Around 20 years ago Vashantha, a thirty five year old hindu lady living in Vayalur (a small village in South East India) was suffering from severe health problems. The people next to her house were feuding with her and doing witchcraft against her. She became depressed and suicidal. She could not walk or eat, became severely underweight and was wasting away.

She and her husband went to many temples and hospitals trying to find relief. They also tried paying people to do witchcraft for her, but nothing helped. The doctors gave up on her and said she was going to die – that she had only one or two months to live. Then someone told her about our church in Kalpakkam.

Vasantha and her husband were hindu and did not believe in Jesus, but her husband, desperate for anything that could help, carried her into the church and just left her there, lying on the floor.

I prayed and discerned that she was afflicted by evil spirits, but I was not able to drive them out. My wife and I were determined to help her so that the reputation of Jesus and of the church would be upheld in our area. We fasted, and ended up fasting for thirty days, praying for her every day, but we were sad because nothing seemed to be changing.

Meanwhile the whole time Vashantha was lying on the church floor, sleeping, not eating, for a whole month!  We tried giving her food, but she would not eat. She only drank water.

Then, on the 30th day, God completely healed and delivered her! We anointed her with oil, laid our hands on her and one evil spirit left. We continued, and a total of thirteen evil spirits left her. The evil spirits would speak to us, and say things like “I am troubling her legs” and then we would expel them in the name of Jesus, and her legs would get better – like that.

After thirteen evil spirits went out, she fell down then woke up and asked for something to eat. Immediately we gave her food, and her family was amazed and delighted. Twenty years later she is still alive and healthy today.

This post was written in partnership with Hands on Houses – take a look at their work here: https://www.handsonhouses.com/

Around 15 years ago we ran a church in a village named Kadalur (in South East India.)

One of the ladies who lived in the area, Dhanakottie Amma, had cancer in her mouth. She was around 45 at the time. She had grown up believing in the Hindu gods so she went to Hindu temples seeking healing but nothing happened. Finally, she went to the hospital but the doctor told her there was nothing they could do and that she would die within one month.

She came to our church, crying, so me and my church fasted and prayed for her. We prayed for her at the church and went to her house, laying our hands on her, and praying for her.

After one month she went back to the hospital and the doctors were amazed because, by the grace of God, she was completely healed! Before, she was unable to eat, but after she was healed, she could eat normally again and is still alive and well today.

This post was written in partnership with Hands on Houses – take a look at their work here: https://www.handsonhouses.com/

“I was a wannabe gangster. Tryna fit in. Started doing drugs, alcohol. I started going to the club because I was tryna find something to fill me up. But it wasn’t working.

I was already baptized in the Holy Spirit and under water, but I kept running away from the Lord. I was like in and out the door.

And then one night I told the Lord, I’m like: “give me one more year to have fun. To do the worldly stuff.” And then, New Years Eve came by. I drank for the last time. Got drunk. Got into a couple of fights.

And then I sat down one night, I’m like, “Lord I’m over it, I just want to die today.” And I was like, “If you’re real, Lord, send me somebody, have someone call me right now.” And then like 2 or 3 minutes later someone called me, and I was like “woah, that’s crazy.”

And that person was asking if I was ok, and I was like, “I’m not going to lie, I’m not OK.”

And then, I was like, “Alright Lord, if you’re real, I’ll give you a week – if you don’t get me back to Kona, I don’t know what to do with my life.” (I was in Texas then)

And then a week later and a couple of days, one of my homies sent me a ticket back to Kona that he had bought. And I’m like, what the heck. And he’s like “yeah, you’re going back Kona, Monday.” And I’m like, woah – that is crazy!”

So I’m like, alright bet, once I get back to Kona I am going to go straight to ministry night.

And it was perfect timing – I got here like 5 on a Monday night, right before ministry night.

And then its crazy cause, at ministry night, Frenchie and one of his homies were saying “who wants to give their lives back to Jesus”

I was like – that’s me right there. So I looked at my homie Alec, I’m like, “Hey, what bro, think I can go up there?” And he said “bro, go up there!” I’m like, alright, bet.

I ran to the front, I’m like, “Lord I want to come back.”

And he’s been restoring me slowly but surely.

I’m really thankful to be here.

I went from a wannabe gangster to a real Christian. And the most gangsterous thing I did was giving my life to the Lord. I was blind but now I see. I was once dead, but now I am alive. Thank you God!”

I was in a time of prayer one day when, in my mind’s eye, I saw a picture of myself walking on a path. It began as a straight path and immediately took a sharp turn onto a jungle trail, over a bridge, and into a village.

I knew immediately that a change was about to take place for my family. We had been serving with Youth With A Mission for a number of years, but after this vision, I knew we were about to move to a different location. It wasn’t long before we were asked to lead a new base in the jungles of Panama.

This vision mentally prepared me for this transition. Then, when we arrived in Panama, on my first trek in the jungle, the path was exactly like I had seen during prayer! I knew then that God had led us exactly where we were meant to be.

Our family was at our very first worship night with Youth with a Mission. I had just finished reading Is That Really You God by Loren Cunningham, a book about hearing God’s voice. As we were singing, in my mind’s eye, I saw us on a ship, worshipping on deck. I saw my feet in flip-flops and the wooden deck of the ship.

Over the next twenty years our family kept feeling led to work with YWAM’s ship ministry. We did other ministry but never with ships. Then we accepted the position of pioneering a base in the remote Bocas Del Toro region of Panama.

We had been there for about six months when we got word that YWAM Mendocino was bringing us a boat. It arrived at our dock and the crew tied her up so I could jump on.

As I swung my legs over the side of the boat and my feet hit the deck, I looked down and noticed I was standing on a wooden deck, in flip flops. Twenty years later the prophetic vision that God had shown me in that time of worship had come true!

In 2010 I was diagnosed with an autoimmune disease called Guillain–Barré syndrome. It affects the central nervous system and causes paralyzation when triggered by stress, loud noises, falling, or any type of physical stress.

The first time I was afflicted I was paralyzed for 3 months. I had an attack from the disease every year like clockwork. I was not walking with God when all this was going on. It was a really rough time. I didn’t have a job, my dad died, and then I was diagnosed with this.

After I’d had the disease for five years it became part of my identity, how I lived, and how I saw myself. At the time I couldn’t use the stairs, I had to be on flat ground; I couldn’t go on gravel because it could make me fall and go into another episode.

Then I started trusting in Jesus and following him. He showed me that the disease was not my identity. I kept hearing him say “you are not sick” but I had been sick for so long that I had a hard time believing that maybe something had changed.

I was on a lot of medication and God showed me that it was making me numb from the inside out. He put it so strongly on my heart that I needed to change things that, one day, I took a leap of faith and flushed all my medication down the toilet (not medical advice, ok, but it is what I did.) Three weeks later, having gone completely off my medicine, I started to feel hungry again and I felt my body coming alive.

Since then I have not had a Guillain–Barré episode. It has been 7 years since I got off the medicine. I listened to the Lord and did what he asked me to do. It was so scary. I thought, “Either I am going to die, or God is a good God and he will do what He has said.” He did what He said.

On a missions trip with YWAM in Cambodia we visited a village a few times to share about Jesus with people. On our second visit we passed by the home of an elderly couple, probably in their eighties. They had heard the gospel before but had not decided to follow Jesus. The husband was paralyzed in half of his body, so he walked with difficulty. He was also blind.

On one visit, our team shared the gospel with them. This time they understood and responded, entering into new life in Christ. After praying with them, I felt an urge that we should also pray for healing, so I asked them if we could pray for them. They agreed.

We gently put our hands on them and began praying. We did not see anything change, but we told them that we had faith that God was going to bring healing to them and then we left.

The next week we were returning to the village and we met a team from Canada who were staying in the same place. They said to us, “do you remember a blind guy that you prayed for? Well, throughout this week, his eyesight has been improving more and more each day.”

We were on the opposite side of the village from their house and I did not know if I would be able to see them. When we had finished the day’s activities, we were walking in different groups when, all of a sudden, someone in another group said, “hey, he’s here!”

I walked over to see him. He was behind his house, cutting firewood, and as I got there, he looked up and in that moment I could tell he could see me!

He was so joyful and said thank you over and over again to us! It was an experience I will never forget!

When I came to YWAM Ships Kona to do a Discipleship Training School I mostly just signed up so I could do some traveling. I did not feel called to it. I really was not that close to God. I just wanted to travel and I knew my church would help pay for my trip. I had no expectations of my relationship with God changing at all nor any desire for my life to change.

My relationship with my parents was rough at the time. The first few weeks of DTS I did not really talk with them or miss them much. I was also pretty hard into alcohol before I came. When I landed in Kona I was still hung over from the night before.

The second week of DTS our speaker was David Gava. He was teaching about hearing God’s voice. I really liked his teaching, but was very skeptical. I wanted it to be true and thought it was such a cool idea, but anything I thought might be from God I questioned and wondered if it was just me.

David taught about how certain things can hold us back from hearing God, so I thought, “OK, it’s time to cut some things out of my life.” I decided to go six months without drinking any alcohol. I also decided to call my parents and fix my relationship with them.

Calling them was very difficult and very emotional. I wrote up a whole long list of things I wanted to talk to them about – a lot of built up resentment and things to confess to them. I didn’t get to half of it, but it sparked us talking more. I began texting them every day and calling them once a week. It was a process but I am now able to be open and honest with them and talk to them about my ups and downs. We are much closer now than before.

My relationship with God also became better than it had been in a long time. As I pursued a close relationship with God, cutting out the bad habits and destructive parts of my life naturally happened. This really opened me up to hearing God’s voice.

One day during this time I was praying with my outreach team. We were going to Greece but still had not decided exactly where to go. Our options were Athens, Thessaloniki, and Lesvos. I felt like God spoke a verse to me: 1 Thesalonians 3:1. I shared it with the group and we looked it up. To my amazement, it read, “ …we thought it best to be left by ourselves in Athens.” God was directing us to Athens!

From then on I knew I really could hear from God. It was a huge eye opener for me. I think I had heard things from God before but this made it so obvious and bolstered my confidence.

Since then I have heard God speak to me and experienced God’s guidance is so many different ways. I started to realize that God wants to have fun with me. He cares about the stuff I love to do and wants me to enjoy life with him. Living life with God is amazing.

When I took on the medical procurement position at YWAM Ships Kona we had almost zero money in our budget. We had a wish list of equipment we were hoping to get for our outreaches in Papua New Guinea but no idea how we would buy them.

One item on our wishlist was an autorefractor. This is a piece of medical equipment that determines the exact prescription glasses a patient needs. Our team already had two on board our medical ship The YWAM Liberty but they were large and not portable enough to use for our land based clinics. The ones we needed were smaller and much more portable. The only problem was that they cost $7,500. Did I mention our current bugdet was basically zero?

Also on our wishlist was a portable autoclave which would allow us to do surgical procedures for patients much faster. This cost a whopping $12,000 new, or $2,500 used.

So you can imagine my excitement when I was at a medical conference and came across a group named International Aid that said they might have the equipment we needed. I sent them an email detailing our wish list and they responded that they had both the autorefractor and the autoclave that we were looking for at the cost of only $500 apiece! Did we want them? they asked.

I was stunned. Still – our budget was basically zero. Our team talked about it, and we decided we would say yes even though we had no idea where we would get the money. We felt God leading us to accept and trust that he would make a way. We responded by saying we would take them and began thinking about how to raise the money.

Later that same day I was on the phone with one of our medical volunteers. Her and her friend (both ophthalmologists) were getting ready to join our team to do cataract surgeries in the highlands of Papua New Guinea. As we were talking, I felt God say to me, “share the need with her.” So I told her about my day and the equipment we had been offered and how we were about to start raising money for it.

How much do you need? she asked. And then, as soon as I told her, she donated the entire amount, plus another $500 for an extra autorefractor to donate to the local clinic in the highlands where we were about to send our next team. I immediately wrote back to our contact at International Aid and said we would take not 1 autorefractor but 2!

Our team was so blown away at how fast God worked to provide this equipment at an incredible price and the funds to buy it! We were so overjoyed and encouraged to see God working miraculously in the midst of our office day! We got to believe for the impossible and see God come through!

It was the YWAM Liberty’s first outreach in Bougainville, an autonomous region of Papua New Guinea. When we arrived, the government put on a lovely welcoming ceremony for us in the town square. They brought lots of dancers and a bamboo band for the event. Our crew was thrilled to experience this amazing part of Papua New Guinea culture.

While we were sitting there, the dancers kept going up, over and over again, to entertain everyone as we waited for some of the dignitaries to arrive. I looked around and noticed the locals had their arms crossed, staring at us. You could tell they were a little bit suspicious and probably asking themselves, “Who are these people? What do they want?”

Then I felt God leading me to get up and join the dancing. I laughed inside, thinking “you’re joking!” It was a very official ceremony. The vice president was there. I was representing the ship in an official capacity and would be making a speech later. I have experienced God’s leadings enough, though, to know that, if it is from God, it’s best to do it.

Overcoming my fear, I stood up and slowly walked over to the dancers. Everyone was staring at me, wondering what I was doing. I got over to them, looked around, and then started trying to dance. Immediately some other girls from our team jumped in and began dancing too. Then two guys on our team from West Africa joined in as well!

The locals loved this and began to laugh and be filled with joy. They loved that we were trying to learn their dances with them!

The spiritual atmosphere completely changed after this. No longer were people looking at us suspiciously, instead, they were relaxed, laughing, and joking.

Taking that step of faith was not easy, but I am so glad I did. It turned into a really beautiful time of being welcomed and seeing who the people there truly are – it broke the ice between us in a way that allowed people to let their guard down and be themselves and instantly built trust between us in such a fun way!