This past weekend, I helped with a retreat called Holy Spirit 101. It is based on the book by the same title written by a young woman, Victoria Harris, aka Tori, who has prayed for many people to be healed—and they were.
She was getting some of the usual resistance that comes with operating in the supernatural, similar to those objections in scripture, “These works are of the devil.”
Even a few hundred years after Jesus walked the earth, the Catholic Church created guidelines for praying for others because they were seeing abuses. So the Church has gone through many times of prayer and discernment in regard to operating in the spiritual gifts described in scripture.
In order to operate within the guidelines of the Magisterium of the Catholic Church, and thereby operating safely in the spiritual realm, Tori decided that she would research the history beginning at the time of Jesus, through the centuries, all the councils, to find out how the laity may effectively pray for our friends, family and others under the authority of the Catholic Church. Remaining under the authority of the Catholic Church is important. The enemy is legalistic. He loves when we break rules. Breaking rules gives him free reign in our lives.
Her book, Holy Spirit 101 has the imprimatur and nihil obstat which means that the book has been approved by the Magisterium and nothing written in the book conflicts with the teachings of the Catholic Church.
With this, she has been allowed to build a ministry training lay people to effectively pray for people.
This past weekend was one of those training retreats which goes through the entire book instructing in the gifts and simulating prayer sessions. Those of us who have gone through the training before facilitate those who are currently on the retreat for the first time.
These retreatants love God and are hungry for more of Him. Like so many people these days, many are wounded by life circumstances and are in need of healing prayer themselves.
In the first session I was to help facilitate, it was supposed to be a quick time of asking what gifts of the Holy Spirit the retreatant wanted to be given. Instead of asking for the gifts, our first retreatant wanted obstacles to be taken away to allow her to operate in the gifts. Mistakenly, I proceeded as I would have in a regular prayer session. My co-facilitator had to gently pull us back to the task at hand. So, I was careful from that point on to let my co-facilitator lead the sessions.
I felt inadequate throughout the rest of the training. I had done my training with AriseWorship about four years ago and spent two years ministering with Arise. Then I moved to Michigan, landing in the Encounter School of Ministry. While the prayer model is very similar, it has been several years since I had helped on the AriseWorship retreat.
We were on a strict schedule, having to limit our time to the basic instructions. Even though each group had as many as six participants needing practice, we only had time for one to go through the process.
In one session, we had one who volunteered to be the prayer leader and another who volunteered to be the supplicant.
As she went through the 10 steps in the prayer format, the prayer leader came to the part when when she asks the supplicant what she wanted prayer for.
The elderly lady sitting two seats away from me replied, “Spiritual healing.”
Immediately, I felt the time constraint. I could see this woman had a genuine need that she hoped the Lord would meet right then and there. I also knew the prayer leader didn’t have the experience to deal with a deep need like the one I was seeing.
Pretty quickly my co-facilitator jumped in prayed a quick prayer but I knew it didn’t reach the place that needed to be touched. I debated. As I prayed about what to do, I felt my heart swell and pressure in my chest.
I asked her if she felt a weight on her heart. She said yes and describe the issue.
I got up and moving to her, I put my hands on her shoulders. As quickly and succinctly as I could, I prayed for the situation she described, asked that the Holy Spirit bring peace and joy in the place of the trauma. I’m sure I could have gone deeper but felt I hit all the high points, finished the prayer and went back to my seat, hoping it was sufficient to move on in the training.
A moment later, the supplicant, who had sat still and quiet as she had when my co-facilitator prayed for her, was suddenly weeping.
“Oh, boy.” I said under my breath and went back to her to check in to find out what was happening and hand her some tissues. “Are these good tears or bad tears.” I asked.
All she did was nod which I took to mean good tears.
She kept crying and after a couple of minutes the two women sitting on either side of her and one or two others in the group were crying also.
Wiping away her own tears, the prayer leader commented that there are so many people in the world who are hurting so much.
I agreed and said to the group, “That’s why it’s so important for more people to learn how to operate in the spiritual gifts and pray for people.
Over the past 26 years, I have experience healing ministries in many places, including non-denominational, Pentecostal, and evangelical ministries. I have also seen and experienced firsthand many abuses, pride and self-righteousness, often adding insult to injury.
Once my husband was told, “if you had faith, you would be healed.” Having experienced this and other unhelpful judgments, he turned it around. “No,” he said, “if you had faith I would be healed.”
Comments such as this are brutal to the heart of someone who is already in pain and confused.
It’s admirable to want to pray for people, but the importance of learning how to operate in the gifts of the Holy Spirit with the humility of the Holy Spirit cannot be understated.
Both AriseWorship Ministry out of Mary Immaculate Catholic Church in Farmers Branch, TX and Encounter Ministries in Brighton, MI teach how to show the gentle love of God to those who are suffering, without adding further guilt and condemnation to their already heavy burden.
