Neck Pain Relieved! Life can be a real pain in the neck.
Take a few sports injuries, mountains of stress, take many long driving stints for years, stare down at a computer for hours every day, and bend your neck to hold a phone in place while multi-tasking, and ultimately you look and feel like Quasimodo. 
For many years I, like many people, have walked around with constant pain in my back. The neck had become so jammed up that I could not look over my shoulder to see if a car was in the blind spot. Thanks to side view mirrors I could make those heavy traffic lane switches without too much trouble. But at times, the pain had become excruciating to where looking in the mirror was the only direction I could ‘turn’ my head. There was a moment playing basketball a couple of decades ago that brought the permanent injury. I used to be pretty strong, I thought, until in a pickup game I reached up for a two-handed rebound. Little did I expect that the strength of the 6’6″ 300 pound no jump dude behind me was there to snatch the ball at the same time I did. He jerked the ball straight back and I was too stubborn to let go. I felt the heat rip through my left shoulder and neck. Afterwards, my whole back and neck was never the same again.
Ever since that day with never relieving stress pouring down, it has been a battle to not have constant pain. I bought every back and neck device advertised to ‘work out’ the pain. Routine visits to the Chiropractor, herb remedies, rehab exercises, pain killers, hot tubs, ointments, and anything else that would provide some pain relief became part of my normal routine. Ultimately I just learned to live with the pain and accepted it as a way of life.
I spent much money on devices to alleviate the pain. Thumpers, vibrators, stretchers, balls, plastic wedges to move my discs, anything. I did find one device that worked better than any on the back but nothing could hep the neck. I don’t recommend many items for back cures, but this is one preventative and re-alligner I do recommend. It is not a fun one, but it provides the important task of alligning the spine which is what you basically pay a chiropracter $80 a visit to do. You can pick it at multiple places, including Amazon, it is not cheap, but if you want my only physical device recommendation this is one worth the money.
I read the side effects of what all the pill bottles say about Tylenol, Advil, aspirin and the muscle relaxers that my doc prescribed for when the aches were more than I could handle. To try to keep my insides alive, I would only pop a pill or two or three as a last resort. I did find that working my tail off into exhaustion would keep my mind off the stress and aches all day helped. And ending the day with a couple of glasses of wine seemed to be the best cure.
I wished my neck pain could be relieved.
I just figured this was God’s way to keep me humble and to remind me of the pain maybe I deserved for all my years of rebellion. It seems like a good answer, doesn’t it?
My church friends would remind me after their mission trips ‘there are those suffering worse than you, get in toughen up mode, dude.’
The Dalai Lama said – ‘Pain can change you, but that doesn’t mean it has to be a bad change. Take that pain and turn it into wisdom.’
Try all the above methods for dealing with constant pain, or, if you dare to stretch your thinking, read on and hear of something I never dreamed could possibly happen…
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Over a year ago from this date we had found ourselves much more open to ‘different thinking’. As a background, long story short, our son made it through some very difficult times. You can read the whole story here.
It was so bad tough I had to take three months of leave from work for us to get him through a horrid situation. Over that period of three months, he became well. I know it was not instantaneous, but we thought ‘maybe’ God did a miracle to bring him out of an awful state. We did our best to explain what happened and the people who with good hearts had stated the Facebook one word of help statement of ‘praying’ said, ‘wow, that is great that God answered our prayers.’
Maybe there is more to this spirit world and supernatural thing. I was taught it was nothing more than charlatanism. I had my doubts but was open like never before. Circumstances caused us to leave the church, (which we did not take lightly) we had been attending for a number of years, as we knew there was something that was missing in our lives. After our sons miracle pull-through we knew there was something that was missing in our ‘beliefs’. I say we, as our whole family shared in our sons seeming demise. Few understood what we went through, but it also opened our eyes to a number of other things, as we saw experientially mainly that;
God is more than just words in a book, He is alive and has power to overcome any problem.
He showed us a glimpse, but we questioned why that power was only a once in a blue moon occurrence? Why is it that the only thing happening in churches are the number of ‘salvations and baptisms’ tallied, while sickly, financially strapped and depressed souls surrounded us.
For a short while, we hopped from one cookie cut service to another before ending up at the smallest of churches near our home. There was something different going on, and the Pastor did not seem to care about having a big building and lots of people. His main concern was that this concept of really knowing God and His presence was more important than fitting the status quo. Maybe that is why it was the smallest of churches, I don’t know, but we liked it and decided to come back a few more times and even started calling it our new home, rather quickly.
This particular Sunday a man whom I met a couple of times was given the reigns to teach a topic. That in and of itself was odd since most churches never hand the mike to anyone other than the preacher, teacher, musician or staff beseecher. Of all the topics, this guy picked to teach on, it was about healing.
Just like I suspected such a teaching would have, he started off not talking from the Bible. He referenced some ancient saint named Augustine who wrote a book back in the year 426 called Retractions. Apparently, this guy who had written about his beliefs, that many adhere to this day, decided in his latter days that too many healings had happened to say they stopped after the book of Acts was written. I guess it is called cessationism.
I thought, well so what, but that is interesting. I have never seen a person healed (other than my son although at the time I did not know it) but have heard lots of stories and seen what looked like fake stories on YouTube with crazies falling down after somebody smacks them in the head. Haha, we all know those were not real, er well, maybe, I don’t know. I have heard of people asking for prayer and getting well and those stories of people going in for surgery and the doctor comparing x-ray’s from 5 months ago to the last second right before surgery, and now they can’t find the cancer. You know those crazy stories?
Wait a second I reminded myself, just two weeks ago at this little church the guy sitting across from me gave that story about his sister. That very thing happened (she lived in Florida). He didn’t seem like a nut. I leaned in to hear more.
The not employed as a ‘pastor’ guy mentioned the word ‘heal’ in a search in any version of the Bible will pull up at least 120 hits in the New Testament. Only in a few places does it say to sit and pray for a sickness to be healed. In fact, he mentioned Jesus sent 72 nobodies (or Average Joe’s) with the instructions: “If you enter a town and it welcomes you, eat whatever is set before you. Heal the sick, and tell them, ‘The Kingdom of God is near you now.’Luke 10:8-9 NLT
He asked some other thought-provoking questions; Did Jesus ask God to heal someone or did He just do it? In Acts 3 in Joe’s Portico, (er Solomon’s porch) did Peter sit and pray for the cripple to be healed or did he just say, ‘get up and walk’? In many examples did Paul go away and beg God to heal people or did it happen just by him laying on hands? In other cases, it says many signs and wonders happened at the hands of the believers and the power to heal was given to ‘all’ of the disciples? One example being in Acts 8 by an average dude named Philip.
He added power and healing comes at a restful presence of God, not in begging Him to ‘do something’, nor in psyching up like a powerlifter ready to lift a free weight. The Authority to heal came from and comes from God through His established authority. This authority was demonstrated via simple commands: be healed, sickness go away.
With my many years of church fondly know the great commission as mentioned in Matthew 28 a question arose. The guy teaching said, why is the other version mentioned in Mark never talked about. It starts the same way as in Mathew: “And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.
But Mark 16: 15-18 adds in some weirdness – ‘And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.”
There was much more to cover but when all was done the temporary teacher of the day said, is there anyone here with a sickness or ailment they want to have prayed over. I was like well I have a lot of things but the one that has been nagging me for years what the heck. I have nothing to lose. So I raised my hand and waited for him to come on over and say some magic words and just maybe this neck pain of 20 years would go away. I figured, worst case, nothing happens, I walk out of this weird little church and never come back and nobody will know. I didn’t know anybody there until the last month anyway.
As I was waiting I got a tap on the shoulder and heard this sweet voice say, sir, do you want prayed for. I turned around and standing behind me was a young lady I later found out was in eighth grade. I was like, um sweetheart, I’m waiting for the man to come over here. But I didn’t want to hurt her feelings and shoot the poor kids faith down the drain. So I said yeah sure. (The dueling doubt was heavy in progress).
She asked, what did you want prayed for? I thought for a second, maybe I had a hangnail or something I could tell her about and get this silliness over with. But I had a chuckle inside going on, and I said, alright, it’s my neck. She goes, ‘the left side or the right?’ I flipped my tin man neck (that’s what my kids jokingly call me when I try to dance as my neck and back has always been like a tin man to them and it makes them laugh) back and forth a bit and said. ‘No doubt, it is the left side, can’t turn it at all,’ I said. And I could not, at all.
From there I have no idea what she actually said as she put her hand on the spot on my neck I had just pointed to, and she prayed something pretty simple. I honestly have no idea what the words were as a few other people joined in, which was kinda weird as well. I could feel a warmth roll from head to shoulders through the neck. When they were all done she asked, is it better?
I rolled the neck a bit and flopped my head from side to side. I really wasn’t sure if the heat from the embarrassment of all the attention was getting to me, or what, but it felt looser. I thanked her and the people around and wasn’t sure what was happening. Maybe something was better, I wasn’t going to take a chance though.
I thought, No way this little girl had the power to heal somebody. But then this guy said, no person heals anybody, only God and His Spirit can heal someone, people are just conduits.
Regardless, I needed to go see THE man to be sure. So I bee-lined to the front and told him what I needed. He seemed to know I had people praying for me a minute ago and asked what I wanted. I told him, and he said, well sometimes it takes a while, so he reached his hand on my shoulder and immediately said, whoa – a bit of stress built up in there huh? I told him, I’m in sales work just like you, you know what that stress is like. He acknowledged. He then prayed a bit more and asked how’s that? I said it doesn’t feel much different than a minute ago, but I feel a bit more flexible.
We talked a bit more nonchalantly about his experience with his feet a time ago. He said he thought something was better but until he got home and had a chance to jump around and test it out he wasn’t positive and likewise was a bit skeptical. But, all was better and had not returned.
I went home wondering. I had to test things out myself, so I went outside to shoot baskets. Swish on the first shot, things were loose. I did a reverse layup and decided to test even further with a few of my old moves I hadn’t tried in years. I needed to be sure before I’ll tell too many people about anything whacky like this.
So I waited a month, and things were still good, I could look in the blind side while driving and turn way further than before. The surrounding pain that really is what causes all the neck pain, that in the shoulders and back, were all better. Waking up in the morning and fearing that I would not be able to move from a stuck position, was gone. So at that one month mark I had to tell the people in this little church, something is going on.
At that 30 day mark, I was handed the mike, something I hadn’t had in my hand in a church in a long time because only the preacher, teacher, musician or staff beseecher are allowed to say something in front of people, you have to be qualified and approved. I told those in the little church just what I told you above. They all cheered, but it wasn’t like it was the first miracle they had seen, it was a routine happening.
But I could never tell too many people beyond our new home and new family.
Now, exactly 365 days since May 3, 2015 I tell you. My neck pain was not only relieved, it was healed. I had to give a year before I could say, I am certain it was a miracle.
Note, latest update on December 10, 2018, ye old neck is still doing well.
Just awesome! I cannot believe you waited a whole year to tell this miracle story. God is so good.
Patience is NOT my best quality, that I know everyone would agree. There is so much doubt in this day and age, I had to wait as extra proof, as hard as it was to hold back, especially the past month. Still I am sure many will think it is made up, sadly, more Christians than non. It is why power is barely visible and few even want to explore it, lest their own weakness be revealed. If we wait until we’re holy and perfect before allowing God to use us, we all will be in the grave before getting a chance to do diddly squat. If every average person crawled out of their comfort zone, think what would happen to change this world filled with despair and anger.