4-6-2005

Kim, and prayer circle friends,

You would not believe what just happened......

I wrote an email a couple hours ago just saying how sick, and discouraged, I felt?  And you already know how I have been searching for God's face in the midst of the chaos of everything happening right now that doesn't make sense?

A niece I have never met or talked to (granddaughter of an uncle - is niece the right word?), who apparently has been getting ranch emails forwarded to her from another relative, called and left a message, near the same time that I was writing my discouraged email, saying that God has laid me quite suddenly on her heart to pray for me. Didn't know why, but just that she was supposed to call and pray for me.

So I called her back after I got offline, and we talked a little bit, and then prayed together, while at the same time I was eating a raw onion that someone suggested that I eat to help kick this cold/flu bug. I was eating the onion before I called her, and not much was happening. But as she was praying, all of a sudden my sinuses started draining, rapidly so, releasing all that pressure in my blocked sinus cavities that was driving me literally to tears of pain earlier in the day.  Now it was literally running from my nose like tears. The pressure is now pretty much gone, and almost all of my sinus cavities now feel clear, clearer than they have in weeks and weeks (better even than normal when not sick). Incidentally, I continued to munch on that raw onion even after we got off the phone, and though it did help, it did not produce the same effect that my niece's prayer did. So I know God had His finger in there somewhere too, and touched me with it.

There is still a little pain there in the left side of my jaw and cheek and forehead, but the pressure has lifted, and I feel encouraged.  That God would reach down and lay me on someone's heart that I have never even met or talked to, to have them call me out of the blue just to pray with/for/over me, to encourage me with the ranch building (they want to come help sometime?), then to have God reach down to touch me with His own finger of healing as my niece was praying for me, it was something that I needed, something tangible to let me know that God is still there, that He is still in control, that He has heard our every desperate prayer that we have prayed recently, and longs to reassure us that things are under control.

I just had to share this. God is good. I am feeling better - not well, but immensely better. Fever is down too. And tomorrow is a new day in which to serve God with new Joy in my heart.

Thank you Kim and all of you who have been praying for me. It is good, and God is honored. Apparently He is after some pretty special fruit in my life to keep the pressure on so intensely in the process of molding me, so I guess I just need to be thankful, and accept the molding willingly..... *soft chuckle*

In Him

Sincerely,

-Tim

Tim Benedict
Thorn Creek Conference Center
21 Yellowpine Lane
Boise, ID 83716
208-392-6723
tbenedict@bigskytel.net