MATTIE'S CHRISTIAN PAGES

I was called to serve my Father in heaven by an angel who spoke to me at the age of two, at a time when the doctor had said that I would not survive past two or at least until 9 or 10 at the most. I gave my first prophcey at age of nine. I was saved at thirteen when I learned I had to trust Jesus as my Savior. I was called to sing for Him at fifteen, as a missionary at age sixteen, to teach at seventeen and much later to preach his word, and began to walk in these callings when I married at eighteen.

In June of 71, I had two operations for cancer of the ovaries as well as a total hystorectomy. I raised my children living with the effect of radiation and pain and weakness. I had to take care of my children from my bed. I am so grateful that God saw me through all these trials and let me live. God had given me a promise while I was in the hospital in '71, after my pastor had come and prayed for me. The pastor left and I simply told the Lord that I really did want to be healed and raise my children that He had given me--both are miracles (see my article on Faith .) He replied, "I'm not going to heal you until you do what I told you what to do in James!" I replied, "But, God, you know that I am a Baptist and they won't do what You said in James!" He made no reply; but I had His promise that when I did what He said in James then He would heal me.

I went to church and asked them to pray for me like it says in James 5. They replied, "We have all prayed for you to be healed." I said, "I know, but you haven't anointed me with oil yet!" They replied, "That is not needed. They don't do that anymore. It isn't necessary!" Then I told them what God had said; but they couldn't see the need. I felt the need as He had spoken to ME! God sent other evangelists there and they prayed for me as well; but still I wasn't anointed with oil or healed. They gave me eight weeks of radiation (five days a week) which made it impossible to eat for that whole 8 weeks since it went over all my stomach and intestines. All I could do was hold on to what God had said and try to hold down the cokes that came right back up as soon as I drank them. It remained in the back of my mind constantly.

After those weeks of no food, on the next to the last treatment, God spoke again and said, "If you don't eat, you are going to die!" I replied, "But, God, it just comes back up anyway. It does no good to eat!" He made no reply; but I tried to eat at supper that day and sure enough, it came back up; but I had obeyed my God's word to me. I did not realize at the time that this was a miracle as well that I had not gone blind or died by then. Years later, some men went on a hunger strike in prison and went blind about the 35th day of their strike. He also showed me that 8x5weeks =40days fasting-1=39days--one less than Jesus' fast in the wilderness! We, many times, do not realize all the significance of the prophetic acts that we preform as we walk in this life daily, trusting Him to lead us as we go!

They soon discovered that a tumor had developed in the colon, they said, from the radiation and would have to be removed; but as I was so weak, they would have to wait until they could build up my body enough to survive. Just before Christmas, they gave me my third surgery. I was so weak from all the radiation and surgery that I could only lay on my bed and watch as Christmas came for my little ones.
A worker with the kids' daddy, played "Santa" to the islands in the Puget Sound each year and when he heard my story--Santa came to visit me as well.

My children were ecstatic--there was daddy and "Santa" too! They actually got to see him on Christmas day. I was so sad as I felt that they didn't believe that I would survive the winter and so it really was the case when later my husband told me what one of them had said about my not living more than 2-3 months. I had rather he had not told me as it tried to destroy my faith in my healing; but still I held on to God's promise to me. If I could only find a Baptist church who would follow James' instructions! But I lived--one month, then two--now it was Feb. and I was still alive! Praise God! His Word was preserving me, I felt!

At the end of Feb we had to move again. There was an opening in San Diego--he was in the pipe-fitters union, and so we set out, with our church's blessings. Before I left my friend told me that God had spoken to her and assured her that I would live and not die. When we got to San Diego; there were no openings and so we decided to come home to West Texas and see my parents before going elsewhere. As we came across Phoenix, I ask him to check out the work there, but he replied, "You couldn't pay me enough to live in this God-forsaken place!" Sure enough, when he tried to find work elsewhere, after our visit, there wasn't anywhere else to go but Phoenix. They were in a building boom at the time. So, we headed back over the road we had just traveled.

There was a small Church with a little step close to our trailer house so we went there to church. But one day, as we were getting the mail at the Post Office (which was across the street from this large brick Baptist church with 11 to 13 steps, the Lord spoke to me and said, "I want you to go there to be prayed for to be healed!" I replied, "But, Lord, do you see those 13 steps? How will I ever get up them? I can't hold my head up much less climb those steps!" He, of course, made no reply. We passed them several times and then one day I said, "God told me to go there to be prayed for to be healed!" So we stopped and my family pushed and pushed me until they gotme up those steps as I clung to the handrail!

We went inside and told the pastor what the Lord had said and asked him to pray for me. It was a Baptist church that the Lord had filled with His Spirit, we found out later. The pastor got some of the other deacons to gather around me to pray. I had given him the Lord's instructions to me; but they did not anoint me with oil. I complained and he replied, "That was the medicine that they used in those days. It was all they had to work with." This didn't seem right to me that God would put something in the word that was unnecessary.

I got no rest or sleep for three days! Finally, the Lord spoke again and told me that "the oil represented my obedience and that I was to obey!" So, I had to call the pastor and tell him what God had said. He laughed and told me to come Wednesday night and he would anoint me with oil. I did and he did and so it stood. I seemed no better; but I was still alive.

In April, we bought some acreage and started building a house on it. Then I really had to pray for my husband expected me to hand him up the boards for the rafters. I did not see how I could; but somehow by His grace I did and he finished the small house and we moved into it. It had the dry wall up but was not painted or sealed inside or out; but it was livable--in all that heat and desert. But I loved the desert and the dry heat healed my lung that had collapsed in my last surgery. Finally the pain when I took a breath stopped and I could once more sing, if I had the strength to draw a deep enough breath. God blessed in all these things even though the cancer was still in my blood stream the Dr. said--I was still here--weak--broken--barely able to go to church--but alive.

God spoke to me again and said that he wanted me to start a home Bible study in my home. Not knowing how to proceed, I told the church I was having one and hung out my shingle telling the time on my orange tree. No one attended but me and my two children and the dogs. Still I was obedient.
My strength increased a little day by day. Now I could drive my daughter to school and her friend started coming over to the house to see her and to ride to school with her. She loved to talk like my daughter and so I started treating her as I would my own--correcting her when she acted ugly and praising her when she did things well. She started spending more and more time there so I included her in our singing songs about Jesus and she listened to the Bible stories as well as my own did. I never realized that she was one of the ones that God sent to our house to be taught--but I believe she was even if it wasn't at the time I had set.

We came back to Lubbock and almost immediately I met Barbara who wanted a ladies' Bible study in her home. So, I started teaching each week. Even our teenage daughters listened sometimes and asked questions. Being a missionary, God seems always to be moving me from place to place even though I am in the same town. But Barbara and I have remained friends all these years and have attended several churches together; but it seems that God always, sooner or later draws us back together again at the church we went to together in the beginning. I believe he still has work for us to do there yet!
We are starting a new Bible Study in her home this week and hopefully her and my daughter will again attend. They have both strayed; but we believe that God will bring them back into His fold and keep them there! Pray that this is true! Pray for me to have strenght to carry out the callings of the Lord in my life as well as hers.

Update:Barbara's daughter was saved in the very first Bible Study we held and praise God she is trying to live for Jesus even though she is struggling.