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Carl trained with The Elijah Challenge in 2006, and served as a missionary in the Philippines until 2011.

August 14-15, 2009

“We endured a grueling 27-hour trip on buses, planes and vans from our home, on the northern Island of Luzon, to Surigao, on the southern Island of Mindanao in the Philippines. This was our third trip to the troubled Island of Mindanao. I traveled with two of our trained Filipino missionary-evangelists, Mila Pating and Nick Abad.

The Elijah Challenge (TEC) sponsor for this event was Richard Keltner, from Watchman Radio in New York City, USA. With four hours sleep under our belts and a hot and humid day, we began training a group of Fifty (50) people, pastors, church leaders, Bible college students, and ordinary believers in the extraordinary work of the Kingdom of God. We introduced the group to the many commands of Jesus to heal the sick, cast out the demons, and preach the gospel. We talked about their authority as kings and priest of God (Rev. 5:10), and their obligation to obey Jesus and preach the gospel. We showed them from the Bible what signs would follow ordinary believers when they begin their supernatural walk with Christ in Baptism (Mark 16:16-18).

We completed Friday night’s training and prepared for the Saturday morning advanced, training session. Saturday morning we were met with many delays and complications, which we all felt were spiritual in nature. There was no water for bathing, late alarm clocks, the door knobbed locked and broke trapping me in an extremely hot bathroom for nearly 30 minutes – the door knob had to be destroyed before it would open – transportation break downs for many of the participants, and no electricity when we arrived at the venue. 

Eventually, the strongholds were defeated, the electricity came back on, and we began training. This second day was the Advanced TEC course. At the end of the training we took a brief lunch and afterwards we called our newly trained volunteers to heal the sick. Because of radio advertising we had record numbers of sick people for the training. As always, the healings began slowly and then exploded like popcorn as one person after another suddenly reported they were healed. 

The healings included:

-Many goiters, arthritis, back injuries, stiff necks, frozen-shoulder joints, knee pain, asthma, heart pain, infections, boils, hip pain, migraine headaches and one man from the Netherlands who had extremely rotten and infected diabetic feet. His feet had open wounds which he called, “caves.” In the first session many of those who would later heal others were healed along with many who had come hoping for healing. 

-Large breast tumors were healed.

-The man with the diabetic wounds immediately reported his pain was gone. Mila and I told him to get up and walk. He was reluctant, but slowly stood and began to walk. By the third step he was normal and was soon dancing, skipping, and trotting back and forth with a large smile on his face. The pain was completely gone. He came into the building with a cane, moving very slowly and leaning on his wife for support. Now he was now dancing, walking, and kneeling down with the same feet! During the afternoon, he un-bandaged and checked the wounds. He found they had filled in from the back and the external opening was 1/3 smaller than they had been in the morning. His feet no longer smelled like rotting flesh and of course his pain was completely gone. That evening, he became our photographer, walking all around and standing for hours on his once bad feet.

-Another woman manifested a demon and fell to the floor screaming and writhing as the demon shouted he wanted to kill the woman. We took authority over the demon and cast it out. The woman got up a different woman with a new liberty she had not known since she was first involved in witchcraft and spirit worship as a child.

-Another very frail woman in her eighties came in using a crutch. She had broken her hip and femur in a fall and was never able to walk without a crutch since that date 5 years before. She felt something happen and she gave up here crutch and began to walk tentatively at first then more and more powerfully. Finally she was smiling with a toothless smile and turning and dancing around in joy. When the meeting was over someone asked her if she wanted her crutch back she said “No, I don’t need it anymore.”

A total of 31 people were healed and one was delivered during the mornings training. 

In the afternoon, the real crusade started. I preached on sin, righteousness and repentance. I told the story of the “Paralytic” lowered in front of Jesus by his friends, that Jesus proved he could forgive sins by healing this paralyzed man and that the true God has both the ability to forgive and heal. If God does not have the ability heal and conqueror disease in our lives, then we should not expect that he can conqueror sin or death for us, or in us, either. I told them, “the God, who heals, is the God who is real!” Then we told them that Jesus was real and that he rose from the dead and that he still heals the sick today. We told them that if they were healed today they must put their faith and trust in Jesus and turn from their sins in repentance. We told them if Jesus did not heal them, they should not believe in him or trust him either.

The newly trained volunteers lined up, and we had those who wanted to be healed come forward. I was excited too see that there were two deaf and mute girls who came forward. We have always had great success healing deaf mutes. We prayed for God to be merciful and then we took authority. 

-One by one, the people started being healed, goiters shrunk, people with hearing and vision problems were healed, female problems, pain and long term bleeding were gone, tumors on thyroids, migraine headaches, slipped disc, back injuries, neck injuries were healed. They danced and wept in joy at their healing. The testimonies were rapidly told one after another. Each person told how they had been healed; it was difficult to keep up with the testimonies, which were often given in their native dialects and through many tears of joy.

-An elderly woman with crippled arthritic knees and hips started dancing and testifying to her healing. The miracles were happening everywhere and there was so much joy and celebration. Some were laughing and hugging and others were weeping for joy. Some could not talk, they were weeping uncontrollably, they just said “thank you Jesus” over and over.

-A Muslim woman came up to testify that Jesus had healed her. Some were hugging me and the trained volunteers; others were joined by their now weeping relatives in group hugs. 

-At the same time another woman manifested a powerful demon and fell to the floor screaming, flailing around with her eyes rolled back. They demon threatened and mocked the newly trained volunteers but we took authority over the demons, silenced them, and commanded them to come out. She was delivered and 15 minutes later thiswoman, was also up on the stage weeping in joy at her deliverance. 

-I had almost forgotten about the deaf and mute girls in all the excitement. I asked for them and they could already hear and speak. I called them up on the stage and asked them questions and asked them to speak. The smaller girl was talking a mile a minute, many words were coming from her mouth and she had a huge smile on her face. I asked the interpreters what she was saying and no one could understand her words (or dialect) but it was obvious she was praising God. I let her speak on the microphone and she talked for 3 minutes straight, non-stop. As far as I know, no one could understand her words but we could all hear that her heart was praising God. Many people wept as we listened to the joy of the Lord falling from her lips in this strange new tongue. The other deaf mute girl was also healed but she was shyer. She would repeat any word we would say to her. We would say “Jesus” and she would repeat it, “Jesus is Lord” or any number of other words and she would repeat them back to us. They were hearing, understanding and speaking for the first time ever.

-Another woman had a “Toxic Tumor” in her throat that made it impossible to eat properly and even difficult to breath. When hands were laid on her, she felt something come loose and fall down her throat, she swallowed and the tumor was gone. She reported that she could now swallow without pain and she could breath freely again. The next day she went to her doctor and he reported that the tumor that was threatening her life and poisoning here body was gone. The doctor confirmed what she had known since the moment she was healed, the tumor was gone.

In all, at least 32 more people were healed (making a total of 63 healed) and another woman delivered from demons. After allowing the healed and delivered to testify, we had everyone return to their seats. 

I then reminded the crowd of my earlier statement, “the God who heals, is the God who is real!” That this Jesus, who healed the sick and overpowered the demons today, was the real God, the one “who holds the keys to death and Hades” (Rev.1:18). I repeated what the Apostle Paul had said in 1 Corinthians 2:4-5, “My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit’s power, so that your faith might not rest on men’s wisdom, but on God’s power.” I told them that they had now seen or personally experienced the power of God and they had no excuse when they stand before God to give an account to Him for their lives. They could never say, “Jesus was not real.” I called for them to put their faith and trust in Jesus and to turn from their sins in repentance.

37 people came forward and made a profession of faith and repentance. There were even more tears and greater joy as they committed themselves to Christ.

In all we had 63 people healed, 2 delivered from demons, 37 profess faith and repentance, and 50 newly trained Filipino evangelists were now ready to do kingdom work in the power and authority of Jesus name. This brings to 750 the number of Filipino evangelist we have trained since coming to the Philippines. The Kingdom of God is advancing in Surigao, Mindanao. King Jesus, the Lamb that was slain, received great glory and honor this night. The God who heals showed himself to be real. Blessed be the name of the Lord!”

Freely you have received freely give! Matthew 10:8


Pastor Carl Henderson
Missionary-Evangelist to the Philippines
www.m-o-r.net