One Friday night I was with a Bethel Church ministry team ministering on the streets of San Francisco. We saw a group of three people talking, and we walked up to them to join their conversation.
One man, Leo, appeared to be homeless and had some apparent addictions, but he really stood out as very outgoing and full of joy. As soon as we introduced ourselves, his two friends left. We apologized for breaking up their conversation, and Leo just chuckled.
As I’d approached him, I had gotten the sense that he frequently experienced chronic back pain and migraine headaches because of the back pain. I asked him, and he began to weep while nodding his head, speechless. I asked if it was the result of a car accident and if we could pray for him. Leo nodded, saying he was a believer, and continued to weep.
Taking a moment to compose himself, Leo said, “I purposely didn’t go to the doctors today to get
medication because I felt like I needed to stay on the street corner, because love was going to find me today.”
I thought to myself, There’s no doubt in my mind he’s going to get healed. On a scale of one to ten, Leo said his pain was a level nine. We gathered around him in this atmosphere of crazy faith and prayed for him, and then we asked him to do something he couldn’t do before. He bent straight down, knelt over, and squatted really low.
He started saying, “Oh, my gosh! Oh, my gosh,” repeatedly through his tears.
“Where’s the pain?” we asked.
Leo responded excitedly, “What pain?! There’s no pain!” He’d been in pain for thirty-four years.
We blessed him and thanked the Lord for touching all of our lives with this powerful encounter.
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