...“I was 24 and suffering with a problem common to much older people. My work was also affected. At the time I was an auxiliary nurse and bending down and walking, which was part of my daily work, was such a burden. When I walked there would be a pulling sensation and then my knee would lock.”

Stella’s GP recommended acupuncture but after attending two sessions and receiving no relief, she stopped going. For the following 10 months she visited a physiotherapist every week but the pain was still ever present and her other leg started to be affected.

“I remember asking the GP how long I would have to keep taking the medication and going to the physio and she told me, ‘As long as it takes’. I was getting angrier and angrier with God, thinking ‘Why am I suffering like this?’ It was like one pain after the other. I even thought that there was no way I’d live to see past 31 because 3 members of my family had died from similar diseases and I believed the same would happen to me.”

But after seeing an advert in a paper Stella’s belief that she would never be healed was challenged.

“I was reading the Voice in the library and saw an advert calling those who were sick and fed up with their situation to come for a change. I tore it out and kept it but never did anything with it. It wasn’t until someone gave me a City News in the streets that I called up because when I went through the paper at home, I saw similar adverts as the one in the Voice.

“There was an event called Lifted being advertised so I called to book my ticket, but at the same time I was sceptical because I thought to myself, ‘ Everyone has problems’. I thought it was one of those places that offers you so much but ends up giving you nothing.

“I attended the event in the London Arena but I was asking myself, ‘Why are you here?’ ...but after the event I remember feeling good.”

In spite of this Stella did not attend the UCKG until a month later when she went to the branch in Peckham.

“I was very sceptical. Deep down I didn’t believe things could really change, but after my first visit I left with hope. I went on a Sunday and left the meeting feeling better. I also learnt about the healing meeting on Tuesdays.

“The following Tuesday I decided to attend. Just before the prayer I blacked out. When I came around I was getting up from the floor and the pastor asked me, ‘Do you believe you can be healed?’ I said yes and he made a prayer for me.”

For the rest of that week Stella was not worried about taking her tablets. She felt better and hardly felt the need to use her inhalers.

“I was still going to the hospital for regular check-ups, but some months later I noticed that I was no longer using my inhalers. The GP said that I didn’t need to take them anymore but to hold on to the preventative one just in case.”

The pastor advised Stella to attend deliverance prayers on Fridays and she did, but the real change happened in her life when she changed the way she thought.

“During the meetings I learnt for the first time that I had a choice and didn’t have to accept my sickness. God didn’t want me to be sick. It wasn’t His fault I was sick. It hit the nail on the head and made me think because I believed that my illness was a part of my life. But I still made excuses. My perception was that some people are born healthy and some are not. I’d been sick all my life and that was the only way I knew how to be.

“I would come to the services but then stop because I wasn’t totally convinced that things could change. I had the spirit of ‘almost there but never getting there.’ I started a lot of things but never saw them through till the end. I did this when I was younger with coursework, I did this with jobs and now I was doing the same with my Chain of Prayer.

“But I kept hearing that I needed to determine my healing during the meetings. One day I told myself that I should accept that I could be healed and started believing more. My frame of mind changed. I stopped doubting and started believing in my own prayers.

no longer needed even the preventative inhaler and my joints were no longer stiff. A little while later I was given the all clear for asthma and rheumatoid arthritis. I was totally healed and I no longer needed to take tablets.”

It took a total of 9 months for Stella Marie to be fully healed.

“I truly believed I’d be sick for the rest of my life but when I came to the realisation that I could make the Chain of Prayer work for me and stuck to it, that’s when the change really happened.

Today I own my own bookkeeping service. I’m healthy and very happy. I not only got my healing but also a new frame of mind. I learnt how to think big and not settle for less.”

Stella Marie Egbuji,
Peckham

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