Jesus' Program of Deliverance (Adventures in Religion #7)

By John G. Lake
July 3, 1935

I am pleased to greet you today, dear friends, with a real account of one of the marvellous adventures in God. Jesus said,

β€œHeal the sick, cleanse the lepers, raise the dead, cast out devils: freely ye have received, freely give.” Matt. 10:8

Christianity was not to be stinted in her giving. She was not to be a beggar. She was to be a giver. She had something from heaven to give that the world did not have. She had something to give that would bring deliverance to the world. Jesus was putting His program of deliverance in force through the Church.

The man is a bold man who undertakes to carry out this program of Jesus. The Christian who never has faith enough in God to undertake it, I fear, is of the cowardly type. I am afraid that modern Christianity stands indicted at the bar of God for cowardliness because of fear to undertake the program of Jesus.

Friends, that is why we urge upon men the necessity of the Baptism of the Holy Ghost. It is the only thing that brings the heavenly equipment to the hearts of men, that makes them equal to this program and the possibility of carrying it out.

I want to talk to you today of a bold soul, and in my judgment a very extraordinary one indeed. I refer to a gentleman who lives in this city, a preacher of the gospel from the days of his youth, Rev. C. W. Westwood. His home is on Nora Avenue.

A number of years ago there was born at one of the great hospitals of the city, a little child (a girl) from healthy parents, Mr and Mrs Young. Mr Young for many years had a stall in the Westlake Market. Mrs Young has been a nurse for many years and also is well known. When this baby was born it weighed 6-1/2 pounds. Because of some strange difficulty the child could not assimilate its food. When she was nine months old she only weighed, four and a half pounds. The child looked more like a little dried up alligator than it did like a human being. She finally fell into a state of death and remained in a dying condition. In the meantime lie were called to minister to the child.

Mr Westwood was assigned to the case. One day when he went to the hospital as usual to minister to the child, they explained that the child was not there. It had died that morning and was in the dead room. He asked if he might see the child, and went into the dead room, took the child down. He sat down on a chair with the baby on his knees. He opened his heart to God, turned the spirit of faith in his heart loose on behalf of the little one. In a little while, (and I am saying this with all reverence before God, because I expect to meet this matter when I stand before the great Judgment Throne), the child revived. He sent for the parents, they took the child from the hospital and put her in the hands of an elderly lady by the name of Mrs Mason, who nursed her for six weeks. At the end of that period she was as well as any other child. Her name is Agnes Young.

About a year ago I received a telephone call from Agnes Young asking me if I would perform a marriage ceremony for her and her fiance. This young couple lives at Eugene, Oregon now.

And so I want to leave this testimony, that God is as good as His Word. That faith in Almighty God brings to pass the very same things today that it always did.