========================================================================
  UNUSUAL ANSWERS TO PRAYER
  by Carter Conlon
========================================================================

Summary: This sermon emphasizes the importance of seeking God's healing
and miraculous intervention in our lives, highlighting testimonies of
answered prayers and unexpected ways God works. It encourages
surrendering to God's ways, trusting in His goodness, and believing in
His power to bring healing and restoration. The speaker shares a
personal story of divine intervention and the need to trust God's ways,
even when they are different from our expectations.

Topics: "Divine Healing", "Trusting God's Plan"
Scripture References: Isaiah 55:6, Romans 8:28, Proverbs 3:5, James 5:15, Psalm 30:2, John 14:13, 1 Peter 2:24, Jeremiah 30:17, Mark 11:24

------------------------------------------------------------------------
DESCRIPTION
------------------------------------------------------------------------

This sermon emphasizes the importance of seeking God's healing and
miraculous intervention in our lives, highlighting testimonies of
answered prayers and unexpected ways God works. It encourages
surrendering to God's ways, trusting in His goodness, and believing in
His power to bring healing and restoration. The speaker shares a
personal story of divine intervention and the need to trust God's ways,
even when they are different from our expectations.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONTENT
------------------------------------------------------------------------

We're going to go to communion after the short sharing this evening. And
so if you have an opportunity to get some crackers and some juice at
your home and be a partaker of the celebration of the victory of Christ
tonight with us. And for those who have been sending in their
testimonies and you've been contacting us, we'd appreciate hearing from
you as well for others.

You can go to testimony at tsc.nyc and we'll send you back instructions
as to how you can give us a two minute or three minute greeting, even
just on your cell phone, how to upload that and get it to us so we can
put your greeting up on the screen when we meet to pray on Tuesday
nights. We also encourage the groups that are meeting in homes tonight
to stay and pray after this prayer meeting every Tuesday night and pray
for the infilling of the Holy Spirit, pray for the baptism of God's Holy
Spirit. You and I are not going to get through the distress of the days
just ahead of us without an empowerment of the Spirit of God.

It's imperative now that you and I know the strength of God, that which
He has provided through the Son of Jesus Christ on the cross. After
Christ rose from the dead, He sent the Holy Spirit and the Holy Spirit
has come to be our comforter, to be our guide, to be our strength, to
take the promises of God and make each of these a living reality inside
of every heart. He's been sent to guide us and to lead us into truth and
to lead us into that which our lives are to be and how we're to glorify
Him while we live here on the earth and teach us how to obey Him.

And that's what I'm gonna do tonight because I had a message all
prepared for this evening, but as I'm sitting in my seat and I'm
listening to the testimonies, first of all, from our brother Serge, who
talked about the healing of his daughter when after five years of
incredible distress, it must be very difficult to have a child that
can't eat without an allergic reaction. But after five years of that, to
simply submit a prayer request when I believe they were in the Ukraine
at the time and to see God's healing hand come upon their daughter and
then for Ross and Sarah to believe, as the Holy Spirit has spoken into
their hearts, that this is the year that Sarah gets out of the
wheelchair. And Sarah, I know there's a day coming that you're gonna run
the aisles of this church and we're gonna have to have our cameras in
place because we're all gonna run with you.

The whole, all of us are gonna get up and we're gonna march around with
you and celebrate the victory in your life. I feel the Lord telling me
tonight to share a story with you. And it's, the context of it is that
God answers prayer, but not always in the way that we think he's going
to.

We have, remember Naaman the Syrian, he was a great commander, but he
was a leper and he was told that there was a prophet of God in Israel
and so he came down to the house of the prophet and he had this
assumption in his mind, perhaps we all do, we get these assumptions
about how God is going to do things, that this great prophet of God was
gonna come out and he was going to kind of weave his hand over him and
bring healing into his body, but the prophet of God didn't even come out
of the house, he just sent word to him and said, just go and dip
yourself in the Jordan River seven times. And he says, you'll be healed.
And he was offended by that, he was offended because he had, during the
whole journey, he probably had it all worked out in his mind, what this
was going to look like and how glorious it was going to be and he was
going to be able to retain his dignity and all of these things.

But the way that God answers prayer is not always the way we think he's
going to answer prayer. And I wanna share with you a specific scripture
and then tell you a story. It's from Isaiah chapter 55, beginning at
verse six.

Now Father, as I'm just standing here in obedience to you tonight, Lord,
it's really up to you to cause this truth to live in people's hearts, to
cause your word to come alive, to cause our hearts to be gripped with
faith. There's so many online tonight that need healing. God Almighty,
there's hundreds of prayer requests of people that are suffering in
their mind, they're suffering in their body, somebody in their family is
suffering.

Lord, this is your church, these are your people reaching out to you. So
many are like the lame man laid at the gate of a beautiful temple, but
God, they don't have the strength to get up and go in, they don't have
the strength to enter into the beauty of worship, the beauty of
understanding you and the way you work in your kingdom. Tonight, help
us, Lord, to move them forward.

Help all of us to begin to believe you in this last of last days, where
we so desperately need your power again in operation in all of us as the
body of Christ. Lord, glorify your name again in this generation. Lord,
let Sarah walk, let Sarah run the aisles of this church, let children be
healed, let marriages be restored, let sickened bodies, Lord, be brought
back to health again.

Lord, we ask you to simply do things, Lord, in a way that only you can.
Answer our prayers, we call out to you, as we cry out to you, Lord, we
think of the numbers of moms and dads in desperation for their children
tonight, the numbers of marriages that are falling apart and husbands
and wives crying out for a miracle. God, you are the God of the
miraculous, and we believe that tonight, or we wouldn't be here.

We wouldn't waste your time, and you wouldn't waste ours. We know who
you are, we know what you can do, we know what you have done. We know
your heart, Lord, for the cross clearly reveals your heart for all of
humanity, Lord.

God almighty, we ask, according to what we know of your heart and what
you've spoken from your word, that you would stretch out your hand and
do the miraculous, God, in the ways that only you can. And Father, we
thank you, and we praise you in Jesus' name. Now, as Serge shared
tonight, he and his wife, Lesia, they just submitted a prayer request
to, it's time to pray, back when the prayer meeting was in Times Square
Church in New York City, and just within a short few days, literally a
miracle happened in this little girl's body.

She was delivered from these life-threatening allergies, is really what
it sounds like they were, and we very, very much thank God for that. And
in the case of Ross and Sarah, we see that the Lord, in their prayer and
faith, has led them to a physician who's a Christian, who's also a man
of prayer, who also believes that there's a way that God would show him
that Sarah could be brought back to health and regain the use of her
legs again. And so we see that God's taken a different route, but still
answering their prayer.

And it still is a miracle, no matter what anyone says, it's still a
miracle after somebody's been in a wheelchair for that long to be able
to stand up and walk again. I wanna talk to you about the night that I
believe I met an angel. Now, lest you think I've lost my mind, let me
read the scripture first.

Isaiah 55, verse six. Seek the Lord while he may be found. Call upon him
while he is near.

In other words, if there's a shred of faith in your heart, if you
believe that God is still God, if you believe that he cares about you
and he can do miracles, seek him now. Seek him with all your heart while
he is near. Let the wicked forsake his way and the unrighteous man his
thoughts.

In other words, turn from sin and don't presume upon God that he has to
do things your way because he doesn't. Let him return to the Lord, for
he will have mercy on him and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
For my thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways my ways, says
the Lord.

As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than
your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts. For as the rain comes down
and the snow from heaven that do not return there, but water the earth
and make it bring forth in bud that he may give seed to the sower and
bread to the eater, so shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth.
It shall not return to me void, but it shall accomplish what I please,
and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.

For you shall go out with joy and be led out with peace. The mountains
and the hills shall break forth into singing before you, and all the
trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall
come up the cypress tree, and instead of the briar shall come up the
myrtle tree, and it shall be to the Lord for a name, for an everlasting
sign that shall not be cut off.

God says, I'm going to do things my way, and if you will allow my word
to touch your heart, it will do the thing for which I sent it to you. I
sent my word to heal you, not to hurt you, not to harm you. I sent my
word to guide you.

I sent my word to strengthen you. I sent my word to lead you, and if you
will follow my word, if you will let my ways lead you, you will go out
with joy. You will be led through this valley of the shadow of death
that's coming over this whole world with peace.

The mountains and the hills will break forth into singing before you.
You'll be able to see praise in places that others can't. You'll be able
to see hope, where people around you can only see hopelessness.

Everything before you will break forth into singing. Even the trees of
the field will clap their hands. Instead of the thorn will come up the
cypress tree.

In other words, instead of that which causes pain, there will be
fruitfulness, and instead of emptiness will come up fruitfulness again,
and it will be something that God will do for his own name and for his
own reputation and for an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.
God will work in ways that you and I have not familiar with, and I
believe this is what we're going to experience in great measure in our
generation. Many years ago, when we first came to New York City, we
moved into a home in a town in New Jersey, and we weren't aware that
this particular home had been, it was only 12 years old, but we didn't
know it was improperly constructed, and being improperly constructed, it
became infested with toxic black mold.

As a matter of fact, when they discovered it about seven years later,
the workers said there was no visible wood left in the attic. The entire
attic was black with toxic mold. The workers that went in to discover
this, both of them got sick, and it took them about six months to
recover, one with a cough and the other with a skin rash.

So that's how toxic this mold was, and we were living in this house. I
began to have breathing issues almost immediately after moving there.
Our son, Jared, developed a hugely, almost debilitating migraine
headaches, and our daughter, Kate, developed exercise-induced asthma,
very quite serious asthma attacks.

And it was one night, it was about 2, 2.30 in the morning. We were in
New York City in an apartment on 51st Street, and Kate came into the
room, and she said to me, dad, I can't breathe. And so I immediately got
out of bed, I picked her up, I took her into the couch in the living
room, and I saw not only she couldn't breathe, but she was turning blue,
because she was breathing through a hole about the size of a straw.

She could barely draw in any air and could barely exhale. That's the
problem with asthma. Sometimes it's not the breathing in, it's the
actual breathing out that's the problem with people that sometimes
suffer from asthma.

And I told my wife, Pastor Teresa, I said, call 911. And so I was beside
the couch, and I could see she's not gonna make it. I knew it, she was
turning a deeper blue, and she wasn't breathing.

And I just prayed, I said, Jesus, help me. What do I do, what do I do?
And I felt a strong impression on my heart. We're on the seventh floor
in this apartment building, go down to the street.

It was that clear, go down to the street. So I took the elevator, and I
told my wife, I said, do what you can. I said, there's not time enough
for an ambulance.

So I went down to the street, and I ran out into the street in a taxi.
There was no traffic, there was absolutely no traffic. By now, it's
pretty close to three o'clock in the morning.

And a taxi's coming down the street, and I stood in the middle of the
road, and I flagged it down. It was an East Indian man, a taxi driver,
and I said, listen, my daughter is very sick, and I have to get her to
the hospital right away. He said, okay, I'll wait here.

So I ran back up into the apartment. I picked her up, got in the
elevator, came down, opened the back door of the taxi, jumped in with
her, and I said, take me to such and such a hospital. It was up on 11th
Avenue.

And he looked at me, he said, there's not enough time. Now, I don't know
how he knew that, because I'd never even told him what was wrong. He
said, there's not enough time.

He took off down 51st, turned the wrong way on 8th, if you can believe
that. A New York taxi driver, East Indian man. He turns the wrong way,
and it goes against traffic, cuts in a block down to a church, not a
church, rather, down to a hospital I didn't even know existed.

I wasn't even aware it was still even operating. And as we pulled in, in
the emergency entrance, there was a doctor standing outside, and a nurse
just standing outside. I guess it was coffee break time, and they were
there, and when I pulled Kate out of the taxi, see, they saw her, and
they immediately rushed her in on a gurney, and they took her into the
rooms where they do what they do, and they filled her full of adrenaline
and such like to get her breathing again, and literally saved her life.

I was there waiting in that room, and outside that room for about 20
minutes, and suddenly, when the doctor came out, and he said, your
daughter's going to be okay. And I thought then, oh, the taxi driver, I
forgot all about the taxi driver. He's still out in the entranceway to
the emergency.

So I went out, and he was still there, and he was still parked there.
And so I said, oh, sir, I can't thank you enough. I said, you've saved
my daughter's life.

And I said, how much do I owe you? And he says, no, you don't owe me
anything. He said, I just stayed here to make sure she was okay, and he
drove away. And the next day, I was sharing this story, and I thought,
I've gotta call the taxi company in New York City, and I wanna take this
man, and I wanna take his family out for dinner, and I just want us to
thank this man.

This man saved my daughter's life. I don't think she would have made it.
And so I called the company, because I had the description of the car,
and I had the description of the driver.

He's East Indian, he was wearing a turban. I mean, there can't be that
many drivers out there at that time of night. And I remember, they said,
they called me back, and I said, this is great publicity for you guys.

This guy really saved my daughter's life, and it was just what a credit
it is to your company, and everything, and they got back to me and said,
sir, we regret to inform you, but there was no car of that number, there
was no driver of that description working midtown at that time in New
York City. And then it just dawned on me. I got in the car, and I said,
how did he know there wasn't enough time? He didn't even know what was
wrong.

And he went down the wrong way on a one-way street, and he didn't take
any money. Now, there's not a single taxi driver in New York City that
wouldn't take any money from him. And I'll tell you that right now.

And to this day, I believe that I met an angel. To this day, I believe
that God just assigned somebody to do something, lest I should have
sorrow upon sorrow. Because he heard a cry, he heard a father's cry.

You know, could he have healed her on the couch? Of course he could
have. He could have opened her airways, he's God, he can do whatever he
wants. But he sends a word, he sends the answer in ways that we don't
anticipate if we have the eyes to see it.

And if we have the ears to want to hear it, God will answer our prayers
in ways we didn't anticipate he was gonna answer us. And he will always
do it for his glory. He will always bring us out.

And here I am today, quite a few years later, just testifying to you.
And as the scripture says, going out with joy and being led out with
peace. In my heart is still a song of praise for a moment where God sent
either he was an angel.

An angel is a messenger from God. So whether he was an actual human
being on the earth driving a taxi, I don't know who he was. I know he
was a messenger sent from God to meet me on the street at three o'clock
in the morning and go down the wrong way on a one-way street and bring
my daughter to a hospital I didn't even know existed for a doctor and a
nurse who were already standing outside the emergency room doors to save
the life of my daughter.

Because God heard a father's cry and a mother's cry. Oh God, help me, I
didn't know what to do. There was nothing I could do, God help me.

And I knew it would be 20 minutes before an ambulance would arrive and
she wouldn't be alive in 20 minutes. And so all through life, because of
circumstances like this, I have learned that all things do work together
for good. To those who love God and are called according to his purpose.

They don't always happen the way we want them to happen. You know, we
suffer too physically from being in that house. And if I had the time,
I'd tell you the reasons why God allowed us to live in that house.

Of all the houses we could have lived in, he allowed us to live in that
house for reasons that we only understood after we had passed through
this valley of the shadow of death, may I put it that way. I wanna tell
you from experience tonight that God is good all the time. There is
never a time he is not good.

And it's time for us again to pray. It's time for us to begin to believe
that God will answer and let God answer his way. God will answer.

Like the Hebrew boys once said, if he wants to, he can deliver us. And
if he chooses not to, we're not bowing down to the statues. We're still
gonna put ourselves into his hands and we're gonna trust that there's a
divine purpose to this.

But he does answer and he sends his word. And his word accomplishes what
he sent it for. So I wanna encourage those that are online tonight and
you're facing heartbreaking situations, terrible, terrible situations.

God will send you an answer you might not always recognize it when you
see it. You might not understand that his ways are higher than our ways.
Naaman the Syrian couldn't understand why.

Why didn't he just come out and wave his hand? Doesn't he have the power
to do that? Why do I have to go down in this muddy river and dip myself
in it seven times? That's why he was offended. He said, aren't there
cleaner rivers? The Jordan is a dirty river. It's a muddy river.

Aren't there cleaner rivers back in Egypt that I could do this? Why did
I come all the way here? You see, the reason is that God's ways are not
our ways. If he brings a healing, he brings it his way. And he brings it
for his purpose.

And if he doesn't bring a healing, sometimes there's a reason way beyond
anything that we can understand. But I do know after all these years, I
do know that all things work together for good. We love God and are
called according to his purpose.

And so it's time again to believe God. It's time to put away all our
questions. It's time for the unrighteous to forsake his ways.

It's time for you and I to say, God, help me to put away my thoughts
about the way I think my life should go and the way I feel that you need
to answer my prayer. And God, if you wanna send an East Indian taxi
driver, then do that. You wanna send an angel down to look like an East
Indian taxi driver, then you do that.

If you wanna take me down the wrong way on a one-way street, you do
that. But God, I cried out to you for my little girl and you heard my
cry and you answered my prayer. And God, you did it your way and for
your reasons and for your purposes.

And maybe one of those purposes is the fact that I'm actually sharing
this story tonight. Maybe it's ministering to somebody who's out there
crying for a wayward child or crying for a situation where you really
need divine intervention. God will do it his way.

God will do it through a doctor. God will do it through a taxi driver.
God will do it through a word that somebody speaks into your life or God
will just do it the way God chooses to do it.

But the issue is that he's a God of the miraculous. And when we let him,
after we pray, do what he wants to do, there'll always be something that
brings his name to glory in the earth. Thanks be to God.

Thanks be to God. You know, if we have the sense just to hear from him
and to respond, I could have stayed by the couch that night and I
believe I would have lost my daughter. Or I could have responded to the
voice that just said, go up and go into the street.

That's all he told me, just get up and go into the street. That's
exactly what I did. And just in obeying that voice of God saved the life
of my daughter.

Kate, I'm gonna ask you to come and join me here tonight. Maybe if you
bring the microphone with you and I'm gonna ask Kate to pray for those
that need healing because tonight seems to be about healing. There's so
many people out there that are suffering in their body.

And Kate has just come through again, another serious bout with COVID
for almost six months of COVID where she has some very, very long days
and some very dark nights. But we had a word from God right at the
beginning that all will be well. And we just, we rested on that word and
we would, Kate would call us or we'd call her at night, we'd pray
together and we just had a word from God, all will be well.

Could he have healed her day one? Yes, could he have healed her day 10?
Yes, he chose to wait but ultimately brought healing into her body and
she stands here again one more time with her dear old dad where we can
join together and just give thanks to God for how good God is, for how
good God is in all of our lives. And we have experienced so many
miracles, haven't we? Along the journey. Would you pray, Kate, just for
people tonight that just really need healing? Dear God, I just thank you
so much, Lord, for this opportunity to stand here, God, and just to say
that you are good.

God, no matter what happens in our lives, Lord, you are sovereign and
you are good, Lord. God, I just thank you that you're gonna bring
healing into the lives of those who are with us tonight, those who are
listening online, God. God, I thank you that you're gonna do it your
way.

God, I thank you that you are a God who answers prayer, God. God, I
thank you that, God, you have called each of us to a purpose, God. You
have come to give us life and to give it abundantly, God.

God, I just, even as I was speaking and praying together with Sarah and
Ross before the service tonight, Lord, God, that she kept reminding me
of that scripture that says that you shall not die but live, God. God, I
thank you for those who are crying out for their families, for their
kids, God. God, I pray for Edgar's son, Daniel, God, that you would
bring miraculous healing, God, to this little boy, God.

God, I thank you that you are the God who answers prayer, God. I thank
you that you're gonna have a testimony in that family of your
faithfulness, God, and of your goodness, God. God, I thank you that even
when it seems difficult, God, there's been times that, in our family,
we've been praying for my own son, God, and his health challenges, God,
but I thank you, God, that even when we don't see the answer, God, that
you are faithful, God.

You are faithful and you are good, Lord. You have called us for a
purpose, God. God, and I thank you that you are gonna continue to be
with us, Lord.

I pray that your presence would be with us even now, God, that your Holy
Spirit would begin to just comfort those who are listening in this room
and those who are listening online, God, that they would be just
overwhelmed with your presence and your goodness, Lord. God, thank you
that when we weep, God, that you are next to us and you comfort us and
you cry with us, God. God, but then you also bring strength into our
hearts, God.

God, I thank you that we will not live in fear of getting sick. We will
not live in fear of what could happen to our loved ones. God, I pray
that you would put just steel in our backbones, God, and in our hearts,
God, that we would stand strong, God.

We would not live in fear, God, that we would not back down, Lord, that
you would remind us of who you are and that you love us, God, and we
love you and we thank you in Jesus' name, amen. Praise God. The ultimate
healing comes when you make the decision to give your life to Jesus
Christ.

I challenge you tonight, those that are listening online, just simply
admit your condition, admit that you need a savior, believe that God
sent his son to a cross to pay the price for your sin, invite him into
your life and begin to confess him with your mouth. Let's make it
simple. Just say this, Jesus, I love you and I thank you for dying for
me and I thank you for receiving me as your own.

From this day forward, I give you my life and I declare you to be my
Lord, my God, and my savior. And by your grace and by your strength, I
will live for you and with you all of my days on this earth and into
eternity. You make that your own prayer and you pray it any way you want
to pray it.

Just while we sing this song before we go to communion, you can just bow
your head and say, Jesus, I'm yours. That's good enough. He'll hear that
and he understands.

It's not a formula. You are surrendering your life to the one who died
so you can be forgiven. Keep it real simple and just do that and say,
God, give me now the strength that I need to be healed, to live for you,
to be free, to be a testimony of your goodness on this earth.

We're gonna go to communion right after this song and we're gonna
celebrate the goodness of our God together. God bless you. ♪ I cast my
mind to Calvary ♪ ♪ Where Jesus bled ♪

========================================================================
Video: https://sermonindex2.b-cdn.net/vyn9Z09PuxE.mp4
Source: https://sermonindex.net/speakers/carter-conlon/unusual-answers-to-prayer/
========================================================================