One night in the late 1920s, John Robert Stevens lay in bed, suffering in the throes of longstanding mastoid infections. His body was wracked with fever, and he could barely think through his piercing headache. Despite multiple lancings of both ears, he spent many nights in sleepless agony. The young Stevens was desperate to be well again. As his parents attempted to comfort their eldest son, the promise of James 5:14-15 came to his remembrance from all those weeks at Sunday school, and he recited it in a weak voice to his parents:
Is anyone among you sick? Then he must call for the elders of the church and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up…
Stevens was aware that a visiting evangelist was in town. He entreated his parents to bring the preacher to come and heal him. His mother and father talked together and decided that they would blame themselves if they didn’t act on this simple request and their first-born son died.
So Stevens’ father found the visiting evangelist who had just set up a tabernacle for a revival in Newton, Iowa. The preacher had a service and was unable to go the Stevens’ residence to lay hands on the boy, but he knelt and prayed with his father. As his father drove home in his Model A Ford, John Stevens’ fever broke, and his ears drained. He had been healed instantly.1
A Childhood HealingCitations
1. Stevens, John Robert: “A Trumpet Sounded in the Mountains”, Put Your Lips to the Trumpet: John Robert Stevens, 1975. 75081803R
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