My Special Healing Stick

My Special Healing Stick

by Earl Tyson

Transcribed from the original recording; may contain errors.

It seems to me that the reason we need this kind of liberty and freedom in our worship is because we are stifled in our local churches. Now, I am not a super critic of the local church, but I know when people are in need. And as a pastor, I found that if my people were not free in worship, they were not free in ministry. For I believe the power to be the body of Christ is directly in proportion to your worship experience. And if you don’t plug into the joy and resources of God in worship, you’re not going to plug into it to minister. Because I believe that high peak of adoration and praise and becoming one in worship enables us, on the other end of the thing, to go into the very depths of hell to minister to human needs. And that’s why I see it’s urgent that the church come alive in its worship. That we not play church, but that we realize that we have deep needs to be free to respond to God. And that’s a frightening thing, isn’t it? For someone to lead you into freedom. That really is frightening.

This morning at the 7:30 hour, which was beautiful, I found myself pulling back on the reins. This didn’t indict you, it indicts me. That every time the Spirit says, “Stir it up!” I’d say, “Wait just a minute.”

Wait just a minute. And… for those of you who’ve been wondering when I was going around to open my Bible, and I know some of you have, well, I’m going to get to it this morning. Because this is the word which the Lord gave to me this morning. And it’s the word that Jesus chose to read in His first message in the synagogue in Nazareth. And it’s from the 61st chapter of Isaiah. The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the afflicted. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,

to proclaim liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners, to proclaim the favorable year of the Lord and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, to grant those who mourn in Zion, giving them a garland instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, the mantle of praise instead of a spirit of fainting, so they will be called oaks of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.

And Jesus chose that, to give to the people whom He loved and with whom He had grown up an understanding of Himself. An understanding which He had come into at some point, which I believe became crystallized there in the wilderness temptation.

Because He heard the Father speak one day. And the Father said to Him, “Thou art my beloved, and You make my heart glad.” That’s what He said. “Thou art my beloved, and in Thee I’m well pleased.” And I believe that the Holy Spirit comes to each of us to say that, to whisper that in your ear: “You are my beloved, and you make my heart glad.” Because how often have you felt, “Lord, You couldn’t love me. I’m so unworthy.” You know, “Yes, You can love that person, because they’re holy. But Lord, I’m not holy. Yes, Lord, You can use old Eugene, because he loves You so much, and he’s so close, and he’s so talented. And Lord, if I had all his time…”

The Lord comes and says, “Hey, I love you. I just want to share all that I have with you. I want you to know that I am a way maker.” And as the brother said, He makes a way where there ain’t no way.

“I want you to know I have come to bring healing to you.” Now this is Jesus giving us the word, if you will, the framework, the structure, that we are to see Him and to understand Him. Now I don’t know where you get your point of reference about Jesus, but I get it from Him. I mean, that’s where I start. I’m like the little boy who got to the piano, you know, and don’t take away the keyhole. You know, that’s more without that. I’m lost. And I come to Jesus, hearing what He said.

And I believe He said what the New Testament said He said. I remember when I was first introduced to the world of higher wisdom. And they told me, “Now you really can’t believe this part, because those are words that the early church put in the mouth of Jesus.”

And I’ve just come to the place where I don’t believe that foolishness. First of all, I think the New Testament church had more integrity than that, see. And secondly, I believe God has more wisdom than that and is able to protect His word. I was also told that all the Old Testament characters were fables, just symbols. Now the scientists are digging up out of the dirt over there evidence that they were historical characters.

One day we’re going to discover God was God all along. We are so afraid to believe Him. And I love what the Jew has done. He’s built a building over there for his scroll, you know. One of the things they said about the Hebrew Scriptures was that while the oldest manuscript we had was about 800 A.D., surely, from generation to generation, they dropped an I or didn’t cross a T, and, you know, errors came in, and all that. And you can’t really believe that.

And then, lo and behold, some shepherd boy down there, throwing rocks in a cave. Isn’t it amazing the way the Lord works? Just a shepherd boy throwing a rock in a cave. Watch that. I believe I’ll turn aside and see what this thing is. Little Moses. Didn’t you know he was Moses?

Found those scrolls. And the finest scroll among the whole thing, of course, was the scroll of Isaiah. That comes at least from the first century. Identical to the one they had from the eighth century, ninth century. And the Jew just said, “See there. I believe we’ll build a building,” you know.

And so I come to receive the word that Jesus says about Himself. That “I have come to heal the brokenhearted, set the captive free.” Where’s my healing stick? Is there a stick over there? Leaning up there against that fireplace. Eugene, give me that stick.

That’s some familiar. I walked in this morning with this thing. This is a very special stick. And a little boy sitting on the front row, his eyes lit up, and he said, “What you doing with that?”

I said to him, “This is my healing stick.” Now he never heard about that kind of stick. Oh, my. Oh, my. The Lord said to old Moses, “Lay your rod down.” Didn’t He? This morning. The Lord comes early in the morning. You do know that, don’t you? He don’t lay in the sack all day. Oh, oh.

And I had the joy of going to the prayer room, and then got my jogging in. And when I got back, I wanted to walk out here in what I call the cathedral. These tall. She’s right here. So I’m back there, sitting up on a stump.

Enjoying myself. And found myself saying the words of David, “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” And I reached down and picked up the stick and started hitting that stump. And I heard myself say, “I forgive you.”

“You really didn’t know. I forgive you.” I was 13. And my dad beat me until I couldn’t stand up, because he didn’t know what else to do. But then when he got through, he sat and cried. And his tears released me from that, but they didn’t heal me, you see. And this morning, Jesus healed me of that. Here.

Anybody hurt you? And you remember how they came down on you with a switch, or a belt, or maybe just a word. Jesus said, “I’ve come to heal the brokenhearted.” That’s the brokenhearted, you know. As we grow up, we become so far removed from the heart of God. We become so hard. And we do that, I’m sure, to survive, to protect ourselves. We become therefore insensitive to the blowing of the Spirit, to His gentleness and beauty and availability.

Because we are so unavailable, so untrusted, so afraid. Because deep within us there are hurts that need to be healed. And Jesus says, “I’ve come to heal you there.” I believe that. He said to His disciples one day, “You are made clean by the words which I’ve spoken to you.”

“Now learn to abide in me, for I am the vine and you are the branches.” And that’s just not allegory. That’s true. He’s just saying, “I’m in the root system of life. I’m the root of life.” And this is not a commandment. This is an invitation. You just learn to abide in me.

“And I’ll abide in you, and you’ll bring forth much fruit.” Whole fruit. Not all eaten up with worms. But fruit that is beautiful to the eye and pleasant to the taste, and fruit that does not have within it the seed of decay.

Because it’s not in Him. And He comes to give us that today, down in the roots of your being. And He brings us into worship to set us free, so we can let our guards down. And lo and behold, we let the Lord see us as little children at play. At play. That’s what worship is. Don’t you know that? Worship ain’t just following the bulletin.

You know, I used to pray, with most other preachers, I suspect, “Lord, let something happen that’s not in the bulletin.” Because it won’t in the bulletin. It just didn’t get in there. You know, I went to a conference board meeting of our conference on evangelism one day, and we were discussing some things. And one of the men said, “Well, I suggest we just have a time of prayer and ask the Holy Spirit what He would have us do.” And the chairman spoke up and said, “Do you see the Holy Spirit on the agenda?”

And so worship is really the children of God at play. For Jesus said, “Of such is the kingdom.” You remember, He was up in northern Galilee. Now He’s in the process of healing His disciples. He’s in the process, for that’s His nature. And it’s not something that He did. It’s what He is.

You know, in Jesus we see, we see what the oughtness getting together with the isness. What we ought to be, He is, see. And He comes to heal. He comes with healing in His wings. That is His nature. His healing. Healing is not an act He does. Healing is what He is. He is health. He is wholeness. And He gives Himself. He doesn’t give something apart from Himself. He just gives Himself. And as He gives Himself, you receive the wholeness. And so He comes to heal His disciples. And His whole ministry is His healing ministry.

And so He’s been living with His disciples now three years, and they’ve been following Him around for those three years all over Galilee and periodically up to Jerusalem. And He winds up in northern Galilee, up on the Lebanon border at the foot of Mount Hermon, called Caesarea Philippi.

And I was there last month in a caboose, and we woke up in the middle of the night by 2 o’clock, and the gun’s going off. And if once you’ve ever heard artillery, you know artillery, see. And I jump out of my bed, and my wife says, “Honey, it’s just thunder.” I didn’t say anything. I got up and stood at the door and waited for somebody to knock the door down. And worrying about the people I had down in the hall, are yet afraid to go out in the hall.

I just knew there were guerrillas and all those guys out there in the hall, you know. I’m standing there, and that shield, that thing’s going off outside the window. And, you know, and it’s getting closer and closer. And I thought, boy, they’re going to zero in. And in a little while, my wife just said, “Well, honey, come on back to bed. It’s just thunder.”

Crazy woman. Well, about that time, somebody knocked on the door, and I opened the door, and there stood little Margaret, one of our Emmaus girls we took with her. And she said, “Mr. Tyson, something’s going on.” I said, “Get in, you, Margaret.” And slammed the door, and threw over there in the bed with Betty.

Standing there, waiting for them to break the door down, you know. They’re lying over there laughing. And I’m scared to death. Oh, my. So I have to chuckle about that. When I think about Jesus and His disciples up there. Because that was a day of turmoil also. And Jesus gets them around, and He says to them, “Who do the people say that I am?” And they begin to say, “Well, some say you’re John the Baptist, some Elijah,” you know. Real fun reports, you see. And then Jesus, just really ignoring that: “How about you?

Who do you say I am?” And then there’s an awful silence while He waits for that response. Because He’s tightening the screws, dear people. There comes a time, He says, “Okay, now. It’s decision time. You’re going to have to choose. You’re going to have to make up your cotton-picking mind. Who am I?”

And old Simon blurted it out. “You are that long-awaited one. You are Yahweh’s anointed one. You are the Messiah.” And Jesus said, “Simon, flesh and blood didn’t reveal that to you. But your Father, who is in heaven. And I want you to know that indeed you are a rock. I know you think you’re quicksand. But you really are a rock. And on a rock like you, Simon, and that’s ridiculous, I’ll build my church.” He wasn’t saying, all that great faith. He was saying on the likes of Simon, “I’ll build my church.” That’s you and me, brother and sister. We’re it. He doesn’t have anything else but us.

That’s the miracle of it, you see. And then He said to them, “Now let me tell you what it means for me to be the Messiah.” So He begins to tell them how He’s going to have to die. And old Simon rebukes Him. You remember what Simon did? Really, I’m appalled at Simon. Jesus said, “Now let me tell you, I’ve got to go to Jerusalem and die.” Simon takes Him by the arm, takes Him to one side. He said, “Now Lord, don’t talk that way in front of the fellow.

Now I understand what you’re trying to say, but they’ll not understand me.” And Jesus said, “Simon, you child of Satan, get behind me. For you do not understand the things of God, only the things of man.” And He sets His face like a flint to go to Jerusalem. And He’s on His way to Jerusalem, going up to Jerusalem.

And He comes to a village where the town mayor and all the hierarchy are there to greet Him. They heard His coming. And there on the edge of the crowd are some children who began to come with the dirty fingers and that cake all over the fingers and reaching out for Him. Orange juice poured all over Him, you know. They just had breakfast. Dirty diapers.

Of course they did. And the disciple said, you know, like you do, “Shoot, get away, get away.” And Jesus said, “Wait just a minute, boys. What do you think you’re doing?” And He goes over to the children. And I don’t know what little Hebrew children played. Maybe a ring around the rosy, a pocket full of posies. Or, you know, I don’t know. Crossing over the Red Sea. That’d be a great day.

It’s beautiful. My little grandson, Chad, was watching the Ten Commandments on television. And he’s a great storyteller. And he’ll call in bed and I’ll say, “Pawpaw, tell me a story.” And I’ll say, “What do you want to tell you, Chad?” “Tell me about the Lone Ranger of the time he found Tonto.” So I’ll tell him. He’ll say, “Pawpaw, that ain’t what you said last time.”

I get my stories mixed up, you know. Chad’s watching the Ten Commandments. And I heard him telling his grandma about it. And he, every detail. And he got Moses up to the Red Sea. And he said, “And the waters rolled back. And Moses and the Ten Commanders went across.”

So I know Jesus played a game with those children. Got down, rolled on the ground with them. And over here stood the committee. It’s what we call priority. “Well, honey, I haven’t got time right now. Later. Got to read the paper. Got to go to a meeting.”

A precious wife said to me, “My husband always has time to make love. Never time to love me.” You know, I think maybe the Lord says that sometimes. And Jesus had time for people. Had that been me, I’d said to the committee, “Appreciate you coming. God bless you, children. I’m on the way to die.”

Did you ever pass somebody whose car broken down on the way to church? “Ain’t got time, brother. Gotta go to church.” Oh, man. And Jesus, just who He is, is healing for His disciples. Later they’re going to recall this, see? That’s why they wrote it.

They go on down to Jericho, and there on the edge of Jericho, there’s a man sitting up there on the tree branch. I wonder why he’s doing up there. The Bible says he’s a little of stature, so he climbed the tree. I don’t think that was it at all. I think he’s got a reason to clean the lines. I think he climbed that tree because the crowd wouldn’t let him through. “Who the hell do you think you are? Get away from here. You’re not standing beside me. Get out of here.” He’s very French collector. Man alive. Scum of the earth. Communist.

So that old boy had so much curiosity, he climbed that tree. And I might add determination. A lot of people would say, “Well, that’s the way you feel about it. I go on back.” Do you do that? This is one of the things the Lord has to heal in me, is my quickness to turn back.

Well, I didn’t think there was anybody home. You remember pastoral calling? One knock. Nobody answers. I didn’t think. Particularly if they’re the family that’s not too turned on to you. Oh, man. Oh, Zacchaeus. Up there on that tree limb. And I love what the gospel writer says. And Jesus saw him.

And Jesus saw that old boy. And in front of the whole crowd, Jesus said, “Zacchaeus, I choose to go home with you today.” And the whole crowd, “Why him?” I was preaching in Philadelphia. It was the day of the Super Bowl game. Is that what you call it? Super Bowl? Super Bowl. You know, but you can’t get it super enough. This was four or five years ago.

I preached my heart out and nobody responded. And I thought, well, all right, go on home. And I’ll go back to the motel and watch the football game. So I’m standing at the door just going through the formality and shaking hands with people.

And I’d almost got rid of everybody and was feeling good as I looked and saw I was going to get back to the motel in time to see the ball game. And somebody pulled on my elbow and I turned around and there stood a little short thing, about like that, looking up at me through great thick glasses, this cocoa bottle glass. And she said, “I’m the oldest member in this church. Would you go and have dinner with me?”

And I just thought, there goes the football game. I really did. That’s what I felt. There it goes. I thought, well, you know, I can get there quick and eat and be polite and get away. So I said, “Yes, ma’am, I’d be glad to.”

So she said, “Well, Miss So-and-so brought me, but can you take me home? I’ll ride with you.” “Yes, ma’am.” I went and got in the car and helped her in the car. And all the time, she’s talking. And I get in the car and we go down the road and she said, “We’re going to have such a good time. I haven’t had any business since Thanksgiving.”

“And I’m just so glad you can go and have lunch with me today.” And we got to her house and got out of the car and she’s still talking. We walk into her little living room and I have to bend down to keep hitting the doorpost.

She sits down on the sofa. She didn’t take her coat off and just keeps right on talking. And I’m sitting in the chair on the edge, I might add. At 1:30, I said, “Could we move to the kitchen?” “Oh,” she said, “I know you are bored to death,” because she was telling me the history of the whole town, everybody in it. I said, “No, ma’am, this is very interesting. But I would like to have a little something to eat.” “Well,” she said, “I’d just love to give you something to eat.” We went into her little kitchen. You had to bend down even further. Because the kitchen was really small. And she stood in the middle of her floor and she said, “Now, let’s see what I have. I have some meatloaf from yesterday and I have some cold turnips and I have a fruit bowl.” And I said, “That’s just lovely. That’s lovely.” So she went to her refrigerator and she got out her little tray of meat and she cut off two little slices of that meatloaf and she covered it up. I might add she was a German stock, good German stock.

She put it back in the refrigerator and put those two little slices of meat in the pan. Then she took some turnips and she put those in the pan. All the time she’s talking, see. She walks over to her little gas stove, she turns on the jet, she stirs it for about 30 seconds. She cuts off the jet and keeps stirring. And don’t even know she’s cut off the jet. Just stirring, I’m warming those cold turnips. Finally, she comes to the table and she puts it on the table and we start eating and she tasted it. “Oh, they’re cold.” She said, “I’m so sorry.” I said, “That’s all right.” Her name was Erda. I said, “That’s all right, Erda. I love turnips. Hard or cold. It’s just fine.” And I thought, I’m going to eat this stuff and I’m going to get out of here.

And I really felt up to then that the whole time had been a real waste. You know, I went all the way to Philadelphia to preach the gospel and nobody responded to my great preaching, you know. And so, washed my hands and shake off the dirt.

And I finished eating and Erda was still talking and I thought, well, when I get a chance, I’m going to excuse myself. So all of a sudden, she just stopped. And for the first time, we locked eyeball to eyeball.

And I couldn’t say anything. And then I heard her say, “I don’t know why I’m going to tell you this. Because I don’t know you. And I’m a woman and you’re a man. But I’m going to tell you.”

Erda was 81. She said, “When I was a little girl, my mom and dad and I lived in this house. And my dad died when I was four. And I would live with my mother and my sister. And one day when I was 11, my mother walked in the front door with a man that she hardly even knew. And she walked into this kitchen and she said, ‘You’re going to call him daddy.’

And she didn’t hardly even know him. And she made me set a table. And she said, ‘Now call him daddy.’ And as I called him daddy, he ran his hand onto my dress and molested me. And she didn’t hardly even know him.

And I would lie upstairs in bed and have migraine headaches. And she didn’t hardly even know him.” And then she looked again and she said, “Oh, why did I tell you that? Why did I tell you that?” And by then, of course, I knew. I said, “Erda, the Lord brought me here today so you could tell me that. And He had you to tell me that so He could heal you of that.” And she said, “What are you talking about?” I said, “Erda, how often do you think of that experience?” She said, “Every time I walk in this room.”

I said, “Erda, do you know where you were sitting when it happened?” She said, “I know the exact spot.” I said, “Erda, get up and move your chair where you were.” She got up, she lifted up her chair, she walked across the kitchen, she sat it down. I said, “Erda, sit down in that chair.” She sat down in the chair. I knelt down in front of her. I said, “Erda, I want you to recall that experience one more time, but this time I want you to imagine that Jesus is standing by your chair when your mother says, ‘Call him daddy.’ And I want you to say to your mother, ‘Mama, in the name of Jesus, I forgive you.’

And then I want you to turn to him and when he molests you, I want you to call his name and I want you to say to him, ‘In the name of Jesus, I forgive you.’ And Erda, then I want you to take all of that and all the darkness in your life and all the hurt and just put it beneath the blood of Jesus.”

And I stood there and I said, “Now Erda, I’m going to represent Jesus and I’ll just be standing beside you.” And I stood there and I laid my hand on her shoulder and soon she spoke it. She looked straight ahead and she said, “Mama, in the name of Jesus, I forgive you.” She turned to the right and she called him Robert. “Robert, in the name of Jesus, I forgive you.”

And then she asked Jesus to forgive all of the things in her life. I reached over and laid my hand on her head and I said, “In the name of Jesus Christ, you are made clean and set free.” I could feel the life of God come within that little body. Just surging. I knelt down again. Her little eyes were dancing with light. She looked down at me. She said, “Why didn’t somebody tell me about this a long time ago?”

I said, “Erda, I don’t know, but you know it now.” She jumped up and went running through the house. Every room she’d go in, she’d touch the bed. She’d touch the dresser. She didn’t know what she was doing. I knew what she was doing. She was cleansing that place in the name of Jesus. Just blessing it in the name of Jesus. She wrote me one letter two weeks later. She just said, “It’s wonderful to walk in the light.”

We have a world out there that like Erda doesn’t know it. It’s our joy to tell them and to be it. Thank You, Father God, for letting us be the body of Christ this day. And thank You for coming and by Your Spirit ministering to every part of our being this day. Deep in the roots of our nature.

Amen and amen, and all the people said, Amen.