New Wine Healing

My wife and I spent a romantic weekend in the town of Leavenworth, Washington, to celebrate our anniversary. Leavenworth is a Bavarian theme town nestled on the eastern slopes of the Cascade Mountains. The downtown area is a bustling shopping district that draws tourists from around the world. Hanging baskets of petunias, fuchsias and geraniums adorn the street corners. Eastern Washington is famous for its apple orchards and in recent years it’s earned a reputation for its wines. One morning while strolling through the shops in the downtown area, we spotted a quaint little store that sold locally bottled wines. A sign in the window invited visitors in to sample their newest vintage, so we went inside.

We struck up a conversation with the woman behind the counter who poured the wine samples.

“What are you folks in town for?”

“We’re celebrating our anniversary by healing people with injuries.”

“Well that’s different. Can I interest you in a sample of one of our wines?”

“Sure. Do you have anything on the sweet side?”

“We have a nice Riesling that you might like.” She got a glass and poured while I thought about asking her my next question.

“You don’t happen to have any chronic pain do you?”

“No… well, except for my shoulder. I can’t raise my right arm up very high without it hurting on top of my shoulder.”

“Do me a favor? Raise your right arm as high as you can without causing it to hurt.” She raised it almost exactly 90 degrees, straight out from her body. My wife and I recognized this as one of the classic signs of “frozen shoulder” also called adhesive capsulitis. Raising the arm up brings severe pain in the shoulder.

“I’ll bet you have frozen shoulder. It may have begun with a rotator cuff injury. Have you had an MRI yet?”

“No. I just live with the pain. I’m afraid to find out what’s wrong.”

“You don’t have to live with the pain. We’ve seen a lot of people healed of the same injury you have. In fact, my wife had frozen shoulder once. For her it all started with a torn rotator cuff.”

My wife explained that after her diagnosis, she rejected the surgery for the torn muscle. She said, “Instead, we went to visit a couple from our church and I was healed after about 30 minutes of prayer!”

I jumped in and asked the woman, “Do you mind if I pray for you? It won’t take 30 minutes.”

“I don’t mind at all.”

I like to close my eyes briefly to see if the Holy Spirit will show me a vision about what’s going on with the person or their injury. In this instance, I didn’t see anything “in the spirit” so I opened my eyes and commanded pain and inflammation to leave. I commanded healing of the tendons, muscles, ligaments and cartilage. It went very quickly. I asked if she felt anything.

“What do you mean?”

“Do you feel any heat or tingling in your shoulder?”

With a little hesitation she answered, “Not really.”

“I’d like you to do something. Would you try to raise your arm up as high as you can?” (I raised mine to show her how I wanted her to do it.) She raised her arm up until it extended straight above her head. Her mouth dropped open in surprise.

“Oh my gosh! It doesn’t hurt.”

We stayed for about 20 more minutes and shared a little with her about some of our experiences with God. We told her about the elderly couple that had been healed at Walmart the previous day. We talked about wine and bought two bottles to take home with us. I bought the Riesling and my wife selected a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon. This was just one of the many people we saw healed on our weekend getaway. Jesus made our vacation better than we expected.