Beltway Testimonies

Testimony unfolded: May 2009

God speaking personally:

God impressed several fresh words to me during the bootcamp and revealed the importance of a “band of brothers” to walk through life with to hold each other up.  God is so good to communicate to me and He is all-sufficient for every need.

John Byington
Blessed from Bootcamp

Testimony unfolded: May 2009

God using everyday people in today’s world to do the miraculous:

Hi my name is Michael B. Rister. I have an interesting story of prayer and healing that I feel like I need to tell the church. For the longest time I lived my Christian life with the idea in my head that for whatever reason GOD did not do supernatural things in our present society like he did in the Bible. I reckoned, like many, that those occurrences mentioned in the Bible were rare things that were reserved for special occasions in special circumstances. Recently GOD began (and still is in the process of) challenging me in this arena. I began to realize than 1. unchristian people tend to respond more to stories of the supernatural than the dry reasoning I had fallen back on before and 2. to deny the supernatural aspects of GOD is to deny the very nature of GOD himself.

To make a long story short, I believed that GOD was able to do the things he claimed to do in the Bible, but for whatever reason he wouldn’t do them. And I definitely didn’t dare believe that someone such as myself could ever perform the kinds of miracles that Peter and the other apostles did (which is kinda dumb because it isn’t me doing it anyway it is GOD) But the challenge ensued, and for sometime this girl I knew had been having severe pains in her side so much so that it completely incapacitated her and no one she went to could find anything wrong with her, yet the pain continued day after day. Finally I gave in and told GOD that if he really would do the things the Bible talks about then I would step out for her and try to invoke a similar healing reaction. I prayed, I laid hands on her, we prayed together and did all the stuff that normally is done, and absolutely nothing happened. Later the girl and I went separate ways and still her pain continued as it had before. Needless to say this left me kinda jaded as to the whole supernatural healing of faith and all that stuff and I walked away with the belief that for whatever reason GOD just didn’t want to do those kinds of things anymore. Sometime later I met another girl with what appeared to be the exact same symptoms as the first girl, the only difference was this girl had not only been to hospitals here in Abilene but had been checked out by hospitals literally all over the country, and still no one could find anything wrong with her. Her story ended with us both in the waiting room at Hendrick hospital at 3:00 in the morning and I decided once again to give the whole ‘miracle of GOD’ thing a try. we prayed together, out loud, in front of everybody and I told GOD I knew he could do it and I would believe and give him all the praise I could if he would just step out and help this girl or at least let the doctors find whats wrong and give us a way to fix it.  I believed and she believed and that night a new doctor fresh out of school with relatively little experience found what had alluded doctors all across the country for years. He prescribed a relatively simple cure, we did it and it worked. She currently experiences no pain, and as for the first girl I ran into her again sometime later and as it turns out the same doctor found the same problem in her at around the same time frame and the same cure healed her and she too currently experiences no more pain. It was kind of a round-a-bout way to do it but I truly believe that doctor was only able to spot that problem because I prayed for them and GOD revealed it to him. So really three healings took place, the two women obviously but maybe also my jaded brain which was full of doubt and skepticism. Jesus Christ really is alive and really is GOD.

thanks,

Michael B. Rister

Testimony unfolded: May 2009

Many salvations:

The Peru medical mission trip saw 842 patients and 171 salvations!  Praise the Lord!

Testimony Unfolded: May 2008

God brings energy:

I suffered from a chronic disease, which left me tired after activities. I had the healing team pray over me. I recently went on an overseas trip and was full of energy, more than I have ever had. THANK YOU LORD!

Testimony Unfolded: April 2007

A man gets prayed for at SHAPE retreat and is healed:

A few weeks back I attended the Men’s SHAPE retreat to learn more about my spiritual gifts.  We broke into our small groups at the end of Friday and went back to a room to pray. We didn’t want to “bother” the group with it and really felt like it was too little a thing.  The group prayed over me and during the prayer, my knee lit up with heat.  It felt like it was on fire on the inside.  I heard God say,”I have healed you; this is where Satan will attack.”  I was still skeptical and processing what had happened, so I didn’t say anything to anyone at that time.  I came home Saturday and told my wife.  She thought it was awesome also, but I said that I needed to “test it out” to prove to myself that it was true.  I went running the next day and there is no still no pain.  Praise God!.  We prayed for different needs of different individuals in the group.  When it was my turn, I mentioned some things I was struggling with and that I thought God was pushing me in new directions.  I had been experiencing some knee pain when I ran, but it didn’t.

In May of 2007, Laura Frankenfeld shared this story with us about her trip around the world:

Stories of healing on the Mexico mission trip from Thomas Wilson, one of our highschool students:

This week we (high school group) went to Mexico with a small team to help out at the Big Heart Orphanage in Reynosa, Mexico. The jobs we did required a lot of long, hard work. During one of these days, Jose Muniz (the Jesus Crew guy…known as a scary looking mexican to many) was cutting rebar with a table saw and accidentally moved his right forearm into the blade. His arm was cut deeply about 3 or 4 inches long. D’Linda Benham, our team’s nurse, immediately treated his wound and wrapped it. Jose was obviously in severe pain and couldn’t do much with his arm. Later that day, before our nightly devotional, D’Linda approached me and asked me to make an announcement after my devo to pray for the injuries that people had from the first 3 days of work. As she said this, I quickly suggested further that we should pray over people because I believed God wanted to do some supernatural work. As I said this, an intern that was there, Kendall, quickly agreed with me and we decided we would do this after the devo. So at the end of our discussion, I made the announcement that if anyone had any kind of injury we were going to stay afterwards to pray over them. About 8 people stayed, so we circled up around the first patient, Jose. And we prayed. After 10 to 20 minutes of praying, I felt confident that God had healed his arm. We were praying that the wound would be completely gone, and I believed it would be. So when we finished, Jose was pressing on the bandage and telling us how amazing it was that there was no pain. I eagerly prompted him to remove the bandage. When he did, we didn’t find just skin, but we also didn’t find a deep cut. On his arm where the deep cut had been earlier was a surface level scab that looked as if it had been drawn on his arm. He showed us that it had truly been healed by pressing on it and hitting it and twisting the skin around it. He could barely touch it without wincing before we prayed, and now he was laughing and poking it liberally.

But that was just the beginning. Next up was Jessie Davis, who had a huge burn on the inside of his leg from the searing hot exhaust pipe of a motorcycle. It had been plaguing him the whole trip and it was not pretty. So after we prayed over it for another 10 to 20 minutes, we were all sure God had healed him. And sure enough, we removed his bandage and found a greatly reduced burn scab that he said had no pain. In fact, that day, D’Linda had traced the area of the red mark from the burn with a purple sharpie, and she showed us that that initial area was at least an inch or two bigger in diameter than the burn mark that was left. Also there was no heat to accompany the wound, something that was a bad sign when D’Linda was checking it out previously.

Then we prayed over Stephanie Maybee who had severe stomach pains. For her though the healing was more spiritual than physical, and God truly did move inside of her. It was an amazing experience and she left changed.

All this to say, Jesus is ALIVE!!! And He is STILL continuing to inpress me and show off his Glory, in new and increasingly powerful ways. Jose’s cut was a ridiculous healing! He cut his arm the morning of the same day it was healed on, and it was TOTALLY healed!

If you have read this, take some time to praise God for the works he is doing! He deserves it!

A simple act of faith, an ankle pain a person experienced for so many years, healed:

My wife and I were invited to a Power and Healing service at New Hope Chapel last year. Many Beltway folks were also attending. We decided to go and just sit in the back and pray for people coming that they would receive healing. The man speaking (Pastor Bill Johnson) talked about the manifestation of the spirit in healing and about the many miracles of healing around the world this ministry was involved in. He said something that really struck my spirit. He said that being a recipient of a gift in most cases is a result of some simple act of faith. (This reminded me of Jesus in his home town. “A Prophet without Honor”) Jesus was amazed at their lack of faith and could do very little except heal the sick.

About 30 minutes in to the service, he said that “there was a man here that has broken his right ankle and has been living with a deep aching pain for over 20 years”. About 30 men stood. Immediately my wife started giggling because she knew who it was. Not many people know that I broke my right ankle three times. Once on ice, then racket ball, then skiing. He then said there is one of you that broke his right ankle not twice but three times. If that is not you, sit down. I was the only one standing. Mark 6:5 ran through my head. At that point I placed my right foot into the isle and back in. A simple act of faith. I didn’t want to be counted with those who lacked faith. At that moment I felt a warm sensation in my ankle. The pain I experienced for so many years was gone. He called me forward and said you were healed, weren’t you. He told me to do something I couldn’t do before. I squatted down and jumped up and down with my ankles. Something I wouldn’t do before because my ankle would swell up and hurt. The next day I played six hours of tennis. To this day, there is no pain or swelling. For many days after I was in an extremely humbled mood, even remorseful to some extent. There were so many there with health problems greater than mine, but yet God chose me. This was a very humbling experience. A most awesome God thing!

One of our high school students testifies to God’s healing power:

I want to share the power of God that is flowing in this generation. Before I continue, I would like to encourage all of you to rejoice in what God is doing and TESTIFY IT!!! Even what seems like the littlest of things is still glory and honor to God and power to those who hear.

Tonight May 25, 2008 at Fearless in the Chapel at Beltway, a young lady was healed of a severe headache that was making her sick to her stomach. She had to keep going in and out of the chapel and also to the restroom. I walked outside the chapel doors and she asked me if I had any medicine for a headache. I kind of chuckled and said, “No, but I have an idea. Follow me.” I guided her into the chapel where we had just finished praying over another man. I announced her pains and we put her in the middle and prayed over her. I laid my hands on her head and everyone else laid hands on her and began to call on the healing power of God to come down. She told me afterwards that right as we started to pray it felt a little better. In the middle of the prayer time she could feel it going away, and at the end, she said it was COMPLETELY GONE! Even the littlest things of God’s glory and power excite me and I rejoiced. She then for the last song of the night danced and sang without any pain or any hinderance holding her back. She was faithful in receiving and then gave glory to the Father for His gracious works.

Whatever amazing things God is doing, TESTIFY IT! Tell others, spread the word that a revival is taking place. Let everyone know of God’s amazing power. No matter how little, small, big, or large His miracles are, they are still to bring glory and honor to Him! Ask and you shall receive AND THEN REJOICE AND TESTIFY!

Are you asking for God to move?

A testimony of the prophetic song:

This last Sunday after we sang “Breathe,” one of our vocalists began singing what she was hearing the Spirit leading her to sing and had a feeling that God was up to something.

We found out this week, that a man who desires to go back into full time ministry has been waiting and waiting and no doors have been opened yet for him. He asked the Lord, “Are You finished with us?” and at that moment the vocalist sang “He’s not finished with you yet.” Needless to say, he was deeply encouraged by the Lord. Praise God for the ways He speaks and the new songs He gives!