For the next six months Allen continued to meet with Henry in an almost secretive fashion. Henry would talk and Allen would listen. Then they would kneel and Allen would lay his hands upon Henry and pray for his healing. After about three months, Henry began to show up wearing a long white robe and sandals. “I’m preaching in it,” Henry related, “it makes me feel closer to God. I tell people that if it was good enough for Moses and Jesus, then it’s good enough for Jesus’ servant. Do you think if I get close enough to God, God will heal me, Allen?”
“Henry,” Allen responded, “You don’t have to wear a robe to curry God’s favor. It’s your heart that God cares about.”
“That’s OK for you, Allen, because you’re already close to God. I need a sign, something that can prove to me that God is listening. He gave a sign to Gideon, didn’t he? I remember hearing that story as a child in Sunday school. Something about laying out a sheep skin and God making it wet while the ground around it was all dry. Maybe I could put a sheep skin in the worship center. People would really be moved if God made it wet right there in the worship center.
As Allen listened, he realized how dependent Henry was on a success oriented gospel. He didn’t have the resources to sustain him when things went wrong. It made Allen feel really sad for him. For another three months they continued to meet. Allen would listen as Henry mixed messages of fear with dreams of getting a sign from God that would prove to his people that he was God’s special friend. Then Henry would kneel and Allen would pray fervently for Henry’s healing.
Then Henry called him in the middle of the day and exuberantly announced that he had his sheep skin. He had just come from the doctors and they told him that his cancer appeared to be in remission. “Allen, I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your support during this dark period in my life. I know that you are very busy and I don’t want to take up any more of your time with our meetings. You have truly been God’s angel in my time of need, Allen. I will never forget what you have done.”
Allen was grateful for Henry’s apparent recovery and offered his own prayer of thanksgiving after he had hung up the phone. Somehow he didn’t feel as threatened by Henry’s successes as he once had. Though, he thought, he wouldn’t mind an infusion of fifty new members into the Garden Church as his own sheep skin.
