Signs and Wonders God Wrought in the Ministry for Forty Years/Chapter 27
CHAPTER XXVII
MEETINGS AT MOLINE, ILLINOIS
In 1903 I held meetings in the beautiful Prospect Park for three weeks, and had good success. Many were born into the Kingdom of our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ, and many were healed of all their diseases. The interest was great when we closed, but had. to do so because the weather got so cold and wet. I baptized in the beautiful lake; a large crowd witnessed the sublime scene. As one after another came up from the watery grave, and the power of the Lord was manifested, we all were made to rejoice in the presence of the Lord. Several came from Muscatine and Andalusia, and were baptized, and they felt that they were well paid for the sacrifice they had made in coming so far. We went from there back to Andalusia, where we held the last meeting in the large tent. The Lord had been there in great power; the surrounding country was stirred; many were saved and God, backed His word with signs and wonders; many were healed and many fell prostrated under the power of God and received wonderful blessings.
We went back the second time a their urgent call so that the work might be more firmly established. While we were away the people of Moline went on with the work, and the interest was so good, that they opened the way for us to come back. I felt sure the Lord was calling.
We commenced our work in Warr Hall. The first four weeks there were thirteen hundred bowed at the altar; I prayed for each, with laying on of hands, and nearly all were converted or reclaimed; and nearly all were healed of from, one to a dozen diseases. The power was present just as it was in the days of Christ, and the Apostles—we do not read of any place where the work was greater—sixty at the altar for healing, at once, in the afternoon meeting. Nearly every one got up rejoicing, showing by their testimonies that they were perfectly well. Many people in the gallery shouted or waved their hands; sometimes nearly the whole house was weeping at the wonderful miracles that were done before them all.
The scenes were wonderful; every meeting they could hardly wait until I gave them the opportunity to come to the altar; then there would be a rush; they brought them in chairs; on cots; and on pillows; the blind, lame, halt, deaf, dumb, and the paralytic; those dying with consumption, tumors, cancer, blood poisoning, catarrh of the stomach and lungs, or all through the blood; broken bones and everything else—all chronic diseases that could not be cured by any earthly power—they laid them at the feet of Jesus, and as at Peter’s great revival they tried to get near enough for his shadow to fall on them, so it was. here—everyone tried to get the nearest me, like those at the Pool of Bethesda, to get into the water first. One after another they were healed; sometimes in an hour every one would be up rejoicing. The people looking on saw large tumors and goiters go, and cancers disappear; children got up and walked, that never had walked before. They saw the deaf hear, the dumb speak, those that had never heard or spoken before. They wondered and were amazed; and they gave glory to God for His great power and love for suffering humanity.
POLICE HELP
The Police Force took quite an interest in bringing the afflicted in the ambulance and carrying them in on stretchers. One man was perfectly helpless with inflammatory rheumatism. He could not move his fingers, and was in great pain with fever. He was saved and healed, and walked upon the platform, then walked out, and down to the Police Station. When the Officers came for him he was gone. They laughed and took the cot, and went out. Infidels and all kinds of sinners who had never before believed in God, were convinced of the reality of the religion of Jesus, and were converted.
A doctor, one of the finest men in the city, when he saw so many of his patients healed, was converted and became an earnest worker.
Men and women of all kinds, both business men and others, came for healing and. received the double cure. The superintendent of the Business Colleges of the Tri-Cities brought his father from a distance, who had to use an ear trumpet. He went away with his son with his hearing restored. Scores of Catholics were converted and healed. One Nun who had been lame and afflicted with heart disease for fifteen years, and could get no help anywhere, was saved and perfectly cured. She came back and gave glory to God.
Some Jews, one the wife of a Rabbi, came for healing. When she first came she asked if she could not be healed without Jesus. I told her no, she could not. She said she did not want anything to do with Jesus. She was badly afflicted, and had suffered much for many years. I talked some to her, and then she went away; but she came back in a few days, was saved and healed, and confessed Christ in public, praising Him for His wonderful works.
Many Swedish and German people and other nationalities came. We could not understand each other, but they were healed and converted.
Two boys were brought from the deaf and dumb school. The deaf and dumb spirits were cast out, and they both talked and heard perfectly. Three mutes came—two men and one woman. All received their hearing and speech. The woman was healed of other diseases, two of which were heart trouble and tumor. When her husband saw she was healed, and that the tumor was gone, he cried and praised the Lord.
A woman in Moline came with a cancer; she had been given up to die by all the physicians. Her mother died with cancer. Her clothes just hung on her—she could not bear anything to touch her, because the least pressure would make her vomit. When I saw the condition she was in, so swollen and deformed, I threw back her wrap and told the people to look at her, she was dying with a cancerous tumor, but the Lord was going to heal her and take it all away right then. She could not kneel down, so I told her to sit on the altar, and that God was going to heal her now. I laid my hands upon her and in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, I commanded the unclean spirits to go out of her. All the pain and misery, the cancer, and the tumor, all passed away. She arose before all who had been watching, from the gallery down, praising the Lord, and saying she was perfectly healed. She came back and testified to being made whole and well.
Shouts arose from the gallery and all over the hall. Strong men wept, and men and women came and knelt at the altar saying, “I believe there is a God; I want to be a Christian.”
A lady came from Iowa, almost dead with tumor; she was given up by the specialists of Chicago and St. Louis. The pain was so great she could not be still one minute. When she came to the meeting and to the altar, we laid on hands and in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, commanded the tumorous spirit with all its works and pain, to come out of her. She was made whole and arose shouting and praising God, who had so wonderfully healed her. She stayed several days without a sign of the tumor, gave many ringing testimonies, and started home to tell what great things the Lord had done for her. The audience looked on in wonder and amazement, at the mighty miracles God was performing at our hands.
A woman brought her boy, six years old, full of tumors all over his body, the most awful sight you ever saw, so deformed. They, were in his throat and in his windpipe, he had a bad cough with it, nearly choking him to death; he had been treated by twenty doctors and had three operations performed. He could not rest a minute, night or day. From the first time we prayed for him he never suffered any more, but slept like a baby! Was quiet day and night. The people could see how fast the tumors were disappearing. It was a great mountain, but in the name of Jesus it was removed and cast into the sea.
Scores of deaf people of all ages were healed—those born deaf, from babies to forty or fifty years of age. Others whose eardrums had been destroyed in different ways, had them restored, and were made to hear. A lady from South Dakota had been deaf in one ear for forty years, and her arm had been paralyzed for nineteen years; she could not raise it to her head, but she was instantly healed.
Over two thousand came or were brought to the altar. We prayed for her; and most all were converted or reclaimed. Nearly all were healed of from one: to a dozen chronic diseases. Hundreds were converted and healed, at the same time; receiving the double cure; Salvation for Soul and Body; like the paralytic son to whom Christ said: “Son, thy sins are forgiven thee; rise, take up they bed and walk.” “Which is easier to say, “Thy sins are forgiven thee,” or, to say, “Arise and walk.” You see one was as easy for the Lord to do as the other, and He did both at once, for He Himself took our infirmities, and bear our sicknesses.” Matt. 8. 17.
The Lord intended the Healing of Soul and Body to go together, that the world might believe He was the Same (Heb. 13. 8), and believe our report, and know that the Lord loved us as He loved His Son.
REMARKABLE HEALING
AT ROCK ISLAND, ILLINOIS, MEETING
There was a boy seven years old, had never walked; he was born insane, blind, deaf, and dumb, and was always pounding his head and beating himself like the maniac amongst the tombs. They tried everything, including the best medical help, but the doctors could not locate his sufferings, and they said he would never have any sense; but praise the Lord, he says, “I am the God of all flesh, is there anything too hard for me?”
Praise his holy name, “All things are possible to him that believeth.” We told the parents if they would give themselves and child into the hands of the Lord, I had faith that the Lord would heal him; they were Catholics. The Lord has performed the greatest miracle ever known; there is no case of healing in bible record so wonderful as this boy.
The man born blind was considered a great wonder; then the man at the Beautiful Gate, who was healed of weak ankles, and who, was born lame, was considered a great miracle; but this child was born blind, deaf, and dumb, and had no mind; now he can hear and see perfectly. God has given him a bright, intelligent mind; he laughs and plays, and walks around in front of the pulpit every day in view of all the congregation; before he was healed he had spasms, as many as twenty a day, but now he is well and happy. Im healing this child God has put his seal on this work, and proven to the world that I am called and sent of God, that the Lord is using me in a wonderful way to do his will in these last days.
The power of Elijah is working among the people with mighty miracles, signs, and wonders, showing that the coming of the Lord is near at hand, even at the door. I. Thes. iv. 16. He is preparing the Bride, mounting her on the White Horse of Power, ready to meet the Bridegroom.