned out to be first time commitments.
Earlier that day there were 7 reported healings on Saturday morning in the youth venue where I was the speaker at “Amplify.” We had 14 young people respond for salvation. I spoke at Amplify on each of the 3 mornings. I preached on John 3:16 on Saturday morning, Luke 15 on Sunday morning, and John 4 yesterday morning.
I also did my new “minimal facts” seminar entitled “When you’re dead you’re dead!” on Saturday afternoon, and we had a bumper attendance for my “Has Science Buried God?” material on Sunday afternoon.
All 6 Holloways had a great time, and massive credit and thanks go to Jeremy & Ann Simpkins, who are the hugely impressive couple who led it all so well, and were personally very kind to Julia and I, and also to Steve & Ruth Hurd, Tony & Kay Smith and so many others on Jeremy’s superb “Christ Central Churches” team.
We also loved seeing our great friends Rhys & Sara Scott who are now church planting in Vancouver.