By Evans Aboagye Tawiah
For two weeks, I took the doctor’s drugs as prescribed but there wasn’t any improvement in my symptoms. The itching refused to stop, the rashes refused to disappear and the genital sores refused to heal. I was greatly disturbed and uncomfortable and I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t go to the Malam because of known reasons not to talk of the spiritualist I once visited.
So my next line of action was to start going for crusades and deliverance in different churches. I hadn’t heard from Hon. Clifford since that day; maybe he was busy, I didn’t know. The woman who had been tormenting me hadn’t appeared for sometime but I still had the fear that she could appear anytime. If only
returning her money would make her leave me alone, I didn’t mind returning it.
No new job had come my way. The few that came I turned them down because there was no way I could go and service a client with the disease I was carrying. I hadn’t heard from my mum since my last
visit home and I wasn’t even planning to cos I didn’t want to throw her into panic.
The first church whose deliverance service I attended was one pentecostal church close to my school whose name I wouldn’t want to mention. I had come very early about one hour before the service started and sat in the centre row waiting for the prayers to begin. The prayers soon began and everybody started to fire. The entire congregation began to bind and cast and I joined. I needed solution to my ailment and I was willing to do anything even giving up my ashawo business. All the money I made from the business was gradually being drained by hospital bills so I needed a cure and needed it fast.
I had made God a promise that I would never go back to ashawo business if he cured me but I guess he was yet to answer and I was ready to continue begging till he answered. I had grown so thin like someone with HIV even though I didn’t have it. I looked like a bamboo stick and was now a shadow of my former self.
Infact if I had happened to turn up before a client in my present condition, the client would have jumped from the window and run for their life. I needed divine intervention and I needed it quick and was willing to seek it from anywhere including the church.
So as the prayers went on, I fired on.
During the altar call I went to the front and presented myself to Christ in repentance. I was willing to accept him in my life so far as I get well. And so I jumped from one church to the other
in search of a cure. I met the pastor of the church after the service and told him my predicament of which he asked me whether I had accepted Jesus into my life to be my lord and personal saviour
to which I responded yes and he prayed for me and gave me some bible-psalms to read.
All this while, Mirabel continued to be of great help to me. The sickness had so much changed me to the extent that all the beauty I once radiated all faded away. I continued to hope and pray that God would have mercy on me and save
me. And it was as if God wasn’t listening. So I continued to jump from one church to another till something remarkable happened one sunday.
That morning I woke up very late unlike me. I looked at the time and it was some minutes after 10. I hurriedly went to the bathroom to have my bath and prepare for church. I didn’t know the particular church to attend but I decided to leave everything in the hands of the holy spirit to direct me. The other day, some group of people on evangelism had given me their flyer and invited me to worship with them in their church.
It was from such flier that I learnt about
some pastors and selected the church I
attended each sunday. I had attended lots of crusades and deliverance sessions hoping for a miracle but none seemed to be forthcoming. On this particular sunday I had woken up very late and went to bath. By the time I was through, the time was fifteen minutes to eleven.
The sunday services of most churches began by 9 so I was already late. I hurried my preparation and hopped into my car and off to church. I had barely entered the door to the church when the pastor stopped abruptly in the middle of his sermon and closed his eyes. He mumbled some inaudible words and stopped
again.
“Stop there!” He shouted with eyes still
closed.
I stopped with fear as I wasn’t sure whether I was the person he was talking to or not. I was the only person walking in at that time so I was most likely the one. But then the pastor’s eyes were still closed so I couldn’t tell for sure. All eyes turned on me and I felt very uncomfortable. In the bid to avoid the preying eyes of the congregation, I continued my walk into the church.
“I said you should stop there!”
The pastor repeated making it obvious that I was the person he was talking to.
“You’re walking in with legions of demons so stop!”
I stood still in obedience even though my
heart had left my chest long ago from shock.
“Confess!” The pastor directed opening his eyes.
He was standing on the pulpit while I stood far off at the back of the church.
I stood still staring at the pastor.
“Come forward,” the pastor directed swinging his hand in a peculiar way. “Come forward and confess.”
There was intense murmuring from the
congregation as everybody wanted to
understand what was happening. I was too
terrified to move not to talk of confessing before this huge congregation.
But then something strange happened when the pastor shouted in a loud voice:
“I command you in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth to come forward and confess!”
Instantly an unseen force started pushing me from behind towards the pulpit. I was greatly terrified and tried to resist but could not. Like an obedient servant I succumbed to the push and was soon standing face to face with the pastor.
“Linda,” the pastor called me.
I looked up with shock. I had never met the pastor before so I wondered how he knew my name.
“Confess and be free!” He prodded on.
I opened my mouth to talk but no sound came out. I was totally blank and confused and was sweating profusely. I was like someone whose tongue was tied and try as I may, I couldn’t utter any word. Then the pastor tapped my forehead with his right hand and I fell backwards to the ground. I would have hit my head on the slab if not forbthe timely intervention of his junior pastors who
caught me in mid air and gently lay me on the floor. The fall untied my tongue and my confessions began. I felt like a boiling kettle erupting as I confessed. I confessed that I was an ashawo girl and that everything I owned was a product of ashawo. I confessed that I once killed a man in the process of ashawo. I confessed that I had dealings with one malam which backfired and caught up with me. I confessed to having sex with a fellow woman even though it was just once. I confessed everything. When I was done, I felt this peculiar calmness inside and I knew at once that my miracle had
happened…
watchout for the final episode (episode 27)
