When our kids were young, “pillow talk” was always special. This was a time to sit in intimate half-light at bedtime and ask how things were–really were–if signs of reticence or sadness were detected that day.

We would gather any untied threads of the day, talk about them and pray these things into the Father’s hands. Confessions, hopes, ideas and fears were expressed then as at no other time.

Trust was built into our relationship that stood us in good stead in later years. One kind of pillow talk we engaged in allowed me to relate to our teen daughter when the distance between us seemed great.

In that first so-different high school year, our lovely, vibrant girl became untypically uncommunicative. The emptiness of our farewell at the door one morning as she went off to class chilled my heart.

I went to her bedroom and sank back against a puff of pillows arranged on her bed against the wall. I asked the Lord to let me see what was dragging my girl down.

I stayed there a long while, hugging her pillows to me. The Lord let me sense the bewilderment and insecurity that so often comes with that age. I felt the uneasiness of suddenly being thrust into a world that sets a different pace and whistles a different tune from the familiar ones of a Christian home.

My own feelings of frustration over the state of our relationship slipped away as I felt for her, wept for her and immersed myself in heartfelt intercession for her. Some hours later, I met her at the door, and though sympathy over her awkward feelings would have been unwelcome, her defenses began to lower before God’s gift to me of quiet understanding.

Just as He bridged the gap between men and God, Christ gives us grace to bridge the generation gap. He can impart to us a willingness to walk a mile in our children’s shoes so that we can keep them company and join hands with them.

When I was 5 years old, one of my family members, who used to baby-sit my siblings and me, began sexually abusing me. For years the images of what he did haunted me and led to my being given to a spirit of perversion.

Another family member teased me about what my uncle had done, and later he, too, began abusing me, as well as my cousin and my sister.

When I was 8, my mother had a nervous breakdown, and I was placed in a foster home. I was molested there for two years.

I was a runaway at 14, a prostitute at 15, married to someone I’d later divorce at 17 and pregnant at 18. At one point I became a drug dealer.

Through a host of perversions and generational curses the enemy tried to destroy my life. But in November 1987, after fighting and pulling a gun on the man I was engaged to marry, I surrendered my life to Christ.

I was a broken and hurting individual whose life was full of pain. When I asked God why He had allowed so many terrible things to happen to me, He helped me remember girls I’d known from the street who had gotten killed or been put in jail.

God told me, “The devil wanted to kill you, but I wouldn’t let him. Now use what you’ve been through to help deliver the sexual abuser as well as the sexually abused.”

Since then, God has made me a minister of the gospel. One of the greatest blessings I’ve experienced is being allowed to preach deliverance to one of the family members who abused me. God gave me the grace to do it with His love and without hurt or pain.

I’ve been delivered in Jesus’ name, and now I’m seeing souls set free by the power of God. To Him be all the glory.

Fifteen years prior to the wonderful day when I was born again, my husband, Al, and I were in an automobile accident that resulted in a serious injury to my back. I spent those years with searing pain as my constant companion.

Though both Al and I are Jewish, it never occurred to us that God was alive and willing to be my healer. Unbeknownst to us, my husband’s secretary, Joan, and her church family were praying for my healing.

One day Joan approached Al and invited us to her church for a healing service. He was not comfortable with the idea. He thought of her as a “religious fanatic”–but all I heard was the word “healing,” and I was all for that.

Jehovah Rapha did not fail me. When the call was issued for those who needed healing to come forward for prayer, I responded.

The elder asked, “Do you believe that Jesus heals?” I wasn’t sure what I believed, so I said, “Sir, if you believe, I’ll believe you.”

Miracle of miracles, our wonderful Lord healed me instantly. At first, it was scary because I felt strangely different. I no longer had the pounding pain and felt physically normal.

The Lord touched me from the top of my head to the soles of my feet–body, soul and spirit. I haven’t been the same since.

Al gave his heart to the Lord shortly after I did, and we were baptized together a few months later.

One morning my 9-year-old daughter, Sara, suddenly began having a violent seizure. At the time, we were on vacation and driving on a road in the middle of nowhere.

We rushed to the nearest emergency room, and within an hour, the doctors confirmed that Sara had experienced a grand mal seizure. We were shocked because she had never had one before.

During the next eight months Sara had five more seizures. Fear and frustration gripped me. All I could do was hold her as tears streamed down my face.

In time, Sara’s medication levels were stabilized, and she had fewer occurrences. I was hopeful the condition was passing. But one night, after nearly a year without any episodes, I went to her room and found her unable to move.

Then I read an article about a woman who had been healed of migraine headaches after suffering for 17 years. She had chosen 34 Bible verses related to healing and the power in Jesus’ name and prayed them constantly, claiming and believing she would be healed.

I copied the verses and took them with us on a long car trip. While my husband drove, I prayed those verses over Sara. A great peace came, and the fear in my heart eased away. I could feel the assurance of God’s love.

That was more than two years ago. Sara has not had another seizure. She is doing well and is being weaned off all medication. Praise God for His healing power and for visible proof He is working on our behalf today.

Growing up in the Roman Catholic Church, I attended parochial schools and sometimes went to Mass six days a week. But I lost faith in the church when, later in life, I found myself divorced with two small children and excluded from communion and the other sacraments.

My twin sister urged me to attend her church and gave me a copy of The Book. At age 31, for the first time in my life, I began reading the Bible.

At the same time, a close friend persuaded me to see a psychic, and I soon became hooked. I was enchanted with the New Age movement because it made me feel as if I had special powers and was in control of my destiny. At church, I felt like an outsider–a divorced single mom in the midst of all those happy families.

For two years, I convinced myself I could go to church and visit my psychic. My Christian friends urged me to stop this practice, but I was deceived.

When I finally got the courage to talk to my minister, he didn’t condemn me but asked me to consider how many times the psychic had been wrong about a prediction. Tears streamed down my face as I asked God to take away the confusion.

The Holy Spirit opened my heart to the errors and the evil that had entered my life. He also showed me a pattern of misfortune and sickness that coincided with my involvement in the New Age movement.

That night, I accepted Christ as my Savior and the only counselor I needed. Initially I was ashamed of my involvement in the occult, but now I can share my story openly, letting others know that they too can be free, that Jesus will show them the way and that He is never wrong!

In 1952, at the age of 2, I was stricken with polio and cerebral palsy. I was placed in the hospital, and my doctors recommended that I undergo exploratory surgery on my brain so they could determine what was causing my symptoms.

Thankfully, my parents would not consent to this surgery. But for 16 years I was in braces that covered nearly my whole body. I also endured four operations.

I can remember going to my aunt and uncle’s house and attending church with them. My uncle was a minister.

I enjoyed going to church but did not fully understand the gospel and salvation. My family did not attend church when I was a child. But at 16, even before I was saved, I said that I wanted to be a minister’s wife.

During most of my high school years I had home instruction. An English and history teacher began witnessing to my mother and me, and I accepted Jesus Christ as my personal savior in 1970.

In 1971 the Lord healed my back of scoliosis, which is curvature of the spine. The doctors were amazed when they saw the X-ray and said I no longer needed the back brace.

I moved into my own apartment at age 38 and decided to attend college. In 1989, I received my associate’s degree in accounting, and the Lord opened the way for a job.

One of the greatest blessings I have received from the Lord is my wonderful husband, whom God had planned for me to meet and fall in love with. He fulfilled the desire of a 16-year-old girl’s heart–to marry a minister.

My husband and I work together in the church the Lord blessed us with after many months of seeking His will. I am actively involved in the church, but I could not do the work without the Lord’s strength, knowledge and wisdom.

Looking back at the last 47 years of my life, I see that God has always had His hand on me. He has been there in every season, helping me through the good and bad times and bringing me to a higher level of faith in Him.

Candace Lang Like millions of children who grow up without a dad, I dreamed of what the ideal father would be like. He would have the wisdom of Ward Cleaver, the compassion of Charles Ingalls and the indulgence of Mike Brady.

After I became a Christian, I realized that God had used my need for a father as a catalyst so that I would seek Him, even when I was young. If I had not had a need, I might never have known Him.

In a tangible way God showed me that He is a father in every sense. He reminded me of the times He had watched over and protected me when I thought I was alone.

Like any good father, God indulges me with gifts, but He also disciplines me. Sometimes He allows me to have my own way. At other times, when I make requests, He shows me emphatically that the answer is no or that I need to wait.

Although I know God loves and accepts me with my imperfections, He cares too much to be indifferent about things in me that need to change. My Father corrects me because He wants what is best for me.

He comforts me with compassion and understands me better than anyone else. I can trust Him and never be disappointed.

The finest earthly fathers are imperfect, but God is not deficient in any way. If I need wise counsel, He gives the greatest answer–Himself.

No matter how far away I feel I’ve been from Him, He assures me He will always be faithful and never leave. How I thank God for the incomparable ways in which He’s shown me that He is the very best father.

Standing in the middle of a cold stream, I lowered the young man into the water. “I baptize you in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost,” I said. “Welcome to the family.”

I thought back to when I was 15 years old and heard a missionary talk. I yearned to preach the gospel overseas.

However, my denomination offered me only two choices: I could remain single and be a nurse or a teacher, or I could marry a missionary and be a wife and mother.

I did want to marry, but I also wanted to preach. I saw no way to fulfill the call.

I married a man whose desire to travel was as great as mine. With our four children, we saw the world as State Department employees. But I had a feeling that I wasn’t doing what God had called me to do.

When I was 40 years old, I received the baptism in the Holy Spirit and with it a renewed zeal to read the Bible and evangelize the lost. Shortly after that, we were sent to serve in the embassy in Thailand.

In Bangkok, I met a woman from the Karen tribe. At her urging, I traveled with her to some bamboo villages high in the hills in the opium-growing Golden Triangle where Myanmar, Laos and Thailand meet.

I was enchanted and totally at ease with these people. Although they looked so different from me and followed strange customs, I felt I’d finally come home.

We retired after the Bangkok tour, and I traveled back every year or two. My husband had no interest in living there in the hills. But my heart ached to stay and fulfill my calling.

Six years later, when I was visiting friends in Hong Kong and feeling distraught that I couldn’t stay with the tribes, my friend said: “You are right where God wants you, doing what He wants you to do. You are a go-between.”

Her words were prophetic. Some of those who have accompanied me on my trips have become very involved with the tribes, raising money and workers and generously giving of themselves. By cooperating with the tribal evangelism group in Chiang Mai, I’m able to intercede, support and advise from a distance.

I’ve watched God (and the Thai government) help the tribes advance from being preliterate to being computer-literate. I’ve witnessed miracles of healing, deliverance and reconciliation. And I’ve seen missionaries and tribal pastors bring thousands of people into God’s kingdom.

Whenever I go to Thailand, it’s still like coming home. That call was worth waiting for.

Today, most people have heard of agoraphobia, which is an abnormal fear of being in open spaces. But 26 years ago, this problem was unknown where I lived.

At 15, my life came to a standstill. I suffered severe panic attacks wherever I went. Shaking uncontrollably and feeling faint, I’d get a compelling urge to run from wherever I was. Eventually, I became housebound.

No one knew what was wrong with me. I thought I was losing my mind, and for two years, I cried out to God for help.

One day I was praying beside my bed, just enjoying the Lord. Suddenly, I felt a current of divine love flow through me, flooding me with peace and joy. I was euphoric!

At first, the only difference I noted was that I couldn’t stop singing. Then I had the sudden urge to venture out to the mailbox.

I did, and I didn’t panic! The shackles that had bound me began to fall away.

No one realized that I was experiencing agoraphobia. Clinics, treatments, counseling–none were available to me. But I had a Great Physician, and there was nothing unknown to Him.

I have learned that we don’t always need to understand the problems we face. What we need to know is that the God in whom we trust is bigger than the problem.

It was a long, exhausting drive from my Lafayette home to my mother’s bedside in the small Alabama town where I grew up. Nothing in my years as a pastor’s wife or my experience as a registered nurse had prepared me for this journey.

Twice in 1997, the Great Physician had intervened, astonishing the medical doctors, who had offered no hope. Prayer had prevailed, and my mother’s life had become a living testimony to the entire hospital staff of God’s miraculous healing power.

Shuttling back and forth across the endless miles for the last few months had taken a huge emotional and physical toll on me. Mother’s wish not to live with me during this time was a decision that I honored but agonized over.

I prayed continually for deliverance from all the pain and heartbreak. With childlike desperation I cried out for an end to the constant round of hospitalizations, family turmoil and rigorous medical treatments.

Finally the surgeon reported that he had done all he could. Now it was all in the Master’s hands.

My 2 a.m. arrival at the intensive care unit was no surprise to the nursing staff. I had spent many nights there in intercession for my precious mother.

Only four months before I had witnessed her receiving the baptism in the Holy Spirit. I paused at the entrance, asking the Father for strength to face this trial.

Selfishly, I asked God to keep my mother here for me. In silent despair, I asked, “Why?”

Walking into the dimly lit room, I looked at her ravaged body. The nurses repositioned her, and she cried out in pain.

I spoke her name. She reached out to weakly embrace me.

Her lips moved silently; she was unable to speak. As I looked helplessly into her face, I saw that God was answering my prayer to end the heartbreak.

The glory of the Lord shone on my mother’s face for a brief moment. Her eyes closed as she drifted into a deep and peaceful sleep. Twelve hours later she went home to be with the Lord.

The last few years have not been without struggle. Grief came, but by faith, victory prevailed! In her eyes I saw glory. In her eyes I saw God.