Flesh Eating Bacteria - Grady Hospital Atlanta

It was a Sunday afternoon and the forecast was threatening rain. We were completing an incredible weekend of evangelism training and impartation meetings with our hero, Surprise Sithole. This was our last chance to take teams into the streets and show them how to preach the Gospel, heal the sick, prophecy, and cast out demons. Soon this awesome weekend would come to a close. But what an awesome weekend it had been so far.


I was heading up a team that was sent to Grady Hospital in downtown Atlanta. Our mission was to bring the Kingdom of Heaven to Grady. My mission was to show how easy this can be when you just rely on Jesus and do what he told us to do (Matt. 10:7-8, look it up).


All the teams met together in the parking garage next to Grady and then split up to go to different parts of downtown. Some went to a nearby park others to "The world of Coke" and others to Underground Atlanta. We were staying put outside of Grady. I was excited. I had never been to Grady without seeing someone healed or born again. It was going to be a good day. As we left the parking garage reality was standing their proudly as if to deter us from our faith that things could change. The first person we saw was a lady obviously strung out on drugs who was trying to sleep wit her head propped up on a nearby newspaper machine. Wino's and drug addicts surrounded us for a few feet. The good thing about "reality" is that Jesus can make it bend to his will. "Reality" comes crashing down at the feet of Jesus and his true reality takes its place.

We had a brief chance to lay hands on the lady who was trying to sleep before she asked us politely to leave her alone and let her sleep. As we made our way across the Entrance grounds to Grady I commented to the three ladies that were with me that this was highly unusual for their to be so few people sitting out in the benches in front of Grady. This is usually where all the action was and to make it really bizarre, there was no one sitting out there with any obvious ailments. After a few minutes of walking and scanning the area I had a slight pressure in my sinuses and a slight impression of a head ache. There were two ladies sitting in a bench nearby and we made a b-line towards them.

"Excuse me ladies i have a weird question for you. I might be way off in left field with this but are either of you having problems with pressure in your sinuses that are causing problems with headaches." The lady to my right had a puzzled look on her face and exclaimed "Yeah, me!" "Well I just wanted to let you know that Jesus is King and his Kingdom is on this Earth. Can we pray for you? The pain will leave and not come back." "Sure but I am not feeling it right now it is something that comes and goes pretty frequently." We laid our hands on her and prayed for her that it would not return but then things got even better.

"We prayed for you about that, is there anything that that is pressing right now that needs prayer? We want to help bring the Kingdom of God to you."

"Since you asked we are here because our sister is upstairs in the ICU because she has a rare flesh eating bacteria and is in a medically induced coma to make sure she doesn't get any worse. You can pray for her." we couldn't get up into the unit so one of the ladies pulled out a handkerchief that she kept in her bible and we began to pray for her healing while laying hands on the handkerchief. (Acts 19) We then told the lady to go and lay that handkerchief on her sister and she would be healed.

For most that would have signaled the end of the ministry time with these two ladies but the Lord began giving us words of knowledge. Their hearts began to race and tears filled their eyes as we began to reveal their hearts and talk about a conversation they had just had a few hours previous. I can not express the joy that two ladies had when we finished telling them what God was showing us. "We were just talking about that not an hour ago and I said those exact words. This must be God." It is amazing to me how encouraged people get when God shows you details especially about their giftings and callings. Most just want to know why they are here and to know that they have a purpose.


As we were about to walk away one of the ladies from my group had an idea to give them the church's address so they could tell us any news about the sister who had the flesh eating bacteria. I quickly asked one of the ladies we were praying for, for her number and text her the church's website address. When we left they hugged us with tears in their eyes and thanked us for the words. Both of them had previously given their heart to the Lord but this was what they needed to get back on track and they were amazed at what God had just done.

We went about trying to find someone else to pray for around Grady but as i said before it was an unusually slow day for the outside of Hospital. Our group passed back by the ladies about 30 minutes later and they were still in shock. Amazed and still crying they thanked us again and waved to us as we walked off heading back to the parking garage.

We were all encouraged but we had not seen anything dramatically healed on the spot. That night when we met back at the church to tell the stories we sat and listened to the other teams tell amazing stories of healings. Blind eyes, visible swelling, all kinds of things had been healed that afternoon but we didn't have a story to tell. The words of knowledge were incredible and these ladies were encouraged but there was nothing along the same lines that everyone else was sharing. This is unusual for me. I am accustomed to being up there telling the stories with everyone else. We had a good day and the team that was with me was really excited. Most of them had never done anything like this before and this was just what they needed to help them step out and do what God had told us all to do in normal, everyday life.



The Report

The following Wednesday afternoon my wife was busy with the kids and wouldn't be home till late so I headed out with a friend into a neighborhood where he had been going every week to preach the Gospel. When we loaded into the car he told me about a strange email he had received on the church website asking about our outreaches. He sent a quick email back explaining our vision and what we do. The reply he got back was amazing.

The email explained that a group from our church had prayed for a prayer clothe at Grady Hospital and told her to lay it on her sister who was in the ICU with a flesh eating bacteria. She went on to explain that she worked for the CDC and that the bacteria was unusually rare and was definitely life threatening. She laid the handkerchief on her sister and within an hour all of the flesh eating bacteria was gone. JESUS!

This is what happens when we obey. The sick are healed, the blind see, the dead are raised, and the Gospel is preached to the poor. Jesus truly is King and his desire is for His will to be done on Earth as it is in Heaven (Matt 6:10).