A Sharing of The Healing Passages
Revealed to Me in The Wilderness
Bringing... "Victory for God, Health & Country!"
bathing suit with a cold wind factor and eating frozen fruit without a goosebump for 15 minutes at a time! Why? I wanted it to be said that I could stand up against the elements, to take whatever weather was dished out to me, to stand strong, and not to complain! Everyone around me put on the "I'm cold!" mode and complained. I did not go up there to complain. Quite frankly, I was already so miserable with all the aches and pains ongoing from pushing my body and asking it to do the near impossible that I couldn't bear to be miserable about the most omnipresent factor of winter Canada the cold. Along with complaining goes an entire mental and emotional and physiological mode of functioning all day and all night long that just , plain spells "M-I-S-E-R-Y!" I refused to buy into it. Instead, I invited the cold to invigorate me! WOW! I experienced the rush and thrill of feeling thousands of tiny bites all over my body when I would go from my water and fruit breaks out in the wind to my dives into the warm water! What a treat exhiliarting! Words really can do no justice to some of our most glorious experiences! Furthermore, the exhilaration of that cold played a huge part in enlivening, quickening, and exciting my brain cells to open up childhood memory banks so that I could access more youthful modes of thinking, feeling, and moving! This accessing of childhood memory banks is the of a natural by-product of the adrenaline rush provided by the cold! Winter never did get cold enough for me, and it was over all too soon!
During this 4th visit, I also went back to The Spiritual Warfare Scripture to which Jan Franklin had introduced me in 1984, when I first became a Christian. (Scripture Page #6.) One morning, I stood up in "Old Blue" with Ephesians 6 : 11 - 21 in hand and began acting out the putting on of all the weaponry. And I experienced The Word coming to life in my soul like never before (the soul being the mind, the emotions, and the free will)! I likened the donning of the soldier's outfit for the preparation of serving The Lord for the day to the donning of the horse's equipment for the preparation of riding HighJoy for the afternoon. Let me explain. In my condition, when I arrived at The J & N, the few times I rode HighJoy in August, September, and October, I had to be exceedingly careful and methodical when I saddled up. My life depended on it! The horse could get startled out on a mountain trail, the saddle could be loose, and I'd be a goner. Dangerous enough is horseback riding for a fit rider, well prepared. In preparing HighJoy, each piece of equipment has to be checked and double-checked: the saddle blanket, the saddle, the breast collar, the martingale, the cinch, the latigo, the bridle. The feet have to be shod and cleaned. And I have to be very careful crawling up on the stump to get on. Riding HighJoy was a bit scary, too, as I knew he was beyond my present riding skills in my huge condition. It took
together for The Health Seeker. It was Victoria on FIRE, fighting for her life! ( See Scripture Page #5. )How I longed to be given time and resources to write a book entitled: Behold! The Living Temple!
Dearest of Friends Ours is not a deaf and dumb temple of bricks and mortar, into which we can pour any manner of foods and substances! Nor is it an unfeeling, inanimate object of stones and pillars, which can withstand any amount of sedentary living and all manner of abuse! No! It is A Living and Holy Temple a Temple, the God-intended fuel for which was clearly proclaimed for us before our first ancestors were even created! The care of which was proclaimed for us before we were even born! We have been told not to defile The Temple of God. This "defilement" refers, of course, to spiritual defilement, as well as physical. But the fact is that we are made of flesh and blood: our physical bodies are molecular realities: and they are created and maintained both in health and in disease according to God's Laws. We are "Fearfully and Wonderfully Made!" And our Temples function according to physiological laws. The only TRUE health care system must be built upon these laws: Provide The Conditions for Health and Remove The Causes of Disease, and the human body will prosper. These natural, physiological laws are reflected in The Superlative, Alternative Health Care System of Natural Hygiene, which is also based on the precept that Toxemia (defilement) is what we must avoid to keep the tissues and fluids in a state of health.
During MY 4th visit to The Wilderness in November, God turned my "Fitness Sabbatical" into "Spiritual Training Camp." No longer did I drag myself, weak and weary, to the morning workout, casual about arriving somewhere between 8:00 and 8:30. I was aware of having moved into a new dimension, complete with the feeling of being "in training," of having moved from near-invalid status, through a very low level of fitness, into a fair level of fitness. I could even swim the front crawl nonstop for an hour! With 40 pounds off my frame, I walked more like an athlete in training than a fat, aging lady, clearly over the hill. There was a slight bounce in my step! I would arrive at the pool at 7:30 sharp every day and would begin stretching until the pool opened at 8:00 A.M. I had done no stretching the entire time, except mild, in-pool work for 4 months. This first month of stretching was so indescribably painful! But it had to be done flexibility became a priority. And so, I asked God to teach me to interpret this stretching excruciation as healing pleasure!
I could perform this feat only because I had previously asked God to help me learn how to prepare for the Canadian cold an equally challenging task! I learned how to stand out in -13° Celsius in a wet
