| How a Young Woman Was Healed of a Goiter By Wayne Warner |
*Note: This story is about Louise Richey,
who later became the wife of John R. Richey and a cofounder of the
Open Bible Evangelistic Association, which started at The Kathedral. |
| In the early days of the Pentecostal revival in Iowa, Evangelist
Maria Woodworth-Etter impacted several cities and towns across the
state with her huge tent meetings. Earlier she helped lay the foundation
of the Pentecostal movement in Iowa with meetings in the 1890s. A 1918 meeting Sister Etter conducted in Sidney, Iowa, was to dramatically change the life of Louise Hansen, a young Methodist woman who was suffering from hardening of the thyroid glands and an inward goiter. It all began when Louise’s mother attended the Sidney meetings where she received healing and the baptism in the Holy Spirit. Burdened for her daughter’s worsening condition, Mrs. Hansen brought a small linen prayer cloth to Louise and instructed her to read Acts 19:11, 12: “God wrought special miracles by the hands of Paul. So that from his body were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs or aprons, and the diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out of them.” Mrs. Hansen told Louise to put a ribbon on each corner of the prayer cloth and tie it around her neck. In an interview R. Bryant Mitchell conducted with Louise for his history “Heritage & Horizons” (see pages 119-20), Louise narrated events of that night. “I went to bed, fell sound asleep and awakened choking . . . I put my hand to my neck and a quiet voice within me spoke and said, ‘The Lord is healing you.’. . . When I awakened in the morning and I looked in the mirror, the handkerchief was hanging down several inches and my neck was smaller . . . I had been healed . . . I went out on the farm, . . . did things that I never could have done before because I couldn’t use my arms too much without things affecting my eyesight. The [poor] circulation of the blood would cut off my vision. God gave me wonderful health. That was November 1918 and now this is 1979. I have never had a recurrence of the goiter. I have prayed for many people across the nation and have given out prayer cloths . . . and thank God that the power of God is just the same today.” That wonderful healing happened 80 years ago next November. And you might remember the rest of the story. This young woman was Louise Hansen Richey, wife of John R. Richey and cofounder with her husband of the Open Bible Evangelistic Association—a forerunner, along with the Bible Standard Mission, of the Open Bible Standard Churches. |
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| Wayne Warner is the author of “Maria Woodworth-Etter, For Such a Time as This” (Bridge-Logos, 2005). |
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