Cast Away

A few years before I came on staff with YWAM Ships, I was visiting Kona, walking along the beach at the Old Airport. I felt God telling me that I would have a season here in which I would walk alongside younger guys and talk with them about the Holy Spirit. 

During my second quarter on staff, I was out on an early morning run with Nils, a German DTS student who I had become friends with. Our run took us to the Old Airport runway, just inland from the beach I had been walking on those years before.

As we ran, Nils began telling me how he had been reading more about the Holy Spirit in the New Testament. It was an awesome conversation and I was amazed at how it was such a clear fulfillment of God’s word to me at that exact same location years before.

Nils was famously accident prone during DTS. It became a bit of a running joke. First it was getting washed up on the rocks after a night swim at Pine Trees beach. Then his leg got sucked into an underwater pipe at a waterfall area on the island we call Narnia. Then, during a soccer game one night, he collided with another student and broke his arm!

The next day we were talking and I felt like God was giving me faith to believe for a miraculous healing. I was a bit nervous though and did not step out in faith. I just did nothing.

Then, after Nils got his cast on, the doctors told him it would be at least five weeks, but probably seven, before he could get it off. They scheduled a check up in three weeks, though, to see if he could get a smaller cast that did not go beyond his elbow. After that he would have to get his final cast off while on outreach in Papua New Guinea – something he was not happy about. 

I felt like I might have missed what God wanted to do when I first felt led to believe for a miracle. Then I got another opportunity. Nils and I were sitting by the pool, talking, and I shared with him that I felt God wanted to heal his arm. This time I laid hands on his cast and, along with another friend, prayed a prayer of faith that his arm would be healed by the three week check up.

Three weeks later, Nils got back from the hospital and his cast was off. The Doctor and Nurse had done an X-ray and his arm no longer needed a cast of any size. I was so overjoyed. It felt like, even though I may have missed the first thing God led me to do, God still met us in our faith and healed Nil’s arm. It was an awesome experience. We told everyone at the base and, even now as I am writing this, I feel deep joy welling up inside me as I recall it. It was an amazing experience to witness this miracle and see the Holy Spirit at work in our lives.

Iain Cook
Communications
YWAM Ships Kona

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