My friend Lloyd shared his friend's remarkable and instructive testimony with me. This man was an avowed unbeliever. One day, as he was strolling through a very crowded mall, he inadvertently bumped into a middle-aged lady. She braced herself for the impact by forcibly placing her hand on his shoulder, smiling, and then going her separate way. When he left that mall, something strange and wonderful happened. He became obsessed with the need to get right with God, despite his prior history of disinterest in spiritual matters. By the end of the day, he had repented and surrendered his life to Christ. Years later, he saw a photo of Christian faith healer, Kathryn Kuhlman, and recognized her as the woman whose hand had touched him that life-changing day with a blessing that allowed the Holy Spirit to pursue him with convicting power!
Kathryn Kuhlman was "a blessing machine." As a young man, I attended Fuller Seminary in Pasadena for a year before transferring to Princeton. One Sunday, my Aussie friend Sam and I attended her noon healing service at the LA Shrine Auditorium, where the Academy Award ceremonies used to be hosted. You had to get there an hour early to get one of the 9,000 seats. Sam insisted that we sit on the platform with the long line of about 60 ministers. At one point, Kathryn wheeled around, looked at us, and jokingly said, "Did you ever see such a dead bunch of pastors? I think they need a blessing, don't you?" The huge audience roared their approval. She then began giving each pastor a gentle touch of blessing on their foreheads. It seemed like her gentle touch electricuted them because it catapulted each of them off their seat, prostrate on the floor! but as she approached Sam and I, sitting at the end of the long row, I was frightened because I'd never been "slain in the Spirit" before, and so, I didn't want her to touch me. Amazingly, without looking my way, she stopped, listened to what the Spirit was telling her, and discontinued her blessings just a couple of people before she would have gotten to Sam and me. I was impressed with her gift of spiritual discernment.
I later learned that a Presbyterian seminarian, a huge ex-college football player, had talked to her after a healing service, when she casually touched him and he "fell under the power," despite his lack of experience with such a phenomenon! Kathryn's whole way of being seemed to be oriented towards blessing all she met and Lloyd's friend was the beneficiary of her touch of blessing in that providential encounter in that crowed mall.
My next planned post will discuss the biblical basis for such a blessing ministry and will make a case for how each of us can learn to become blessing machines like Kathryn Kuhlman.
Kathryn Kuhlman was "a blessing machine." As a young man, I attended Fuller Seminary in Pasadena for a year before transferring to Princeton. One Sunday, my Aussie friend Sam and I attended her noon healing service at the LA Shrine Auditorium, where the Academy Award ceremonies used to be hosted. You had to get there an hour early to get one of the 9,000 seats. Sam insisted that we sit on the platform with the long line of about 60 ministers. At one point, Kathryn wheeled around, looked at us, and jokingly said, "Did you ever see such a dead bunch of pastors? I think they need a blessing, don't you?" The huge audience roared their approval. She then began giving each pastor a gentle touch of blessing on their foreheads. It seemed like her gentle touch electricuted them because it catapulted each of them off their seat, prostrate on the floor! but as she approached Sam and I, sitting at the end of the long row, I was frightened because I'd never been "slain in the Spirit" before, and so, I didn't want her to touch me. Amazingly, without looking my way, she stopped, listened to what the Spirit was telling her, and discontinued her blessings just a couple of people before she would have gotten to Sam and me. I was impressed with her gift of spiritual discernment.
I later learned that a Presbyterian seminarian, a huge ex-college football player, had talked to her after a healing service, when she casually touched him and he "fell under the power," despite his lack of experience with such a phenomenon! Kathryn's whole way of being seemed to be oriented towards blessing all she met and Lloyd's friend was the beneficiary of her touch of blessing in that providential encounter in that crowed mall.
My next planned post will discuss the biblical basis for such a blessing ministry and will make a case for how each of us can learn to become blessing machines like Kathryn Kuhlman.
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