This is a God story.

It Started With a Friendship

A few years ago, my husband and I decided to go on a trip to a beautiful, beachy vacation for a week. Although we were on a tight budget, we felt so strongly that we were supposed to invite a new friend of ours to join us; not just that, but we were to pay for his flight, room, and meals for the whole week. In one sense, it felt preposterous, but the urging of the Holy Spirit on our hearts was clear. When we invited our friend to join us on our romantic getaway, he said yes. Honestly, we were surprised!

This friend had been very sick most of his life, to the point where he couldn’t work or stray far from his team of doctors. He lived off of disability payments and spent his days going from doctor to hospital, just trying to manage his dozens of symptoms. He began to call himself, a “professional patient”. By the time we met him, he had been living this sickly life for decades upon decades.

We did what we always do: we introduced him to the Holy Spirit. He experienced several “encounters” with God; at first, these encounters where through our guided “inner healing” prayers but after a couple of times, he began encountering God through his own prayers, as well. Despite these experiences, he was trepidatious about everything: the spirituality of it all as opposed to the religiosity in which he had been raised, his felt lack of worthiness to even speak to God, his wondering about whether God even wanted to help him. Yet, his longing for God to be as real in his life as God was in ours kept him moving forward.

Which Led to a Vacation

So, we took him on a lavish vacation at a four-star resort with all expenses paid—possibly the first such vacation in all his life.

He took the week to be mostly by himself, sleeping when he could, walking when he could. Sometimes, he joined us on our outings, but mostly, he just sat on his balcony and watched the sun reflect on the water. He called and messaged his friends about how beautiful it was. He thanked God for giving him such an opportunity. And he soaked in the experience of it all.

That Became an Adventure

One night, he decided to go out to the boardwalk after we had gone to sleep. He met a young, homeless boy whom he befriended. He prayed and prophesied over the boy, and the boy began to cry tears in the presence of the Holy Spirit. Our friend—who had never been taught how to “minister” to others—just gave away what he had received from us: the love of God. He rinsed and repeated with a wayward young girl; the Holy Spirit also touched her. By the time he came back to the hotel, he was elated and full of testimonies about the goodness and power of God!

“I decided to try to do what you guys do, and it worked!” he exclaimed. “I was a different person last night: I wasn’t afraid anymore, I wasn’t ‘the sick one’. I was on a mission to make an impact on this world, and it worked!” He was on cloud nine.

For the first time in a long time, he did not see himself as a disabled man living on welfare or on the charity of his elderly parents. He saw himself as a powerful instrument of God who still had a lot to offer this world!

And Bore Fruit One Year Later

One year later, we ran into him and asked him to tell us how he had been. You see, we hadn’t spent much time with him since our vacation together and we didn’t know all that had been going on in his life. When we saw him, we were amazed!

First of all, he had lost 30 lbs! Thirty extra pounds that had been exacerbating some of the health conditions with which he was born had just melted off. When we asked how he did it, he replied that one day, he felt an urging to make better food choices for his health. Six months later, he was 30 lbs lighter.

Next, he had gotten a job. It was a part-time job doing something he had always dreamed about doing. It did not pay much but it filled his heart. Most importantly, it made him feel like he still had something to offer to others.

Finally, he was making preparations to move out of his parents’ house, where he had been living rent-free as a disabled adult for decades. He had found a job halfway across the country, near the beach, and he was about to make the leap into caring for himself for the first time in his life.

Most importantly, he was excited; no longer fearful, not trepidatious at all. He had courage to make changes in his life that most people are never willing to make. The fruit of the work of the Holy Spirit was so evident in his life: he had come alive—possibly for the first time—just by obeying the voice of God! (No church attendance, no Bible study, no discipleship of any kind… just following the leading of the Holy Spirit.)

At the end of explaining all that had been going on in his life since our vacation, he said, “I cannot thank you enough for all that you have done. My life was catatonic before you introduced me to the Holy Spirit. But now, I am finally living my life!”

When we parted ways, my husband turned to me and said:

“God works in mysterious ways. Some people need a prayer to turn their lives around. Others need an all-expense paid vacation! 🤣”

-Brett Benes (My Husband)

That’s what the love of God does: it causes dead bones to come to life, it puts breath life into the lungs of the lifeless, it brings the healing that no man could ever know to give. All our friend needed to get onto the path towards his destiny was a lavish, abundant, unconditional love-gift from God.

Thank you, God, for being so good!