At the beginning of our conversation I expressed that I was feeling

miserable.  I was sick with bronchitis, having the chills and a fever.  My

lip was throbbing from an abscess, a huge, hot and rock hard lump rubbing

against my teeth when I talked or smiled, making it impossible to eat and

pulling my face tight.   Imagine how painful it was to cough, both in my

chest and my lip.  I was in agony and feeling very sorry for myself.

We were talking about Christians being demon-oppressed opposed to being

demon-possessed.  We discussed how sickness came from sin, and was caused by

demons.  We looked at the main cause of sickness in people’s lives, which is

stress.  I have been experiencing poor health lately, and was sick of

feeling sick.  I had had tonsillitis without having tonsils, never thought

that was possible.  I had an abscess in a spit gland in my inner lip.  Never

even heard of that before.  It was clear to me that these were attacks from

the enemy, these weren’t illnesses that I was supposed to be having, but

somehow I had allowed them into my body.  So when we talked of stress being

the leading cause of sickness, I realized how stressed I had been the last

few weeks.  I realized that I had allowed the enemy to steal my peace and

cause me to stress about losing control over things that were going on in my

life at the time.  We processed out that I had not resisted the devil’s

attempts to steal my peace, but played right into his hand by allowing

myself to become anxious about the situation.  I should have submitted my

stressful thoughts to God. I didn’t resist the devil and change my thought

processes.  By not doing this I had opened myself up to attack from the

enemy.  I had lost my peace in the Lord.  This was an eye opener to me, as I

hadn’t even realized that this was happening.  We prayed together, and I

repented for allowing negative thoughts to rule my life, not submitting to

God.  I gave it all to Jesus in my heart.  Knowing now what had gone wrong I

repented to the Holy Spirit for not listening for his voice, for trying to

handle things on my own, for wanting to keep control.  We asked for

forgiveness and healing.

I felt an immediate change.  Through our conversation I had begun to relax

and unwind, coughing less often.  But as soon as we finished praying the

hot, throbbing pain in my lip subsided and the bulge was gone!  There was

just a little soft lump left where the abscess had been minutes before.  I

no longer had the chills, the fever had left and my aching head felt light

and refreshed.  My tongue kept returning to where the abscess had been, not

being able to believe that it wasn’t there any more.  I was in awe, and

still am!  And so very grateful.  It’s still unreal to me how God had taught

me a lesson in trust and surrendering control of my life to Him, changing my

thought life and standing up against the enemy’s tactics, and had healed me

in the wink of an eye.  I went to work today full of vitality, with a broad,

pain free smile.  I wasn’t sick at all, I wasn’t coughing any longer and

there was no sign of the abscess.  All without having to take any of the

medicine the doctor had given me.  One of my colleagues commented:  “You’re

looking different. have you lost some weight?”  And I just laughed as I

thought of the burden that I had carried on my shoulders.  “Yes”, I said.

“I have.”                 This person lives in South Africa and this whole thing took place over skype from my home in Washington State.