Ian Royle

It has been a while since I began this experiment and it is time to resume it.  But with a new theme.  This is just going to be my random thoughts.  Maybe about what I like maybe what I don’t.  So I will recap these months away over the next few days.  The family and I went on a cruise this past February.  We went to Florida and took a cruise with Norwegian Cruise Lines on the Norwegian Sky.  The trip to Florida went pretty well.  Our flights lined up perfectly and we didn’t get lost anywhere.  The car we rented was a Toyota Sienna and was awesome.  When I can, I would like to buy one for my family.  We went to the Keys where my wife and I had honeymooned six years ago and retraced some of our steps.  The Hungry Pelican is now just The Pelican and has added a whole bunch of units so some of it’s old charm is gone.  No more polopas to lounge in.  But the really big thing was we attended a Spanish service at the church my wife and I attended on our honeymoon.  The church is called The Lighthouse on the Rock in Key Largo.  We don’t speak Spanish but the people invited us to stay for the St. Valentines service and a special sermon by Pastor Enrique Alfonso.  They offered to translate the service and so we decided to stay.  At eh end of the sermon Pastor Enrique invited anyone who needed prayer to come forward.  My mother-in-law, Marty Misner went up.  Marty suffered from fibromialgia and was in constant pain all the time.  Constant and debilitating the pain was always present.  It sapped her of her strength and energy and sucked the joy out of much of life.  So she went forward and the congregation prayed.  She began to shake.  I usually am unmoved by these things.  Often people “perform” during these things.  But my mother-in-law, is the opposite of a performer.  She isn’t even that good at social conventions let alone performing as to a script where the preacher prays and the sinner shakes, quakes and falls down as happens at many of the travelling “Christian” circuses.   The ones that travel about the country, renting space from credulous congregations, taking out radio adverts, and then having lines of people prayed on.  If they don’t play according to scrip, then they WILL shove you down.  No this was different, it was a small church of believers.  Not travellers, moving on when no one gives them money anymore.  This was their home. and this was their reputation.  My mother in law WAS being touched by God, moving among these believers.  She said afterward she felt a powerful tingling in her body, she felt power coming in.  And she has been better since.  She had abundant energy on the cruise and since the prayer has went off her multitude of medications she took daily to control the pain.  She has been pain free since and we praise God and the power of Jesus Christ for this.  May he continue to bless the congregation in Key Largo and the people of Florida.  Amen