GOD MAKES A DIFFERENCE

Permanent or Temporary Change?
A scientist came to me the year he retired. He claimed to be an atheist, but he was in trouble because his son Stewart was going blind. He had lost most of his peripheral eyesight, and the doctor said his tunnel vision would also be gone and everything would be totally black by age thirty. His wife had become a Christian six year earlier, and he was angry with her. But now that the doctors had given up on Stewart, he said to her, “What will we do? It has been over two years, and Stewart will be blind.”
She asked him if he was willing to try anything, and he agreed that he would do anything for his son. She told him, “Go see Al Friesen.” He responded, “I will not go see him.” But, behind her back, he called me but didn’t really know what to ask. I told him he wanted change in his family, and he said, “Yes, that is what I want!”
I asked him whether he wanted permanent change or temporary change. He responded, “What kind of question is that! Of course I want permanent change. Everyone does!”
“There is one recipe for permanent change and about a million for temporary change,” I told him.”
“As a scientist, I would like the one recipe, please,” he answered. I suggested to him that he was not firing on all five cylinders—emotionally, socially, mentally, physically and spiritually.
“Spiritually?” he asked, “I am an atheist.” I told him that atheism is actually a religion!
“Let’s imagine,” I said, “you and I are on an escalator going down. Just in front of us is a woman on crutches. Because I hate crutches, I kick them out from under her and she goes tumbling down the stairs, taking others with her. What would you do?”
He said, “I would attack you and leave you in a puddle of blood!”
“Exactly,” I answered. “You have been kicking the crutches from your wife’s spiritual body for six years. If I would use your measure, I would rip off your ears, break your nose, carve up your tongue and poke out your eyes.” He just looked at me for a moment and then, with tears, in his eyes, asked me to lead him to Jesus.
His next question was, “Now, what do I do?” I gave him a Bible and told him to go home, wrap his arms around his sweetheart and ask for forgiveness for kicking the crutches from under her. “Then tell her, ‘Since God’s number one purpose for us is to honour Him and Jesus teaches us to present our needs to Him, let’s combine the two and pray.’ Tell the Lord to use Stewart’s blindness to honour His name in a huge way and to make your family strong enough for whatever that means.”
Three days later Stewart had his three-month check-up. It took a long time, but eventually the specialist came out and said, “Sir, sorry for the long wait, but my technology people have made some mistakes the past three times your son was here. His eyesight is better today than it was a year ago, and that is not how this kind of blindness works.” This new Christian scientist offered a humble explanation of how he had given his life to Jesus and that he suspected that the Master Physician had played into this.
I could you tell story after story of how I use the Scriptures from LifeLight Ministries. The ones I use most are How to Find God and The Living LifeLight. I really appreciate the description at the beginning of the NT of how a person can begin walking with God and how to use the Bible as a help in this new walk.
Al Friesen