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She abandoned her fruitless job hunt, parked and got out, leaving her elderly mother in the passenger seat with her oxygen tank and a rolled-down window.

"I said, Lord, I'm going up in there because I need all the prayers I can get," she said.

Inside the tidy house with the green shutters, it was like a doctor's office. Brewton filled out a form with her name and phone number.

Then she filled out the Prayer Need section.

That was easy. She needed everything: a job, money and peace with her children, now grown, distant and angry.

"Ever since I was born I had a hard life," she said. "I have child problems, bad relationships, my mother has heart failure, one lung and sugar," referring to diabetes. "I lost my job. I'm like, how am I going to pay the rent? Lord."

She remembered years ago reading in the Bible that God said if she took one step, he would take two.

The house felt welcoming to Brewton. The walls were peach-colored and the couch was soft.

The ministry and healing school is affiliated with the Flowing River Church, a small nondenominational Christian church which is part of the International Apostolic Ministries. The church is a member of the International Association of Healing Rooms in Spokane, Wash.

* * *

At the Healing House, a group of about six prayer ministers guided Brewton to an easy chair in the Glory Room, one of the healing rooms, and surrounded her.

"Can we lay hands on you?" asked Kathleen Peck, director of Healing House and pastor of Flowing River Church along with her husband, Stephen.

"You can touch me, whatever," Brewton said.

Each member of the group took turns touching Brewton on her knee or shoulder and prayed.

"Jesus, you know everything about Harriett," said Irene Mundell, assistant director of Healing House. "You know the bills she has and the finances. We ask that you meet these needs."

Andrew Brooks, 16, said: "You make a way when no way is possible. We ask that you help her through this and fill her with strength so she knows you're there."

When it was over, Brewton's eyes were welling up.

"The Lord is happy you sought his council today," said Peck. "You are going to find favor with him."

"Amen!" said Brewton.

Everyone hugged.

Squinting her eyes against the sun, Brewton opened the door and walked back out to the world that has been so unkind to her, but this time she was smiling.

The church bought the small house next to its sanctuary at 1140 E Turner St. in 1984 for $75,000. For years, the pastors rented it out, but after the last tenants moved out, they decided to turn it into a facility for their expanded healing ministry.

They buffed the hardwood floors and built a cafe off the kitchen.

Since it opened in December, the Healing House, one of over 200 around the world, has prayed for people with ailments ranging from rotator cuff injuries to brain damage. The service is free.

The ministry has about 30 prayer team members, ranging in age from 12 to people in their 70s. The members attend seminars to get training in intercessory prayer.

According to a 2003 Newsweek poll, 72 percent of Americans say they believe that prayer can cure someone - even if science says the person is terminal.

In the Newsweek story, Dr. Lynda H. Powell, an epidemiologist at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, found that people who regularly attend church live longer than people who do not.

And just last week, scientists at Oxford University announced a study to test the power of religious belief to see whether believers are better able to tolerate pain.

Members of Healing House believe healing is part of their ministry and that the Holy Spirit heals through human contact.

"Jesus mandated that we heal people," said Belle Ochs, associate director of the Healing House. "We're not actually doing the healing. It's the Holy Spirit."

Ochs said God does not cause illnesses.

"Sickness began with sin and gave the Devil the authority to give us disease," she said. "What is disease but slow death? Because of what he did, death came in. But life came in through the one man, Jesus Christ."

There are roadblocks to healing, the team said, such as unforgiveness, sinful lifestyle and unbelief.

"People don't realize they have the authority to speak to sickness and make it flee," said Peck. "I'm not saying we are always successful, but we can try."

But they don't believe in faith alone. They believe in medical science and do not advise clients not to seek medical treatment.

"We believe God works with doctors," said Sandy Broadley, 63, who is on the healing team. "A miracle would be that a person doesn't have to go back to the doctor."

Valparaiso University professor and Lutheran minister Christoffer H. Grundmann teaches a course called "Faith and Healing: What Faith-Healing is All About" and cautions that faith healing "is a question of interpretation."

"There is something called spontaneous remission, a phenomenon known to the medical field that (applies) to nearly every disease," he said. "What (doctors) do is say we have to acknowledge this is a kind of miracle. You cannot argue a miracle.

"To feel better, that's so subjective," he said. "What does it mean? Any healing is a success story. They do not report the failures."

One regular attendee of the Healing House, Bernie Lasky, suffered from heart failure three years ago. Doctors at Bay Pines VA Medical Center gave him six months to live.

"I've got everything under the sun except cancer and pregnancy," said Lasky, 78. "I've got arthritis, kidney problems, prostate problems and liver problems."

He discovered the prayer ministry when he went to the church's food pantry one day.

"They kept asking me to go to the Healing Room," he said. "I said no. I'm Jewish."

He told them he used to watch the faith healers on TV, how they hit people on the head who would then jump out of their wheelchairs and run across the stage, cured. The group laughed and said, "Bernie, we don't hit you on the head."

Eventually, he agreed to a healing.

"The first question was, "Do you believe in Jesus?" Lasky said. "I said I believe he existed but that's about it."

Team members prayed over him for two hours.

Lasky said his pain disappeared and he was able to stand for 20 minutes, something he hadn't done in 16 years.

"I was saying thank you, Jesus," Lasky said.

The pain came back after a few days, but gradually, he said his condition improved to the point where he could move about without his scooter. His prostate and kidney problems are a "nonissue" now.

He now goes for weekly healings.

"Those girls have a direct line to God," Lasky said.

Lasky recently celebrated his third anniversary "of still living after being told I have six months."

Grundmann said visits to places that claim to heal through God have risks. One of those is disappointment when it doesn't work.

"They fall into a depression when even God can't heal them," he said.

But Lasky said it's worth the gamble.

"I'll be the first to tell you I don't believe in healing," he said. "But it works."

IF YOU GO

The Clearwater Healing House, 1140 E Turner St., will have open house events from 2 to 5 p.m. Friday and Jan. 28. Admission is free. Call (727) 461-1100.

[Last modified January 15, 2005, 01:12:05]