23rd June, 2023. Cliff Cowling was a friend from my youth. In our ‘teens he encouraged me to sing duets with him at our church; at the same time he was setting up a guitar band with Lol and Frank, two other members of our Youth Fellowship. Before long we ‘merged’ (Frank left and Dave and June joined) and called ourselves “The Evangelors”, and went on a tour of all the statutory Youth Clubs in Coventry, bringing the Gospel in music and song, testimony and preaching, also performing at a “Youth for Christ” rally and a Sunday evening open-air in the city’s revolutionary Shopping Precinct. We were on course to record for a Christian record label, but when two of the band dropped out, we went acoustic and the company lost interest.
At his funeral a few years ago I spoke of his likeness to a “mad professor”, typified by – rather than buying a metronome – putting his electronics training to good use and building a bundle of wires which produced a rhythmic clicking sound. I also heard that while he spent a brief time in London he would play piano at clubs (Jerry Lee Lewis style), and his party-piece was to play the keys with his toes! But other things about him were revealed to me. In his early manhood he had realised that the lack of Holy Spirit doctrine and experience at the church of our youth left him “running on empty” for living the Christian life. His friendship with a Pentecostal had led to the youth Group from the “Assemblies of God” joining us at the youth clubs and showing films featuring the healing ministry of TL Osborn. Cliff’s awareness of Healing ministry was more advanced than mine.
Some years ago he phoned me and talked about a woman at his office who was sick with cancer. Their workmates had collected money on her behalf – presumably to pay towards her funeral. On hearing this Cliff experienced a welling-up within of intense anger at the meek acceptance of cancer’s ‘inevitable triumph’. The upshot of this was a remission in the woman’s condition. I later learned that the cancer eventually returned and killed the women; but the experience of the power of anger at sickness’s acceptance had made a deep impression on Cliff and me. For me it recalls Jesus’ emotion on being approached by a leper (Mark 1:41). Most translations have this as ‘pity’ or ‘compassion’, but one very reliable textual source has ‘anger’. And why would Jesus not become emotional over the works of the Enemy, as we also see at the death of Lazarus (John 11:35)?
A friend of mine who recently underwent cancer surgery, told a group of us was that she now has a ‘stoical’ attitude towards cancer’s possible return and triumph. How sad! Not just because of Jesus’ attitude, but because of my own brush with cancer, and Cliff’s testimony, I show anger at the appearance of cancer. Dare to join me?
Healing in Jesus' Name 